GREAT EXPECTATIONS


By Charles Dickens


Chapter 1

My father's family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my 
infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than 
Pip. So, I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.
I give Pirrip as my father's family name, on the authority of his tombstone 
and my sister - Mrs Joe Gargery, who married the blacksmith. As I never saw 
my father or my mother, and never saw any likeness of either of them (for 
their days were long before the days of photographs), my first fancies 
regarding what they were like, were unreasonably derived from their 
tombstones. The shape of the letters on my father's, gave me an odd idea 
that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair. From the 
character and turn of the inscription, 'Also Georgiana Wife of the Above,' 
I drew a childish conclusion that my mother was freckled and sickly. To 
five little stone lozenges, each about a foot and a half long which were 
arranged in a neat row beside their grave, and were sacred to the memory of 
five little brothers of mine - who gave up trying to get a living, 
exceedingly early in that universal struggle - I am indebted for a belief I 
religiously entertained that they had all been born on their backs with 
their hands in their trousers-pockets, and had never taken them out in this 
state of existence.
Ours was the marsh country, down by the river, within, as the river wound, 
twenty miles of the sea. My first most vivid and broad impression of the 
identity of things, seems to me to have been gained on a memorable raw 
afternoon towards evening. At such a time I found out for certain, that 
this bleak place overgrown with nettles was the churchyard; and that Philip 
Pirrip, late of this parish, and also Georgiana wife of the above, were 
dead and buried; and that Alexander, Bartholomew, Abraham, Tobias, and 
Roger, infant children of the aforesaid, were also dead and buried; and 
that the dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with dykes 
and mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes; 
and that the low leaden line beyond, was the river; and that the distant 
savage lair from which the wind was rushing was the sea; and that the small 
bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and beginning to cry, was Pip.
'Hold your noise!' cried a terrible voice, as a man started up from among 
the graves at the side of the church porch. 'Keep still, you little devil, 
or I'll cut your throat!'
A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg. A man with 
no hat, and with broken shoes, and with an old rag tied round his head. A 
man who had been soaked in water, and smothered in mud, and lamed by 
stones, and cut by flints, and stung by nettles, and torn by briars; who 
limped, and shivered, and glared and growled; and whose teeth chattered in 
his head as he seized me by the chin.
'O! Don't cut my throat, sir,' I pleaded in terror. 'Pray don't do it, 
sir.'
'Tell us your name!' said the man. 'Quick'
'Pip, sir.'
'Once more,' said the man, staring at me. 'Give it mouth!'
'Pip. Pip, sir.'
'Show us where you live,' said the man. 'Pint out the place!'
I pointed to where our village lay, on the flat inshore among the alder-
trees and pollards, a mile or more from the church.
The man, after looking at me for a moment, turned me upside down, and 
emptied my pockets. There was nothing in them but a piece of bread. When 
the church came to itself - for he was so sudden and strong that he made it 
go head over heels before me, and I saw the steeple under my feet - when 
the church came to itself, I say, I was seated on a high tombstone, 
trembling, while he ate the bread ravenously.
'You young dog,' said the man, licking his lips, 'what fat cheeks you ha' 
got.'
I believe they were fat, though I was at that time undersized for my years, 
and not strong.
'Darn Me if I couldn't eat em,' said the man, with a threatening shake of 
his head, 'and if I han't half a mind to't!'
I earnestly expressed my hope that he wouldn't, and held tighter to the 
tombstone on which he had put me; partly, to keep myself upon it; partly, 
to keep myself from crying.
'Now look'ee here!' said the man. 'Where's your mother?'
'There, sir!' said I.
He started, made a short run, and stopped and looked over his shoulder.
'There, sir!' I timidly explained. 'Also Georgiana. That's my mother.'
'Oh!' said he, coming back. 'And is that your father alonger your mother?'
'Yes, sir,' said I; 'him too; late of this parish.'
'Ha!' he muttered then, considering. 'Who d'ye live with - supposin' you're 
kindly let to live, which I han't made up my mind about?'
'My sister, sir - Mrs Joe Gargery - wife of Joe Gargery, the blacksmith, 
sir.'
'Blacksmith, eh?' said he. And looked down at his leg.
After darkly looking at his leg and me several times, he came closer to my 
tombstone, took me by both arms, and tilted me back as far as he could hold 
me; so that his eyes looked most powerfully down into mine, and mine looked 
most helplessly up into his.
'Now look'ee here,' he said, 'the question being whether you're to be let 
to live. You know what a file is?'
'Yes, sir.'
'And you know what wittles is?'
'Yes, sir.'
After each question he tilted me over a little more, so as to give me a 
greater sense of helplessness and danger.
'You get me a file.' He tilted me again. 'And you get me wittles.' He 
tilted me again. 'You bring 'em both to me.' He tilted me again. 'Or I'll 
have your heart and liver out.' He tilted me again.
I was dreadfully frightened, and so giddy that I clung to him with both 
hands, and said, 'If you would kindly Please to let me keep upright, sir, 
perhaps I shouldn't be sick, and perhaps I could attend more.'
He gave me a most tremendous dip and roll, so that the church jumped over 
its own weather-cock. Then, he held me by the arms, in an upright position 
on the top of the stone, and went on in these fearful terms -
'You bring me, tomorrow morning early, that file and them wittles. You 
bring the lot to me, at that old Battery over yonder. You do it, and you 
never dare to say a word or dare to make a sign concerning your having seen 
such a person as me, or any person sumever, and you shall be let to live. 
You fail, or you go from my words in any partickler, no matter how small it 
is, and your heart and your liver shall be tore out, roasted and ate. Now, 
I ain't alone, as you may think I am. There's a young man hid with me, in 
comparison with which young man I am a Angel. That young man hears the 
words I speak. That young man has a secret way pecooliar to himself, of 
getting at a boy, and at his heart, and at his liver. It is in wain for a 
boy to attempt to hide himself from that young man. A boy may lock his 
door, may be warm in bed, may tuck himself up, may draw the clothes over 
his head, may think himself comfortable and safe, but that young man will 
softly creep and creep his way to him and tear him open. I am a keeping 
that young man from harming of you at the present moment, with great 
difficulty. I find it wery hard to hold that young man off of your inside. 
Now, what do you say?'
I said that I would get him the file, and I would get him what broken bits 
of food I could, and I would come to him at the Battery early in the 
morning.
'Say Lord strike you dead if you don't!' said the man.
I said so, and he took me down.
'Now,' he pursued, 'you remember what you've undertook, and you remember 
that young man, and you get home!'
'Good-good night, sir,' I faltered.
'Much of that!' said he, glancing about him over the cold wet flat. 'I wish 
I was a frog. Or a eel!'
At the same time, he hugged his shuddering body in both his arms - clasping 
himself, as if to hold himself together - and limped towards the low church 
wall. As I saw him go, picking his way among the nettles, and among the 
brambles that bound the green mounds, he looked in my young eyes as if he 
were eluding the hands of the dead people, stretching up cautiously out of 
their graves, to get a twist upon his ankle and pull him in.
When he came to the low church wall, he got over it, like a man whose legs 
were numbed and stiff, and then turned round to look for me. When I saw him 
turning, I set my face towards home, and made the best use of my legs. But 
presently I looked over my shoulder, and saw him going on again towards the 
river, still hugging himself in both arms, and picking his way with his 
sore feet among the great stones dropped into the marshes here and there 
for stepping-places when the rains were heavy, or the tide was in.
The marshes were just a long black horizontal line then, as I stopped to 
look after him; and the river was just another horizontal line, not nearly 
so broad nor yet so black; and the sky was just a row of long angry red 
lines and dense black lines intermixed. On the edge of the river I could 
faintly make out the only two black things in all the prospect that seemed 
to be standing upright; one of these was the beacon by which the sailors 
steered - like an unhooped cask upon a pole - an ugly thing when you were 
near it; the other a gibbet, with some chains hanging to it which had once 
held a pirate. The man was limping on towards this latter, as if he were 
the pirate come to life, and come down, and going back to hook himself up 
again. It gave me a terrible turn when I thought so; and as I saw the 
cattle lifting their heads to gaze after him, I wondered whether they 
thought so too. I looked all round for the horrible young man, and could 
see no signs of him. But, now I was frightened again, and ran home without 
stopping.


Chapter 2

My sister, Mrs Joe Gargery, was more than twenty years older than I, and 
had established a great reputation with herself and the neighbours because 
she had brought me up 'by hand.' Having at that time to find out for myself 
what the expression meant, and knowing her to have a hard and heavy hand, 
and to be much in the habit of laying it upon her husband as well as upon 
me, I supposed that Joe Gargery and I were both brought up by hand.
She was not a good-looking woman, my sister; and I had a general impression 
that she must have made Joe Gargery marry her by hand. Joe was a fair man, 
with curls of flaxen hair on each side of his smooth face, and with eyes of 
such a very undecided blue that they seemed to have somehow got mixed with 
their own whites. He was a mild, good-natured, sweet-tempered, easy-going, 
foolish, dear fellow - a sort of Hercules in strength, and also in 
weakness.
My sister, Mrs Joe, with black hair and eyes, had such a prevailing redness 
of skin that I sometimes used to wonder whether it was possible she washed 
herself with a nutmeg-grater instead of soap. She was tall and bony, and 
almost always wore a coarse apron, fastened over her figure behind with two 
loops, and having a square impregnable bib in front, that was stuck full of 
pins and needles. She made it a powerful merit in herself, and a strong 
reproach against Joe, that she wore this apron so much. Though I really see 
no reason why she should have worn it at all: or why, if she did wear it at 
all, she should not have taken it off, every day of her life.
Joe's forge adjoined our house, which was a wooden house, as many of the 
dwellings in our country were - most of them, at that time. When I ran home 
from the churchyard, the forge was shut up and Joe was sitting alone in the 
kitchen. Joe and I being fellow-sufferers, and having confidences as such, 
Joe imparted a confidence to me, the moment I raised the latch of the door 
and peeped in at him opposite to it, sitting in the chimney-corner.
'Mrs Joe has been out a dozen times, looking for you, Pip. And she's out 
now, making it a baker's dozen.'
'Is she?'
'Yes, Pip,' said Joe, 'and what's worse, she's got Tickler with her.'
At this dismal intelligence, I twisted the only button on my waistcoat 
round and round, and looked in great depression at the fire. Tickler was a 
wax ended piece of cane, worn smooth by collision with my tickled frame.
'She sot down,' said Joe, 'and she got up, and she made a grab at Tickler, 
and she rampaged out. That's what she did,' said Joe, slowly clearing the 
fire between the lower bars with the poker, and looking at it, 'she 
rampaged out, Pip.'
'Has she been gone long, Joe?' I always treated him as a larger species of 
child, and as no more than my equal.
'Well,' said Joe, glancing up at the Dutch clock, 'she's been on the 
rampage, this last spell, about five minutes, Pip. She's a-coming! Get 
behind the door, old chap, and have the jack-towel betwixt you.'
I took the advice. My sister, Mrs Joe, throwing the door wide open, and 
finding an obstruction behind it, immediately divined the cause, and 
applied Tickler to its further investigation. She concluded by throwing me -
 I often served her as a connubial missile - at Joe, who, glad to get hold 
of me on any terms, passed me on into the chimney, and quietly fenced me up 
there with his great leg.
'Where have you been, you young monkey?' said Mrs Joe, stamping her foot 
'Tell me directly what you've been doing to wear me away with fret and 
fright and worrit, or I'd have you out of that corner if you was fifty 
Pips, and he was five hundred Gargerys.'
'I have only been to the churchyard,' said I, from my stool, crying and 
rubbing myself
'Churchyard!' repeated my sister. If it warn't for me you'd have been to 
the churchyard long ago, and stayed there. Who brought you up by hand?'
'You did,' said I.
'And why did I do it, I should like to know?' exclaimed my sister.
I whimpered, I don't know.'
'I don't!' said my sister. 'I'd never do it again! I know that. I may truly 
say I've never had this apron of mine off, since born you were. It's bad 
enough to be a blacksmith's wife (and him a Gargery) without being your 
mother.'
My thoughts strayed from that question as I looked disconsolately at the 
fire. For, the fugitive out on the marshes with the ironed leg, the 
mysterious young man, the file, the food, and the dreadful pledge I was 
under to commit a larceny on those sheltering premises, rose before me in 
the avenging coals.
'Ha!' said Mrs Joe, restoring Tickler to his station. 'Churchyard, indeed! 
You may well say churchyard, you two.' One of us, by the bye, had not said 
it at all. 'You'll drive me to the churchyard betwixt you, one of these 
days, and oh, a pr-r-recious pair you'd be without me!'
As she applied herself to set the tea-things, Joe peeped down at me over 
his leg, as if he were mentally casting me and himself up, and calculating 
what kind of pair we practically should make, under the grievous 
circumstances foreshadowed. After that, he sat feeling his right-side 
flaxen curls and whiskers, and following Mrs Joe about with his blue eyes, 
as his manner always was at squally times.
My sister had a trenchant way of cutting our bread-and-butter for us, that 
never varied. First, with her left hand, she jammed the loaf hard and fast 
against her bib - where it sometimes got a pin into it, and sometimes a 
needle, which we afterwards got into our mouths. Then, she took some butter 
(not too much) on a knife and spread it on the loaf, in an apothecary kind 
of way, as if she were making a plaister using both sides of the knife with 
a slapping dexterity, and trimming and moulding the butter off round the 
crust. Then, she gave the knife a final smart wipe on the edge of the 
plaister, and then sawed a very thick round off the loaf; which she 
finally, before separating from the loaf, hewed into two halves, of which 
Joe got one, and I the other.
On the present occasion, though I was hungry, I dared not eat my slice. I 
felt I must have something in reserve for my dreadful acquaintance, and his 
ally the still more dreadful young man. I knew Mrs Joe's housekeeping to be 
of the strictest kind, and that my larcenous researches might find nothing 
available in the safe. Therefore I resolved to put my hunk of bread-and-
butter down the leg of my trousers.
The effort of resolution necessary to the achievement of this purpose, I 
found to be quite awful. It was as if I had to make up my mind to leap from 
the top of a high house, or plunge into a great depth of water. And it was 
made the more difficult by the unconscious Joe. In our already-mentioned 
freemasonry as fellow sufferers, and in his good-natured companionship with 
me, it was our evening habit to compare the way we bit through our slices, 
by silently holding them up to each other's admiration now and then - which 
stimulated us to new exertions. Tonight, Joe several times invited me, by 
the display of his fast-diminishing slice, to enter upon our usual friendly 
competition; but he found me, each time, with my yellow mug of tea on one 
knee, and my untouched bread-and-butter on the other. At last, I 
desperately considered that the thing I contemplated must be done, and that 
it had best be done in the least improbable manner consistent with the 
circumstances. I took advantage of a moment when Joe had just looked at me, 
and got my bread-and-butter down my leg.
Joe was evidently made uncomfortable by what he supposed to be my loss of 
appetite, and took a thoughtful bite out of his slice, which he didn't seem 
to enjoy. He turned it about in his mouth much longer than usual, pondering 
over it a good deal, and after all gulped it down like a pill. He was about 
to take another bite, and had just got his head on one side for a good 
purchase on it, when his eye fell on me, and he saw that my bread-and-
butter was gone.
The wonder and consternation with which Joe stopped on the threshold of his 
bite and stared at me were too evident to escape my sister's observation.
'What's the matter now?' said she smartly, as she put down her cup.
'I say, you know!' muttered Joe, shaking his head at me in very serious 
remonstrance. 'Pip, old chap! You'll do yourself a mischief. It'll stick 
somewhere. You can't have chawed it, Pip.'
'What's the matter?' repeated my sister, more sharply than before.
'If you can cough any trifle on it up, Pip, I'd recommend you to do it,' 
said Joe, all aghast. 'Manners is manners, but still your elth's your 
elth.'
By this time, my sister was quite desperate, so she pounced on Joe, and, 
taking him by the two whiskers, knocked his head for a little while against 
the wall behind him: while I sat in the comer, looking guiltily on.
'Now, perhaps you'll mention what's the matter,' said my sister, out of 
breath, 'you staring great stuck pig.'
Joe looked at her in a helpless way; then took a helpless bite, and looked 
at me again.
'You know, Pip,' said Joe solemnly, with his last bite in his cheek, and 
speaking in a confidential voice, as if we two were quite alone, 'you and 
me is always friends, and I'd be the last to tell upon you, any time. But 
such a' - he moved his chair and looked about the floor between us, and 
then again at me - 'such a most oncommon bolt as that!'
'Been bolting his food, has he?' cried my sister.
'You know, old chap,' said Joe, looking at me, and not at Mrs Joe, with his 
bite still in his cheek, 'I Bolted, myself, when I was your age frequent - 
and as a boy I've been among a many Bolters; but I never seen your Bolting 
equal yet, Pip, and it's a mercy you an't Bolted dead.'
My sister made a dive at me, and fished me up by the hair: saying nothing 
more than the awful words, 'You come along and be dosed.'
Some medical beast had revived Tar-water in those days as a fine medicine, 
and Mrs Joe always kept a supply of it in the cupboard; having a belief in 
its virtues correspondent to its nastiness. At the best of times, so much 
of this elixir was administered to me as a choice restorative, that I was 
conscious of going about, smelling like a new fence. On this particular 
evening, the urgency of my case demanded a pint of this mixture, which was 
poured down my throat, for my greater comfort, while Mrs Joe held my head 
under her arm, as a boot would be held in a bootjack. Joe got off with half 
a pint; but was made to swallow that (much to his disturbance, as he sat 
slowly munching and meditating before the fire), 'because he had had a 
turn.' Judging from myself, I should say he certainly had a turn 
afterwards, if he had had none before.
Conscience is a dreadful thing when it accuses man or boy; but when, in the 
case of a boy, that secret burden co-operates with another secret burden 
down the leg of his trousers, it is (as I can testify) a great punishment. 
The guilty knowledge that I was going to rob Mrs Joe - I never thought I 
was going to rob Joe, for I never thought of any of the housekeeping 
property as his - united to the necessity of always keeping one hand on my 
bread-and-butter as I sat, or when I was ordered about the kitchen on any 
small errand, almost drove me out of my mind. Then, as the marsh winds made 
the fire glow and flare, I thought I heard the voice outside, of the man 
with the iron on his leg who had sworn me to secrecy, declaring that he 
couldn't and wouldn't starve until tomorrow, but must be fed now. At other 
times, I thought, What if the young man who was with so much difficulty 
restrained from imbruing his hands in me, should yield to a constitutional 
impatience, or should mistake the time, and should think himself accredited 
to my heart and liver tonight, instead of tomorrow! If ever anybody's hair 
stood on end in terror, mine must have done so then. But, perhaps, nobody's 
ever did!
It was Christmas Eve, and I had to stir the pudding for next day, with a 
copper-stick, from seven to eight by the Dutch clock. I tried it with the 
load upon my leg (and that made me think afresh of the man with the load on 
his leg), and found the tendency of exercise to bring the bread-and-butter 
out at my ankle, quite unmanageable. Happily I slipped away, and deposited 
that part of my conscience in my garret bedroom.
'Hark!' said I, when I had done my stirring, and was taking a final warm in 
the chimney-corner before being sent up to bed; 'was that great guns, Joe?'
'Ah!' said Joe. 'There's another conwict off.'
'What does that mean, Joe?' said I.
Mrs Joe, who always took explanations upon herself, said snappishly. 
'Escaped. Escaped.' Administering the definition like Tar-water.
While Mrs Joe sat with her head bending over her needlework, I put my mouth 
into the forms of saying to Joe, 'What's a convict? 'Joe put his mouth into 
the forms of returning such a highly elaborate answer, that I could make 
out nothing of it but the single word, 'Pip.'
'There was a conwict off last night,' said Joe, aloud, 'after sunset-gun. 
And they fired warning of him. And now it appears they're firing warning of 
another.'
'Who's firing?' said I.
'Drat that boy,' interposed my sister, frowning at me over her work, 'what 
a questioner he is. Ask no questions, and you'll be told no lies.'
It was not very polite to herself, I thought, to imply that I should be 
told lies by her, even if I did ask questions. But she never was polite, 
unless there was company.
At this point, Joe greatly augmented my curiosity by taking the utmost 
pains to open his mouth very wide, and to put it into the form of a word 
that looked to me like 'sulks.' There, I naturally pointed to Mrs Joe, and 
put my mouth into the form of saying 'her?' But Joe wouldn't hear of that 
at all, and again opened his mouth very wide, and shook the form of a most 
emphatic word out of it But I could make nothing of the word.
'Mrs Joe,' said I, as a last resort, 'I should like to know - if you 
wouldn't much mind - where the firing comes from?'
'Lord bless the boy!' exclaimed my sister, as if she didn't quite mean 
that, but rather the contrary. 'From the Hulks!'
'Oh-h!' said I, looking at Joe. 'Hulks!'
Joe gave a reproachful cough, as much as to say, 'Well, I told you so.'
'And please what's Hulks?' said I.
'That's the way with this boy!' exclaimed my sister, pointing me out with 
her needle and thread, and shaking her head at me. 'Answer him one 
question, and he'll ask you a dozen directly. Hulks are prison-ships, right 
'cross th' meshes.' We always used that name for marshes in our country.
'I wonder who's put into prison-ships, and why they're put there?' said I, 
in a general way, and with quiet desperation.
It was too much for Mrs Joe, who immediately rose. 'I tell you what, young 
fellow,' said she, 'I didn't bring you up by hand to badger people's lives 
out. It would be blame to me, and not praise, if I had. People are put in 
the Hulks because they do murder, and because they rob, and forge, and do 
all sorts of bad; and they always begin by asking questions. Now, you get 
along to bed!'
I was never allowed a candle to light me to bed, and, as I went upstairs in 
the dark, with my head tingling - from Mrs Joe's thimble having played the 
tambourine upon it, to accompany her last words - I felt fearfully sensible 
of the great convenience that the Hulks were handy for me. I was clearly on 
my way there. I had begun by asking questions, and I was going to rob Mrs 
Joe.
Since that time, which is far enough away now, I have often thought that 
few people know what secrecy there is in the young, under terror. No matter 
how unreasonable the terror, so that it be terror. I was in mortal terror 
of the young man who wanted my heart and liver; I was in mortal terror of 
my interlocutor with the ironed leg; I was in mortal terror of myself, from 
whom an awful promise had been extracted; I had no hope of deliverance 
through my all-powerful sister, who repulsed me at every turn; I am afraid 
to think of what I might have done, on requirement, in the secrecy of my 
terror.
If I slept at all that night, it was only to imagine myself drifting down 
the river on a strong spring-tide, to the Hulks; a ghostly pirate calling 
out to me through a speaking trumpet, as I passed the gibbet-station, that 
I had better come ashore and be hanged there at once, and not put it off. I 
was afraid to sleep, even if I had been inclined, for I knew that at the 
first faint dawn of morning I must rob the pantry. There was no doing it in 
the night, for there was no getting a light by easy friction then; to have 
got one, I must have struck it out of flint and steel, and have made a 
noise like the very pirate himself rattling his chains.
As soon as the great black velvet pall outside my little window was shot 
with grey, I got up and went downstairs; every board upon the way, and 
every crack in every board, calling after me, 'Stop, thief!' and 'Get up, 
Mrs Joe!' In the pantry, which was far more abundantly supplied than usual, 
owing to the season, I was very much alarmed by a hare hanging up by the 
heels, whom I rather thought I caught, when my back was half turned, 
winking. I had no time for verification, no time for selection, no time for 
anything, for I had no time to spare. I stole some bread, some rind of 
cheese, about half a jar of mincemeat (which I tied up in my pocket-
handkerchief with my last night's slice), some brandy from a stone bottle 
(which I decanted into a glass bottle I had secretly used for making that 
intoxicating fluid, Spanish-liquorice-water, up in my room: diluting the 
stone bottle from a jug in the kitchen cupboard), a meat bone with very 
little on it, and a beautiful round compact pork pie. I was nearly going 
away without the pie, but I was tempted to mount upon a shelf, to look what 
it was that was put away so carefully in a covered earthenware dish in a 
corner, and I found it was the pie, and I took it, in the hope that it was 
not intended for early use, and would not be missed for some time.
There was a door in the kitchen, communicating with the forge; I unlocked 
and unbolted that door, and got a file from among Joe's tools. Then I put 
the fastenings as I had found them, opened the door at which I had entered 
when I ran home last night, shut it, and ran for the misty marshes.


Chapter 3

It was a rimy morning, and very damp. I had seen the damp lying on the 
outside of my little window, as if some goblin had been crying there all 
night, and using the window for a pocket-handkerchief. Now, I saw the damp 
lying on the bare hedges and spare grass, like a coarser sort of spiders' 
webs; hanging itself from twig to twig and blade to blade. On every rail 
and gate, wet lay clammy; and the marsh-mist was so thick, that the wooden 
finger on the post directing people to our village - a direction which they 
never accepted, for they never came there - was invisible to me until I was 
quite close under it. Then, as I looked up at it, while it dripped, it 
seemed to my oppressed conscience like a phantom devoting me to the Hulks.
The mist was heavier yet when I got out upon the marshes, so that instead 
of my running at everything, everything seemed to run at me. This was very 
disagreeable to a guilty mind. The gates and dykes and banks came bursting 
at me through the mist, as if they cried as plainly as could be, 'A boy 
with Somebody-else's pork pie! Stop him!' The cattle came upon me with like 
suddenness, staring out of their eyes and steaming out of their nostrils, 
'Hollo, young thief!' One black ox, with a white cravat on - who even had 
to my awakened conscience something of a clerical air - fixed me so 
obstinately with his eyes, and moved his blunt head round in such an 
accusatory manner as I moved round, that I blubbered out to him, 'I 
couldn't help it, sir! It wasn't for myself I took it!' Upon which, he put 
down his head, blew a cloud of smoke out of his nose, and vanished with a 
kick-up of his hind legs and a flourish of his tail.
All this time, I was getting on towards the river; but however fast I went, 
I couldn't warm my feet, to which the damp cold seemed riveted, as the iron 
was riveted to the leg of the man I was running to meet. I knew my way down 
to the Battery, pretty straight, for I had been down there on a Sunday with 
Joe, and Joe, sitting on an old gun, had told me that when I was 'prentice 
to him regularly bound, we would have such Larks there! However, in the 
confusion of the mist, I found myself at last too far to the right, and 
consequently had to try back along the riverside, on the banks of loose 
stones above the mud and the stakes that staked the tide out. Making my way 
along here with all despatch, I had just crossed a ditch, which I knew to 
be very near the Battery, and had just scrambled up the mound beyond the 
ditch, when I saw a man sitting before me. His back was towards me, and he 
had his arms folded, and was nodding forward, heavy with sleep.
I thought he would be more glad if I came upon him with his breakfast, in 
that unexpected manner, so I went forward softly and touched him on the 
shoulder. He instantly jumped up, and it was not the same man, but another 
man!
And yet this man was dressed in coarse grey, too, and had a great iron on 
his leg, and was lame, and hoarse, and cold, and was everything that the 
other man was; except that he had not the same face, and had a flat, broad-
brimmed, low-crowned, felt hat on. All this I saw in a moment, for I had 
only a moment to see it in: he swore an oath at me, made a hit at me - it 
was a round, weak blow that missed me and almost knocked himself down, for 
it made him stumble - and then he ran into the mist, stumbling twice as he 
went, and I lost him.
'It's the young man!' I thought, feeling my heart shoot as I identified 
him. I daresay I should have felt a pain in my liver, too, if I had known 
where it was.
I was soon at the Battery after that, and there was the right man hugging 
himself and limping to and fro, as if he had never all night left off 
hugging and limping - waiting for me. He was awfully cold, to be sure. I 
half expected to see him drop down before my face and die of deadly cold. 
His eyes looked so awfully hungry, too, that when I handed him the file and 
he laid it down on the grass, it occurred to me he would have tried to eat 
it, if he had not seen my bundle. He did not turn me upside down, this 
time, to get at what I had, but left me right side upwards while I opened 
the bundle and emptied my pockets.
'What's in the bottle, boy?' said he.
'Brandy,' said I.
He was already handing mincemeat down his throat in the most curious manner 
- more like a man who was putting it away somewhere in a violent hurry, 
than a man who was eating it - but he left off to take some of the liquor. 
He shivered all the while, so violently, that it was quite as much as he 
could do to keep the neck of the bottle between his teeth, without biting 
it off.
'I think you have got the ague,' said I.
'I'm much of your opinion, boy,' said he.
'It's bad about here,' I told him. 'You've been lying out on the meshes, 
and they're dreadful aguish. Rheumatic, too.'
'I'll eat my breakfast afore they're the death of me,' said he. 'I'd do 
that, if I was going to be strung up to that there gallows as there is over 
there, directly arterwards. I'll beat the shivers so far, I'll bet you.'
He was gobbling mincemeat, meat-bone, bread, cheese, and pork pie, all at 
once: staring distrustfully while he did so at the mist all round us, and 
often stopping - even stopping his jaws - to listen. Some real or fancied 
sound, some clink upon the river or breathing of beast upon the marsh, now 
gave him a start, and he said, suddenly
'You're not a deceiving imp? You brought no one with you?'
'No, sir! No!'
'Nor giv' no one the office to follow you?'
'No!'
'Well,' said he, 'I believe you. You'd be but a fierce young hound indeed, 
if at your time of life you could help to hunt a wretched warmint, hunted 
as near death and dunghill as this poor wretched warmint is!'
Something clicked in his throat, as if he had works in him like a clock, 
and was going to strike. And he smeared his ragged rough sleeve over his 
eyes.
Pitying his desolation, and watching him as he gradually settled down upon 
the pie, I made bold to say, 'I am glad you enjoy it.'
'Did you speak?'
'I said I was glad you enjoyed it'
'Thankee, my boy. I do.'
I had often watched a large dog of ours eating his food; and I now noticed 
a decided similarity between the dog's way of eating and the man's. The man 
took strong, sharp, sudden bites, just like the dog. He swallowed, or 
rather snapped up, every mouthful, too soon and too fast; and he looked 
sideways here and there while he ate, as if he thought there was danger in 
every direction of somebody's coming to take the pie away. He was 
altogether too unsettled in his mind over it, to appreciate it comfortably, 
I thought, or to have anybody to dine with him, without making a chop with 
his jaws at the visitor. In all of which particulars he was very like the 
dog.
'I am afraid you won't leave any of it for him,' said I timidly, after a 
silence, during which I had hesitated as to the politeness of making the 
remark. 'There's no more to be got where that came from.' It was the 
certainty of this fact that impelled me to offer the hint.
'Leave any for him? Who's him?' said my friend, stopping in his crunching 
of pie-crust
'The young man. That you spoke of That was hid with you.'
'Oh, ah!' he returned, with something like a gruff laugh. 'Him? Yes, yes! 
He don't want no wittles.'
'I thought he looked as if he did,' said I.
The man stopped eating, and regarded me with the keenest scrutiny, and the 
greatest surprise.
'Looked? When?'
'Just now.'
'Where?'
'Yonder,' said I, pointing; 'over there, where I found him nodding asleep, 
and thought it was you.'
He held me by the collar and stared at me so, that I began to think his 
first idea about cutting my throat had revived.
'Dressed like you, you know, only with a hat,' I explained, trembling; 'and 
- and' - I was very anxious to put this delicately - 'and with - the same 
reason for wanting to borrow a file. Didn't you hear the cannon last 
night?'
'Then, there was firing!' he said to himself.
'I wonder you shouldn't have been sure of that,' I returned, 'for we heard 
it up at home, and that's farther away, and we were shut in besides.'
'Why, see now!' said he. 'When a man's alone on these flats, with a light 
head and a light stomach, perishing of cold and want, he hears nothin' all 
night, but guns firing, and voices calling. Hears? He sees the soldiers, 
with their red coats lighted up by the torches carried afore, closing in 
round him. Hears his number called, hears himself challenged, hears the 
rattle of the muskets, hears the orders, "Make ready' Present! Cover him 
steady, men!" and is laid hands on - and there's nothin'! Why, if I see one 
pursuing party last night - coming up in order, Damn 'em, with their tramp, 
tramp - I see a hundred. And as to firing! Why, I see the mist shake with 
the cannon, arter it was broad day. - But this man;' he had said all the 
rest, as if he had forgotten my being there; 'did you notice anything in 
him?'
'He had a badly bruised face,' said I, recalling what I hardly knew I knew.
'Not here?' exclaimed the man, striking his left cheek mercilessly, with 
the flat of his hand.
'Yes, there!'
'Where is he?' He crammed what little food was left into the breast of his 
gray jacket. 'Show me the way he went. I'll pull him down, like a 
bloodhound. Curse this iron on my sore leg! Give us hold of the file, boy.'
I indicated in what direction the mist had shrouded the other man, and he 
looked up at it for an instant But he was down on the rank wet grass, 
filing at his iron, like a madman, and not minding me or minding his own 
leg, which had an old chafe upon it, and was bloody, but which he handled 
as roughly as if it had no more feeling in it than the file. I was very 
much afraid of him again, now that he had worked himself into this fierce 
hurry, and I was likewise very much afraid of keeping away from home any 
longer. I told him I must go, but he took no notice, so I thought the best 
thing I could do was to slip off. The last I saw of him, his head was bent 
over his knee and he was working hard at his fetter, muttering impatient 
imprecations at it and at his leg. The last I heard of him, I stopped in 
the mist to listen, and the file was still going.


Chapter 4

I fully expected to find a Constable in the kitchen, waiting to take me up. 
But not only was there no Constable there, but no discovery had yet been 
made of the robbery. Mrs Joe was prodigiously busy in getting the house 
ready for the festivities of the day, and Joe had been put upon the kitchen 
doorstep to keep him out of the dustpan - an article into which his destiny 
always led him sooner or later, when my sister was vigorously reaping the 
floors of her establishment
'And where the deuce ha'you been?' was Mrs Joe's Christmas salutation, when 
I and my conscience showed ourselves.
I said I had been down to hear the Carols. 'Ah! well!' observed Mrs Joe. 
'You might ha' done worse.' Not a doubt of that, I thought.
'Perhaps if I warn't a blacksmith's wife, and (what's the same thing) a 
slave with her apron never off, I should have been to hear the Carols,' 
said Mrs Joe. 'I'm rather partial to Carols, myself, and that's the best of 
reasons for my never hearing any.'
Joe, who had ventured into the kitchen after me as the dustpan had retired 
before us, drew the back of his hand across his nose with a conciliatory 
air when Mrs Joe darted a look at him, and, when her eyes were withdrawn, 
secretly crossed his two forefingers, and exhibited them to me, as our 
token that Mrs Joe was in a cross temper. This was so much her normal 
state, that Joe and I would often, for weeks together, be, as to our 
fingers, like monumental Crusaders as to their legs.
We were to have a superb dinner, consisting of a leg of pickled pork and 
greens, and a pair of roast stuffed fowls. A handsome mince-pie had been 
made yesterday morning (which accounted for the mincemeat not being 
missed), and the pudding was already on the boil. These extensive 
arrangements occasioned us to be cut off unceremoniously in respect of 
breakfast; 'for I an't,' said Mrs Joe, 'I an't a-going to have no formal 
cramming and bursting and washing up now, with what I've got before me, I 
promise you!'
So, we had our slices served out, as if we were two thousand troops on a 
forced march instead of a man and boy at home; and we took gulps of milk 
and water, with apologetic countenances, from a jug on the dresser. In the 
meantime, Mrs Joe put clean white curtains up, and tacked a new flowered 
flounce across the wide chimney to replace the old one, and uncovered the 
little state parlour across the passage, which was never uncovered at any 
other time, but passed the rest of the year in a cool haze of silver paper, 
which even extended to the four little white crockery poodles on the 
mantelshelf, each with a black nose and a basket of flowers in his mouth, 
and each the counterpart of the other. Mrs Joe was a very clean 
housekeeper, but had an exquisite art of making her cleanliness more 
uncomfortable and unacceptable than dirt itself. Cleanliness is next to 
Godliness, and some people do the same by their religion.
My sister having so much to do, was going to church vicariously; that is to 
say, Joe and I were going. In his working clothes, Joe was a well-knit, 
characteristic-looking blacksmith; in his holiday clothes, he was more like 
a scarecrow in good circumstances, than anything else. Nothing that he wore 
then, fitted him or seemed to belong to him; and everything that he wore 
then grazed him. On the present festive occasion he emerged from his room, 
when the blithe bells were going, the picture of misery, in a full suit of 
Sunday penitentials. As to me, I think my sister must have had some general 
idea that I was a young offender whom an Accoucheur Policeman had taken up 
(on my birthday) and delivered over to her, to be dealt with according to 
the outraged majesty of the law. I was always treated as if I had insisted 
on being born, in opposition to the dictates of reason, religion, and 
morality, and against the dissuading arguments of my best friends. Even 
when I was taken to have a new suit of clothes, the tailor had orders to 
make them like a kind of Reformatory, and on no account to let me have the 
free use of my limbs.
Joe and I going to church, therefore, must have been a moving spectacle for 
compassionate minds. Yet, what I suffered outside, was nothing to what I 
underwent within. The terrors that had assailed me whenever Mrs Joe had 
gone near the pantry, or out of the room, were only to be equalled by the 
remorse with which my mind dwelt on what my hands had done. Under the 
weight of my wicked secret, I pondered whether the Church would be powerful 
enough to shield me from the vengeance of the terrible young man, if I 
divulged to that establishment I conceived the idea that the time when the 
banns were read and when the clergyman said 'Ye are now to declare it!' 
would be the time for me to rise and propose a private conference in the 
vestry. I am far from being sure that I might not have astonished our small 
congregation by resorting to this extreme measure, but for its being 
Christmas Day and no Sunday.
Mr Wopsle, the clerk at church, was to dine with us; and Mr Hubble, the 
wheelwright, and Mrs Hubble; and Uncle Pumblechook (Joe's uncle, but Mrs 
Joe appropriated him), who was a well-to-do corn-chandler in the nearest 
town, and drove his own chaise-cart The dinner hour was half-past one. When 
Joe and I got home, we found the table laid, and Mrs Joe dressed, and the 
dinner dressing, and the front door unlocked (it never was, at any other 
time) for the company to enter by, and everything most splendid. And still, 
not a word of the robbery.
The time came, without bringing with it any relief to my feelings, and the 
company came. Mr Wopsle, united to a Roman nose and a large, shining, bald 
forehead, had a deep voice which he was uncommonly proud of; indeed it was 
understood among his acquaintance that if you could only give him his head, 
he would read the clergyman into fits; he himself confessed that if the 
Church was 'thrown open,' meaning to competition, he would not despair of 
making his mark in it The Church not being 'thrown open,' he was, as I have 
said, our clerk. But he punished the Amens tremendously and when he gave 
out the psalm - always giving the whole verse - he looked all round the 
congregation first, as much as to say, 'You have heard my friend overhead; 
oblige me with your opinion of this style!'
I opened the door to the company - making believe that it was a habit of 
ours to open that door - and I opened it first to Mr Wopsle, next to Mr and 
Mrs Hubble, and last of all to Uncle Pumblechook. N.B., I was not allowed 
to call him uncle, under the severest penalties.
'Mrs Joe,' said Uncle Pumblechook: a large hard-breathing, middle-aged, 
slow man, with a mouth like a fish, dull staring eyes, and sandy hair 
standing upright on his head, so that he looked as if he had just been all 
but choked, and had that moment come to; 'I have brought you, as the 
compliments of the season - I have brought you, Mum, a bottle of sherry 
wine - and I have brought you, Mum, a bottle of port wine.'
Every Christmas Day he presented himself, as a profound novelty, with 
exactly the same words, and carrying the two bottles like dumbbells. Every 
Christmas Day, Mrs Joe replied, as she now replied, 'Oh, Un - cle Pum - ble 
- chook! This is kind!' Every Christmas Day, he retorted, as he now 
retorted, 'It's no more than your merits. And now are you all bobbish, and 
how's Sixpennorth of halfpence?' meaning me.
We dined on these occasions in the kitchen, and adjourned, for the nuts and 
oranges and apples, to the parlour; which was a change very like Joe's 
change from his working clothes to his Sunday dress. My sister was 
uncommonly lively on the present occasion, and indeed was generally more 
gracious in the society of Mrs Hubble than in any other company. I remember 
Mrs Hubble as a little, curly, sharp-edged person in sky-blue, who held a 
conventionally juvenile position, because she had married Mr Hubble - I 
don't know at what remote period - when she was much younger than he. I 
remember Mr Hubble as a tough, high-shouldered, stooping old man, of a saw-
dusty fragrance, with his legs extraordinarily wide apart so that in my 
short days I always saw some miles of open country between them when I met 
him coming up the lane.
Among this good company I should have felt myself, even if I hadn't robbed 
the pantry, in a false position. Not because I was squeezed in at an acute 
angle of the tablecloth, with the table in my chest, and the Pumblechookian 
elbow in my eye, nor because I was not allowed to speak (I didn't want to 
speak), nor because I was regaled with the scaly tips of the drumsticks of 
the fowls, and with those obscure corners of pork of which the pig, when 
living, had had the least reason to be vain. No; I should not have minded 
that, if they would only have left me alone. But they wouldn't leave me 
alone. They seemed to think the opportunity lost, if they failed to point 
the conversation at me, every now and then, and stick the point into me. I 
might have been an unfortunate little bull in a Spanish arena, I got so 
smartingly touched up by these moral goads.
It began the moment we sat down to dinner. Mr Wopsle said grace with 
theatrical declamation - as it now appears to me, something like a 
religious cross of the Ghost in 'Hamlet' with 'Richard the Third' - and 
ended with the proper aspiration that we might be truly grateful. Upon 
which my sister fixed me with her eye, and said, in a low, reproachful 
voice, 'Do you hear that? Be grateful.'
'Especially,' said Mr Pumblechook, 'be grateful, boy, to them which brought 
you up by hand.'
Mrs Hubble shook her head, and contemplating me with a mournful 
presentiment that I should come to no good, asked, Why is it that the young 
are never grateful?' This moral mystery seemed too much for the company 
until Mr Hubble tersely solved it by saying, 'Naterally wicious.' Everybody 
then murmured, 'True!' and looked at me in a particularly unpleasant and 
personal manner.
Joe's station and influence were something feebler (if possible), when 
there was company, than when there was none. But he always aided and 
comforted me when he could, in some way of his own, and he always did so at 
dinner-time by giving me gravy, if there were any. There being plenty of 
gravy today, Joe spooned into my plate, at this point, about half a pint
A little later on in the dinner, Mr Wopsle reviewed the sermon with some 
severity, and intimated - in the usual hypothetical case of the Church 
being 'thrown open' - what kind of sermon he would have given them. After 
favouring them with some heads of that discourse, he remarked that he 
considered the subject of the day's homily ill-chosen; which was the less 
excusable, he added, when there were so many subjects 'going about.'
'True again,' said Uncle Pumblechook. 'You've hit it, sir! Plenty of 
subjects going about, for them that know how to put salt upon their tails. 
That's what's wanted. A man needn't go far to find a subject, if he's ready 
with his salt-box.' Mr Pumblechook added, after a short interval of 
reflection, 'Look at Pork alone. There's a subject! If you want a subject, 
look at Pork!'
'True, sir. Many a moral for the young,' returned Mr Wopsle; and I knew he 
was going to lug me in, before he said it; 'might be deduced from that 
text.'
('You listen to this,' said my sister to me, in a severe parenthesis.)
Joe gave me some more gravy.
'Swine,' pursued Mr Wopsle, in his deepest voice, and pointing his fork at 
my blushes, as if he were mentioning my Christian name; 'Swine were the 
companions of the prodigal. The gluttony of Swine is put before us, as an 
example to the young.' (I thought this pretty well in him who had been 
praising up the pork for being so plump and juicy.) 'What is detestable in 
a pig, is more detestable in a boy.'
'Or girl,' suggested Mr Hubble.
'Of course, or girl, Mr Hubble,' assented Mr Wopsle, rather irritably, 'but 
there is no girl present.'
'Besides,' said Mr Pumblechook, turning sharp on me, 'think what you've got 
to be grateful for. If you'd been born a Squeaker - '
'He was, if ever a child was,' said my sister most emphatically.
Joe gave me some more gravy.
'Well, but I mean a four-footed Squeaker,' said Mr Pumblechook. 'If you had 
been born such, would you have been here now. Not you - '
'Unless in that form,' said Mr Wopsle, nodding towards the dish.
'But I don't mean in that form, sir,' returned Mr Pumblechook, who had an 
objection to being interrupted; 'I mean, enjoying himself with his elders 
and betters, and improving himself with their conversation, and rolling in 
the lap of luxury. Would he have been doing that? No, he wouldn't. And what 
would have been your destination?' turning on me again. 'You would have 
been disposed of for so many shillings, according to the market price of 
the article, and Dunstable the butcher would have come up to you as you lay 
in your straw, and he would have whipped you under his left arm, and with 
his right he would have tucked up his frock to get a penknife from out of 
his waistcoat-pocket, and he would have shed your blood and had your life. 
No bringing up by hand then. Not a bit of it! '
Joe offered me more gravy, which I was afraid to take.
'He was a world of trouble to you, ma'am,' said Mrs Hubble, commiserating 
my sister.
'Trouble?' echoes my sister; 'trouble?' And then entered on a fearful 
catalogue of all the illnesses I had been guilty of, and all the acts of 
sleeplessness I had committed, and all the high places I had tumbled from, 
and all the low places I had tumbled into, and all the injuries I had done 
myself, and all the times she had wished me in my grave, and I had 
contumaciously refused to go there.
I think the Romans must have aggravated one another very much with their 
noses. Perhaps, they became the restless people they were, in consequence. 
Anyhow, Mr Wopsle's Roman nose so aggravated me during the recital of my 
misdemeanours, that I should have liked to pull it until he howled. But, 
all I had endured up to this time, was nothing in comparison with the awful 
feelings that took possession of me when the pause was broken which ensued 
upon my sister's recital, and in which pause everybody had looked at me (as 
I felt painfully conscious) with indignation and abhorrence.
'Yet,' said Mr Pumblechook, leading the company gently back to the theme 
from which they had strayed, 'Pork - regarded as biled - is rich, too; 
ain't it?'
'Have a little brandy, uncle,' said my sister.
O Heavens, it had come at last! He would find it was weak, he would say it 
was weak, and I was lost! I held tight to the leg of the table under the 
cloth, with both hands, and awaited my fate.
My sister went for the stone bottle, came back with the stone bottle, and 
poured his brandy out no one else taking any. The wretched man trifled with 
his glass - took it up, looked at it through the light, put it down - 
prolonged my misery. All this time, Mrs Joe and Joe were briskly clearing 
the table for the pie and pudding.
I couldn't keep my eyes off him. Always holding tight by the leg of the 
table with my hands and feet, I saw the miserable creature finger his glass 
playfully, take it up, smile, throw his head back, and drink the brandy 
off. Instantly afterwards, the company were seized with unspeakable 
consternation, owing to his springing to his feet, turning round several 
times in an appalling spasmodic whooping-cough dance, and rushing out at 
the door; he then became visible through the window, violently plunging and 
expectorating, making the most hideous faces, and apparently out of his 
mind.
I held on tight, while Mrs Joe and Joe ran to him. I didn't know how I had 
done it, but I had no doubt I had murdered him somehow. In my dreadful 
situation, it was a relief when he was brought back, and, surveying the 
company all round as if they had disagreed with him, sank down into his 
chair with the one significant gasp, 'Tar!'
I had filled up the bottle from the tar-water jug. I knew he would be worse 
by and by. I moved the table, like a Medium of the present day, by the 
vigour of my unseen hold upon it.
'Tar!' cried my sister in amazement. 'Why, however could Tar come there?'
But, Uncle Pumblechook, who was omnipotent in that kitchen, wouldn't hear 
the word, wouldn't hear the subject, imperiously waved it all away with his 
hand, and asked for hot gin-and-water. My sister, who had begun to be 
alarmingly meditative, had to employ herself actively in getting the gin, 
the hot water, the sugar, and the lemon-peel, and mixing them. For the time 
being at least, I was saved. I still held on to the leg of the table, but 
clutched it now with the fervour of gratitude.
By degrees, I became calm enough to release my grasp and partake of 
pudding. Mr Pumblechook partook of pudding. All partook of pudding. The 
course terminated, and Mr Pumblechook had begun to beam under the genial 
influence of gin-and-water.
I began to think I should get over the day, when my sister said to Joe, 
'Clean plates - cold.'
I clutched the leg of the table again immediately, and pressed it to my 
bosom as if it had been the companion of my youth and friend of my soul. I 
foresaw what was coming, and I felt that this time I really was gone.
'You must taste,' said my sister, addressing the guests with her best 
grace, 'you must taste, to finish with, such a delightful and delicious 
present of Uncle Pumblechook's!'
Must they! Let them not hope to taste it!
'You must know,' said my sister, rising, 'it's a pie; a savoury pork pie.'
The company murmured their compliments. Uncle Pumblechook, sensible of 
having deserved well of his fellow-creatures, said quite vivaciously, all 
things considered, 'Well, Mrs Joe, we'll do our best endeavours; let us 
have a cut at this same pie.'
My sister went out to get it. I heard her steps proceed to the pantry. I 
saw Mr Pumblechook balance his knife. I saw reawakening appetite in the 
Roman nostrils of Mr Wopsle. I heard Mr Hubble remarked that 'a bit of 
savoury pork pie would lay atop of anything you could mention, and do no 
harm,' and I heard Joe say, 'You shall have some, Pip.' I have never been 
absolutely certain whether I uttered a shrill yell of terror, merely in 
spirit, or in the bodily hearing of the company. I felt that I could bear 
no more, and that I must run away. I released the leg of the table, and ran 
for my life.
But, I ran no farther than the house door, for there I ran head foremost 
into a party of soldiers with their muskets; one of whom had out a pair of 
handcuffs to me saying, 'Here you are, look sharp, come on!'


Chapter 5

The apparition of a file of soldiers ringing down the butt-ends of their 
loaded muskets on our doorstep, caused the dinner-party to rise from table 
in confusion, and caused Mrs Joe, re-entering the kitchen empty-handed, to 
stop short and stare, in her wondering lament of 'Gracious goodness 
gracious me, what's gone - with the - pie!'
The sergeant and I were in the kitchen when Mrs Joe stood staring; at which 
crisis I partially recovered the use of my senses. It was the sergeant who 
had spoken to me, and he was now looking round at the company, with his 
handcuffs invitingly extended towards them in his right hand, and his left 
on my shoulder.
'Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen,' said the sergeant, 'but as I have 
mentioned at the door to this smart young shaver (which he hadn't), 'I am 
on a chase in the name of the King, and I want the blacksmith.'
'And pray what might you want with him?' retorted my sister, quick to 
resent his being wanted at all.
'Missis,' returned the gallant sergeant, 'speaking for myself, I should 
reply, the honour and pleasure of his fine wife's acquaintance; speaking 
for the King, I answer, a little job done.'
This was received as rather neat in the sergeant; insomuch that Mr 
Pumblechook cried audibly, 'Good again!'
'You see, blacksmith,' said the sergeant, who had by this time picked out 
Joe with his eye, 'we have had an accident with these, and I find the lock 
of one of 'em goes wrong, and the coupling don't act pretty. As they are 
wanted for immediate service, will you throw your eye over them?'
Joe drew his eye over them, and pronounced that the job would necessitate 
the lighting of his forge fire, and would take nearer two hours than one. 
'Will it? Then will you set about it at once, blacksmith,' said the offhand 
sergeant, 'as it's on His Majesty's service. And if my men can bear a hand 
anywhere, they'll make themselves useful.' With that, he called to his men, 
who came trooping into the kitchen one after another, and piled their arms 
in a corner. And then they stood about, as soldiers do; now, with their 
hands loosely before them; now, resting a knee or a shoulder; now, easing a 
belt or a pouch; now, opening the door to spit stiffly over their high 
stocks, out into the yard.
All these things I saw without then knowing that I saw them, for I was in 
an agony of apprehension. But, beginning to perceive that the handcuffs 
were not for me, and that the military had so far got the better of the pie 
as to put it in the background, I collected a little more of my scattered 
wits.
'Would you give me the Time?' said the sergeant, addressing himself to Mr 
Pumblechook, as to a man whose appreciative powers justified the inference 
that he was equal to the time.
'It's just gone half-past two.'
'That's not so bad,' said the sergeant, reflecting; 'even if I was forced 
to halt here nigh two hours, that'll do. How far might you call yourselves 
from the marshes, hereabouts? Not above a mile, I reckon?'
'Just a mile,' said Mrs Joe.
'That'll do. We begin to close in upon 'em about dusk. A little before 
dusk, my orders are. That'll do.'
'Convicts, sergeant?' asked Mr Wopsle, in a matter-of-course way.
'Ay!' returned the sergeant, 'Two. They're pretty well known to be out on 
the marshes still, and they won't try to get clear of 'em before dusk. 
Anybody here seen anything of such game?'
Everybody, myself excepted, said no, with confidence. Nobody thought of me.
'Well!' said the sergeant, 'they'll find themselves trapped in a circle, I 
expect, sooner than they count on. Now, blacksmith! If you're ready, His 
Majesty the King is.'
Joe had got his coat and waistcoat and cravat off, and his leather apron 
on, and passed into the forge. One of the soldiers opened its wooden 
windows, another lighted the fire, another turned to at the bellows, the 
rest stood round the blaze, which was soon roaring. Then Joe began to 
hammer and clink, hammer and clink, and we all looked on.
The interest of the impending pursuit not only absorbed the general 
attention, but even made my sister liberal. She drew a pitcher of beer from 
the cask for the soldiers, and invited the sergeant to take a glass of 
brandy. But Mr Pumblechook said, sharply, 'Give him wine, Mum. I'll engage 
there's no Tar in that;' so, the sergeant thanked him and said that as he 
preferred his drink without tar, he would take wine, if it was equally 
convenient When it was given him, he drank His Majesty's health and 
Compliments of the Season, and took it all at a mouthful and smacked his 
lips.
'Good stuff, eh, sergeant?' said Mr Pumblechook.
'I'll tell you something,' returned the sergeant; 'I suspect that stuff's 
of your providing.'
Mr Pumblechook, with a fat sort of laugh, said 'Ay, ay? Why?'
'Because,' returned the sergeant, clapping him on the shoulder, 'you're a 
man that knows what's what.'
'D'ye think so?' said Mr Pumblechook, with his former laugh. 'Have another 
glass!'
'With you. Hob and nob,' returned the sergeant. 'The top of mine to the 
foot of yours - the foot of yours to the top of mine - ring once, ring 
twice - the best tune on the Musical Glasses! Your health. May you live a 
thousand years, and never be a worse judge of the right sort than you are 
at the present moment of your life!'
The sergeant tossed off his glass again, and seemed quite ready for another 
glass. I noticed that Mr Pumblechook in his hospitality appeared to forget 
that he had made a present of the wine, but took the bottle from Mrs Joe, 
and had all the credit of handing it about in a gush of joviality. Even I 
got some. And he was so very free of the wine that he even called for the 
other bottle and handed that about with the same liberality, when the first 
was gone.
As I watched them while they all stood clustering about the forge, enjoying 
themselves so much, I thought what terrible good sauce for a dinner my 
fugitive friend on the marshes was. They had not enjoyed themselves a 
quarter so much, before the entertainment was brightened with the 
excitement he furnished. And now, when they were all in lively anticipation 
of 'the two villains' being taken, and when the bellows seemed to roar for 
the fugitives, the fire to flare for them, the smoke to hurry away in 
pursuit of them, Joe to hammer and clink for them, and all the murky 
shadows on the wall to shake at them in menace as the blaze rose and sank, 
and the red-hot sparks dropped and died, the pale afternoon outside almost 
seemed in my pitying young fancy to have turned pale on their account, poor 
wretches.
At last, Joe's job was done, and the ringing and roaring stopped. As Joe 
got on his coat, he mustered courage to propose that some of us should go 
down with the soldiers and see what came of the hunt. Mr Pumblechook and 
.Mr Hubble declined, on the plea of a pipe and ladies' society; but Mr 
Wopsle said he would go, if Joe would. Joe said he was agreeable, and would 
take me, if Mrs Joe approved. We never should have got leave to go, I am 
sure, but for Mrs Joe's curiosity to know all about it and how it ended. As 
it was, she merely stipulated, 'If you bring the boy back with his head 
blown to bits by a musket, don't look to me to put it together again.'
The sergeant took a polite leave of the ladies, and parted from Mr 
Pumblechook as from a comrade; though I doubt if he were quite as fully 
sensible of that gentleman's merits under arid conditions, as when 
something moist was going. His men resumed their muskets and fell in. Mr 
Wopsle, Joe and I, received strict charge to keep in the rear, and to speak 
no word after we reached the marshes. When we were all out in the raw air 
and were steadily moving towards our business, I treasonably whispered to 
Joe, q hope, Joe, we shan't find them.' And Joe whispered to me, 'I'd give 
a shilling if they had cut and run, Pip.'
We were joined by no stragglers from the village, for the weather was cold 
and threatening, the way dreary, the footing bad, darkness coming on, and 
the people had good fires indoors and were keeping the day. A few faces 
hurried to glowing windows and looked after us, but none came out. We 
passed the finger-post, and held straight on to the churchyard. There we 
were stopped a few minutes by a signal from the sergeant's hand, while two 
or three of his men dispersed themselves among the graves, and also 
examined the porch. They came in again without finding anything, and then 
we struck out on the open marshes, through the gate at the side of the 
churchyard. A bitter sleet came rattling against us here on the east wind, 
and Joe took me on his back.
Now that we were out upon the dismal wilderness where they little thought I 
had been within eight or nine hours and seen both men hiding, I considered 
for the first time, with great dread, if we should come upon them, would my 
particular convict suppose that it was I who had brought the soldiers 
there? He had asked me if I was a deceiving imp, and he had said I should 
be a fierce young hound if I joined the hunt against him. Would he believe 
that I was both imp and hound in treacherous earnest, and had betrayed him?
It was of no use asking myself this question now. There I was, on Joe's 
back, and there was Joe beneath me, charging at the ditches like a hunter, 
and stimulating Mr Wopsle not to tumble on his Roman nose, and to keep up 
with us. The soldiers were in front of us, extended into a pretty wide line 
with an interval between man and man. We were taking the course I had begun 
with, and from which I had diverged in the mist Either the mist was not out 
again, or the wind had dispelled it Under the low red glare of the sunset, 
the beacon, and the gibbet, and the mound of the Battery, and the opposite 
shore of the river, were plain, though all of a watery lead colour.
With my heart thumping like a blacksmith at Joe's broad shoulder, I looked 
all about for any sign of the convicts. I could see none, I could hear 
none. Mr Wopsle had greatly alarmed me more than once, by his blowing and 
hard breathing; but I knew the sound by this time, and could disassociate 
them from the object of pursuit. I got a dreadful start, when I thought I 
heard the file still going; but it was only a sheep bell. The sheep stopped 
in their eating and looked timidly at us; and the cattle, their heads 
turned from the wind and sleet, stared angrily as if they held us 
responsible for both annoyances; but, except these things, and the shudder 
of the dying day in every blade of grass, there was no break in the bleak 
stillness of the marshes.
The soldiers were moving on in the direction of the old Battery, and we 
were moving on a little way behind them, when, all of a sudden, we all 
stopped. For there had reached us on the wings of the wind and rain a long 
shout. It was repeated. It was at a distance towards the east, but it was 
long and loud. Nay, there seemed to be two or more shouts raised together - 
if one might judge from a confusion in the sound.
To this effect the sergeant and the nearest men were speaking under their 
breath, when Joe and I came up. After another moment's listening, Joe (who 
was a good judge) agreed, and Mr Wopsle (who was a bad judge) agreed. The 
sergeant, a decisive man, ordered that the sound should not be answered, 
but that the course should be changed, and that his men should make towards 
it 'at the double.' So we slanted to the right (where the east was), and 
Joe pounded away so wonderfully, that I managed to hold on tight to keep my 
seat.
It was a run indeed now, and what Joe called, in the only two words he 
spoke all the time 'a Winder.' Down banks and up banks, and over gates, and 
splashing into dykes, and breaking among coarse rushes; no man cared where 
he went As we came nearer to the shouting, it became more and more apparent 
that it was made by more than one voice. Sometimes it seemed to stop 
altogether, and then the soldiers stopped. When it broke out again, the 
soldiers made for it at a greater rate than ever, and we after them. After 
a while, we had so run it down, that we could hear one voice calling 
'Murder!' and another voice, 'Convicts! Runaways! Guard! This way for the 
runaway convicts!' Then both voices would seem to be stifled in a struggle, 
and then would break out again. And when it had come to this, the soldiers 
ran like deer, and Joe too.
The sergeant ran in first, when we had run the noise quite down, and two of 
his men ran in close upon him. Their pieces were cocked and levelled when 
we all ran in.
'Here are both men!' panted the sergeant, struggling at the bottom of a 
ditch. 'Surrender, you two! and confound you for two wild beasts! Come 
asunder!'
Water was splashing, and mud was flying, and oaths were being sworn, and 
blows were being struck, when some more men went down into the ditch to 
help the sergeant, and dragged out, separately, my convict and the other 
one. Both were bleeding and panting and execrating and struggling; but of 
course I knew them both directly.
'Mind!' said my convict, wiping blood from his face with his ragged 
sleeves, and shaking torn hair from his fingers; 'I took him! I give him up 
to you! Mind that!'
'It's not much to be particular about,' said the sergeant; 'it'll do you 
small good, my man, being in the same plight yourself. Handcuffs there!'
'I don't expect it to do me any good. I don't want it to do me more good 
than it does me now,' said my convict, with a greedy laugh. 'I took him. He 
knows it. That's enough for me.'
The other convict was livid to look at, and, in addition to the old bruised 
left side of his face, seemed to be bruised and torn all over. He could not 
so much as get his breath to speak, until they were both separately 
handcuffed, but leaned upon a soldier to keep himself from falling.
'Take notice, guard - he tried to murder me,' were his first words.
'Tried to murder him?' said my convict disdainfully. 'Try, and not do it? I 
took him, and giv' him up; that's what I done. I not only prevented him 
getting off the marshes, but I dragged him here - dragged him this far on 
his way back. He's a gentleman, if you please, this villain. Now, the Hulks 
has got its gentleman again, through me. Murder him? Worth my while, too, 
to murder him, when I could do worse and drag him back!'
The other one still gasped, 'He tried - he tried - to - murder me. Bear - 
bear witness.'
'Look'ee here!' said my convict to the sergeant. 'Single-handed I got clear 
of the prison-ship; I made a dash and I done it I could ha' got clear of 
these death-cold flats likewise - look at my leg: you won't find much iron 
on it - if I hadn't made the discovery that he was here. Let him go free? 
Let him profit by the means as I found out? Let him make a tool of me 
afresh and again? Once more? No, no, no. If I had died at the bottom 
there;' and he made an emphatic swing at the ditch with his manacled hands; 
'I'd have held to him with that grip, that you should have been safe to 
find him in my hold.'
The other fugitive, who was evidently in extreme horror of his companion, 
repeated, 'He tried to murder me. I should have been a dead man if you had 
not come up.'
'He lies!' said my convict with fierce energy. 'He's a liar born, and he'll 
die a liar. Look at his face; ain't it written there? Let him turn those 
eyes of his on me. I defy him to do it'
The other, with an effort at a scornful smile - which could not, however, 
collect the nervous working of his mouth into any set expression - looked 
at the soldiers, and looked about at the marshes, and at the sky, but 
certainly did not look at the speaker.
'Do you see him?' pursued my convict 'Do you see what a villain he is? Do 
you see those grovelling and wandering eyes? That's how he looked when we 
were tried together. He never looked at me.'
The other, always working and working his dry lips and turning his eyes 
restlessly about him far and near, did at last turn them for a moment on 
the speaker, with the words, 'You are not much to look at,' and with a half-
taunting glance at the bound hands. At that point, my convict became so 
frantically exasperated that he would have rushed upon him but for the 
interposition of the soldiers. 'Didn't I tell you,' said the other convict 
then, 'that he would murder me, if he could?' And anyone could see that he 
shook with fear, and that there broke out upon his lips, curious white 
flakes, like thin snow.
'Enough of this parley,' said the sergeant 'Light those torches.'
As one of the soldiers, who carried a basket in lieu of a gun, went down on 
his knee to open it, my convict looked round him for the first time, and 
saw me. I had alighted from Joe's back on the brink of the ditch when we 
came up, and had not moved since. I looked at him eagerly when he looked at 
me, and slightly moved my hands and shook my head. I had been waiting for 
him to see me, that I might try to assure him of my innocence. It was not 
at all expressed to me that he even comprehended my intention, for he gave 
me a look that I did not understand, and it all passed in a moment But if 
he had looked at me for an hour or for a day, I could not have remembered 
his face ever afterwards, as having been more attentive.
The soldier with the basket soon got a light, and lighted three or four 
torches, and took one himself and distributed the others. It had been 
almost dark before, but now it seemed quite dark, and soon afterwards very 
dark. Before we departed from that spot, four soldiers standing in a ring, 
fired twice into the air. Presently we saw other torches kindled at some 
distance behind us, and others on the marshes on the opposite bank of the 
river. 'All right,' said the sergeant. 'March.'
We had not gone far when three cannons were fired ahead of us with a sound 
that seemed to burst something inside my ear. 'You are expected on board,' 
said the sergeant to my convict; 'they know you are coming Don't straggle, 
my man. Close up here.'
The two were kept apart, and each walked surrounded by a separate guard. I 
had hold of Joe's hand now, and Joe carried one of the torches. Mr Wopsle 
had been for going back, but Joe was resolved to see it out, so we went on 
with the party. There was a reasonably good path now, mostly on the edge of 
the river, with a divergence here and there where a dyke came, with a 
miniature windmill on it and a muddy sluice-gate. When I looked round, I 
could see the other lights coming in after us. The torches we carried 
dropped great blotches of fire upon the track, and I could see those, too, 
lying smoking and flaring. I could see nothing else but black darkness. Our 
lights warmed the air about us with their pitchy blaze, and the two 
prisoners seemed rather to like that, as they limped along in the midst of 
the muskets. We could not go fast, because of their lameness; and they were 
so spent, that two or three times we had to halt while they rested
After an hour or so of this travelling, we came to a rough wooden hut, and 
a landing-place. There was a guard in the hut, and they challenged, and the 
sergeant answered. Then, we went into the hut where there was a smell of 
tobacco and whitewash, and a bright fire, and a lamp, and a stand of 
muskets, and a drum, and a low wooden bedstead, like an overgrown mangle 
without the machinery, capable of holding about a dozen soldiers all at 
once. Three or four soldiers who lay upon it in their greatcoats were not 
much interested in us, but just lifted their heads and took a sleepy stare, 
and then lay down again. The sergeant made some kind of report, and some 
entry in a book, and then the convict whom I call the other convict was 
drafted off with his guard, to go on board first
My convict never looked at me, except that once. While we stood in the hut, 
he stood before the fire looking thoughtfully at it, or putting up his feet 
by turns upon the hob, and looking thoughtfully at them as if he pitied 
them for their recent adventures. Suddenly, he turned to the sergeant, and 
remarked
'I wish to say something respecting this escape. It may prevent some 
persons laying under suspicion alonger me.'
'You can say what you like,' returned the sergeant, standing coolly looking 
at him with his arms folded, 'but you have no call to say it here. You'll 
have opportunity enough to say about it, and hear about it, before its done 
with, you know.'
'I know, but this is another pint, a separate matter. A man can't starve; 
at least I can't I took some wittles, up at the village over yonder - where 
the church stands a'most out on the marshes.'
'You mean stole,' said the sergeant.
'And I'll tell you where from. From the blacksmith's.'
'Hollo!' said the sergeant, staring at Joe.
'Hollo, Pip!' said Joe, staring at me.
'It was some broken wittles - that's what it was - and a dram of liquor, 
and a pie.'
'Have you happened to miss such an article as a pie, blacksmith?' asked the 
sergeant confidentially.
'My wife did, at the very moment when you came in. - Don't you know, Pip?'
'So,' said my convict, turning his eyes on Joe in a moody manner, and 
without the least glance at me; 'so you're the blacksmith, are you? Then 
I'm sorry to say, I've eat your pie.'
'God knows you're welcome to it - so far as it was ever mine,' returned 
Joe, with a saving remembrance of Mrs Joe. 'We don't know what you have 
done, but we wouldn't have you starved to death for it, poor miserable 
fellow-creatur. - Would us, Pip?'
The something that I had noticed before, clicked in the man's throat again, 
and he turned his back. The boat had returned, and his guard were ready, so 
we followed him to the landing-place made of rough stakes and stones, and 
saw him put into the boat, which was rowed by a crew of convicts like 
himself. No one seemed surprised to see him, or interested in seeing him, 
or glad to see him, or sorry to see him, or spoke a word, except that 
somebody in the boat growled as if to dogs, 'Give way, you!' which was the 
signal for the dip of the oars. By the light of the torches, we saw the 
black Hulk lying out a little way from the mud of the shore, like a wicked 
Noah's ark. Cribbed and barred and moored by massive rusty chains, the 
prison-ship seemed in my young eyes to be ironed like the prisoners. We saw 
the boat go alongside, and we saw him taken up the side and disappear. 
Then, the ends of the torches were flung hissing into the water, and went 
out, as if it were all over with him.


Chapter 6

My state of mind regarding the pilfering from which I had been so 
unexpectedly exonerated, did not impel me to frank disclosure; but I hope 
it had some dregs of good at the bottom of it.
I do not recall that I felt any tenderness of conscience in reference to 
Mrs Joe, when the fear of being found out was lifted off me. But I loved 
Joe - perhaps for no better reason in those early days than because the 
dear fellow let me love him - and, as to him, my inner self was not so 
easily composed. It was much upon my mind (particularly when I first saw 
him looking about for his file), that I ought to tell Joe the whole truth. 
Yet I did not, and for the reason that I mistrusted that if I did, he would 
think me worse than I was. The fear of losing Joe's confidence, and of 
thenceforth sitting in the chimney-corner at night, staring drearily at my 
for ever lost companion and friend, tied up my tongue. I morbidly 
represented to myself that if Joe knew it, I never afterwards could see him 
at the fireside feeling his fair whisker, without thinking that he was 
meditating on it. That, if Joe knew it, I never afterwards could see him 
glance, however casually, at yesterday's meat or pudding when it came on 
today's table, without thinking that he was debating whether I had been in 
the pantry. That, if Joe knew it, and at any subsequent period of our joint 
domestic life remarked that his beer was flat or thick, the conviction that 
he suspected Tar in it, would bring a rush of blood to my face. In a word, 
I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right, as I had been too 
cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong. I had had no intercourse 
with the world at that time, and I imitated none of its many inhabitants 
who act in this manner. Quite an untaught genius, I made the discovery of 
the line of action for myself
As I was sleepy before we were far away from the prison-ship, Joe took me 
on his back again and carried me home. He must have had a tiresome journey 
of it, for Mr Wopsle, being knocked up, was in such a very bad temper that 
if the Church had been thrown open, he would probably have excommunicated 
the whole expedition, beginning with Joe and myself In his lay capacity, be 
persisted in sitting down in the damp to such an insane extent, that when 
his coat was taken off to be dried at the kitchen fire, the circumstantial 
evidence on his trousers would have hanged him if it had been a capital 
offence.
By that time, I was staggering on the kitchen floor like a little drunkard, 
through having been newly set upon my feet, and through having been fast 
asleep, and through waking in the heat and lights and noise of tongues. As 
I came to myself (with the aid of a heavy thump between the shoulders, and 
the restorative exclamation, 'Yah! Was there ever such a boy as this!' from 
my sister), I found Joe telling them about the convict's confession, and 
all the visitors suggesting different ways by which he had got into the 
pantry. Mr Pumblechook made out, after carefully surveying the premises, 
that he had first got upon the roof of the forge, and had then got upon the 
roof of the house, and had then let himself down the kitchen chimney by a 
rope made of his bedding cut into strips; and as Mr Pumblechook was very 
positive, and drove his own chaise-cart - over everybody - it was agreed 
that it must be so. Mr Wopsle, indeed, wildly cried out 'No!' with the 
feeble malice of a tired man; but, as he had no theory, and no coat on, he 
was unanimously set at naught - not to mention his smoking hard behind, as 
he stood with his back to the kitchen fire to draw the damp out which was 
not calculated to inspire confidence.
This was all I heard that night before my sister clutched me, as a 
slumberous offence to the company's eyesight, and assisted me up to bed 
with such a strong hand that I seemed to have fifty boots on, and to be 
dangling them all against the edges of the stairs. My state of mind, as I 
have described it, began before I was up in the morning, and lasted long 
after the subject had died out, and had ceased to be mentioned saving on 
exceptional occasions.


Chapter 7

At the time when I stood in the churchyard, reading the family tombstones, 
I had just enough learning to be able to spell them out. My construction 
even of their simple meaning was not very correct, for I read 'wife of the 
Above' as a complimentary reference to my father's exaltation to a better 
world; and if any one of my deceased relations had been referred to as 
'Below,' I have no doubt I should have formed the worst opinions of that 
member of the family. Neither were my notions of the theological positions 
to which my Catechism bound me at all accurate; for I have a lively 
remembrance that I supposed my declaration that I was to 'walk in the same 
all the days of my life,' laid me under an obligation always to go through 
the village from our house in one particular direction, and never to vary 
it by turning down by the wheelwright's or up by the mill.
When I was old enough, I was to be apprenticed to Joe, and until I could 
assume that dignity I was not to be what Mrs Joe called 'Pompeyed,' or (as 
I render it) pampered. Therefore, I was not only odd-boy about the forge, 
but if any neighbour happened to want an extra boy to frighten birds, or 
pick up stones, or do any such job, I was favoured with the employment. In 
order, however, that our superior position might not be compromised 
thereby, a moneybox was kept on the kitchen mantel-shelf, into which it was 
publicly made known that all my earnings were dropped. I have an impression 
that they were to be contributed eventually towards the liquidation of the 
National Debt, but I know I had no hope of any personal participation in 
the treasure.
Mr Wopsle's great-aunt kept an evening school in the village; that is to 
say, she was a ridiculous old woman of limited means and unlimited 
infirmity who used to go to sleep from six to seven every evening, in the 
society of youth who paid twopence per week each for the improving 
opportunity of seeing her do it. She rented a small cottage, and Mr Wopsle 
had the room upstairs, where we students used to overhear him reading aloud 
in a most dignified and terrific manner, and occasionally bumping on the 
ceiling. There was a fiction that Mr Wopsle 'examined' the scholars, once a 
quarter. What he did on those occasions, was to turn up his cuffs, stick up 
his hair, and give us Mark Antony's oration over the body of Caesar. This 
was always followed by Collins's Ode on the Passions, wherein I 
particularly venerated Mr Wopsle as Revenge, throwing his blood-stained 
sword in thunder down, and taking the War-denouncing trumpet with a 
withering look It was not with me then, as it was in later life, when I 
fell into the society of the Passions, and compared them with Collins and 
Wopsle, rather to the disadvantage of both gentlemen.
Mr Wopsle's great-aunt, besides keeping this Educational Institution, kept -
 in the same room - a little general shop. She had no idea what stock she 
had, or what the price of anything in it was; but there was a little greasy 
memorandum-book kept in a drawer, which served as a Catalogue of Prices, 
and by this oracle Biddy arranged all the shop transactions. Biddy was Mr 
Wopsle's great-aunt's grand-daughter; I confess myself quite unequal to the 
working-out of the problem, what relation she was to Mr Wopsle. She was an 
orphan like myself, like me, too, had been brought up by hand. She was most 
noticeable, I thought, in respect of her extremities; for her hair always 
wanted brushing, her hands always wanted washing, and her shoes always 
wanted mending and pulling up at heel. This description must be received 
with a weekday limitation. On Sundays, she went to church elaborated.
Much of my unassisted self, and more by the help of Biddy than of Mr 
Wopsle's great-aunt, I struggled through the alphabet as if it had been a 
bramble-bush; getting considerably worried and scratched by every letter. 
After that, I fell among those thieves, the nine figures, who seemed every 
evening to do something new to disguise themselves and baffle recognition. 
But, at last I began, in a purblind, groping way, to read, write, and 
cipher, on the very smallest scale.
One night, I was sitting in the chimney-corner with my slate, expending 
great efforts on the production of a letter to Joe. I think it must have 
been a full year after our hunt upon the marshes, for it was a long time 
after, and it was winter and a hard frost With an alphabet on the hearth at 
my feet for reference, I contrived in an hour or two to print and smear 
this epistle:

'mI deEr JO i opE U r krWitE wEll i opE i shAl soN B haBelL 4 2 teeDge U JO 
aN theN wE shOrl b sO glOdd aN wEn i M preNgtD 2 u  JO woT larX an blEvE ME 
inF xn PiP.'

There was no indispensable necessity for my communicating with Joe by 
letter, inasmuch as he sat beside me and we were alone. But I delivered 
this written communication (slate and all) with my own hand, and Joe 
received it as a miracle of erudition.
'I say, Pip, old chap!' cried Joe, opening his blue eyes wide, 'what a 
scholar you are. An't you?'
'I should like to be,' said I, glancing at the slate as he held it with a 
misgiving that the writing was rather hilly.
'Why, here's a J,' said Joe, 'and a O equal to anythink! Here's a J and a 
O, Pip, and a J-O, Joe.'
I had never heard Joe read aloud to any greater extent than this 
monosyllable, and I had observed at church last Sunday, when I accidentally 
held our Prayer Book upside down, that it seemed to suit his convenience 
quite as well as if it had been all right. Wishing to embrace the present 
occasion of finding out whether, in teaching Joe, I should have to begin 
quite at the beginning, I said, 'Ah! But read the rest, Joe.'
'The rest, eh, Pip?' said Joe, looking at it with a slowly searching eye, 
'one, two, three. Why, here's three Js, and three Os, and three J-O, Joes, 
in it, Pip!'
I leaned over Joe, and, with the aid of my forefinger, read him the whole 
letter.
'Astonishing!' said Joe, when I had finished. 'You ARE a scholar.'
'How do you spell Gargery, Joe? 'I asked him, with a modest patronage.
'I don't spell it at all,' said Joe.
'But supposing you did?'
'It can't be supposed,' said Joe. 'Tho' I'm oncommon fond of reading too.'
'Are you, Joe?'
'On-common. Give me,' said Joe, 'a good book, or a good newspaper, and sit 
me down afore a good fire, and I ask no better. Lord!' he continued, after 
rubbing his knees a little, 'when you do come to a J and a 0, and says you, 
"Here, at last, is a J-O, Joe," how interesting reading is!'
I derived from this, that Joe's education, like Steam, was yet in its 
infancy. Pursuing the subject, I inquired
'Didn't you ever go to school, Joe, when you were as little as me?'
'No, Pip.'
'Why didn't you ever go to school, Joe, when you were as little as me?'
'Well, Pip,' said Joe, taking up the poker, and settling himself to his 
usual occupation when he was thoughtful, of slowly raking the fire between 
the lower bars; 'I'll tell you. My father, Pip, he were given to drink, and 
when he were overtook with drink, he hammered away at my mother, most 
onmerciful. It were a'most the only hammering he did, indeed, 'xcepting at 
myself. And he hammered at me with a wigour only to be equalled by the 
wigour with which he didn't hammer at his anwil. - You're a-listening and 
understanding Pip?'
'Yes, Joe.'
' 'Consequence, my mother and me we ran away from my father, several times; 
and then my mother she'd go out to work, and she'd say, "Joe," she'd say, 
"now, please God, you shall have some schooling, child," and she'd put me 
to school. But my father were that good in his hart that he couldn't abear 
to be without us. So he'd come with a most tremenjous crowd, and make such 
a row at the doors of the houses where we was, that they used to be 
obligated to have no more to do with us and to give us up to him. And then 
he took us home and hammered us. Which, you see, Pip,' said Joe, pausing in 
his meditative raking of the fire and looking at me, 'were a drawback on my 
learning.'
'Certainly, poor Joe!'
'Though mind you, Pip,' said Joe, with a judicial touch or two of the poker 
on the top bar, 'rendering unto all their doo, and maintaining equal 
justice betwixt man and man, my father were that good in his hart, don't 
you see?'
I didn't see; but I didn't say so.
'Well!' Joe pursued, 'somebody must keep the pot a-biling, Pip, or the pot 
wont bile, don't you know?'
I saw that, and said so.
''Consequence, my father didn't make objections to my going to work; so I 
went to work at my present calling, which were his too, if he would have 
followed it, and I worked tolerable hard, I assure you, Pip. In time I were 
able to keep him, and I kep him till he went off in a purple leptic fit. 
And it were my intentions to have put upon his tombstone that Whatsume'er 
the failing on his part, Remember reader he were that good in his hart.'
Joe recited this couplet with such manifest pride and careful perspicuity, 
that I asked him if he had made it himself.
'I made it,' said Joe, 'my own self. I made it in a moment It was like 
striking out a horseshoe complete, in a single blow. I never was so much 
surprised in all my life - couldn't credit my own 'ed - to tell you the 
truth, hardly believed it were my own 'ed. As I was saying, Pip, it were my 
intentions to have had it cut over him; but poetry costs money, cut it how 
you will, small or large, and it were not done. Not to mention bearers, all 
the money that could be spared were wanted for my mother. She were in poor 
'elth, and quite broke. She weren't long of following, poor soul, and her 
share of peace come round at last.'
Joe's blue eyes turned a little watery; he rubbed, first one of them, and 
then the other, in a most uncongenial and uncomfortable manner, with the 
round knob on the top of the poker.
'It were but lonesome then,' said Joe, 'living here alone, and I got 
acquainted with your sister. Now, Pip, 'Joe looked firmly at me, as if he 
knew I was not going to agree with him, 'your sister is a fine figure of a 
woman.'
I could not help looking at the fire, in an obvious state of doubt.
'Whatever family opinions, or whatever the world's opinions, on that 
subject may be, Pip, your sister is,' Joe tapped the top bar with the poker 
after every word following, 'a - fine - figure - of - a - woman!'
I could think of nothing better to say than, 'I am glad you think so, Joe.'
'So am I,' returned Joe, catching me up. 'I am glad I think so, Pip. A 
little redness, or a little matter of Bone, here or there, what does it 
signify to Me?'
I sagaciously observed, if it didn't signify to him, to whom did it 
signify?
'Certainly!' assented Joe. 'That's it. You're right, old chap! When I got 
acquainted with your sister, it were the talk how she was bringing you up 
by hand. Very kind of her too, all the folks said, and I said, along with 
all the folks. As to you,' Joe pursued, with a countenance expressive of 
seeing something very nasty indeed, 'if you could have been aware how small 
and flabby and mean you was, dear me, you'd have formed the most 
contemptible opinion of yourself!'
Not exactly relishing this, I said, 'Never mind me, Joe.'
'But I did mind you, Pip,' he returned with tender simplicity. 'When I 
offered to your sister to keep company, and to be asked in church at such 
times as she was willing and ready to come to the forge, I said to her, 
"And bring the poor little child. God bless the poor little child," I said 
to your sister, "there's room for him at the forge!" '
I broke out crying and begging pardon, and hugged Joe round the neck who 
dropped the poker to hug me, and to say, 'Ever the best of friends; an't 
us, Pip? Don't cry, old chap!'
When this little interruption was over, Joe resumed
'Well, you see, Pip, and here we are! That's about where it lights; here we 
are! Now, when you take me in hand in my learning, Pip (and I tell you 
beforehand I am awful dull, most awful dull), Mrs Joe mustn't see too much 
of what we're up to. It must be done, as I may say, on the sly. And why on 
the sly? I'll tell you why, Pip.'
He had taken up the poker again; without which, I doubt if he could have 
proceeded in his demonstration.
Your sister is given to government'
'Given to government, Joe?' I was startled, for I had some shadowy idea 
(and I am afraid I must add, hope) that Joe had divorced her in favour of 
the Lords of the Admiralty, or Treasury. 'Given to government,' said Joe. 
'Which I meanter say the government of you and myself.'
'Oh!'
'And she an't over partial to having scholars on the premises,' Joe 
continued, 'and in partickler would not be over partial to my being a 
scholar, for fear as I might rise. Like a sort of rebel, don't you see?'
I was going to retort with an inquiry, and had got as far as 'Why - 'when 
Joe stopped me.
'Stay a bit I know what you're a-going to say, Pip; stay a bit I don't deny 
that your sister comes the Mogul over us, now and again. I don't deny that 
she do throw us back-falls, and that she do drop down upon us heavy. At 
such times as when your sister is on the Ram-page, Pip,' Joe sank his voice 
to a whisper and glanced at the door, 'candour compels fur to admit that 
she is a Buster.'
Joe pronounced this word, as if it began with at least twelve capital Bs.
'Why don't I rise? That were your observation when I broke it off, Pip?'
'Yes, Joe.'
'Well,' said Joe, passing the poker into his left hand, that he might feel 
his whisker; and I had no hope of him whenever he took to that placid 
occupation; 'your sister's a master-mind. A master-mind.'
'What's that?' I asked, in some hope of bringing him to a stand. But, Joe 
was readier with his definition than I had expected, and completely stopped 
me by arguing circularly, and answering with a fixed look, 'Her.'
'And I an't a master-mind,' Joe resumed, when he had unfixed his look, and 
got back to his whisker. 'And last of all, Pip - and this I want to say 
very serious to you, old chap - I see so much in my poor mother, of a woman 
drudging and slaving and breaking her honest hart and never getting no 
peace in her mortal days, that I'm dead afeerd of going wrong in the way of 
not doing what's right by a woman, and I'd fur rather of the two go wrong 
the t'other way, and be a little ill-convenienced myself. I wish it was 
only me that got put out, Pip; I wish there warn't no Tickler for you, old 
chap; I wish I could take it all on myself; but this is the up-and-down-and-
straight on it, Pip, and I hope you'll overlook shortcomings.'
Young as I was, I believe that I dated a new admiration of Joe from that 
night. We were equals afterwards, as we had been before; but afterwards, at 
quiet times when I sat looking at Joe and thinking about him, I had a new 
sensation of feeling conscious that I was looking up to Joe in my heart
'However,' said Joe, rising to replenish the fire; 'here's the Dutch clock 
a-working himself up to being equal to strike Eight of 'em, and she's not 
come home yet! I hope Uncle Pumblechook's mare mayn't have set a fore-foot 
on a piece o' ice, and gone down.'
Mrs Joe made occasional trips with Uncle Pumblechook on market-days, to 
assist him in buying such household stuffs and goods as required a woman's 
judgment; Uncle Pumblechook being a bachelor and reposing no confidences in 
his domestic servant. This was market-day, and Mrs Joe was out on one of 
these expeditions.
Joe made the fire and swept the hearth, and then we went to the door to 
listen for the chaise-cart. It was a dry cold night, and the wind blew 
keenly, and the frost was white and hard. A man would die tonight of lying 
out on the marshes, I thought. And then I looked at the stars, and 
considered how awful it would be for a man to turn his face up to them as 
he froze to death, and see no help or pity in all the glittering multitude.
'Here comes the mare,' said Joe, 'ringing like a peal of bells!'
The sound of her iron shoes upon the hard road was quite musical, as she 
came along at a much brisker trot than usual. We got a chair out, ready for 
Mrs Joe's alighting, and stirred up the fire that they might see a bright 
window, and took a final survey of the kitchen that nothing might be out of 
its place. When we had completed these preparations, they drove up, wrapped 
to the eyes. Mrs Joe was soon landed, and Uncle Pumblechook was soon down 
too, covering the mare with a cloth, and we were soon all in the kitchen, 
carrying so much cold air in with us that it seemed to drive all the heat 
out of the fire.
'Now,' said Mrs Joe, unwrapping herself with haste and excitement, and 
throwing her bonnet back on her shoulders, where it hung by the strings: 
'if this boy an't grateful this night, he never will be!'
I looked as grateful as any boy possibly could, who was wholly uninformed 
why he ought to assume that expression.
'It's only to be hoped,' said my sister, 'that he won't be Pompeyed. But I 
have my fears.'
'She an't in that line, Mum,' said Mr Pumblechook. 'She knows better.'
She? I looked at Joe, making the motion with my lips and eyebrows, 'She?' 
Joe looked at me, making the motion with his lips and eyebrows, 'She?' My 
sister catching him in the act, he drew the back of his hand across his 
nose with his usual conciliatory air on such occasions, and looked at her.
'Well?' said my sister, in her snappish way. 'What are you staring at? Is 
the house a-fire?'
' - Which some individual,' Joe politely hinted, 'mentioned - she.'
'And she is a she, I suppose?' said my sister. 'Unless you call Miss 
Havisham a he. And I doubt if even you'll go so far as that'
'Miss Havisham, up town?' said Joe.
'Is there any Miss Havisham down town?' returned my sister. 'She wants this 
boy to go and play there. And of course he's going. And he had better play 
there,' said my sister, shaking her head at me as an encouragement to be 
extremely light and sportive, 'or I'll work him.'
I had heard of Miss Havisham up town - everybody for miles round had heard 
of Miss Havisham up town - as an immensely rich and grim lady who lived in 
a large and dismal house barricaded against robbers, and who led a life of 
seclusion.
'Well to be sure!' said Joe, astounded. 'I wonder how she come to know 
Pip!'
'Noodle!' cried my sister. 'Who said she knew him?'
' - Which some individual,' Joe again politely hinted, 'mentioned that she 
wanted him to go and play there.'
'And couldn't she ask Uncle Pumblechook if he knew of a boy to go and play 
there? Isn't it just barely possible that Uncle Pumblechook may be a tenant 
of hers, and that he may sometimes - we won't say quarterly or half-yearly, 
for that would be requiring too much of you but sometimes - go there to pay 
his rent? And couldn't she then ask Uncle Pumblechook if he knew of a boy 
to go and play there? And couldn't Uncle Pumblechook, being always 
considerate and thoughtful for us - though you may not think it, Joseph,' 
in a tone of the deepest reproach, as if he were the most callous of 
nephews, 'then mention this boy, standing Prancing here' - which I solemnly 
declare I was not doing - 'that I have for ever been a willing slave to?'
'Good again!' cried Uncle Pumblechook. Well put! Prettily pointed! Good 
indeed! Now, Joseph, you know the case.'
'No, Joseph,' said my sister, still in a reproachful manner, while Joe 
apologetically drew the back of his hand across and across his nose, 'you 
do not yet - though you may not think it - know the case. You may consider 
that you do, but you do not, Joseph. For you do not know that Uncle 
Pumblechook, being sensible that for anything we can tell, this boy's 
fortune may be made by his going to Miss Havisham's, has offered to take 
him into town tonight, in his own chaise-cart, and to keep him tonight, and 
to take him with his own hands to Miss Havisham's tomorrow morning. And Lor-
a-mussy me!' cried my sister, casting off her bonnet in sudden desperation, 
'here I stand talking to mere Mooncalfs, with Uncle Pumblechook waiting, 
and the mare catching cold at the door, and the boy grimed with crock and 
dirt from the hair of his head to the sole of his foot!'
With that, she pounced upon me, like an eagle on a lamb, and my face was 
squeezed into wooden bowls in sinks, and my head was put under taps of 
water-butts, and I was soaped, and kneaded, and towelled, and thumped, and 
harrowed, and rasped, until I really was quite beside myself. (I may here 
remark that I suppose myself to be better acquainted than any living 
authority with the ridgy effect of a wedding-ring, passing 
unsympathetically over the human countenance.)
When my ablutions were completed, I was put into clean linen of the 
stiffest character, like a young penitent into sackcloth, and was trussed 
up in my tightest and fearfullest suit. I was then delivered over to Mr 
Pumblechook, who formally received me as if he were the Sheriff, and who 
let off upon me the speech that I knew he had been dying to make all along: 
'Boy, be for ever grateful to all friends, but especially unto them which 
brought you up by hand!'
'God-bye, Joe!'
'God bless you, Pip, old chap!'
I had never parted from him before, and what with my feelings and with soap-
suds, I could at first see no stars from the chaise-cart. But they twinkled 
out one by one, without throwing any light on the questions why on earth I 
was going to play at Miss Havisham's and what on earth I was expected to 
play at


Chapter 8

Mr Pumblechook's premises in the High Street of the market town were of a 
peppercorny and farinaceous character, as the premises of a corn-chandler 
and seedsman should be. It appeared to me that he must be a very happy man 
indeed, to have so many little drawers in his shop; and I wondered when I 
peeped into one or two on the lower tiers, and saw the tied-up brown paper 
packets inside, whether the flower-seeds and bulbs ever wanted of a fine 
day to break out of those jails, and bloom.
k was in the early morning after my arrival that I entertained this 
speculation. On the previous night, I had been sent straight to bed in an 
attic with a sloping roof which was so low in the corner where the bedstead 
was, that I calculated the tiles as being within a foot of my eyebrows. In 
the same early morning, I discovered a singular affinity between seeds and 
corduroys. Mr Pumblechook wore corduroys, and so did his shopman; and 
somehow, there was a general air and flavour about the corduroys, so much 
in the nature of seeds, and a general air and flavour about the seeds, so 
much in the nature of corduroys, that I hardly knew which was which. The 
same opportunity served me for noticing that Mr Pumblechook appeared to 
conduct his business by looking across the street at the saddler, who 
appeared to transact his business by keeping his eye on the coach-maker, 
who appeared to get on in life by putting his hands in his pockets and 
contemplating the baker, who in his turn folded his arms and stared at the 
grocer, who stood at his door and yawned at the chemist. The watchmaker, 
always poring over a little desk with a magnifying glass at his eye, and 
always inspected by a group in smock-frocks poring over him through the 
glass of his shop-window, seemed to be about the only person in the High 
Street whose trade engaged his attention.
Mr Pumblechook and I breakfasted at eight o'clock in the parlour behind the 
shop, while the shopman took his mug of tea and hunch of bread-and-butter 
on a sack of peas in the front premises. I considered Mr Pumblechook 
wretched company. Besides being possessed by my sister's idea that a 
mortifying and penitential character ought to be imparted to my diet - 
besides giving me as much crumb as possible in combination with as little 
butter, and putting such a quantity of warm water into my milk that it 
would have been more candid to have left the milk out altogether - his 
conversation consisted of nothing but arithmetic. On my politely bidding 
him Good-morning, he said pompously, 'Seven times nine, boy!' And how 
should I be able to answer, dodged in that way, in a strange place, on an 
empty stomach! I was hungry, but before I had swallowed a morsel, he began 
a running sum that lasted all through the breakfast. 'Seven?' 'And four?' 
'And eight.)' 'And six?' 'And two?' 'And ten?' And so on. And after each 
figure was disposed of, it was as much as I could do to get a bite or a 
sup, before the next came; while he sat at his ease guessing nothing, and 
eating bacon and hot roll, in (if I may be allowed the expression) a 
gorging and gormandising manner.
For such reasons, I was very glad when ten o'clock came and we started for 
Miss Havisham's; though I was not at all at my ease regarding the manner in 
which I should acquit myself under that lady's roof. Within a quarter of an 
hour we came to Miss Havisham's house, which was of old brick, and dismal, 
and had a great many iron bars to it. Some of the windows had been walled 
up; of those that remained, all the lower were rustily barred. There was a 
courtyard in front, and that was barred; so, we had to wait, after ringing 
the bell, until someone should come to open it While we waited at the gate, 
I peeped in (even then Mr Pumblechook said, 'And fourteen?' but I pretended 
not to hear him), and saw that at the side of the house there was a large 
brewery. No brewing was going on in it, and none seemed to have gone on for 
a long, long time.
A window was raised, and a clear voice demanded, 'What name?' To which my 
conductor replied, 'Pumblechook.' The voice returned, 'Quite right' and the 
window was shut again, and a young lady came across the courtyard, with 
keys in her hand.
'This,' said Mr Pumblechook, 'is Pip.'
'This is Pip, is it?' returned the young lady, who was very pretty and 
seemed very proud; 'come in, Pip.'
Mr Pumblechook was coming in also, when she stopped him with the gate.
'Oh!' she said. 'Did you wish to see Miss Havisham?'
'If Miss Havisham wished to see me,' returned Mr Pumblechook, discomfited.
'Ah!' said the girl; 'but you see she don't.'
She said it so finally, and in such an undiscussible way, that Mr 
Pumblechook, though in a condition of ruffled dignity, could not protest 
But he eyed me severely as if I had done anything to him! - and departed 
with the words reproachfully delivered: 'Boy! Let your behaviour here be a 
credit unto them which brought you up by hand!' I was not free from 
apprehension that he would come back to propound through the gate, 'And 
sixteen?' But he didn't.
My young conductress locked the gate, and we went across the courtyard. It 
was paved and clean, but grass was growing in every crevice. The brewery 
buildings had a little lane of communication with it; and the wooden gates 
of that lane stood open, and all the brewery beyond stood open, away to the 
high inclosing wall; and all was empty and disused. The cold wind seemed to 
blow colder there than outside the gate; and it made a shrill noise in 
howling in and out at the open sides of the brewery, like the noise of wind 
in the rigging of a ship at sea.
She saw me looking at it, and she said, 'You could drink without hurt all 
the strong beer that's brewed there now, boy.'
'I should think I could, miss,' said I in a shy way.
'Better not try to brew beer there now, or it would turn out sour, boy; 
don't you think so? '
'k looks like it, miss.'
'Not that anybody means to try,' she added, 'for that's all done with, and 
the place will stand as idle as it is, till it falls. As to strong beer, 
there's enough of it in the cellars already to drown the Manor House.'
'Is that the name of this house, miss?'
'One of its names, boy.'
'It has more than one, then, miss?'
'One more. Its other name was Satis; which is Greek, or Latin, or Hebrew, 
or all three - or all one to me - for enough.'
'Enough House,' said I; 'that's a curious name, miss.'
'Yes,' she replied; 'but it meant more than it said. It meant, when it was 
given, that whoever had this house, could want nothing else. They must have 
been easily satisfied in those days, I should think. But don't loiter, 
boy.'
Though she called me 'boy' so often, and with a carelessness that was far 
from complimentary, she was of about my own age. She seemed much older than 
I, of course, being a girl, and beautiful and self-possessed; and she was 
as scornful of me as if she had been one-and-twenty, and a queen.
We went into the house by a side door - the great front entrance had two 
chains across it outside - and the first thing I noticed was that the 
passages were all dark, and that she had left a candle burning there. She 
took it up, and went through more passage and up a staircase, and still it 
was all dark, and only the candle lighted us.
At last we came to the door of a room, and she said, 'Go in.'
I answered, more in shyness than politeness, 'After you, miss.'
To this, she returned: 'Don't be ridiculous, boy, I am not going in.' And 
scornfully walked away, and - what was worse - took the candle with her.
This was very uncomfortable, and I was half afraid. However, the only thing 
to be done being to knock at the door, I knocked, and was told from within 
to enter. I entered, therefore, and found myself in a pretty large room, 
well lighted with wax candles. No glimpse of daylight was to be seen in it. 
It was a dressing-room, as I supposed from the furniture, though much of it 
was of forms and uses then quite unknown to me. But prominent in it was a 
draped table with a gilded looking-glass, and that I made out at first to 
be a fine lady's dressing-table.
Whether I should have made out this object so soon, if there had been no 
fine lady sitting at it, I cannot say. In an armchair, with an elbow 
resting on the table and her head leaning on that hand, sat the strangest 
lady I have ever seen, or shall ever see.
She was dressed in rich materials - satins, and lace, and silks - all of 
white. Her shoes were white. And she had a long white veil dependent from 
her hair, and she had bridal flowers in her hair, but her hair was white. 
Some bright jewels sparkled on her neck and on her hands, and some other 
jewels lay sparkling on the table. Dresses, less splendid than the dress 
she wore, and half-packed trunks, were scattered about. She had not quite 
finished dressing, for she had but one shoe on - the other was on the table 
near her hand - her veil was but half arranged, her watch and chain were 
not put on, and some lace for her bosom lay with those trinkets, and with 
her handkerchief, and gloves, and some flowers, and a Prayer-Book, all 
confusedly heaped about the looking-glass.
It was not in the first moments that I saw all these things, though I saw 
more of them in the first moments than might be supposed. But I saw that 
everything within my view which ought to be white, had been white long ago, 
and had lost its lustre, and was faded and yellow. I saw that the bride 
within the bridal dress had withered like the dress, and like the flowers, 
and had no brightness left but the brightness of her sunken eyes. I saw 
that the dress had been put upon the rounded figure of a young woman, and 
that the figure upon which it now hung loose, had shrunk to skin and bone. 
Once, I had been taken to see some ghastly waxwork at the Fair, 
representing I know not what impossible personage lying in state. Once, I 
had been taken to one of our old marsh churches to see a skeleton in the 
ashes of a rich dress, that had been dug out of a vault under the church 
pavement. Now waxwork and skeleton seemed to have dark eyes that moved and 
looked at me. I should have cried out, if I could.
'Who is it?' said the lady at the table.
'Pip, ma'am.'
'Pip?'
'Mr Pumblechook's boy, ma'am. Come - to play.'
'Come nearer; let me look at you. Come close.'
It was when I stood before her, avoiding her eyes, that I took note of the 
surrounding objects in detail, and saw that her watch had stopped at twenty 
minutes to nine, and that a clock in the room had stopped at twenty minutes 
to nine.
'Look at me,' said Miss Havisham. 'You are not afraid of a woman who has 
never seen the sun since you were born?'
I regret to state that I was not afraid of telling the enormous lie 
comprehended in the answer, 'No.'
'Do you know what I touch here?' she said, laying her hands, one upon the 
other, on her left side.
'Yes, ma'am.' at made me think of the young man.)
'What do I touch?'
'Your heart.'
'Broken!'
She uttered the word with an eager look, and with strong emphasis, and with 
a weird smile that had a kind of boast in it.
Afterwards, she kept her hands there for a little while, and slowly took 
them away as if they were heavy.
'I am tired,' said Miss Havisham. 'I want diversion, and I have done with 
men and women. Play.'
I think it will be conceded by my most disputatious reader, that she could 
hardly have directed an unfortunate boy to do anything in the wide world 
more difficult to be done under the circumstances.
'I sometimes have sick fancies,' she went on, 'and I have a sick fancy that 
I want to see some play. There, there!' with an impatient movement of the 
fingers of her right hand; 'play, play, play!'
For a moment, with the fear of my sister's working me before my eyes, I had 
a desperate idea of starting round the room in the assumed character of Mr 
Pumblechook's chaise-cart. But, I felt myself so unequal to the performance 
that I gave it up, and stood looking at Miss Havisham in what I suppose she 
took for a dogged manner, inasmuch as she said, when we had taken a good 
look at each other
'Are you sullen and obstinate?'
'No, ma'am, I am very sorry for you, and very sorry I can't play just now. 
If you complain of me I shall get into trouble with my sister, so I would 
do it if I could; but it's so new here, and so strange, and so fine and 
melancholy - 'I stopped, fearing I might say too much, or had already said 
it, and we took another look at each other.
Before she spoke again, she turned her eyes from me, and looked at the 
dress she wore, and at the dressing-table, and finally at herself in the 
looking-glass.
'So new to him,' she muttered, 'so old to me; so strange to him, so 
familiar to me; so melancholy to both of us! Call Estella.'
As she was still looking at the reflection of herself, I thought she was 
still talking to herself, and kept quiet.
'Call Estella,' she repeated, flashing a look at me. 'You can do that. Call 
Estella. At the door.'
To stand in the dark in a mysterious passage of an unknown house, bawling 
Estella to a scornful young lady neither visible nor responsive, and 
feeling it a dreadful liberty so to roar out her name, was almost as bad as 
playing to order. But she answered at last, and her light came along the 
dark passage like a star.
Miss Havisham beckoned her to come close, and took up a jewel from the 
table, and tried its effect upon her fair young bosom and against her 
pretty brown hair. 'Your own, one day, my dear, and you will use it well. 
Let me see you play cards with this boy.'
'With this boy! Why, he is a common labouring-boy!'
I thought I overheard Miss Havisham answer - only it seemed so unlikely - 
'Well! You can break his heart'
'What do you play, boy?' asked Estella of myself with the greatest disdain.
'Nothing but beggar my neighbour, miss.'
'Beggar him,' said Miss Havisham to Estella. So we sat down to cards.
It was then I began to understand that everything in the room had stopped, 
like the watch and the clock, a long time ago. I noticed that Miss Havisham 
put down the jewel exactly on the spot from which she had taken it up. As 
Estella dealt the cards, I glanced at the dressing-table again, and saw 
that the shoe upon it, once white, now yellow, had never been worn. I 
glanced down at the foot from which the shoe was absent, and saw that the 
silk stocking on it, once white, now yellow, had been trodden ragged. 
Without this arrest of everything, this standing still of all the pale 
decayed objects, nor even the withered bridal dress on the collapsed form 
could have looked so like grave-clothes, or the long veil so like a shroud.
So she sat, corpse-like, as we played at cards; the frillings and trimmings 
on her bridal dress looking like earthy paper. I knew nothing then of the 
discoveries that are occasionally made of bodies buried in ancient times, 
which fall to powder in the moment of being distinctly seen; but I have 
often thought since, that she must have looked as if the admission of the 
natural light of day would have struck her to dust.
'He calls the knaves, Jacks, this boy!' said Estella with disdain, before 
our first game was out 'And what coarse hands he has. And what thick 
boots!'
I had never thought of being ashamed of my hands before; but I began to 
consider them a very indifferent pair. Her contempt was so strong, that it 
became infectious, and I caught it.
She won the game, and I dealt I misdealt, as was only natural, when I knew 
she was lying in wait for me to do wrong; and she denounced me for a 
stupid, clumsy labouring-boy.
'You say nothing of her,' remarked Miss Havisham to me, as she looked on. 
'She says many hard things of you, but you say nothing of her What do you 
think of her?'
'I don't like to say,' I stammered.
'Tell me in my ear,' said Miss Havisham, bending down.
'I think she is very proud,' I replied in a whisper.
'Anything else?'
'I think she is very pretty.'
'Anything else?'
'I think she is very insulting.' (She was looking at me then, with a look 
of supreme aversion.)
'Anything else?'
'I think I should like to go home.'
'And never see her again, though she is so pretty?'
'I am not sure that I shouldn't like to see her again, but I should like to 
go home now.'
'You shall go soon,' said Miss Havisham aloud. 'Play the game out.'
Saving for the one weird smile at first, I should have felt almost sure 
that Miss Havisham's face could not smile. It had dropped into a watchful 
and brooding expression - most likely when all the things about her had 
become transfixed - and it looked as if nothing could ever lift it up 
again. Her chest had dropped, so that she stooped; and her voice had 
dropped, so that she spoke low, and with a dead lull upon her; altogether, 
she had the appearance of having drooped, body and soul, within and 
without, under the weight of a crushing blow.
I played the game to an end with Estella, and she beggared me. She threw 
the cards down on the table when she had won them all, as if she despised 
them for having been won of me.
'When shall I have you here again?' said Miss Havisham. 'Let me think.'
I was beginning to remind her that today was Wednesday, when she checked me 
with her former impatient movement of the fingers of her right hand.
'There, there! I know nothing of days of the week; I know nothing of weeks 
of the year. Come again after six days. You hear?'
'Yes, ma'am.'
'Estella, take him down. Let him have something to eat, and let him roam 
and look about him while he eats. Go, Pip.'
I followed the candle down, as I had followed the candle up, and she stood 
it in the place where we had found it. Until she opened the side entrance, 
I had fancied, without thinking about it, that it must necessarily be night-
time. The rush of the daylight quite confounded me, and made me feel as if 
I had been in the candlelight of the strange room many hours.
'You are to wait here, you boy,' said Estella; and disappeared and closed 
the door.
I took the opportunity of being alone in the courtyard to look at my coarse 
hands and my common boots. My opinion of those accessories was not 
favourable. They had never troubled me before, but they troubled me now, as 
vulgar appendages. I determined to ask Joe why he had ever taught me to 
call those picture-cards, Jacks, which ought to be called knaves. I wished 
Joe had been rather more genteelly brought up, and then I should have been 
so too.
She came back, with some bread and meat and a little mug of beer. She put 
the mug down on the stones of the yard, and gave me the bread and meat 
without looking at me, as insolently as if I were a dog in disgrace. I was 
so humiliated, hurt, spurned, offended, angry, sorry - I cannot hit upon 
the right name for the smart - God knows what its name was - that tears 
started to my eyes. The moment they sprang there, the girl looked at me 
with a quick delight in having been the cause of them. This gave me power 
to keep them back and to look at her: so she gave a contemptuous toss - but 
with a sense, I thought, of having made too sure that I was so wounded - 
and left me.
But, when she was gone, I looked about me for a place to hide my face in, 
and got behind one of the gates in the brewery-lane, and leaned my sleeve 
against the wall there, and leaned my forehead on it, and cried. As I 
cried, I kicked the wall, and took a hard twist at my hair; so bitter were 
my feelings, and so sharp was the smart without a name, that needed 
counteraction
My sister's bringing-up had made me sensitive. In the little world in which 
children have their existence, whosoever brings them up, there is nothing 
so finely perceived and so finely felt, as injustice. It may be only small 
injustice that the child can be exposed to; but the child is small, and its 
world is small, and its rocking-horse stands as many hands high, according 
to scale, as a big-boned Irish hunter. Within myself, I had sustained, from 
my babyhood, a perpetual conflict with injustice. I had known, from the 
time when I could speak, that my sister, in her capricious and violent 
coercion, was unjust to me. I had cherished a profound conviction that her 
bringing me up by hand gave her no right to bring me up by jerks. Through 
all my punishments, disgraces, fasts and vigils, and other penitential 
performances, I had nursed this assurance; and to my communing so much with 
it, in a solitary and unprotected way, I in great part refer the fact that 
I was morally timid and very sensitive.
I got rid of my injured feelings for the time by kicking them into the 
brewery wall, and twisting them out of my hair, and then I smoothed my face 
with my sleeve, and came from behind the gate. The bread and meat were 
acceptable, and the beer was warming and tingling, and I was soon in 
spirits to look about me.
To be sure, it was a deserted place, down to the pigeon-house in the 
brewery-yard, which had been blown crooked on its pole by some high wind, 
and would have made the pigeons think themselves at sea, if there had been 
any pigeons there to be rocked by it. But, there were no pigeons in the 
dove-cot, no horses in the stable, no pigs in the sty, no malt in the store-
house, no smells of grains and beer in the copper or the vat. All the uses 
and scents of the brewery might have evaporated with its last reek of 
smoke. In a by-yard, there was a wilderness of empty casks, which had a 
certain sour remembrance of better days lingering about them; but it was 
too sour to be accepted as a sample of the beer that was gone - and in this 
respect I remember those recluses as being like most others.
Behind the farthest end of the brewery was a rank garden with an old wall: 
not so high but that I could struggle up and hold on long enough to look 
over it, and see that the rank garden was the garden of the house, and that 
it was overgrown with tangled weeds, but that there was a track upon the 
green and yellow paths, as if someone sometimes walked there, and that 
Estella was walking away from me even then. But she seemed to be 
everywhere. For, when I yielded to the temptation presented by the casks, 
and began to walk on them, I saw her walking on them at the end of the yard 
of casks. She had her back towards me, and held her pretty brown hair 
spread out in her two hands, and never looked round, and passed out of my 
view directly. So, in the brewery itself - by which I mean the large paved 
lofty place in which they used to make the beer, and where the brewing 
utensils still were. When I first went into it, and, rather oppressed by 
its gloom, stood near the door looking about me, I saw her pass among the 
extinguished fires, and ascend some light iron stairs, and go out by a 
gallery high overhead, as if she were going out into the sky.
It was in this place, and at this moment, that a strange thing happened to 
my fancy. I thought it a strange thing then, and I thought it a stranger 
thing long afterwards. I turned my eyes - a little dimmed by looking up at 
the frosty light - towards a great wooden beam in a low nook of the 
building near me on my right hand, and I saw a figure hanging there by the 
neck. A figure all in yellow white, with but one shoe to the feet, and it 
hung so, that I could see that the faded trimmings of the dress were like 
earthy paper, and that the face was Miss Havisham's, with a movement going 
over the whole countenance as if she were trying to call to me. In terror 
of seeing the figure, and in the terror of being certain that it had not 
been there a moment before, I at first ran from it, and then ran towards 
it. And my terror was greatest of all, when I found no figure there.
Nothing less than the frosty light of the cheerful sky, the sight of people 
passing beyond the bars of the courtyard gate, and the reviving influence 
of the rest of the bread and meat and beer, would have brought me round. 
Even with those aids, I might not have come to myself as soon as I did, but 
that I saw Estella approaching with the keys to let me out. She would have 
some fair reason for looking down upon me, I thought, if she saw me 
frightened; and she would have no fair reason.
She gave me a triumphant glance in passing me, as if she enjoyed that my 
hands were so coarse and my boots were so thick, and she opened the gate, 
and stood holding it. I was passing out without looking at her, when she 
touched me with a taunting hand.
'Why don't you cry?'
'Because I don't want to.'
'You do,' said she. 'You have been crying till you are half blind, and you 
are near crying again now.'
She laughed contemptuously, pushed me out, and locked the gate upon me. I 
went straight to Mr Pumblechook's, and was immensely relieved to find him 
not at home. So, leaving word with the shopman on what day I was wanted at 
Miss Havisham's again, I set off on the four-mile walk to our forge; 
pondering, as I went along, on all I had seen, and deeply revolving that I 
was a common labouring-boy; that my hands were coarse, that my boots were 
thick; that I had fallen into a despicable habit of calling knaves Jacks; 
that I was much more ignorant than I had considered myself last night, and 
generally that I was in a low-lived, bad way.


Chapter 9

When I reached home, my sister was very curious to know all about Miss 
Havisham's, and asked a number of questions. And I soon found myself 
getting heavily bumped from behind in the nape of the neck and the small of 
the back, and having my face ignominiously shoved against the kitchen wall, 
because I did not answer those questions at sufficient length.
If a dread of not being understood be hidden in the breasts of other young 
people to anything like the extent to which it used to be hidden in mine - 
which I consider probable, as I have no particular reason to Suspect myself 
of having been a monstrosity - it is the key to many reservations. I felt 
convinced that if I described Miss Havisham's as my eyes had seen it, I 
should not be understood. Not only that, but I felt convinced that Miss 
Havisham too would not be understood; and although she was perfectly 
incomprehensible to me, I entertained an impression that there would be 
something coarse and treacherous in my dragging her as she really was (to 
say nothing of Miss Estella) before the contemplation of Mrs Joe. 
Consequently, I said as little as I could and had my face shoved against 
the kitchen wall.
The worst of it was, that that bullying old Pumblechook, preyed upon by a 
devouring curiosity to be informed of all I had seen and heard, came gaping 
over in his chaise-cart at tea-time, to have the details divulged to him. 
And the mere sight of the torment, with his fishy eyes and mouth open, his 
sandy hair inquisitively on end, and his waistcoat heaving with windy 
arithmetic, made me vicious in my reticence.
'Well, boy,' Uncle Pumblechook began, as soon as he was seated in the chair 
of honour by the fire. 'How did you get on up town? '
I answered, 'Pretty well, sir,' and my sister shook her fist at me.
'Pretty well?' Mr Pumblechook repeated. 'Pretty well is no answer. Tell us 
what you mean by pretty well, boy?'
Whitewash on the forehead hardens the brain into a slate of obstinacy 
perhaps. Anyhow, with whitewash from the wall on my forehead, my obstinacy 
was adamantine. I reflected for some time, and then answered as if I had 
discovered a new idea, 'I mean pretty well.'
My sister, with an exclamation of impatience, was going to fly at me - I 
had no shadow of defence, for Joe was busy in the forge - when Mr 
Pumblechook interposed with, 'No! Don't lose your temper. Leave this lad to 
me, ma'am; leave this lad to me.' Mr Pumblechook then turned me towards 
him, as if he were going to cut my hair, and said -
'First (to get our thoughts in order): Forty-three pence? '
I calculated the consequences of replying 'Four Hundred Pound,' and finding 
them against me, went as near the answer as I could which was somewhere 
about eightpence off. Mr Pumblechook then put me through my pence-table 
from 'twelve pence make one shilling,' up to 'forty pence make three and 
fourpence,' and then triumphantly demanded, as if he had done for me, 'Now! 
How much is forty-three pence?' To which I replied, after a long interval 
of reflection, 'I don't know.' And I was so aggravated that I almost doubt 
if I did know.
Mr Pumblechook worked his head like a screw to screw it out of me, and 
said, 'Is forty-three pence seven and sixpence three fardens, for 
instance?'
'Yes!' said I. And although my sister instantly boxed my ears, it was 
highly gratifying to me to see that the answer spoilt his joke, and brought 
him to a dead stop.
'Boy! What like is Miss Havisham?' Mr Pumblechook began again when he had 
recovered; folding his arms tight on his chest and applying the screw.
'Very tall and dark,' I told him.
'Is she, uncle?' asked my sister.
Mr Pumblechook winked assent; from which I at once inferred that he had 
never seen Miss Havisham, for she was nothing of the kind.
'Good!' said Mr Pumblechook conceitedly. ('This is the way to have him! We 
are beginning to hold our own, I think, Mum?')
'I am sure, uncle,' returned Mrs Joe, 'I wish you had him always: you know 
so well how to deal with him.'
'Now, boy! What was she a-doing of, when you went in today?' asked Mr 
Pumblechook
'She was sitting,' I answered, 'in a black velvet coach.'
Mr Pumblechook and Mrs Joe stared at one another - as well they might - and 
both repeated, 'In a black velvet coach?'
'Yes,' said I. 'And Miss Estella - that's her niece, I think - handed her 
in cake and wine at the coach-window, on a gold plate. And we all had cake 
and wine on gold plates. And I got up behind the coach to eat mine, because 
she told me to.'
'Was anybody else there?' asked Mr Pumblechook.
'Four dogs,' said I.
'Large or small?'
'Immense,' said I. 'And they fought for veal-cutlets out of a silver 
basket.'
Mr Pumblechook and Mrs Joe stared at one another again, in utter amazement. 
I was perfectly frantic - a reckless witness under the torture - and would 
have told them anything.
'Where was this coach, in the name of gracious?' asked my sister.
'In Miss Havisham's room.' They stared again. 'But there weren't any horses 
to it.' I added this saving clause, in the moment of rejecting four richly 
caparisoned coursers which I had had wild thoughts of harnessing.
'Can this be possible, uncle?' asked Mrs Joe. 'What can the boy mean?'
'I'll tell you, Mum,' said Mr Pumblechook 'My opinion is, it's a sedan-
chair. She's flighty, you know - very flighty - quite flighty enough to 
pass her days in a sedan-chair.'
'Did you ever see her in it, uncle?' asked Mrs Joe.
'How could I?' he returned, forced to the admission, 'when I never see her 
in my life? Never clapped eyes upon her!'
'Goodness, uncle! And yet you have spoken to her?'
'Why, don't you know,' said Mr Pumblechook testily, 'that when I have been 
there, I have been took up to the outside of her door, and the door has 
stood ajar, and she has spoke to me that way. Don't say you don't know 
that, Mum. Howsever, the boy went there to play. What did you play at, 
boy?'
'We played with flags,' I said. (I beg to observe that I think of myself 
with amazement, when I recall the lies I told on this occasion.)
'Flags!' echoed my sister.
'Yes,' said I. 'Estella waved a blue flag, and I waved a red one and Miss 
Havisham waved one sprinkled all over with little gold stars, out at the 
coach-window. And then we all waved our swords and hurrahed.'
'Swords!' repeated my sister. 'Where did you get swords from?'
'Out of a cupboard,' said I. 'And I saw pistols in it - and jam - and 
pills. And there was no daylight in the room, but it was all lighted up 
with candles.'
'That's true, Mum,' said Mr Pumblechook, with a grave nod. 'That's the 
state of the case, for that much I've seen myself.' And then they both 
stared at me, and I, with an obtrusive show of artlessness on my 
countenance, stared at them, and plaited the right leg of my trousers with 
my right hand.
If they had asked me any more questions I should undoubtedly have betrayed 
myself, for I was even then on the point of mentioning that there was a 
balloon in the yard, and should have hazarded the statement but for my 
invention being divided between that phenomenon and a bear in the brewery. 
They were so much occupied, however, in discussing the marvels I had 
already presented for their consideration, that I escaped. The subject 
still held them when Joe came in from his work to have a cup of tea. To 
whom my sister, more for the relief of her own mind than for the 
gratification of his, related my pretended experiences.
Now, when I saw Joe open his blue eyes and roll them all round the kitchen 
in helpless amazement, I was overtaken by penitence; but only as regarded 
him - not in the least as regarded the other two. Towards Joe, and Joe 
only, I considered myself a young monster, while they sat debating what 
results would come to me from Miss Havisham's acquaintance and favour. They 
had no doubt that Miss Havisham would 'do something' for me; their doubts 
related to the form that something would take. My sister stood out for 
'property.' Mr Pumblechook was in favour of a handsome premium for binding 
me apprentice to some genteel trade - say, the corn and seed trade, for 
instance. Joe fell into the deepest disgrace with both, for offering the 
bright suggestion that I might only be presented with one of the dogs who 
had fought for the veal-cutlets. 'If a fool's head can't express better 
opinions than that,' said my sister, 'and you have got any work to do, you 
had better go and do it.' So he went.
After Mr Pumblechook had driven off, and when my sister was washing up, I 
stole into the forge to Joe, and remained by him until he had done for the 
night. Then I said, 'Before the fire goes out, Joe, I should like to tell 
you something.'
'Should you, Pip?' said Joe, drawing his shoeing-stool near the forge. 
'Then tell us. What is it, Pip?'
'Joe,' said I, taking hold of his rolled-up shirt-sleeve, and twisting it 
between my finger and thumb, 'you remember all that about Miss Havisham's?'
'Remember?' said Joe. 'I believe you! Wonderful!'
'It's a terrible thing, Joe; it ain't true.'
'What are you telling of, Pip?' cried Joe, falling back in the greatest 
amazement. 'You don't mean to say it's - '
'Yes I do; it's lies, Joe.'
'But not all of it? Why sure you don't mean to say, Pip, that there was no 
black welwet coach?' For I stood shaking my head. 'But at least there was 
dogs, Pip. Come, Pip,' said Joe persuasively, 'if there warn't no weal-
cutlets, at least there was dogs?'
'No, Joe.'
'A dog?' said Joe. 'A puppy? Come?'
'No, Joe, there was nothing at all of the kind.'
As I fixed my eyes hopelessly on Joe, Joe contemplated me in dismay. 'Pip, 
old chap! This won't do, old fellow! I say! Where do you expect to go to?'
'It's terrible, Joe; an't it? '
'Terrible?' cried Joe. 'Awful! What possessed you?'
'I don't know what possessed me, Joe,' I replied, letting his shirtsleeve 
go, and sitting down in the ashes at his feet, hanging my head; 'but I wish 
you hadn't taught me to call Knaves at cards, Jacks; and I wish my boots 
weren't so thick nor my hands so coarse.'
And then I told Joe that I felt very miserable and that I hadn't been able 
to explain myself to Mrs Joe and Pumblechook who were so rude to me, and 
that there had been a beautiful young lady at Miss Havisham's who was 
dreadfully proud, and that she had said I was common, and that I knew I was 
common, and that I wished I was not common, and that the lies had come of 
it somehow, though I didn't know how.
This was a case of metaphysics, at least as difficult for Joe to deal with 
as for me. But Joe took the case altogether out of the region of 
metaphysics and by that means vanquished it
'There's one thing you may be sure of, Pip,' said Joe after some 
rumination, 'namely, that lies is lies. Howsever they come, they didn't 
ought to come, and they come from the father of lies, and work round to the 
same. Don't you tell no more of 'em, Pip. That an't the way to get out of 
being common, old chap. And as to being common, I don't make it out at all 
clear. You are oncommon in some things. You're oncommon small. Likewise 
you're a oncommon scholar.'
'No, I am ignorant and backward, Joe.'
'Why, see what a letter you wrote last night Wrote in print even! I've seen 
letters - Ah! and from gentlefolks! - that I'll swear weren't wrote in 
print,' said Joe.
'I've learnt next to nothing, Joe. You think much of me. It's only that.'
'Well, Pip,' said Joe, 'be it so or be it son't, you must be a common 
scholar afore you can be a oncommon one, I should hope! The king upon his 
throne, with his crown upon his 'ed, can't sit and write his acts of 
Parliament in print, without having begun, when he were a unpromoted 
Prince, with the alphabet - Ah!' adder Joe, with a shake of the head that 
was full of meaning, 'and begun at A too, and worked his way to Z. And I 
know what that is to do, though I can't say I've exactly done it'
There was some hope in this piece of wisdom, and it rather encouraged me.
'Whether common ones as to callings and earnings,' pursued Joe 
reflectively, 'mightn't be the better of continuing for to keep company 
with common ones, instead of going out to play with oncommon ones which 
reminds me to hope that there were a flag, perhaps?'
'No, Joe.'
'(I'm sorry there weren't a flag, Pip.) Whether that might be or mightn't 
be, is a thing as can't be looked into now, without putting your sister on 
the Rampage; and that's a thing not to be thought of, as being done 
intentional. Lookee here, Pip, at what is said to you by a true friend. 
Which this to you the true friend say. If you can't get to be oncommon 
through going straight, you'll never get to do it through going crooked. So 
don't tell no more on 'em, Pip, and live well and die happy.'
'You are not angry with me, Joe?'
'No, old chap. But bearing in mind that them were which I meantersay of a 
stunning and outdacious sort - alluding to them which bordered on weal-
cutlets and dog-fighting - a sincere well-wisher would adwise, Pip, their 
being dropped into your meditations, when you go upstairs to bed. That's 
all, old chap, and don't never do it no more.'
When I got up to my little room and said my prayers, I did not forget Joe's 
recommendation, and yet my young mind was in that disturbed and unthankful 
state, that I thought long after I laid me down, how common Estella would 
consider Joe, a mere blacksmith: how thick his boots, and how coarse his 
hands. I thought how Joe and my sister were then sitting in the kitchen, 
and how I had come up to bed from the kitchen, and how Miss Havisham and 
Estella never sat in a kitchen, but were far above the level of such common 
doings. I fell asleep recalling what I 'used to do' when I was at Miss 
Havisham's; as though I had been there weeks or months, instead of hours; 
and as though it were quite an old subject of remembrance, instead of one 
that had arisen only that day.
That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me. But, it is 
the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it, and 
think how different its course would have been. Pause you who read this, 
and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or 
flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the 
first link on one memorable day.


Chapter 10

The felicitous idea occurred to me a morning or two later when I woke, that 
the best step I could take towards making myself uncommon was to get out of 
Biddy everything she knew. In pursuance of this luminous conception I 
mentioned to Biddy when I went to Mr Wopsle's great-aunt's at night, that I 
had a particular reason for wishing to get on in life, and that I should 
feel very much obliged to her if she would impart all her learning to me. 
Biddy, who was the most obliging of girls, immediately said she would, and 
indeed began to carry out her promise within five minutes.
The Educational scheme or Course established by Mr Wopsle's great-aunt may 
be resolved into the following synopsis. The pupils ate apples and put 
straws down one another's backs until Mr Wopsle's great-aunt collected her 
energies, and made an indiscriminate totter at them with a birch-rod. After 
receiving the charge with every mark of derision, the pupils formed in line 
and buzzingly passed a ragged book from hand to hand. The book had an 
alphabet in it, some figures and tables, and a little spelling - that is to 
say, it had had once. As soon as this volume began to circulate, Mr 
Wopsle's great-aunt fell into a state of coma; arising either from sleep or 
a rheumatic paroxysm. The pupils then entered among themselves upon a 
competitive examination on the subject of Boots, with the view of 
ascertaining who could tread the hardest upon whose toes. This mental 
exercise lasted until Biddy made a rush at them and distributed three 
defaced Bibles (shaped as if they had been unskilfully cut off the chump-
end of something), more illegibly printed at the best than any curiosities 
of literature I have since met with, speckled all over with iron-mould, and 
having various specimens of the insect world smashed between their leaves. 
This part of the Course was usually lightened by several single combats 
between Biddy and refractory students. When the fights were over, Biddy 
gave out the number of a page, and then we all read aloud what we could - 
or what we couldn't - in a frightful chorus; Biddy leading with a high 
shrill monotonous voice, and none of us having the least notion of, or 
reverence for, what we were reading about. When this horrible din had 
lasted a certain time, it mechanically awoke Mr Wopsle's great-aunt, who 
staggered at a boy fortuitously, and pulled his ears. This was understood 
to terminate the Course for the evening, and we emerged into the air with 
shrieks of intellectual victory. It is fair to remark that there was no 
prohibition against any pupil's entertaining himself with a slate or even 
with the ink (when there was any), but that it was not easy to pursue that 
branch of study in the winter season, on account of the little general shop 
in which the classes were holden - and which was also Mr Wopsle's great-
aunt's sitting-room and bed-chamber - being but faintly illuminated through 
the agency of one low-spirited dip-candle and no snuffers.
It appeared to me that it would take time, to become uncommon under these 
circumstances: nevertheless, I resolved to try it, and that very evening 
Biddy entered on our special agreement, by imparting some information from 
her little catalogue of Prices, under the head of moist sugar, and lending 
me, to copy at home, a large old English D which she had imitated from the 
heading of some newspaper, and which I supposed, until she told me what it 
was, to be a design for a buckle.
Of course there was a public-house in the village, and of course Joe liked 
sometimes to smoke his pipe there. I had received strict orders from my 
sister to call for him at the Three Jolly Bargemen, that evening, on my way 
from school, and bring him home at my peril. To the Three Jolly Bargemen, 
therefore, I directed my steps.
There was a bar at the Jolly Bargemen, with some alarmingly long chalk 
scores in it on the wall at the side of the door, which seemed to me to be 
never paid off. They had been there ever since I could remember, and had 
grown more than I had. But there was a quantity of chalk about our country, 
and perhaps the people neglected no opportunity of turning it to account.
It being Saturday night, I found the landlord looking rather grimly at 
these records, but as my business was with Joe and not with him, I merely 
wished him good evening, and passed into the common room at the end of the 
passage, where there was a bright large kitchen fire, and where Joe was 
smoking his pipe in company with Mr Wopsle and a stranger. Joe greeted me 
as usual with 'Hollo, Pip, old chap!' and the moment he said that, the 
stranger turned his head and looked at me.
He was a secret-looking man whom I had never seen before. His head was all 
on one side, and one of his eyes was half shut up, as if he were taking aim 
at something with an invisible gun. He had a pipe in his mouth, and he took 
it out, and, after slowly blowing all his smoke away and looking hard at me 
all the time, nodded. So, I nodded, and then he nodded again, and made room 
on the settle beside him that I might sit down there.
But, as I was used to sit beside Joe whenever I entered that place of 
resort, I said 'No, thank you, sir,' and fell into the space Joe made for 
me on the opposite settle. The strange man, after glancing at Joe, and 
seeing that his attention was otherwise engaged, nodded to me again when I 
had taken my seat, and then rubbed his leg - in a very odd way, as it 
struck me.
'You was saying,' said the strange man, turning to Joe, 'that you was a 
blacksmith.'
'Yes. I said it, you know,' said Joe.
'What'll you drink, Mr - ? You didn't mention your name, by-the-bye.'
Joe mentioned it now, and the strange man called him by it. 'What'll you 
drink, Mr Gargery? At my expense? To top up with?'
'Well,' said Joe, 'to tell you the truth, I ain't much in the habit of 
drinking at anybody's expense but my own.'
'Habit? No,' returned the stranger, 'but once and away, and on a Saturday 
night too. Come! Put a name to it, Mr Gargery.'
'I wouldn't wish to be stiff company,' said Joe. 'Rum.'
'Rum,' repeated the stranger. 'And will the other gentleman originate a 
sentiment.'
'Rum,' said Mr Wopsle.
'Three Rums!' cried the stranger, calling to the landlord. 'Glasses round!'
'This other gentleman,' observed Joe, by way of introducing Mr Wopsle, 'is 
a gentleman that you would like to hear give it out. Our clerk at church.'
'Aha!' said the stranger, quickly, and cocking his eye at me. 'The lonely 
church, right out on the marshes, with graves round it!'
'That's it,' said Joe.
The stranger, with a comfortable kind of grunt over his pipe, put his legs 
up on the settle that he had to himself. He wore a flapping broad-brimmed 
traveller's hat, and under it a handkerchief tied over his head in the 
manner of a cap: so that he showed no hair. As he looked at the fire, I 
thought I saw a cunning expression, followed by a half-laugh, come into his 
face.
'I am not acquainted with this country, gentlemen, but it seems a solitary 
country towards the river.'
'Most marshes is solitary,' said Joe.
'No doubt, no doubt. Do you find any gypsies, now, or tramps, or vagrants 
of any sort, out there?'
'No,' said Joe; 'none but a runaway convict now and then. And we don't find 
them, easy. Eh, Mr Wopsle?'
Mr Wopsle, with a majestic remembrance of old discomfiture, assented; but 
not warmly.
'Seems you have been out after such?' asked the stranger.
'Once,' returned Joe. 'Not that we wanted to take them, you understand; we 
went out as lookers-on; me, and Mr Wopsle, and Pip. Didn't us, Pip?'
'Yes, Joe.'
The stranger looked at me again - still cocking his eye, as if he were 
expressly taking aim at me with his invisible gun - and said, 'He's a 
likely young parcel of bones that. What is it you call him?'
'Pip,' said Joe.
'Christened Pip?'
'No, not christened Pip.'
'Surname Pip?'
'No,' said Joe, 'it's a kind of family name what he gave himself when a 
infant, and is called by.'
'Son of yours?'
'Well,' said Joe, meditatively - not, of course, that it could be in 
anywise necessary to consider about it, but because it was the way at the 
Jolly Bargemen to seem to consider deeply about everything that was 
discussed over pipes; 'well - no. No, he ain't.'
'Nevvy?' said the strange man.
'Well,' said Joe, with the same appearance of profound cogitation, 'he is 
not - no, not to deceive you, he is not - my nevvy.'
'What the Blue Blazes is he?' asked the stranger. Which appeared to me to 
be an inquiry of unnecessary strength.
Mr Wopsle struck in upon that; as one who knew all about relationships, 
having professional occasion to bear in mind what female relations a man 
might not marry; and expounded the ties between me and Joe. Having his hand 
in, Mr Wopsle finished off with a most terrifically snarling passage from 
Richard the Third, and seemed to think he had done quite enough to account 
for it when he added, - 'as the poet says.'
And here I may remark that when Mr Wopsle referred to me, he considered it 
a necessary part of such reference to rumple my hair and poke it into my 
eyes. I cannot conceive why everybody of his standing who visited at our 
house should always have put me through the same inflammatory process under 
similar circumstances. Yet I do not call to mind that I was ever in my 
earlier youth the subject of remark in our social family circle, but some 
large-handed person took some such ophthalmic steps to patronise me.
All this while, the strange man looked at nobody but me, and looked at me 
as if he were determined to have a shot at me at last, and bring me down. 
But he said nothing after offering his Blue Blazes observation, until the 
glasses of rum-and-water were brought; and then he made his shot, and a 
most extraordinary shot it was.
It was not a verbal remark, but a proceeding in dump show, and was 
pointedly addressed to me. He stirred his rum-and-water pointedly at me, 
and he tasted his rum-and-water pointedly at me. And he stirred it and he 
tasted it: not with a spoon that was brought to him, but with a file.
He did this so that nobody but I saw the file; and when he had done it he 
wiped the file and put it in a breast-pocket. I knew it to be Joe's file, 
and I knew that he knew my convict, the moment I saw the instrument. I sat 
gazing at him, spell-bound. But he now reclined on his settle, taking very 
little notice of me, and talking principally about turnips.
There was a delicious sense of cleaning-up and making a quiet pause before 
going on in life afresh, in our village on Saturday nights, which 
stimulated Joe to dare to stay out half an hour longer on Saturdays than at 
other times. The half hour and the rum-and-water running out together, Joe 
got up to go, and took me by the hand.
'Stop half a moment, Mr Gargery,' said the strange man. 'I think I've got a 
bright new shilling somewhere in my pocket, and if I have, the boy shall 
have it.'
He looked it out from a handful of small change, folded it in some crumpled 
paper, and gave it to me. 'Yours!' said he. 'Mind! Your own.'
I thanked him, staring at him far beyond the bounds of good manners, and 
holding tight to Joe. He gave Joe good-night, and he gave Mr Wopsle good-
night (who went out with us), and he gave me only a look with his aiming 
eye - no, not a look, for he shut it up, but wonders may be done with an 
eye by hiding it.
On the way home, if I had been in a humour for talking, the talk must have 
been all on my side, for Mr Wopsle parted from us at the door of the Jolly 
Bargemen, and Joe went all the way home with his mouth wide open, to rinse 
the rum out with as much air as possible. But I was in a manner stupefied 
by this turning up of my old misdeed and old acquaintance, and could think 
of nothing else.
My sister was not in a very bad temper when we presented ourselves in the 
kitchen, and Joe was encouraged by that unusual circumstance to tell her 
about the bright shilling. 'A bad 'un, I'll be bound,' said Mrs Joe 
triumphantly, 'or he wouldn't have given it to the boy! Let's look at it.'
I took it out of the paper, and it proved to be a good one. 'But what's 
this?' said Mrs Joe, throwing down the shilling and catching up the paper. 
'Two One-Pound notes?'
Nothing less than two fat sweltering one-pound notes that seemed to have 
been on terms of the warmest intimacy with all the cattle markets in the 
county. Joe caught up his hat again, and ran with them to the Jolly 
Bargemen to restore them to their owner. While he was gone, I sat down on 
my usual stool and looked vacantly at my sister, feeling pretty sure that 
the man would not be there.
Presently, Joe came back, saying that the man was gone, but that he, Joe, 
had left word at the Three Jolly Bargemen concerning the notes. Then my 
sister sealed them up in a piece of paper, and put them under some dried 
rose-leaves in an ornamental teapot on the top of a press in the state 
parlour. There they remained, a nightmare to me, many and many a night and 
day.
I had sadly broken sleep when I got to bed, through thinking of the strange 
man taking aim at me with his invisible gun, and of the guiltily coarse and 
common thing it was, to be on secret terms of conspiracy with convicts - a 
feature in my low career that I had previously forgotten. I was haunted by 
the file too. A dread possessed me that when I least expected it, the file 
would reappear. I coaxed myself to sleep by thinking of Miss Havisham's, 
next Wednesday; and in my sleep I saw the file coming at me out of a door, 
without seeing who held it, and I screamed myself awake.


Chapter 11

At the appointed time I returned to Miss Havisham's, and my hesitating ring 
at the gate brought out Estella. She locked it after admitting me, as she 
had done before, and again preceded me into the dark passage where her 
candle stood. She took no notice of me until she had the candle in her 
hand, when she looked over her shoulder, superciliously saying, 'You are to 
come this way today,' and took me to quite another part of the house.
The passage was a long one, and seemed to pervade the whole square basement 
of the Manor House. We traversed but one side of the square, however, and 
at the end of it she stopped, and put her candle down and opened a door. 
Here, the daylight reappeared, and I found myself in a small paved court-
yard, the opposite side of which was formed by a detached dwelling-house, 
that looked as if it had once belonged to the manager or head clerk of the 
extinct brewery. There was a clock in the outer wall of this house. Like 
the clock in Miss Havisham's room, and like Miss Havisham's watch, it had 
stopped at twenty minutes to nine.
We went in at the door, which stood open, and into a gloomy room with a low 
ceiling, on the ground floor at the back. There was some company in the 
room, and Estella said to me as she joined it, 'You are to go and stand 
there, boy, till you are wanted.' 'There', being the window, I crossed to 
it, and stood 'there,' in a very uncomfortable state of mind, looking out.
It opened to the ground, and looked into a most miserable corner of the 
neglected garden, upon a rank ruin of cabbage-stalks, and one box tree that 
had been clipped round long ago, like a pudding, and had a new growth at 
the top of it, out of shape and of a different colour, as if that part of 
the pudding had stuck to the saucepan and got burnt. This was my homely 
thought, as I contemplated the box-tree. There had been some light snow, 
overnight, and it lay nowhere else to my knowledge; but, it had not quite 
melted from the cold shadow of this bit of garden, and the wind caught it 
up in little eddies and threw it at the window, as if it pelted me for 
coming there.
I divined that my coming had stopped conversation in the room, and that its 
other occupants were looking at me. I could see nothing of the room except 
the shining of the fire in the window glass, but I stiffened in all my 
joints with the consciousness that I was under close inspection.
There were three ladies in the room and one gentleman. Before I had been 
standing at the window five minutes, they somehow conveyed to me that they 
were all toadies and humbugs, but that each of them pretended not to know 
that the others were toadies and humbugs: because the admission that he or 
she did know it, would have made him or her out to be a toady and humbug.
They all had a listless and dreary air of waiting somebody's pleasure, and 
the most talkative of the ladies had to speak quite rigidly to repress a 
yawn. This lady, whose name was Camilla, very much reminded me of my 
sister, with the difference that she was older, and (as I found when I 
caught sight of her) of a blunter cast of features. Indeed, when I knew her 
better I began to think it was a Mercy she had any features at all, so very 
blank and high was the dead wall of her face.
'Poor dear soul!' said this lady, with an abruptness of manner quite my 
sister's. 'Nobody's enemy but his own!'
'It would be much more commendable to be somebody else's enemy,' said the 
gentleman; 'far more natural.'
'Cousin Raymond,' observed another lady, 'we are to love our neighbour.'
'Sarah Pocket,' returned Cousin Raymond, 'if a man is not his own 
neighbour, who is?'
Miss Pocket laughed, and Camilla laughed and said (checking a yawn), 'The 
idea!' But I thought they seemed to think it rather a good idea too. The 
other lady, who had not spoken yet, said gravely and emphatically, 'Very 
true!'
'Poor soul!' Camilla presently went on (I knew they had all been looking at 
me in the mean time), 'he is so very strange! Would anyone believe that 
when Tom's wife died, he actually could not be induced to see the 
importance of the children's having the deepest of trimmings to their 
mourning? "Good Lord!" says he, "Camilla, what can it signify so long as 
the poor bereaved little things are in black?" So like Matthew! The idea!'
'Good points in him, good points in him,' said Cousin Raymond; 'Heaven 
forbid I should deny good points in him; but he never had, and he never 
will have, any sense of the proprieties.'
'You know I was obliged,' said Camilla, 'I was obliged to be firm. I said, 
"It WILL NOT DO, for the credit of the family." I told him that, without 
deep trimmings, the family was disgraced. I cried about it from breakfast 
till dinner. I injured my digestion. And at last he flung out in his 
violent way, and said, with a D-, "Then do as you like." Thank Goodness it 
will always be a consolation to me to know that I instantly went out in a 
pouring rain and bought the things.'
'He paid for them, did he not?' asked Estella.
'It's not the question, my dear child, who paid for them,' returned 
Camilla. 'I bought them. And I shall often think of that with peace, when I 
wake up in the night.'
The ringing of a distant bell, combined with the echoing of some cry or 
call along the passage by which I had come, interrupted the conversation 
and caused Estella to say to me, 'Now, boy!' On my turning round, they all 
looked at me with the utmost contempt, and, as I went out, I heard Sarah 
Pocket say, 'Well I am sure! What next!' and Camilla add, with indignation, 
'Was there ever such a fancy! The i-de-a!'
As we were going with our candle along the dark passage, Estella stopped 
all of a sudden, and, facing round, said in her taunting manner with her 
face quite close to mine:
'Well?'
'Well, miss?' I answered, almost falling over her and checking myself.
She stood looking at me, and, of course, I stood looking at her.
'Am I pretty?'
'Yes; I think you are very pretty.'
'Am I insulting?'
'Not so much so as you were last time,' said I.
'Not so much so?'
'No.'
She fired when she asked the last question, and she slapped my face with 
such force as she had, when I answered it.
'Now?' said she. 'You little coarse monster, what do you think of me now?'
'I shall not tell you.'
'Because you are going to tell, upstairs. It that it?'
'No,' said I, 'that's not it.'
'Why don't you cry again, you little wretch?'
'Because I'll never cry for you again,' said I. Which was, I suppose, as 
false a declaration as ever was made; for I was inwardly crying for her 
then, and I know what I know of the pain she cost me afterwards.
We went on our way upstairs after this episode; and, as we were going up, 
we met a gentleman groping his way down.
'Whom have we here?' asked the gentleman, stopping and looking at me.
'A boy,' said Estella.
He was a burly man of an exceedingly dark complexion, with an exceedingly 
large head and a corresponding large hand. He took my chin in his large 
hand and turned up my face to have a look at me by the light of the candle. 
He was prematurely bald on the top of his head, and had bushy black 
eyebrows that wouldn't lie down but stood up bristling. His eyes were set 
very deep in his head, and were disagreeably sharp and suspicious. He had a 
large watch-chain, and strong black dots where his beard and whiskers would 
have been if he had let them. He was nothing to me, and I could have had no 
foresight then, that he ever would be anything to me, but it happened that 
I had this opportunity of observing him well.
'Boy of the neighbourhood? Hey?' said he.
'Yes, sir,' said I.
'How do you come here?'
'Miss Havisham sent for me, sir,' I explained.
'Well! Behave yourself. I have a pretty large experience of boys, and 
you're a bad set of fellows. Now mind!' said he, biting the side of his 
great forefinger as he frowned at me, 'you behave yourself!'
With those words, he released me - which I was glad of, for his hand smelt 
of scented soap - and went his way downstairs. I wondered whether he could 
be a doctor; but no, I thought; he couldn't be a doctor, or he would have a 
quieter and more persuasive manner. There was not much time to consider the 
subject, for we were soon in Miss Havisham's room, where she and everything 
else were just as I had left them. Estella left me standing near the door, 
and I stood there until Miss Havisham cast her eyes upon me from the 
dressing-table.
'So!' she said, without being startled or surprised; 'the days have worn 
away, have they?'
'Yes, ma'am. Today is - '
'There, there, there!' with the impatient movement of her fingers. 'I don't 
want to know. Are you ready to play?'
I was obliged to answer in some confusion, 'I don't think I am, ma'am.'
'Not at cards again?' she demanded, with a searching look.
'Yes, ma'am; I could do that, if I was wanted.'
'Since this house strikes you old and grave, boy,' said Miss Havisham, 
impatiently, 'and you are unwilling to play, are you willing to work?'
I could answer this inquiry with a better heart than I had been able to 
find for the other question, and I said I was quite willing.
'Then go into that opposite room,' said she, pointing at the door behind me 
with her withered hand, 'and wait there till I come.'
I crossed the staircase landing, and entered the room she indicated. From 
that room, too, the daylight was completely excluded, and it had an airless 
smell that was oppressive. A fire had been lately kindled in the damp old-
fashioned grate, and it was more disposed to go out than to burn up, and 
the reluctant smoke which hung in the room seemed colder than the clearer 
air - like our own marsh mist. Certain wintry branches of candles on the 
high chimney-piece faintly lighted the chamber: or, it would be more 
expressive to say, faintly troubled its darkness. It was spacious, and I 
dare say had once been handsome, but every discernible thing in it was 
covered with dust and mould, and dropping to pieces. The most prominent 
object was a long table with a tablecloth spread on it, as if a feast had 
been in preparation when the house and the clocks all stopped together. An 
epergne or centrepiece of some kind was in the middle of this cloth; it was 
so heavily overhung with cobwebs that its form was quite undistinguishable; 
and, as I looked along the yellow expanse out of which I remember its 
seeming to grow, like a black fungus, I saw speckled-legged spiders with 
blotchy bodies running home to it, and running out from it, as if some 
circumstances of the greatest public importance had just transpired in the 
spider community.
I heard the mice too, rattling behind the panels, as if the same occurrence 
were important to their interests. But, the black-beetles took no notice of 
the agitation, and groped about the hearth in a ponderous elderly way, as 
if they were short-sighted and hard of hearing, and not on terms with one 
another.
These crawling things had fascinated my attention and I was watching them 
from a distance, when Miss Havisham laid a hand upon my shoulder. In her 
other hand she had a crutch-headed stick on which she leaned, and she 
looked like the Witch of the place.
'This,' said she, pointing to the long table with her stick, 'is where I 
will be laid when I am dead. They shall come and look at me here.'
With some vague misgiving that she might get upon the table then and there 
and die at once, the complete realization of the ghastly waxwork at the 
Fair, I shrank under her touch.
'What do you think that is?' she asked me, again pointing with her stick; 
'that, where those cobwebs are?'
'I can't guess what it is, ma'am.'
'It's a great cake. A bride-cake. Mine!'
She looked all round the room in a glaring manner, and then said, leaning 
on me while her hand twitched my shoulder, 'Come, come, come! Walk me, walk 
me!'
I made out from this, that the work I had to do, was to walk Miss Havisham 
round and round the room. Accordingly, I stated at once, and she leaned 
upon my shoulder, and we went away at a pace that might have been an 
imitation (founded on my first impulse under that roof) of Mr Pumblechook's 
chaise-cart.
She was not physically strong, and after a little time said, 'Slower!' 
Still, we went at an impatient fitful speed, and as we went, she twitched 
the hand upon my shoulder, and worked her mouth, and led me to believe that 
we were going fast because her thoughts went fast. After a while she said, 
'Call Estella!' so I went out on the landing and roared that name as I had 
done on the previous occasion. When her light appeared, I returned to Miss 
Havisham, and we started away again round and round the room.
If only Estella had come to be a spectator of our proceedings, I should 
have felt sufficiently discontented; but, as she brought with her the three 
ladies and the gentleman whom I had seen below, I didn't know what to do. 
In my politeness, I would have stopped; but, Miss Havisham twitched my 
shoulder, and we posted on - with a shame-faced consciousness on my part 
that they would think it was all my doing.
'Dear Miss Havisham,' said Miss Sarah Pocket. 'How well you look!'
'I do not,' returned Miss Havisham. 'I am yellow skin and bone.'
Camilla brightened when Miss Pocket met with this rebuff; and she murmured, 
as she plaintively contemplated Miss Havisham, 'Poor dear soul!' Certainly 
not to be expected to look well, poor thing. The idea!'
'And how are you?' said Miss Havisham to Camilla. As we were close to 
Camilla then, I would have stopped as a matter of course, only Miss 
Havisham wouldn't stop. We swept on, and I felt that I was highly obnoxious 
to Camilla.
'Thank you, Miss Havisham,' she returned, 'I am as well as can be 
expected.'
'Why, what's the matter with you?' asked Miss Havisham, with exceeding 
sharpness.
'Nothing worth mentioning,' replied Camilla. 'I don't wish to make a 
display of my feelings, but I have habitually thought of you more in the 
night than I am quite equal to.'
'Then don't think of me,' retorted Miss Havisham.
'Very easily said!' remarked Camilla, amiably repressing a sob, while a 
hitch came into her upper lip, and her tears overflowed. 'Raymond is a 
witness what ginger and sal volatile I am obliged to take in the night. 
Raymond is a witness what nervous jerkings I have in my legs. Chokings and 
nervous jerkings, however, are nothing new to me when I think with anxiety 
of those I love. If I could be less affectionate and sensitive, I should 
have a better digestion and an iron set of nerves. I am sure I wish to 
could be so. But as to not thinking of you in the night - The idea!' Here, 
a burst of tears.
The Raymond referred to, I understood to be the gentleman present, and him 
I understood to be Mr Camilla. He came to the rescue at this point, and 
said in a consolatory and complimentary voice, 'Camilla, my dear, it is 
well known that your family feelings are gradually undermining you to the 
extent of making one of your legs shorter than the other.'
'I am not aware,' observed the grave lady whose voice I had heard but once, 
'that to think of any person is to make a great claim upon that person, my 
dear.'
Miss Sarah Pocket, whom I now saw to be a little dry brown corrugated old 
woman, with a small face that might have been made of walnut shells, and a 
large mouth like a cat's without the whiskers, supported this position by 
saying, 'No, indeed, my dear. Hem!'
'Thinking is easy enough,' said the grave lady.
'What is easier, you know?' assented Miss Sarah Pocket.
'Oh, yes, yes!' cried Camilla, whose fermenting feelings appeared to rise 
from her legs to her bosom. 'It's all very true! It's a weakness to be so 
affectionate, but I can't help it. No doubt my health would be much better 
if it was otherwise, still I wouldn't change my disposition if I could. 
It's the cause of much suffering, but it's a consolation to know I posses 
it, when I wake up in the night.' Here another burst of feeling.
Miss Havisham and I had never stopped all this time, but kept going round 
and round the room: now, brushing against the skirts of the visitors: now, 
giving them the whole length of the dismal chamber.
'There's Matthew!' said Camilla. 'Never mixing with any natural ties, never 
coming here to see how Miss Havisham is! I have taken to the sofa with my 
stay-lace cut, and have lain there hours, insensible, with my head over the 
side, and my hair all down, and my feet I don't know where - '
('Much higher than your head, my love,' said Mr Camilla.)
'I have gone off into that state, hours and hours, on account of Matthew's 
strange and inexplicable conduct, and nobody has thanked me.'
'Really I must say I should think not!' interposed the grave lady.
'You see, my dear,' added Miss Sarah Pocket (a blandly vicious personage), 
'the question to put to yourself is, who did you expect to thank you, my 
love?'
'Without expecting any thanks, or anything of the sort,' resumed Camilla, 
'I have remained in that state, hours and hours, and Raymond is a witness 
of the extent to which I have choked, and what the total inefficacy of 
ginger has been, and I have been heard at the pianoforte-tuner's across the 
street, where the poor mistaken children have even supposed it to be 
pigeons cooing at a distance-and now to be told -' Here Camilla put her 
hand to her throat, and began to be quite chemical as to the formation of 
new combinations there.
When this same Matthew was mentioned, Miss Havisham stopped me and herself, 
and stood looking at the speaker. This change had a great influence in 
bringing Camilla's chemistry to a sudden end.
'Matthew will come and see me at last,' said Miss Havisham, sternly, when I 
am laid on that table. That will be his place - there,' striking the table 
with her stick, 'at my head! And yours will be there! And your husband's 
there! And Sarah Pocket's there! And Georgiana's there! Now you all know 
where to take your stations when you come to feast upon me. And now go!'
At the mention of each name, she had struck the table with her stick in a 
new place. She now said, 'Walk me, walk me!' and we went on again.
'I suppose there's nothing to be done,' exclaimed Camilla, 'but comply and 
depart. It's something to have seen the object of one's love and duty, for 
even so short a time. I shall think of it with a melancholy satisfaction 
when I wake up in the night. I wish Matthew could have that comfort, but he 
sets it at defiance. I am determined not to make a display of my feelings, 
but it's very hard to be told one wants to feast on one's relations - as if 
one was a Giant - and to be told to go. The bare idea!'
Mr Camilla interposing, as Mrs Camilla laid her hand upon her heaving 
bosom, that lady assumed an unnatural fortitude of manner which I supposed 
to be expressive of an intention to drop and choke when out of view, and 
kissing her hand to Miss Havisham, was escorted forth. Sarah Pocket and 
Georgiana contended who should remain last; but, Sarah was too knowing to 
be outdone, and ambled round Georgiana with that artful slipperiness, that 
the latter was obliged to take precedence. Sarah Pocket then made her 
separate effect of departing with 'Bless you, Miss Havisham dear!' and with 
a smile of forgiving pity on her walnut-shell countenance for the 
weaknesses of the rest.
While Estella was away lighting them down, Miss Havisham still walked with 
her hand on my shoulder, but more and more slowly. At last she stopped 
before the fire, and said, after muttering and looking at it some seconds:
'This is my birthday, Pip.'
I was going to wish her many happy returns, when she lifted her stick.
'I don't suffer it to be spoken of. I don't suffer those who were here just 
now, or any one, to speak of it. They come here on the day, but they dare 
not refer to it.'
Of course I made no further effort to refer to it.
'On this day of the year, long before you were born, this heap of decay,' 
stabbing with her crutched stick at the pile of cobwebs on the table but 
not touching it, 'was brought here. It and I have worn away together. The 
mice have gnawed at it, and sharper teeth than teeth of mice have gnawed at 
me.'
She held the head of her stick against her heart as she stood looking at 
the table; she in her once white dress, all yellow and withered; the once 
white cloth all yellow and withered; everything around, in a state to 
crumble under a touch.
'When the ruin is complete,' said she, with a ghastly look, 'and when they 
lay me dead, in my bride's dress on the bride's table - which shall be 
done, and which will be the finished curse upon him - so much the better if 
it is done on this day!'
She stood looking at the table as if she stood looking at her own figure 
lying there. I remained quiet. Estella returned, and she too remained 
quiet. It seemed to me that we continued thus for a long time. In the heavy 
air of the room, and the heavy darkness that brooded in its remoter 
corners, I even had an alarming fancy that Estella and I might presently 
begin to decay.
At length, not coming out of her distraught state by degrees, but in an 
instant, Miss Havisham said, 'Let me see you two play cards; why have you 
not begun?' With that, we returned to her room, and sat down as before; I 
was beggared, as before; and again, as before, Miss Havisham watched us all 
the time, directed my attention to Estella's beauty, and made me notice it 
the more by trying her jewels on Estella's breast and hair.
Estella, for her part, likewise treated me as before; except that she did 
not condescend to speak. When we had played some half-dozen games, a day 
was appointed for my return, and I was taken down into the yard to be fed 
in the former dog-like manner. There, too, I was again left to wander about 
as I liked.
It is not much to the purpose whether a gate in that garden wall which I 
had scrambled up to peep over on the last occasion was, on that last 
occasion, open or shut. Enough that I saw no gate them, and that I saw one 
now. As it stood open, and as I knew that Estella had let the visitors out -
 for, she had returned with the keys in her hand - I strolled into the 
garden and strolled all over it. It was quite a wilderness, and there were 
old melon-frames and cucumber-frames in it, which seemed in their decline 
to have produced a spontaneous growth of weak attempts at pieces of old 
hats and boots, with now and then a weedy offshoot into the likeness of a 
battered saucepan.
When I had exhausted the garden, and a greenhouse with nothing in it but a 
fallen-down grape-vine and some bottles, I found myself in the dismal 
corner upon which I had looked out of window. Never questioning for a 
moment that the house was now empty, I looked in at another window, and 
found myself, to my great surprise, exchanging a broad stare with a pale 
young gentleman with red eyelids and light hair.
This pale young gentleman quickly disappeared, and reappeared beside me. He 
had been at his books when I had found myself staring at him, and I now saw 
that he was inky.
'Halloa!' said he, 'young fellow!'
Halloa being a general observation which I had usually observed to be best 
answered by itself, I said, 'Halloa!' politely omitting young fellow.
'Who let you in?' said he.
'Miss Estella.'
'Who gave you leave to prowl about?'
'Miss Estella.'
'Come and fight,' said the pale young gentleman.
What could I do but follow him? I have often asked myself the question 
since: but, what else could I do? His manner was so final and I was so 
astonished, that I followed where he led, as if I had been under a spell.
'Stop a minute, though,' he said, wheeling round before we had gone many 
paces. 'I ought to give you a reason for fighting, too. There it is!' In a 
most irritating manner he instantly slapped his hands against one another, 
daintily flung one of his legs up behind him, pulled my hair, slapped his 
hands again, dipped his head, and butted it into my stomach.
The bull-like proceeding last mentioned, besides that it was unquestionably 
to be regarded in the light of a liberty, was particularly disagreeable 
just after bread and meat. I therefore hit out at him and was going to hit 
out again, when he said, 'Aha! Would you?' and began dancing backwards and 
forwards in a manner quite unparalleled within my limited experience.
'Laws of the game!' said he. Here, he skipped from his left leg on to his 
right. 'Regular rules!' Here, he skipped from his right leg on to his left. 
'Come to the ground, and go through the preliminaries!' Here, he dodged 
backwards and forwards, and did all sorts of things while I looked 
helplessly at him.
I was secretly afraid of him when I saw him so dextrous; but, I felt 
morally and physically convinced that his light head of hair could have had 
no business in the pit of my stomach, and that I had a right to consider it 
irrelevant when so obtruded on my attention. Therefore, I followed him 
without a word, to a retired nook of the garden, formed by the junction of 
two walls and screened by some rubbish. On his asking me if I was satisfied 
with the ground, and on my replying Yes, he begged my leave to absent 
himself for a moment, and quickly returned with a bottle of water and a 
sponge dipped in vinegar. 'Available for both,' he said, placing these 
against the wall. And then fell to pulling off, not only his jacket and 
waistcoat, but his shirt too, in a manner at once light-hearted, 
businesslike, and bloodthirsty.
Although he did not look very healthy - having pimples on his face, and a 
breaking out at his mouth - these dreadful preparations quite appalled me. 
I judged him to be about my own age, but he was much taller, and he had a 
way of spinning himself about that was full of appearance. For the rest, he 
was a young gentleman in a grey suit (when not denuded for battle), with 
his elbows, knees, wrists, and heels, considerably in advance of the rest 
of him as to development.
My heart failed me when I saw him squaring at me with every demonstration 
of mechanical nicety, and eyeing my anatomy as if he were minutely choosing 
his bone. I never have been so surprised in my life, as I was when I let 
out the first blow, and saw him lying on his back, looking up at me with a 
bloody nose and his face exceedingly fore-shortened.
But, he was on his feet directly, and after sponging himself with a great 
show of dexterity began squaring again. The second greatest surprise I have 
ever had in my life was seeing him on his back again, looking up at me out 
of a black eye.
His spirit inspired me with great respect. He seemed to have no strength, 
and he never once hit me hard, and he was always knocked down; but, he 
would be up again in a moment, sponging himself or drinking out of the 
water-bottle, with the greatest satisfaction in seconding himself according 
to form, and then came at me with an air and a show that made me believe he 
really was going to do for me at last. He got heavily bruised, for I am 
sorry to record that the more I hit him, the harder I hit him; but, he came 
up again and again and again, until at last he got a bad fall with the back 
of his head against the wall. Even after that crisis in our affairs, he got 
up and turned round and round confusedly a few times, not knowing where I 
was; but finally went on his knees to his sponge and threw it up: at the 
same time panting out, 'That means you have won.'
He seemed to brave and innocent, that although I had not proposed the 
contest I felt but a gloomy satisfaction in my victory. Indeed, I go so far 
as to hope that I regarded myself while dressing, as a species of savage 
young wolf, or other wild beast. However, I got dressed, darkly wiping my 
sanguinary face at intervals, and I said, 'Can I help you?' and he said 'No 
thank'ee,' and I said 'Good afternoon,' and he said 'Same to you.'
When I got into the court-yard, I found Estella waiting with the keys. But, 
she neither asked me where I had been, nor why I had kept her waiting; and 
there was a bright flush upon her face, as though something had happened to 
delight her. Instead of going straight to the gate, too, she stepped back 
into the passage, and beckoned me.
'Come here! You may kiss me, if you like.'
I kissed her cheek as she turned it to me. I think I would have gone 
through a great deal to kiss her cheek. But, I felt that the kiss was given 
to the coarse common boy as a piece of money might have been, and that it 
was worth nothing.
What with the birthday visitors, and what with the cards, and what with the 
fight, my stay had lasted so long, that when I neared home the light on the 
spit of sand off the point on the marshes was gleaming against a black 
night-sky, and Joe's furnace was flinging a path of fire across the road.


Chapter 12

My mind grew very uneasy on the subject of the pale young gentleman. The 
more I thought of the fight, and recalled the pale young gentleman on his 
back in various stages of puffy and incrimsoned countenance, the more 
certain it appeared that something would be done to me. I felt that the 
pale young gentleman's blood was on my head, and that the Law would avenge 
it. Without having any definite idea of the penalties I had incurred, it 
was clear to me that village boys could not go stalking about the country, 
ravaging the houses of gentlefolks and pitching into the studious youth of 
England, without laying themselves open to severe punishment. For some 
days, I even kept close at home, and looked out at the kitchen door with 
the greatest caution and trepidation before going on an errand, lest the 
officers of the County Jail should pounce upon me. The pale young 
gentleman's nose had stained my trousers, and I tried to wash out that 
evidence of my guilt in the dead of night. I had cut my knuckles against 
the pale young gentleman's teeth, and I twisted my imagination into a 
thousand tangles, as I devised incredible ways of accounting for that 
damnatory circumstance when I should be haled before the Judges.
When the day came round for my return to the scene of the deed of violence, 
my terrors reached their height. Whether myrmidons of Justice, specially 
sent down from London, would be lying in ambush behind the gate? Whether 
Miss Havisham, preferring to take personal vengeance for an outrage done to 
her house, might rise in those grave-clothes of hers, draw a pistol, and 
shoot me dead? Whether suborned boys - a numerous band of mercenaries - 
might be engaged to fall upon me in the brewery, and cuff me until I was no 
more? It was high testimony to my confidence in the spirit of the pale 
young gentleman, that I never imagined him accessory to these retaliations; 
they always came into my mind as the acts of injudicious relatives of his, 
goaded on by the state of his visage and an indignant sympathy with the 
family features.
However, go to Miss Havisham's I must, and go I did. And behold! nothing 
came of the late struggle. It was not alluded to in any way, and no pale 
young gentleman was to be discovered on the premises. I found the same gate 
open, and I explored the garden, and even looked in at the windows of the 
detached house; but, my view was suddenly stopped by the closed shutters 
within, and all was lifeless. Only in the corner where the combat had taken 
place, could I detect any evidence of the young gentleman's existence. 
There were traces of his gore in that spot, and I covered them with garden-
mould from the eye of man.
On the broad landing between Miss Havisham's own room and that other room 
in which the long table was laid out, I saw a garden-chair - a light chair 
on wheels, that you pushed from behind. It had been placed there since my 
last visit, and I entered, that same day, on a regular occupation of 
pushing Miss Havisham in this chair (when she was tired of walking with her 
hand upon my shoulder) round her own room, and across the landing, and 
round the other room. Over and over and over again, we would make these 
journeys, and sometimes they would last as long as three hours at a 
stretch. I insensibly fall into a general mention of these journeys as 
numerous, because it was at once settled that I should return every 
alternate day at noon for these purposes, and because I am now going to sum 
up a period of at least eight or ten months.
As we began to be more used to one another, Miss Havisham talked more to 
me, and asked me such questions as what had I learnt and what was I going 
to be? I told her I was going to be apprenticed to Joe, I believed; and I 
enlarged upon my knowing nothing and wanting to know everything, in the 
hope that she might offer some help towards that desirable end. But, she 
did not; on the contrary, she seemed to prefer my being ignorant. Neither 
did she ever give me any money - or anything but my daily dinner - nor even 
stipulate that I should be paid for my services.
Estella was always about, and always let me in and out, but never told me I 
might kiss her again. Sometimes, she would coldly tolerate me; sometimes, 
she would condescend to me; sometimes, she would be quite familiar with me; 
sometimes, she would tell me energetically that she hated me. Miss Havisham 
would often ask me in a whisper, or when we were alone, 'Does she grow 
prettier and prettier, Pip?' And when I said yes (for indeed she did), 
would seem to enjoy it greedily. Also, when we played at cards Miss 
Havisham would look on, with a miserly relish of Estella's moods, whatever 
they were. And sometimes, when her moods were so many and so contradictory 
of one another that I was puzzled what to say or do, Miss Havisham would 
embrace her with lavish fondness, murmuring something in her ear that 
sounded like 'Break their hearts my pride and hope, break their hearts and 
have no mercy!'
There was a song Joe used to hum fragments of at the forge, of which the 
burden was Old Clem. This was not a very ceremonious way of rendering 
homage to a patron saint; but, I believe Old Clem stood in that relation 
towards smiths. It was a song that imitated the measure of beating upon 
iron, and was a mere lyrical excuse for the introduction of Old Clem's 
respected name. Thus, you were to hammer boys round - Old Clem! With a 
thump and a sound - Old Clem! Beat it out, beat it out - Old Clem! With a 
clink for the stout - Old Clem! Blow the fire, blow the fire - Old Clem! 
Roaring dryer, soaring higher - Old Clem! One day soon after the appearance 
of the chair, Miss Havisham suddenly saying to me, with the impatient 
movement of her fingers, 'There, there, there! Sing!' I was surprised into 
crooning this ditty as I pushed her over the floor. It happened so to catch 
her fancy, that she took it up in a low brooding voice as if she were 
singing in her sleep. After that, it became customary with us to have it as 
we moved about, and Estella would often join in; though the whole strain 
was so subdued, even when there were three of us, that it made less noise 
in the grim old house than the lightest breath of wind.
What could I become with these surroundings? How could my character fail to 
be influenced by them? Is it to be wondered at if my thoughts were dazed, 
as my eyes were, when I came out into the natural light from the misty 
yellow rooms?
Perhaps, I might have told Joe about the pale young gentleman, if I had not 
previously been betrayed into those enormous inventions to which I had 
confessed. Under the circumstances, I felt that Joe could hardly fail to 
discern in the pale young gentleman, an appropriate passenger to be put 
into the black velvet coach; therefore, I said nothing of him. Besides: 
that shrinking from having Miss Havisham and Estella discussed, which had 
come upon me in the beginning, grew much more potent as time went on. I 
reposed complete confidence in no one but Biddy; but, I told poor Biddy 
everything. Why it came natural to me to do so, and why Biddy had a deep 
concern in everything I told her, I did not know then, though I think I 
know now.
Meanwhile, councils went on in the kitchen at home, fraught with almost 
insupportable aggravation to my exasperated spirit. That ass, Pumblechook, 
used often to come over a night for the purpose of discussing my prospects 
with my sister; and I really do believe (to this hour with less penitence 
than I ought to feel), that if these hands could have taken a linchpin out 
of his chaise-cart, they would have done it. The miserable man was a man of 
that confined stolidity of mind, that he could not discuss my prospects 
without having me before him - as it were, to operate upon - and he would 
drag me up from my stool (usually by the collar) where I was quiet in a 
corner, and, putting me before the fire as if I were going to be cooked, 
would begin by saying, 'Now, Mum, here is this boy! Here is this boy which 
you brought up by hand. Hold up your head, boy, and be for ever grateful 
unto them which so did do. Now, Mum, with respections to this boy!' And 
then he would rumple my hair the wrong way - which from my earliest 
remembrance, as already hinted, I have in my soul denied the right of any 
fellow-creature to do - and would hold me before him by the sleeve: a 
spectacle of imbecility only to be equalled by himself.
Then, he and my sister would pair off in such nonsensical speculations 
about Miss Havisham, and about what she would do with me and for me, that I 
used to want - quite painfully - to burst into spiteful tears, fly at 
Pumblechook, and pummel him all over. In these dialogues, my sister spoke 
to me as if she were morally wrenching one of my teeth out at every 
reference; while Pumblechook himself, self-constituted my patron, would sit 
supervising me with a deprecatory eye, like the architect of my fortunes 
who thought himself engaged on a very unremunerative job.
In these discussions, Joe bore no part. But he was often talked at, while 
they were in progress, by reason of Mrs Joe's perceiving that he was not 
favourable to my being taken from the forge. I was fully old enough now, to 
be apprenticed to Joe; and when Joe sat with the poker on his knees 
thoughtfully raking out the ashes between the lower bars, my sister would 
so distinctly construe that innocent action into opposition on his part, 
that she would dive at him, take the poker out of his hands, shake him, and 
put it away. There was a most irritating end to every one of these debates. 
All in a moment, with nothing to lead up to it, my sister would stop 
herself in a yawn, and catching sight of me as it were incidentally, would 
swoop upon me with, 'Come! there's enough of you! You get along to bed; 
you've given trouble enough for one night, I hope!' As if I had besought 
them as a favour to bother my life out.
We went on in this way for a long time, and it seemed likely that we should 
continue to go on in this way for a long time, when, one day, Miss Havisham 
stopped short as she and I were walking, she leaning on my shoulder; and 
said with some displeasure:
'You are growing tall, Pip!'
I thought it best to hint, through the medium of a meditative look, that 
this might be occasioned by circumstances over which I had no control.
She said no more at the time; but, she presently stopped and looked at me 
again; and presently again; and after that, looked frowning and moody. On 
the next day of my attendance when our usual exercise was over, and I had 
landed her at her dressing-table, she stayed me with a movement of her 
impatient fingers:
'Tell me the name again of that blacksmith of yours.'
'Joe Gargery, ma'am.'
'Meaning the master you were to be apprenticed to?'
'Yes, Miss Havisham.'
'You had better be apprenticed at once. Would Gargery come here with you, 
and bring your indentures, do you think?'
I signified that I had no doubt he would take it as an honour to be asked.
'Then let him come.'
'At any particular time, Miss Havisham?'
'There, there! I know nothing about times. Let him come soon, and come 
alone with you.'
When I got home at night, and delivered this message for Joe, my sister 
'went on the Rampage,' in a more alarming degree than at any previous 
period. She asked me and Joe whether we supposed she was door-mats under 
our feet, and how we dared to use her so, and what company we graciously 
thought she was fit for? When she had exhausted a torrent of such 
inquiries, she threw a candlestick at Joe, burst into a loud sobbing, got 
out the dustpan - which was always a very bad sign - put on her coarse 
apron, and began cleaning up to a terrible extent. Not satisfied with a dry 
cleaning, she took to a pail and scrubbing-brush, and cleaned us out of 
house and home, so that we stood shivering in the back-yard. It was ten 
o'clock at night before we ventured to creep in again, and then she asked 
Joe why he hadn't married a Negress Slave at once? Joe offered no answer, 
poor fellow, but stood feeling his whisker and looking dejectedly at me, as 
if he thought it really might have been a better speculation.


Chapter 13

It was a trial to my feelings, on the next day but one, to see Joe arraying 
himself in his Sunday clothes to accompany me to Miss Havisham's. However, 
as he thought his court-suit necessary to the occasion, it was not for me 
tell him that he looked far better in his working dress; the rather, 
because I knew he made himself so dreadfully uncomfortable, entirely on my 
account, and that it was for me he pulled up his shirt-collar so very high 
behind, that it made the hair on the crown of his head stand up like a tuft 
of feathers.
At breakfast time my sister declared her intention of going to town with 
us, and being left at Uncle Pumblechook's and called for 'when we had done 
with our fine ladies' - a way of putting the case, from which Joe appeared 
inclined to augur the worst. The forge was shut up for the day, and Joe 
inscribed in chalk upon the door (as it was his custom to do on the very 
rare occasions when he was not at work) the monosyllable HOUT, accompanied 
by a sketch of an arrow supposed to be flying in the direction he had 
taken.
We walked to town, my sister leading the way in a very large beaver bonnet, 
and carrying a basket like the Great Seal of England in plaited straw, a 
pair of patterns, a spare shawl, and an umbrella, though it was a fine 
bright day. I am not quite clear whether these articles were carried 
penitentially or ostentatiously; but, I rather think they were displayed as 
articles of property - much as Cleopatra or any other sovereign lady on the 
Rampage might exhibit her wealth in a pageant or procession.
When we came to Pumblechook's, my sister bounced in and left us. As it was 
almost noon, Joe and I held straight on to Miss Havisham's house. Estella 
opened the gate as usual, and, the moment she appeared, Joe took his hat 
off and stood weighing it by the brim in both his hands: as if he had some 
urgent reason in his mind for being particular to half a quarter of an 
ounce.
Estella took no notice of either of us, but led us the way that I knew so 
well. I followed next to her, and Joe came last. When I looked back at Joe 
in the long passage, he was still weighing his hat with the greatest care, 
and was coming after us in long strides on the tips of his toes.
Estella told me we were both to go in, so I took Joe by the coat-cuff and 
conducted him into Miss Havisham's presence. She was seated at her dressing-
table, and looked round at us immediately.
'Oh!' said she to Joe. 'You are the husband of the sister of this boy?'
I could hardly have imagined dear old Joe looking so unlike himself or so 
like some extraordinary bird; standing, as he did, speechless, with his 
tuft of feathers ruffled, and his mouth open, as if he wanted a worm.
'You are the husband,' repeated Miss Havisham, 'of the sister of this boy?'
It was very aggravating; but, throughout the interview Joe persisted in 
addressing Me instead of Miss Havisham.
'Which I meantersay, Pip,' Joe now observed in a manner that was at once 
expressive of forcible argumentation, strict confidence, and great 
politeness, 'as I hup and married your sister, and I were at the time what 
you might call (if you was anyways inclined) a single man.'
'Well!' said Miss Havisham. 'And you have reared the boy, with the 
intention of taking him for your apprentice; is that so, Mr Gargery?'
'You know, Pip,' replied Joe, 'as you and me were ever friends, and it were 
looked for'ard to betwixt us, as being calc'lated to lead to larks. Not but 
what, Pip, if you had ever made objections to the business - such as its 
being open to black and sut, or suchlike - not but what they would have 
been attended to, don't you see?'
'Has the boy,' said Miss Havisham, 'ever made any objection? Does he like 
the trade?'
'Which it is well beknown to yourself, Pip,' returned Joe, strengthening 
his former mixture of argumentation, confidence, and politeness, 'that it 
were the wish of your own hart.' (I saw the idea suddenly break upon him 
that he would adapt his epitaph to the occasion, before he went on to say) 
'And there weren't no objection on your part, and Pip it were the great 
wish of your hart!'
It was quite in vain for me to endeavour to make him sensible that he ought 
to speak to Miss Havisham. The more I made faces and gestures to him to do 
it, the more confidential, argumentative, and polite, he persisted in being 
to Me.
'Have you brought his indentures with you?' asked Miss Havisham.
'Well, Pip, you know,' replied Joe, as if that were a little unreasonable, 
'you yourself see me put 'em in my 'at, and therefore you know as they are 
here.' With which he took them out, and gave them, not to Miss Havisham, 
but to me. I am afraid I was ashamed of the dear good fellow - I know I was 
ashamed of him - when I saw that Estella stood at the back of Miss 
Havisham's chair, and that her eyes laughed mischievously. I took the 
indentures out of his hand and gave them to Miss Havisham.
'You expected,' said Miss Havisham, as she looked them over, 'no premium 
with the boy?'
'Joe!' I remonstrated; for he made no reply at all. 'Why don't you answer - 
'
'Pip,' returned Joe, cutting me short as if he were hurt, 'which I 
meantersay that were not a question requiring a answer betwixt yourself and 
me, and which you know the answer to be full well No. You know it to be No, 
Pip, and wherefore should I say it?'
Miss Havisham glanced at him as if she understood what he really was, 
better than I had thought possible, seeing what he was there; and took up a 
little bag from the table beside her.
'Pip has earned a premium here,' she said, 'and here it is. There are five-
and-twenty guineas in this bag. Give it to your master, Pip.'
As if he were absolutely out of his mind with the wonder awakened in him by 
her strange figure and the strange room, Joe, even at this pass, persisted 
in addressing me.
'This is wery liberal on your part, Pip,' said Joe, 'and it is as such 
received and grateful welcome, though never looked for, far nor near nor 
nowheres. And now, old chap,' said Joe, conveying to me a sensation, first 
of burning and then of freezing, for I felt as if that familiar expression 
were applied to Miss Havisham; 'and now, old chap, may we do our duty! May 
you and me do our duty, both on us by one and another, and by them which 
your liberal present - have - conweyed - to be - for the satisfaction of 
mind - of - them as never -' here Joe showed that he felt he had fallen 
into frightful difficulties, until he triumphantly rescued himself with the 
words, 'and from myself far be it!' These words had such a round and 
convincing sound for him that he said them twice.
'Good-bye, Pip!' said Miss Havisham. 'Let them out, Estella.'
'Am I to come again, Miss Havisham?' I asked.
'No. Gargery is your master now. Gargery! One word!'
Thus calling him back as I went out of the door, I heard her say to Joe, in 
a distinct emphatic voice, 'The boy has been a good boy here, and that is 
his reward. Of course, as an honest man, you will expect no other and no 
more.'
How Joe got out of the room, I have never been able to determine; but, I 
know that when he did get out he was steadily proceeding upstairs instead 
of coming down, and was deaf to all remonstrances until I went after him 
and laid hold of him. In another minute we were outside the gate, and it 
was locked, and Estella was gone.
When we stood in the daylight alone again, Joe backed up against a wall, 
and said to me, 'Astonishing!' And there he remained so long, saying 
'Astonishing' at intervals, so often, that I began to think his senses were 
never coming back. At length he prolonged his remark into 'Pip, I do assure 
you this is astonishing!' and so, by degrees, became conversational and 
able to walk away.
I have reason to think that Joe's intellects were brightened by the 
encounter they had passed through, and that on our way to Pumblechook's he 
invented a subtle and deep design. My reason is to be found in what took 
place in Mr Pumblechook's parlour: where, on our presenting ourselves, my 
sister sat in conference with that detested seedsman.
'Well?' cried my sister, addressing us both at once. 'And what's happened 
to you? I wonder you condescend to come back to such poor society as this, 
I am sure I do!'
'Miss Havisham,' said Joe, with a fixed look at me, like an effort of 
remembrance, 'made it wery partick'ler that we should give her - were it 
compliments or respects, Pip?'
'Compliments,' I said.
'Which that were my own belief,' answered Joe - 'her compliments to Mrs J. 
Gargery - '
'Much good they'll do me!' observed my sister; but rather gratified too.
'And wishing,' pursued Joe, with another fixed look at me, like another 
effort to remembrance, 'that the state of Miss Havisham's 'elth were sitch 
as would have - allowed, were it, Pip?'
'Of her having the pleasure,' I added.
'Of ladies' company,' said Joe. And drew a long breath.
'Well!' cried my sister, with a mollified glance at Mr Pumblechook. 'She 
might have had the politeness to send that message at first, but it's 
better late than never. And what did she give young Rantipole here?'
'She giv' him,' said Joe, 'nothing.'
Mrs Joe was going to break out, but Joe went on.
'What she giv',' said Joe, 'she giv' to his friends. "And by his friends," 
were her explanation, "I mean into the hands of his sister Mrs J. Gargery." 
Them were her words; "Mrs J. Gargery." She mayn't have know'd,' added Joe, 
with an appearance of reflection, 'whether it were Joe, or Jorge.'
My sister looked at Pumblechook: who smoothed the elbows of his wooden 
armchair, and nodded at her and at the fire, as if he had known all about 
it beforehand.
'And how much have you got?' asked my sister, laughing. Positively, 
laughing!
'What would present company say to ten pound?' demanded Joe.
'They'd say,' returned my sister, curtly, 'pretty well. Not too much, but 
pretty well.'
'It's more than that, then,' said Joe.
That fearful Impostor, Pumblechook, immediately nodded, and said, as he 
rubbed the arms of his chair: 'It's more than that, Mum.'
'Why, you don't mean to say -' began my sister.
'Yes I do, Mum,' said Pumblechook; 'but wait a bit. Go on, Joseph. Good in 
you! Go on!'
'What would present company say,' proceeded Joe, 'to twenty pound?'
'Handsome would be the word,' returned my sister.
'Well, then,' said Joe, 'It's more than twenty pound.'
That abject hypocrite, Pumblechook, nodded again, and said, with a 
patronising laugh, 'It's more than that, Mum. Good again! Follow her up, 
Joseph!'
'Then to make an end of it,' said Joe, delightedly handing the bag to my 
sister; 'it's five-and-twenty pound.'
'It's five-and-twenty pound, Mum,' echoed that basest of swindlers, 
Pumblechook, rising to shake hands with her; 'and it's no more than your 
merits (as I said when my opinion was asked), and I wish you joy of the 
money!'
If the villain had stopped here, his case would have been sufficiently 
awful, but he blackened his guilt by proceeding to take me into custody, 
with a right of patronage that left all his former criminality far behind.
'Now you see, Joseph and wife,' said Pumblechook, as he took me by the arm 
above the elbow, 'I am one of them that always go right through with what 
they've begun. This boy must be bound, out of hand. That's my way. Bound 
out of hand.'
'Goodness knows, Uncle Pumblechook,' said my sister (grasping the money), 
'we're deeply beholden to you.'
'Never mind me, Mum, returned that diabolical corn-chandler. 'A pleasure's 
a pleasure, all the world over. But this boy, you know; we must have him 
bound. I said I'd see to it - to tell you the truth.'
The Justices were sitting in the Town Hall near at hand, and we at once 
went over to have me bound apprentice to Joe in the Magisterial presence. I 
say, we went over, but I was pushed over by Pumblechook, exactly as if I 
had that moment picked a pocket or fired a rick; indeed, it was the general 
impression in Court that I had been taken red-handed, for, as Pumblechook 
shoved me before him through the crowd, I heard some people say, 'What's he 
done?' and others, 'He's a young 'un, too, but looks bad, don't he? One 
person of mild and benevolent aspect even gave me a tract ornamented with a 
woodcut of a malevolent young man fitted up with a perfect sausage-shop of 
fetters, and entitled, TO BE READ IN MY CELL.
The Hall was a queer place, I thought, with higher pews in it than a church 
- and with people hanging over the pews looking on - and with mighty 
Justices (one with a powdered head) leaning back in chairs, with folded 
arms, or taking snuff, or going to sleep, or writing, or reading the 
newspapers - and with some shining black portraits on the walls, which my 
unartistic eye regarded as a composition of hardbake and sticking-plaister. 
Here, in a corner, my indentures were duly signed and attested, and I was 
'bound;' Mr Pumblechook holding me all the while as if we had looked in on 
our way to the scaffold, to have those little preliminaries disposed of.
When we had come out again, and had got rid of the boys who had been put 
into great spirits by the expectation of seeing me publicly tortured, and 
who were much disappointed to find that my friends were merely rallying 
round me, we went back to Pumblechook's. And there my sister became so 
excited by the twenty-five guineas, that nothing would serve her but we 
must have a dinner out of that windfall, at the Blue Boar, and that 
Pumblechook must go over in his chaise-cart, and bring the Hubbles and Mr 
Wopsle.
It was agreed to be done; and a most melancholy day I passed. For, it 
inscrutably appeared to stand to reason, in the minds of the whole company, 
that I was an excrescence on the entertainment. And to make it worse, they 
all asked me from time to time - in short, whenever they had nothing else 
to do - why I didn't enjoy myself. And what could I possibly do then, but 
say I was enjoying myself - when I wasn't?
However, they were grown up and had their own way, and they made the most 
of it. That swindling Pumblechook, exalted into the beneficent contriver of 
the whole occasion, actually took the top of the table; and, when he 
addressed them on the subject of my being bound, and had fiendishly 
congratulated them on my being liable to imprisonment if I played at cards, 
drank strong liquors, kept late hours or bad company, or indulged in other 
vagaries which the form of my indentures appeared to contemplate as next to 
inevitable, he placed me standing on a chair beside him, to illustrate his 
remarks.
My only other remembrances of the great festival are, That they wouldn't 
let me go to sleep, but whenever they saw me dropping off, woke me up and 
told me to enjoy myself. That, rather late in the evening Mr Wopsle gave us 
Collins's ode, and threw his blood-stained sword in thunder down, with such 
effect, that a waiter came in and said, 'The Commercials underneath sent up 
their compliments, and it wasn't the Tumblers' Arms.' That, they were all 
in excellent spirits on the road home, and sang O Lady Fair! Mr Wopsle 
taking the bass, and asserting with a tremendously strong voice (in reply 
to the inquisitive bore who leads that piece of music in a most impertinent 
manner, by wanting to know all about everybody's private affairs) that he 
was the man with his white locks flowing, and that he was upon the whole 
the weakest pilgrim going.
Finally, I remember that when I got into my little bedroom I was truly 
wretched, and had a strong conviction on me that I should never like Joe's 
trade. I had liked it once, but once was not now.


Chapter 14

It is a most miserable thing to feel ashamed of home. There may be black 
ingratitude in the thing, and the punishment may be retributive and well 
deserved; but, that it is a miserable thing, I can testify.
Home had never been a very pleasant place to me, because of my sister's 
temper. But, Joe had sanctified it, and I had believed in it. I had 
believed in the best parlour as a most elegant saloon; I had believed in 
the front door, as a mysterious portal of the Temple of State whose solemn 
opening was attended with a sacrifice of roast fowls; I had believed in the 
kitchen as a chaste though not magnificent apartment; I had believed in the 
forge as the glowing road to manhood and independence. Within a single 
year, all this was changed. Now, it was all coarse and common, and I would 
not have had Miss Havisham and Estella see it on any account.
How much of my ungracious condition of mind may have been my own fault, how 
much Miss Havisham's, how much my sister's, is now of no moment to me or to 
any one. The change was made in me; the thing was done. Well or ill done, 
excusably or inexcusably, it was done.
Once, it had seemed to me that when I should at last roll up my shirt-
sleeves and go into the forge, Joe's 'prentice, I should be distinguished 
and happy. Now the reality was in my hold, I only felt that I was dusty 
with the dust of small coal, and that I had a weight upon my daily 
remembrance to which the anvil was a feather. There have been occasions in 
my later life (I suppose as in most lives) when I have felt for a time as 
if a thick curtain had fallen on all its interest and romance, to shut me 
out from anything save dull endurance any more. Never has that curtain 
dropped so heavy and blank, as when my way in life lay stretched out 
straight before me through the newly-entered road of apprenticeship to Joe.
I remember that at a later period of my 'time,' I used to stand about the 
churchyard on Sunday evenings when night was falling, comparing my own 
perspective with the windy marsh view, and making out some likeness between 
them by thinking how flat and low both were, and how on both there came an 
unknown way and a dark mist and then the sea. I was quite as dejected on 
the first working-day of my apprenticeship as in that after-time; but I am 
glad to know that I never breathed a murmur to Joe while my indentures 
lasted. It is about the only thing I am glad to know of myself in that 
connection.
For, though it includes what I proceed to add, all the merit of what I 
proceed to add was Joe's. It was not because I was faithful, but because 
Joe was faithful, that I never ran away and went for a soldier or a sailor. 
It was not because I had a strong sense of the virtue of industry, but 
because Joe had a strong sense of the virtue of industry, that I worked 
with tolerable zeal against the grain. It is not possible to know how far 
the influence of any amiable honest-hearted duty-doing man flies out into 
the world; but it is very possible to know how it has touched one's self in 
going by, and I know right well, that any good that intermixed itself with 
my apprenticeship came of plain contented Joe, and not of restlessly 
aspiring discontented me.
What I wanted, who can say? How can I say, when I never knew? What I 
dreaded was, that in some unlucky hour I, being at my grimiest and 
commonest, should lift up my eyes and see Estella looking in at one of the 
wooden windows of the forge. I was haunted by the fear that she would, 
sooner or later, find me out, with a black face and hands, doing the 
coarsest part of my work, and would exult over me and despise me. Often 
after dark, when I was pulling the bellows for Joe, and we were singing Old 
Clem, and when the thought how we used to sing it at Miss Havisham's would 
seem to show me Estella's face in the fire, with her pretty hair fluttering 
in the wind and her eyes scorning me, - often at such a time I would look 
towards those panels of black night in the wall which the wooden windows 
then were, and would fancy that I saw her just drawing her face away, and 
would believe that she had come at last.
After that, when we went in to supper, the place and the meal would have a 
more homely look than ever, and I would feel more ashamed of home than 
ever, in my own ungracious breast.



Chapter 15

As I was getting too big for Mr Wopsle's great-aunt's room, my education 
under that preposterous female terminated. Not, however, until Biddy had 
imparted to me everything she knew, from the little catalogue of prices, to 
a comic song she had once bought for a halfpenny. Although the only 
coherent part of the latter piece of literature were the opening lines,

When I went to Lunnon town sirs,
Too rul loo rul
Too rul loo rul
Wasn't I done very brown sirs?
Too rul loo rul
Too rul loo rul

 - still, in my desire to be wiser, I got this composition by heart with 
the utmost gravity; nor do I recollect that I questioned its merit, except 
that I thought (as I still do) the amount of Too rul somewhat in excess of 
the poetry. In my hunger for information, I made proposals to Mr Wopsle to 
bestow some intellectual crumbs upon me; with which he kindly complied. As 
it turned out, however, that he only wanted me for a dramatic lay-figure, 
to be contradicted and embraced and wept over and bullied and clutched and 
stabbed and knocked about in a variety of ways, I soon declined that course 
of instruction; though not until Mr Wopsle in his poetic fury had severely 
mauled me.
Whatever I acquired, I tried to impart to Joe. This statement sounds so 
well, that I cannot in my conscience let it pass unexplained. I wanted to 
make Joe less ignorant and common, that he might be worthier of my society 
and less open to Estella's reproach.
The old Battery out on the marshes was our place of study, and a broken 
slate and a short piece of slate pencil were our educational implements: to 
which Joe always added a pipe of tobacco. I never knew Joe to remember 
anything from one Sunday to another, or to acquire, under my tuition, any 
piece of information whatever. Yet he would smoke his pipe at the Battery 
with a far more sagacious air than anywhere else - even with a learned air -
 as if he considered himself to be advancing immensely. Dear fellow, I hope 
he did.
It was pleasant and quiet, out there with the sails on the river passing 
beyond the earthwork, and sometimes, when the tide was low, looking as if 
they belonged to sunken ships that were still sailing on at the bottom of 
the water. Whenever I watched the vessels standing out to sea with their 
white sails spread, I somehow thought of Miss Havisham and Estella; and 
whenever the light struck aslant, afar off, upon a cloud or sail or green 
hill-side or water-line, it was just the same. - Miss Havisham and Estella 
and the strange house and the strange life appeared to have something to do 
with everything that was picturesque.
One Sunday when Joe, greatly enjoying his pipe, had so plumed himself on 
being 'most awful dull,' that I had given him up for the day, I lay on the 
earthwork for some time with my chin on my hand, descrying traces of Miss 
Havisham and Estella all over the prospect, in the sky and in the water, 
until at last I resolved to mention a thought concerning them that had been 
much in my head.
'Joe,' said I; 'don't you think I ought to make Miss Havisham a visit?'
'Well, Pip,' returned Joe, slowly considering. 'What for?'
'What for, Joe? What is any visit made for?'
'There is some wisits, p'r'aps,' said Joe, 'as for ever remains open to the 
question, Pip. But in regard to wisiting Miss Havisham. She might think you 
wanted something - expected something of her.'
'Don't you think I might say that I did not, Joe?'
'You might, old chap,' said Joe. 'And she might credit it. Similarly she 
mightn't.'
Joe felt, as I did, that he had made a point there, and he pulled hard at 
his pipe to keep himself from weakening it by repetition.
'You see, Pip,' Joe pursued, as soon as he was past that danger, 'Miss 
Havisham done the handsome thing by you. When Miss Havisham done the 
handsome thing by you, she called me back to say to me as that were all.'
'Yes, Joe. I heard her.'
'ALL,' Joe repeated, very emphatically.
'Yes, Joe. I tell you, I heard her.'
'Which I meantersay, Pip, it might be that her meaning were - Make a end on 
it! - As you was! - Me to the North, and you to the South! - Keep in 
sunders!'
I had thought of that too, and it was very far from comforting to me to 
find that he had thought of it; for it seemed to render it more probable.
'But, Joe.'
'Yes, old chap.'
'Here am I, getting on in the first year of my time, and, since the day of 
my being bound, I have never thanked Miss Havisham, or asked after her, or 
shown that I remember her.'
'That's true, Pip; and unless you was to turn her out a set of shoes all 
four round - and which I meantersay as even a set of shoes all four round 
might not act acceptable as a present, in a total wacancy of hoofs - '
'I don't mean that sort of remembrance, Joe; I don't mean a present.'
But Joe had got the idea of a present in his head and must harp upon it. 
'Or even,' said he, 'if you was helped to knocking her up a new chain for 
the front door - or say a gross or two of shark-headed screws for general 
use - or some light fancy article, such as a toasting-fork when she took 
her muffins - or a gridiron when she took a sprat or such like - '
'I don't mean any present at all, Joe,' I interposed.
'Well,' said Joe, still harping on it as though I had particularly pressed 
it, 'if I was yourself, Pip, I wouldn't. No, I would not. For what's a door-
chain when she's got one always up? And shark-headers is open to 
misrepresentations. And if it was a toasting-fork, you'd go into brass and 
do yourself no credit. And the oncommonest workman can't show himself 
oncommon in a gridiron - for a gridiron IS a gridiron,' said Joe, 
steadfastly impressing it upon me, as if he were endeavouring to rouse me 
from a fixed delusion, 'and you may haim at what you like, but a gridiron 
it will come out, either by your leave or again your leave, and you can't 
help yourself - '
'My dear Joe,' I cried, in desperation, taking hold of his coat, 'don't go 
on in that way. I never thought of making Miss Havisham any present.'
'No, Pip,' Joe assented, as if he had been contending for that, all along; 
'and what I say to you is, you are right, Pip.'
'Yes, Joe; but what I wanted to say, was, that as we are rather slack just 
now, if you would give me a half-holiday tomorrow, I think I would go up-
town and make a call on Miss Est - Havisham.'
'Which her name,' said Joe, gravely, 'ain't Estavisham, Pip, unless she 
have been rechris'ened.'
'I know, Joe, I know. It was slip of mine. What do you think of it, Joe?'
In brief, Joe thought that if I thought well of it, he thought well of it. 
But, he was particular in stipulating that if I were not received with 
cordiality, or if I were not encouraged to repeat my visit as a visit which 
had no ulterior object but was simply one of gratitude for a favour 
received, then this experimental trip should have no successor. By these 
conditions I promised to abide.
Now, Joe kept a journeyman at weekly wages whose name was Orlick. He 
pretended that his Christian name was Dolge - a clear impossibility - but 
he was a fellow of that obstinate disposition that I believe him to have 
been the prey of no delusion in this particular, but wilfully to have 
imposed that name upon the village as an affront to its understanding. He 
was a broad-shouldered loose-limbed swarthy fellow of great strength, never 
in a hurry, and always slouching. He never even seemed to come to his work 
on purpose, but would slouch in as if by mere accident; and when he went to 
the Jolly Bargemen to eat his dinner, or went away at night, he would 
slouch out, like Cain or the Wandering Jew, as if he had no idea where he 
was going and no intention of ever coming back. He lodged at a sluice-
keeper's out on the marshes, and on working days would come slouching from 
his hermitage, with his hands in his pockets and his dinner loosely tied in 
a bundle round his neck and dangling on his back. On Sundays he mostly lay 
all day on sluice-gates, or stood against ricks and barns. He always 
slouched, locomotively, with his eyes on the ground; and, when accosted or 
otherwise required to raise them, he looked up in a half resentful, half 
puzzled way, as though the only thought he ever had, was, that it was 
rather an odd and injurious fact that he should never be thinking.
This morose journeyman had no liking for me. When I was very small and 
timid, he gave me to understand that the Devil lived in a black corner of 
the forge, and that he knew the fiend very well: also that it was necessary 
to make up the fire, once in seven years, with a live boy, and that I might 
consider myself fuel. When I became Joe's 'prentice, Orlick was perhaps 
confirmed in some suspicion that I should displace him; howbeit, he liked 
me still less. Not that he ever said anything, or did anything, openly 
importing hostility; I only noticed that he always beat his sparks in my 
direction, and that whenever I sang Old Clem, he came in out of time.
Dolge Orlick was at work and present, next day, when I reminded Joe of my 
half-holiday. He said nothing at the moment, for he and Joe had just got a 
piece of hot iron between them, and I was at the bellows; but by-and-by he 
said, leaning on his hammer:
'Now, master! Sure you're not a going to favour only one of us. If Young 
Pip has a half-holiday, do as much for Old Orlick.' I suppose he was about 
five-and-twenty, but he usually spoke of himself as an ancient person.
'Why, what'll you do with a half-holiday, if you get it?' said Joe.
'What'll I do with it! What'll he do with it? I'll do as much with it as 
him,' said Orlick.
'As to Pip, he's going up-town,' said Joe.
'Well then, as to Old Orlick, he's a going up-town,' retorted that worthy. 
'Two can go up-town. Tan't only one wot can go up-town.
'Don't lose your temper,' said Joe.
'Shall if I like,' growled Orlick. 'Some and their up-towning! Now, master! 
Come. No favouring in this shop. Be a man!'
The master refusing to entertain the subject until the journeyman was in a 
better temper, Orlick plunged at the furnace, drew out a red-hot bar, made 
at me with it as if he were going to run it through my body, whisked it 
round my head, laid it on the anvil, hammered it out - as if it were I, I 
thought, and the sparks were my spurting blood - and finally said, when he 
had hammered himself hot and the iron cold, and he again leaned on his 
hammer:
'Now, master!'
'Are you all right now?' demanded Joe.
'Ah! I am all right,' said gruff Old Orlick.
'Then, as in general you stick to your work as well as most men,' said Joe, 
'let it be a half-holiday for all.'
My sister had been standing silent in the yard, within hearing - she was a 
most unscrupulous spy and listener - and she instantly looked in at one of 
the windows.
'Like you, you fool!' said she to Joe, 'giving holidays to great idle 
hulkers like that. You are a rich man, upon my life, to waste wages in that 
way. I wish I was his master!'
'You'd be everybody's master, if you durst,' retorted Orlick, with an ill-
favoured grin.
('Let her alone,' said Joe.)
'I'd be a match for all noodles and all rogues,' returned my sister, 
beginning to work herself into a mighty rage. 'And I couldn't be a match 
for the noodles, without being a match for your master, who's the dunder-
headed king of the noodles. And I couldn't be a match for the rogues, 
without being a match for you, who are the blackest-looking and the worst 
rogue between this and France. Now!'
'You're a foul shrew, Mother Gargery, growled the journeyman. 'If that 
makes a judge of rogues, you ought to be a good 'un.'
('Let her alone, will you?' said Joe.)
'What did you say?' cried my sister, beginning to scream. 'What did you 
say? What did that fellow Orlick say to me, Pip? What did he call me, with 
my husband standing by? O! O! O!' Each of these exclamations was a shriek; 
and I must remark of my sister, what is equally true of all the violent 
women I have ever seen, that passion was no excuse for her, because it is 
undeniable that instead of lapsing into passion, she consciously and 
deliberately took extraordinary pains to force herself into it, and became 
blindly furious by regular stages; 'what was the name he gave me before the 
base man who swore to defend me? O! Hold me! O!'
'Ah-h-h!' growled the journeyman, between his teeth, 'I'd hold you, if you 
was my wife. I'd hold you under the pump, and choke it out of you.'
('I tell you, let her alone,' said Joe.)
'Oh! To hear him!' cried my sister, with a clap of her hands and a scream 
together - which was her next stage. 'To hear the names he's giving me! 
That Orlick! In my own house! Me, a married woman! With my husband standing 
by! O! O!' Here my sister, after a fit of clappings and screamings, beat 
her hands upon her bosom and upon her knees, and threw her cap off, and 
pulled her hair down - which were the last stages on her road to frenzy. 
Being by this time a perfect Fury and a complete success, she made a dash 
at the door, which I had fortunately locked.
What could the wretched Joe do now, after his disregarded parenthetical 
interruptions, but stand up to his journeyman, and ask him what he meant by 
interfering betwixt himself and Mrs Joe; and further whether he was man 
enough to come on? Old Orlick felt that the situation admitted of nothing 
less than coming on, and was on his defence straightway; so, without so 
much as pulling off their singed and burnt aprons, they went at one 
another, like two giants. But, if any man in that neighbourhood could stand 
up long against Joe, I never saw the man. Orlick, as if he had been of no 
more account than the pale young gentleman, was very soon among the coal-
dust, and in no hurry to come out of it. Then, Joe unlocked the door and 
picked up my sister, who had dropped insensible at the window (but who had 
seen the fight first, I think), and who was carried into the house and laid 
down, and who was recommended to revive, and would do nothing but struggle 
and clench her hands in Joe's hair. Then, came that singular calm and 
silence which succeed all uproars; and then, with the vague sensation which 
I have always connected with such a lull - namely, that it was Sunday, and 
somebody was dead - I went upstairs to dress myself.
When I came down again, I found Joe and Orlick sweeping up, without any 
other traces of discomposure than a slit in one of Orlick's nostrils, which 
was neither expressive nor ornamental. A pot of beer had appeared from the 
Jolly Bargemen, and they were sharing it by turns in a peaceable manner. 
The lull had a sedative and philosophical influence on Joe, who followed me 
out into the road to say, as a parting observation that might do me good, 
'On the Rampage, Pip, and off the Rampage, Pip - such is Life!'
With what absurd emotions (for, we think the feelings that are very serious 
in a man quite comical in a boy) I found myself again going to Miss 
Havisham's, matters little here. Nor, how I passed and repassed the gate 
many times before I could make up my mind to ring. Nor, how I debated 
whether I should go away without ringing; nor, how I should undoubtedly 
have gone, if my time had been my own, to come back.
Miss Sarah Pocket came to the gate. No Estella.
'How, then? You here again?' said Miss Pocket. 'What do you want?'
When I said that I only came to see how Miss Havisham was, Sarah evidently 
deliberated whether or no she should send me about my business. But, 
unwilling to hazard the responsibility, she let me in, and presently 
brought the sharp message that I was to 'come up.'
Everything was unchanged, and Miss Havisham was alone.
'Well?' said she, fixing her eyes upon me. 'I hope you want nothing? You'll 
get nothing.'
'No, indeed, Miss Havisham. I only wanted you to know that I am doing very 
well in my apprenticeship, and am always much obliged to you.'
'There, there!' with the old restless fingers. 'Come now and then; come on 
your birthday. - Ay!' she cried suddenly, turning herself and her chair 
towards me, 'You are looking round for Estella? Hey?'
I had been looking round - in fact, for Estella - and I stammered that I 
hoped she was well.
'Abroad,' said Miss Havisham; 'educating for a lady; far out of reach; 
prettier than ever; admired by all who see her. Do you feel that you have 
lost her?'
There was such a malignant enjoyment in her utterance of the last words, 
and she broke into such a disagreeable laugh, that I was at a loss what to 
say. She spared me the trouble of considering, by dismissing me. When the 
gate was closed upon me by Sarah of the walnut-shell countenance, I felt 
more than ever dissatisfied with my home and with my trade and with 
everything; and that was all I took by that motion.
As I was loitering along the High-street, looking in disconsolately at the 
shop windows, and thinking what I would buy if I were a gentleman, who 
should come out of the bookshop but Mr Wopsle. Mr Wopsle had in his hand 
the affecting tragedy of George Barnwell, in which he had that moment 
invested sixpence, with the view of heaping every word of it on the head of 
Pumblechook, with whom he was going to drink tea. No sooner did he see me, 
than he appeared to consider that a special Providence had put a 'prentice 
in his way to be read at; and he laid hold of me, and insisted on my 
accompanying him to the Pumblechookian parlour. As I knew it would be 
miserable at home, and as the nights were dark and the way was dreary, and 
almost any companionship on the road was better than none, I made no great 
resistance; consequently, we turned into Pumblechook's just as the street 
and the shops were lighting up.
As I never assisted at any other representation of George Barnwell, I don't 
know how long it may usually take; but I know very well that it took until 
half-past nine o' clock that night, and that when Mr Wopsle got into 
Newgate, I thought he never would go to the scaffold, he became so much 
slower than at any former period of his disgraceful career. I thought it a 
little too much that he should complain of being cut short in his flower 
after all, as if he had not been running to seed, leaf after leaf, ever 
since his course began. This, however, was a mere question of length and 
wearisomeness. What stung me, was the identification of the whole affair 
with my unoffending self. When Barnwell began to go wrong, I declare that I 
felt positively apologetic, Pumblechook's indignant stare so taxed me with 
it. Wopsle, too, took pains to present me in the worst light. At once 
ferocious and maudlin, I was made to murder my uncle with no extenuating 
circumstances whatever; Millwood put me down in argument, on every 
occasion; it became sheer monomania in my master's daughter to care a 
button for me; and all I can say for my gasping and procrastinating conduct 
on the fatal morning, is, that it was worthy of the general feebleness of 
my character. Even after I was happily hanged and Wopsle had closed the 
book, Pumblechook sat staring at me, and shaking his head, and saying, 
'Take warning, boy, take warning!' as if it were a well-known fact that I 
contemplated murdering a near relation, provided I could only induce one to 
have the weakness to become my benefactor.
It was a very dark night when it was all over, and when I set out with Mr 
Wopsle on the walk home. Beyond town, we found a heavy mist out, and it 
fell wet and thick. The turnpike lamp was a blur, quite out of the lamp's 
usual place apparently, and its rays looked solid substance on the fog. We 
were noticing this, and saying how that the mist rose with a change of wind 
from a certain quarter of our marshes, when we came upon a man, slouching 
under the lee of the turnpike house.
'Halloa!' we said, stopping. 'Orlick, there?'
'Ah!' he answered, slouching out. 'I was standing by, a minute, on the 
chance of company.'
'You are late,' I remarked.
Orlick not unnaturally answered, 'Well? And you're late.'
'We have been,' said Mr Wopsle, exalted with his late performance, 'we have 
been indulging, Mr Orlick, in an intellectual evening.'
Old Orlick growled, as if he had nothing to say about that, and we all went 
on together. I asked him presently whether he had been spending his half-
holiday up and down town?
'Yes,' said he, 'all of it. I come in behind yourself. I didn't see you, 
but I must have been pretty close behind you. By-the-bye, the guns is going 
again.'
'At the Hulks?' said I.
'Ay! There's some of the birds flown from the cages. The guns have been 
going since dark, about. You'll hear one presently.'
In effect, we had not walked many yards further, when the well-remembered 
boom came towards us, deadened by the mist, and heavily rolled away along 
the low grounds by the river, as if it were pursuing and threatening the 
fugitives.
'A good night for cutting off in,' said Orlick. 'We'd be puzzled how to 
bring down a jail-bird on the wing, tonight.'
The subject was a suggestive one to me, and I thought about it in silence. 
Mr Wopsle, as the ill-requited uncle of the evening's tragedy, fell to 
meditating aloud in his garden at Camberwell. Orlick, with his hands in his 
pockets, slouched heavily at my side. It was very dark, very wet, very 
muddy, and so we splashed along. Now and then, the sound of the signal 
cannon broke upon us again, and again rolled sulkily along the course of 
the river. I kept myself to myself and my thoughts. Mr Wopsle died amiably 
at Camberwell, and exceedingly game on Bosworth Field, and in the greatest 
agonies at Glastonbury. Orlick sometimes growled, 'Beat it out, beat it out 
- Old Clem! With a clink for the stout - Old Clem!' I thought he had been 
drinking, but he was not drunk.
Thus, we came to the village. The way by which we approached it, took us 
past the Three Jolly Bargemen, which we were surprised to find - it being 
eleven o'clock - in a state of commotion, with the door wide open, and 
unwonted lights that had been hastily caught up and put down, scattered 
about. Mr Wopsle dropped in to ask what was the matter (surmising that a 
convict had been taken), but came running out in a great hurry.
'There's something wrong,' said he, without stopping, 'up at your place, 
Pip. Run all!'
'What is it?' I asked, keeping up with him. So did Orlick, at my side.
'I can't quite understand. The house seems to have been violently entered 
when Joe Gargery was out. Supposed by convicts. Somebody has been attacked 
and hurt.'
We were running too fast to admit of more being said, and we made no stop 
until we got into our kitchen. It was full of people; the whole village was 
there, or in the yard; and there was a surgeon, and there was Joe, and 
there was a group of women, all on the floor in the midst of the kitchen. 
The unemployed bystanders drew back when they saw me, and so I became aware 
of my sister - lying without sense or movement on the bare boards where she 
had been knocked down by a tremendous blow on the back of the head, dealt 
by some unknown hand when her face was turned towards the fire - destined 
never to be on the Rampage again, while she was the wife of Joe.


Chapter 16

With my head full of George Barnwell, I was at first disposed to believe 
that I must have had some hand in the attack upon my sister, or at all 
events that as her near relation, popularly known to be under obligations 
to her, I was a more legitimate object of suspicion than any one else. But 
when, in the clearer light of next morning, I began to reconsider the 
matter and to hear it discussed around me on all sides, I took another view 
of the case, which was more reasonable.
Joe had been at the Three Jolly Bargemen, smoking his pipe, from a quarter 
after eight o'clock to a quarter before ten. While he was there, my sister 
had been seen standing at the kitchen door, and had exchanged Good Night 
with a farm-labourer going home. The man could not be more particular as to 
the time at which he saw her (he got into dense confusion when he tried to 
be), than that it must have been before nine. When Joe went home at five 
minutes before ten, he found her struck down on the floor, and promptly 
called in assistance. The fire had not then burnt unusually low, nor was 
the snuff of the candle very long; the candle, however, had been blown out.
Nothing had been taken away from any part of the house. Neither, beyond the 
blowing out of the candle - which stood on a table between the door and my 
sister, and was behind her when she stood facing the fire and was struck - 
was there any disarrangement of the kitchen, excepting such as she herself 
had made, in falling and bleeding. But, there was one remarkable piece of 
evidence on the spot. She had been struck with something blunt and heavy, 
on the head and spine; after the blows were dealt, something heavy had been 
thrown down at her with considerable violence, as she lay on her face. And 
on the ground beside her, when Joe picked her up, was a convict's leg-iron 
which had been filed asunder.
Now, Joe, examining this iron with a smith's eye, declared it to have been 
filed asunder some time ago. The hue and cry going off to the Hulks, and 
people coming thence to examine the iron, Joe's opinion was corroborated. 
They did not undertake to say when it had left the prison-ships to which it 
undoubtedly had once belonged; but they claimed to know for certain that 
that particular manacle had not been worn by either of two convicts who had 
escaped last night. Further, one of those two was already re-taken, and had 
not freed himself of his iron.
Knowing what I knew, I set up an inference of my own here. I believed the 
iron to be my convict's iron - the iron I had seen and heard him filing at, 
on the marshes - but my mind did not accuse him of having put it to its 
latest use. For, I believed one of two other persons to have become 
possessed of it, and to have turned it to this cruel account. Either 
Orlick, or the strange man who had shown me the file.
Now, as to Orlick; he had gone to town exactly as he told us when we picked 
him up at the turnpike, he had been seen about town all the evening, he had 
been in divers companies in several public-houses, and he had come back 
with myself and Mr Wopsle. There was nothing against him, save the quarrel; 
and my sister had quarrelled with him, and with everybody else about her, 
ten thousand times. As to the strange man; if he had come back for his two 
banknotes there could have been no dispute about them, because my sister 
was fully prepared to restore them. Besides, there had been no altercation; 
the assailant had come in so silently and suddenly, that she had been 
felled before she could look round.
It was horrible to think that I had provided the weapon, however 
undesignedly, but I could hardly think otherwise. I suffered unspeakable 
trouble while I considered and reconsidered whether I should at last 
dissolve that spell of my childhood, and tell Joe all the story. For months 
afterwards, I every day settled the question finally in the negative, and 
reopened and reargued it next morning. The contention came, after all, to 
this; - the secret was such an old one now, had so grown into me and become 
a part of myself, that I could not tear it away. In addition to the dread 
that, having led up to so much mischief, it would be now more likely than 
ever to alienate Joe from me if he believed it, I had a further restraining 
dread that he would not believe it, but would assort it with the fabulous 
dogs and veal-cutlets as a monstrous invention. However, I temporised with 
myself, of course - for, was I not wavering between right and wrong, when 
the thing is always done? - and resolved to make a full disclosure if I 
should see any such new occasion as a new chance of helping in the 
discovery of the assailant.
The Constables, and the Bow Street men from London - for, this happened in 
the days of the extinct red-waistcoated police - were about the house for a 
week or two, and did pretty much what I have heard and read of like 
authorities doing in other such cases. They took up several obviously wrong 
people, and they ran their heads very hard against wrong ideas, and 
persisted in trying to fit the circumstances to the ideas, instead of 
trying to extract ideas from the circumstances. Also, they stood about the 
door of the Jolly Bargemen, with knowing and reserved looks that filled the 
whole neighbourhood with admiration; and they had a mysterious manner of 
taking their drink, that was almost as good as taking the culprit. But not 
quite, for they never did it.
Long after these constitutional powers had dispersed, my sister lay very 
ill in bed. Her sight was disturbed, so that she saw objects multiplied, 
and grasped at visionary teacups and wine-glasses instead of the realities; 
her hearing was greatly impaired; her memory also; and her speech was 
unintelligible. When, at last, she came round so far as to be helped 
downstairs, it was still necessary to keep my slate always by her, that she 
might indicate in writing what she could not indicate in speech. As she was 
(very bad handwriting apart) a more than indifferent speller, and as Joe 
was a more than indifferent reader, extraordinary complications arose 
between them, which I was always called in to solve. The administration of 
mutton instead of medicine, the substitution of Tea for Joe, and the baker 
for bacon, were among the mildest of my own mistakes.
However, her temper was greatly improved, and she was patient. A tremulous 
uncertainty of the action of all her limbs soon became a part of her 
regular state, and afterwards, at intervals of two or three months, she 
would often put her hands to her head, and would then remain for about a 
week at a time in some gloomy aberration of mind. We were at a loss to find 
a suitable attendant for her, until a circumstance happened conveniently to 
relieve us. Mr Wopsle's great-aunt conquered a confirmed habit of living 
into which she had fallen, and Biddy became a part of our establishment.
It may have been about a month after my sister's reappearance in the 
kitchen, when Biddy came to us with a small speckled box containing the 
whole of her worldly effects, and became a blessing to the household. Above 
all, she was a blessing to Joe, for the dear old fellow was sadly cut up by 
the constant contemplation of the wreck of his wife, and had been 
accustomed, while attending on her of an evening, to turn to me every now 
and then and say, with his blue eyes moistened, 'Such a fine figure of a 
woman as she once were, Pip!' Biddy instantly taking the cleverest charge 
of her as though she had studied her from infancy, Joe became able in some 
sort to appreciate the greater quiet of his life, and to get down to the 
Jolly Bargemen now and then for a change that did him good. It was 
characteristic of the police people that they had all more or less 
suspected poor Joe (though he never knew it), and that they had to a man 
concurred in regarding him as one of the deepest spirits they had ever 
encountered.
Biddy's first triumph in her new office, was to solve a difficulty that had 
completely vanquished me. I had tried hard at it, but had made nothing of 
it. Thus it was:
Again and again and again, my sister had traced upon the slate, a character 
that looked like a curious T, and then with the utmost eagerness had called 
our attention to it as something she particularly wanted. I had in vain 
tried everything producible that began with a T, from tar to toast and tub. 
At length it had come into my head that the sign looked like a hammer, and 
on my lustily calling that word in my sister's ear, she had begun to hammer 
on the table and had expressed a qualified assent. Thereupon, I had brought 
in all our hammers, one after another, but without avail. Then I bethought 
me of a crutch, the shape being much the same, and I borrowed one in the 
village, and displayed it to my sister with considerable confidence. But 
she shook her head to that extent when she was shown it, that we were 
terrified lest in her weak and shattered state she should dislocate her 
neck.
When my sister found that Biddy was very quick to understand her, this 
mysterious sign reappeared on the slate. Biddy looked thoughtfully at it, 
heard my explanation, looked thoughtfully at my sister, looked thoughtfully 
at Joe (who was always represented on the slate by his initial letter), and 
ran into the forge, followed by Joe and me.
'Why, of course!' cried Biddy, with an exultant face. 'Don't you see? It's 
him!'
Orlick, without a doubt! She had lost his name, and could only signify him 
by his hammer. We told him why we wanted him to come into the kitchen, and 
he slowly laid down his hammer, wiped his brow with his arm, took another 
wipe at it with his apron, and came slouching out, with a curious loose 
vagabond bend in the knees that strongly distinguished him.
I confess that I expected to see my sister denounce him, and that I was 
disappointed by the different result. She manifested the greatest anxiety 
to be on good terms with him, was evidently much pleased by his being at 
length produced, and motioned that she would have him given something to 
drink. She watched his countenance as if she were particularly wishful to 
be assured that he took kindly to his reception, she showed every possible 
desire to conciliate him, and there was an air of humble propitiation in 
all she did, such as I have seen pervade the bearing of a child towards a 
hard master. After that day, a day rarely passed without her drawing the 
hammer on her slate, and without Orlick's slouching in and standing 
doggedly before her, as if he knew no more than I did what to make of it.


Chapter 17

I Now fell into a regular routine of apprenticeship life, which was varied, 
beyond the limits of the village and the marshes, by no more remarkable 
circumstance than the arrival of my birthday and my paying another visit to 
Miss Havisham. I found Miss Sarah Pocket still on duty at the gate, I found 
Miss Havisham just as I had left her, and she spoke of Estella in the very 
same way, if not in the very same words. The interview lasted but a few 
minutes, and she gave me a guinea when I was going, and told me to come 
again on my next birthday. I may mention at once that this became an annual 
custom. I tried to decline taking the guinea on the first occasion, but 
with no better effect than causing her to ask me very angrily, if I 
expected more? Then, and after that, I took it.
So unchanging was the dull old house, the yellow light in the darkened 
room, the faded spectre in the chair by the dressing-table glass, that I 
felt as if the stopping of the clocks had stopped Time in that mysterious 
place, and, while I and everything else outside it grew older, it stood 
still. Daylight never entered the house as to my thoughts and remembrances 
of it, any more than as to the actual fact. It bewildered me, and under its 
influence I continued at heart to hate my trade and to be ashamed of home.
Imperceptibly I became conscious of a change in Biddy, however. Her shoes 
came up at the heel, her hair grew bright and neat, her hands were always 
clean. She was not beautiful - she was common, and could not be like 
Estella - but she was pleasant and wholesome and sweet-tempered. She had 
not been with us more than a year (I remember her being newly out of 
mourning at the time it struck me), when I observed to myself one evening 
that she had curiously thoughtful and attentive eyes; eyes that were very 
pretty and very good.
It came of my lifting up my own eyes from a task I was poring at - writing 
some passages from a book, to improve myself in two ways at once by a sort 
of stratagem - and seeing Biddy observant of what I was about. I laid down 
my pen, and Biddy stopped in her needlework without laying it down.
'Biddy,' said I, 'how do you manage it? Either I am very stupid, or you are 
very clever.'
'What is it that I manage? I don't know,' returned Biddy, smiling.
She managed our whole domestic life, and wonderfully too; but I did not 
mean that, though that made what I did mean, more surprising.
'How do you manage, Biddy,' said I, 'to learn everything that I learn, and 
always to keep up with me?' I was beginning to be rather vain of my 
knowledge, for I spent my birthday guineas on it, and set aside the greater 
part of my pocket-money for similar investment; though I have no doubt, 
now, that the title I knew was extremely dear at the price.
'I might as well ask you,' said Biddy, 'how you manage?'
'No; because when I come in from the forge of a night, any one can see me 
turning to at it. But you never turn to at it, Biddy.'
'I suppose I must catch it - like a cough,' said Biddy, quietly; and went 
on with her sewing.
Pursuing my idea as I leaned back in my wooden chair and looked at Biddy 
sewing away with her head on one side, I began to think her rather an 
extraordinary girl. For, I called to mind now, that she was equally 
accomplished in the terms of our trade, and the names of our different 
sorts of work, and our various tools. In short, whatever I knew, Biddy 
knew. Theoretically, she was already as good a blacksmith as I, or better.
'You are one of those, Biddy,' said I, 'who make the most of every chance. 
You never had a chance before you came here, and see how improved you are!'
Biddy looked at me for an instant, and went on with her sewing. 'I was your 
first teacher though; wasn't I?' said she, as she sewed.
'Biddy!' I exclaimed, in amazement. 'Why, you are crying!'
'No I am not,' said Biddy, looking up and laughing. 'What put that in your 
head?'
What could have put it in my head, but the glistening of a tear as it 
dropped on her work? I sat silent, recalling what a drudge she had been 
until Mr Wopsle's great-aunt successfully overcame that bad habit of 
living, so highly desirable to be got rid of by some people. I recalled the 
hopeless circumstances by which she had been surrounded in the miserable 
little shop and the miserable little noisy evening school, with that 
miserable old bundle of incompetence always to be dragged and shouldered. I 
reflected that even in those untoward times there must have been latent in 
Biddy what was now developing, for, in my first uneasiness and discontent I 
had turned to her for help, as a matter of course. Biddy sat quietly 
sewing, shedding no more tears, and while I looked at her and thought about 
it all, it occurred to me that perhaps I had not been sufficiently grateful 
to Biddy. I might have been too reserved, and should have patronised her 
more (though I did not use that precise word in my meditations), with my 
confidence.
'Yes, Biddy,' I observed, when I had done turning it over, 'you were my 
first teacher, and that at a time when we little thought of ever being 
together like this, in this kitchen.'
'Ah, poor thing!' replied Biddy. It was like her self-forgetfulness, to 
transfer the remark to my sister, and to get up and be busy about her, 
making her more comfortable; 'that's sadly true!'
'Well!' said I, 'we must talk together a little more, as we used to do. And 
I must consult you a little more, as I used to do. Let us have a quiet walk 
on the marshes next Sunday, Biddy, and a long chat.'
My sister was never left alone now; but Joe more than readily undertook the 
care of her on that Sunday afternoon, and Biddy and I went out together. It 
was summer-time, and lovely weather. When we had passed the village and the 
church and the churchyard, and were out on the marshes and began to see the 
sails of the ships as they sailed on, I began to combine Miss Havisham and 
Estella with the prospect, in my usual way. When we came to the river-side 
and sat down on the bank, with the water rippling at our feet, making it 
all more quiet than it would have been without that sound, I resolved that 
it was a good time and place for the admission of Biddy into my inner 
confidence.
'Biddy,' said I, after binding her to secrecy, 'I want to be a gentleman.'
'Oh, I wouldn't, if I was you!' she returned. 'I don't think it would 
answer.'
'Biddy,' said I, with some severity, 'I have particular reasons for wanting 
to be a gentleman.'
'You know best, Pip; but don't you think you are happier as you are?'
'Biddy,' I exclaimed, impatiently, 'I am not at all happy as I am. I am 
disgusted with my calling and with my life. I have never taken to either, 
since I was bound. Don't be absurd.'
'Was I absurd?' said Biddy, quietly raising her eyebrows; 'I am sorry for 
that; I didn't mean to be. I only want you to do well, and to be 
comfortable.'
'Well then, understand once for all that I never shall or can be 
comfortable - or anything but miserable - there, Biddy! - unless I can lead 
a very different sort of life from the life I lead now.'
'That's a pity!' said Biddy, shaking her head with a sorrowful air.
Now, I too had so often thought it a pity, that, in the singular kind of 
quarrel with myself which I was always carrying on, I was half inclined to 
shed tears of vexation and distress when Biddy gave utterance to her 
sentiment and my own. I told her she was right, and I knew it was much to 
be regretted, but still it was not to be helped.
'If I could have settled down,' I said to Biddy, plucking up the short 
grass within reach, much as I had once upon a time pulled my feelings out 
of my hair and kicked them into the brewery wall: 'if I could have settled 
down and been but half as fond of the forge as I was when I was little, I 
know it would have been much better for me. You and I and Joe would have 
wanted nothing then, and Joe and I would perhaps have gone partners when I 
was out of my time, and I might even have grown up to keep company with 
you, and we might have sat on this very bank on a fine Sunday, quite 
different people. I should have been good enough for you; shouldn't I, 
Biddy?'
Biddy sighed as she looked at the ships sailing on, and returned for 
answer, 'Yes; I am not over-particular.' It scarcely sounded flattering, 
but I knew she meant well.
'Instead of that,' said I, plucking up more grass and chewing a blade or 
two, 'see how I am going on. Dissatisfied, and uncomfortable, and - what 
would it signify to me, being coarse and common, if nobody had told me so!'
Biddy turned her face suddenly towards mine, and looked far more 
attentively at me than she had looked at the sailing ships.
'It was neither a very true nor a very polite thing to say,' she remarked, 
directing her eyes to the ships again. 'Who said it?'
I was disconcerted, for I had broken away without quite seeing where I was 
going to. It was not to be shuffled off now, however, and I answered, 'The 
beautiful young lady at Miss Havisham's, and she's more beautiful than 
anybody ever was, and I admire her dreadfully, and I want to be a gentleman 
on her account.' Having made this lunatic confession, I began to throw my 
torn-up grass into the river, as if I had some thoughts of following it.
'Do you want to be a gentleman, to spite her or to gain her over?' Biddy 
quietly asked me, after a pause.
'I don't know,' I moodily answered.
'Because, if it is to spite her,' Biddy pursued, 'I should think - but you 
know best - that might be better and more independently done by caring 
nothing for her words. And if it is to gain her over, I should think - but 
you know best - she was not worth gaining over.'
Exactly what I myself had thought, many times. Exactly what was perfectly 
manifest to me at the moment. But how could I, a poor dazed village lad, 
avoid that wonderful inconsistency into which the best and wisest of men 
fall every day?
'It may be all quite true,' said I to Biddy, 'but I admire her dreadfully.'
In short, I turned over on my face when I came to that, and got a good 
grasp on the hair on each side of my head, and wrenched it well. All the 
while knowing the madness of my heart to be so very mad and misplaced, that 
I was quite conscious it would have served my face right, if I had lifted 
it up by my hair, and knocked it against the pebbles as a punishment for 
belonging to such an idiot.
Biddy was the wisest of girls, and she tried to reason no more with me. She 
put her hand, which was a comfortable hand though roughened by work, upon 
my hands, one after another, and gently took them out of my hair. Then she 
softly patted my shoulder in a soothing way, while with my face upon my 
sleeve I cried a little - exactly as I had done in the brewery yard - and 
felt vaguely convinced that I was very much ill-used by somebody, or by 
everybody; I can't say which.
'I am glad of one thing,' said Biddy, 'and that is, that you have felt you 
could give me your confidence, Pip. And I am glad of another thing, and 
that is, that of course you know you may depend upon my keeping it and 
always so far deserving it. If your first teacher (dear! such a poor one, 
and so much in need of being taught herself!) had been your teacher at the 
present time, she thinks she knows what lesson she would set. But It would 
be a hard one to learn, and you have got beyond her, and it's of no use 
now.' So, with a quiet sigh for me, Biddy rose from the bank, and said, 
with a fresh and pleasant change of voice, 'Shall we walk a little further, 
or go home?'
'Biddy,' I cried, getting up, putting my arm round her neck, and giving her 
a kiss, 'I shall always tell you everything.'
'Till you're a gentleman,' said Biddy.
'You know I never shall be, so that's always. Not that I have any occasion 
to tell you anything, for you know everything I know - as I told you at 
home the other night.'
'Ah!' said Biddy, quite in a whisper, as she looked away at the ships. And 
then repeated, with her former pleasant change; 'shall we walk a little 
further, or go home?'
I said to Biddy we would walk a little further, and we did so, and the 
summer afternoon toned down into the summer evening, and it was very 
beautiful. I began to consider whether I was not more naturally and 
wholesomely situated, after all, in these circumstances, than playing 
beggar my neighbour by candlelight in the room with the stopped clocks, and 
being despised by Estella. I thought it would be very good for me if I 
could get her out of my head, with all the rest of those remembrances and 
fancies, and could go to work determined to relish what I had to do, and 
stick to it, and make the best of it. I asked myself the question whether I 
did not surely know that if Estella were beside me at that moment instead 
of Biddy, she would make me miserable? I was obliged to admit that I did 
know it for a certainty, and I said to myself, 'Pip, what a fool you are!'
We talked a good deal as we walked, and all that Biddy said seemed right. 
Biddy was never insulting, or capricious, or Biddy today and somebody else 
tomorrow; she would have derived only pain, and no pleasure, from giving me 
pain; she would far rather have wounded her own breast than mine. How could 
it be, then, that I did not like her much the better of the two?
'Biddy,' said I, when we were walking homeward, 'I wish you could put me 
right.'
'I wish I could!' said Biddy.
'If I could only get myself to fall in love with you - you don't mind my 
speaking so openly to such an old acquaintance?'
'Oh dear, not at all!' said Biddy. 'Don't mind me.'
'If I could only get myself to do it, that would be the thing for me.'
'But you never will, you see,' said Biddy.
It did not appear quite so unlikely to me that evening, as it would have 
done if we had discussed it a few hours before. I therefore observed I was 
not quite sure of that. But Biddy said she was, and she said it decisively. 
In my heart I believed her to be right; and yet I took it rather ill, too, 
that she should be so positive on the point.
When we came near the churchyard, we had to cross an embankment, and get 
over a stile near a sluice gate. There started up, from the gate, or from 
the rushes, or from the ooze (which was quite in his stagnant way), Old 
Orlick.
'Halloa!' he growled, 'where are you two going?'
'Where should we be going, but home?'
'Well then,' said he, 'I'm jiggered if I don't see you home!'
This penalty of being jiggered was a favourite supposititious case of his. 
He attached no definite meaning to the word that I am aware of, but used 
it, like his own pretended Christian name, to affront mankind, and convey 
an idea of something savagely damaging. When I was younger, I had had a 
general belief that if he had jiggered me personally, he would have done it 
with a sharp and twisted hook.
Biddy was much against his going with us, and said to me in a whisper, 
'Don't let him come; I don't like him.' As I did not like him either, I 
took the liberty of saying that we thanked him, but we didn't want seeing 
home. He received that piece of information with a yell of laughter, and 
dropped back, but came slouching after us at a little distance.
Curious to know whether Biddy suspected him of having had a hand in that 
murderous attack of which my sister had never been able to give any 
account, I asked her why she did not like him.
'Oh!' she replied, glancing over her shoulder as he slouched after us, 
'because I - I am afraid he likes me.'
'Did he ever tell you he liked you?' I asked, indignantly.
'No,' said Biddy, glancing over her shoulder again, 'he never told me so; 
but he dances at me, whenever he can catch my eye.'
However novel and peculiar this testimony of attachment, I did not doubt 
the accuracy of the interpretation. I was very hot indeed upon Old Orlick's 
daring to admire her; as hot as if it were an outrage on myself.
'But it makes no difference to you, you know,' said Biddy, calmly.
'No, Biddy, it makes no difference to me; only I don't like it; I don't 
approve of it.'
'Nor I neither,' said Biddy. 'Though that makes no difference to you.'
'Exactly,' said I; 'but I must tell you I should have no opinion of you, 
Biddy, if he danced at you with your own consent.'
I kept an eye on Orlick after that night, and, whenever circumstances were 
favourable to his dancing at Biddy, got before him, to obscure that 
demonstration. He had struck root in Joe's establishment, by reason of my 
sister's sudden fancy for him, or I should have tried to get him dismissed. 
He quite understood and reciprocated my good intentions, as I had reason to 
know thereafter.
And now, because my mind was not confused enough before, I complicated its 
confusion fifty thousand-fold, by having states and seasons when I was 
clear that Biddy was immeasurably better than Estella, and that the plain 
honest working life to which I was born, had nothing in it to be ashamed 
of, but offered me sufficient means of self-respect and happiness. At those 
times, I would decide conclusively that my disaffection to dear old Joe and 
the forge, was gone, and that I was growing up in a fair way to be partners 
with Joe and to keep company with Biddy - when all in a moment some 
confounding remembrance of the Havisham days would fall upon me, like a 
destructive missile, and scatter my wits again. Scattered wits take a long 
time picking up; and often, before I had got them well together, they would 
be dispersed in all directions by one stray thought, that perhaps after all 
Miss Havisham was going to make my fortune when my time was out.
If my time had run out, it would have left me still at the height of my 
perplexities, I dare say. It never did run out, however, but was brought to 
a premature end, as I proceed to relate.


Chapter 18

It was in the fourth year of my apprenticeship to Joe, and it was a 
Saturday night. There was a group assembled round the fire at the Three 
Jolly Bargemen, attentive to Mr Wopsle as he read the newspaper aloud. Of 
that group I was one.
A highly popular murder had been committed, and Mr Wopsle was imbrued in 
blood to the eyebrows. He gloated over every abhorrent adjective in the 
description, and identified himself with every witness at the Inquest. He 
faintly moaned, 'I am done for,' as the victim, and he barbarously 
bellowed, 'I'll serve you out,' as the murderer. He gave the medical 
testimony, in pointed imitation of our local practitioner; and he piped and 
shook, as the aged turnpike-keeper who had heard blows, to an extent so 
very paralytic as to suggest a doubt regarding the mental competency of 
that witness. The coroner, in Mr Wopsle's hands, became Timon of Athens; 
the beadle, Coriolanus. He enjoyed himself thoroughly, and we all enjoyed 
ourselves, and were delightfully comfortable. In this cosy state of mind we 
came to the verdict Wilful Murder.
Then, and not sooner, I became aware of a strange gentleman leaning over 
the back of the settle opposite me, looking on. There was an expression of 
contempt on his face, and he bit the side of a great forefinger as he 
watched the group of faces.
'Well!' said the stranger to Mr Wopsle, when the reading was done, 'you 
have settled it all to your own satisfaction, I have no doubt?'
Everybody started and looked up, as if it were the murderer. He looked at 
everybody coldly and sarcastically.
'Guilty, of course?' said he. 'Out with it. Come!'
'Sir,' returned Mr Wopsle, 'without having the honour of your acquaintance, 
I do say Guilty.' Upon this, we all took courage to unite in a confirmatory 
murmur.
'I know you do,' said the stranger; 'I knew you would. I told you so. But 
now I'll ask you a question. Do you know, or do you not know, that the law 
of England supposes every man to be innocent, until he is proved - proved - 
to be guilty?'
'Sir,' Mr Wopsle began to reply, 'as an Englishman myself, I - '
'Come!' said the stranger, biting his forefinger at him. 'Don't evade the 
question. Either you know it, or you don't know it. Which is it to be?'
He stood with his head on one side and himself on one side, in a bullying 
interrogative manner, and he threw his forefinger at Mr Wopsle - as it were 
to mark him out - before biting it again.
'Now!' said he. 'Do you know it, or don't you know it?'
'Certainly I know it,' replied Mr Wopsle.
'Certainly you know it. Then why didn't you say so at first? Now, I'll ask 
you another question;' taking possession of Mr Wopsle, as if he had a right 
to him. 'Do you know that none of these witnesses have yet been cross-
examined?'
Mr Wopsle was beginning, 'I can only say -' when the stranger stopped him.
'What? You won't answer the question, yes or no? Now, I'll try you again.' 
Throwing his finger at him again. 'Attend to me. Are you aware, or are you 
not aware, that none of these witnesses have yet been cross-examined? Come, 
I only want one word from you. Yes, or no?'
Mr Wopsle hesitated, and we all began to conceive rather a poor opinion of 
him.
'Come!' said the stranger, 'I'll help you. You don't deserve help, but I'll 
help you. Look at that paper you hold in your hand. What is it?'
'What is it?' repeated Mr Wopsle, eyeing it, much at a loss.
'Is it,' pursued the stranger in his most sarcastic and suspicious manner, 
'the printed paper you have just been reading from?'
'Undoubtedly.'
'Undoubtedly. Now, turn to that paper, and tell me whether it distinctly 
states that the prisoner expressly said that his legal advisers instructed 
him altogether to reserve his defence?'
'I read that just now,' Mr Wopsle pleaded.
'Never mind what you read just now, sir; I don't ask you what you read just 
now. You may read the Lord's Prayer backwards, if you like - and, perhaps, 
have done it before today. Turn to the paper. No, no, no my friend; not to 
the top of the column; you know better than that; to the bottom, to the 
bottom.' (We all began to think Mr Wopsle full of subterfuge.) 'Well? Have 
you found it?'
'Here it is,' said Mr Wopsle.
'Now, follow that passage with your eye, and tell me whether it distinctly 
states that the prisoner expressly said that he was instructed by his legal 
advisers wholly to reserve his defence? Come! Do you make that of it?'
Mr Wopsle answered, 'Those are not the exact words.'
'Not the exact words!' repeated the gentleman, bitterly. 'Is that the exact 
substance?'
'Yes,' said Mr Wopsle.
'Yes,' repeated the stranger, looking round at the rest of the company with 
his right hand extended towards the witness, Wopsle. 'And now I ask you 
what you say to the conscience of that man who, with that passage before 
his eyes, can lay his head upon his pillow after having pronounced a fellow-
creature guilty, unheard?'
We all began to suspect that Mr Wopsle was not the man we had thought him, 
and that he was beginning to be found out.
'And that same man, remember,' pursued the gentleman, throwing his finger 
at Mr Wopsle heavily; 'that same man might be summoned as a juryman upon 
this very trial, and, having thus deeply committed himself, might return to 
the bosom of his family and lay his head upon his pillow, after 
deliberately swearing that he would well and truly try the issue joined 
between Our Sovereign Lord the King and the prisoner at the bar, and would 
a true verdict give according to the evidence, so help him God!'
We were all deeply persuaded that the unfortunate Wopsle had gone too far, 
and had better stop in his reckless career while there was yet time.
The strange gentleman, with an air of authority not to be disputed, and 
with a manner expressive of knowing something secret about every one of us 
that would effectually do for each individual if he chose to disclose it, 
left the back of the settle, and came into the space between the two 
settles, in front of the fire, where he remained standing: his left hand in 
his pocket, and he biting the forefinger of his right.
'From information I have received,' said he, looking round at us as we all 
quailed before him, 'I have reason to believe there is a blacksmith among 
you, by name Joseph - or Joe - Gargery. Which is the man?'
'Here is the man,' said Joe.
The strange gentleman beckoned him out of his place, and Joe went.
'You have an apprentice,' pursued the stranger, 'commonly known as Pip? Is 
he here?'
'I am here!' I cried.
The stranger did not recognise me, but I recognised him as the gentleman I 
had met on the stairs, on the occasion of my second visit to Miss Havisham. 
I had known him the moment I saw him looking over the settle, and now that 
I stood confronting him with his hand upon my shoulder, I checked off again 
in detail, his large head, his dark complexion, his deep-set eyes, his 
bushy black eyebrows, his large watch-chain, his strong black dots of beard 
and whisker, and even the smell of scented soap on his great hand.
'I wish to have a private conference with you two,' said he, when he had 
surveyed me at his leisure. 'It will take a little time. Perhaps we had 
better go to your place of residence. I prefer not to anticipate my 
communication here; you will impart as much or as little of it as you 
please to your friends afterwards; I have nothing to do with that.'
Amidst a wondering silence, we three walked out of the Jolly Bargemen, and 
in a wondering silence walked home. While going along, the strange 
gentleman occasionally looked at me, and occasionally bit the side of his 
finger. As we neared home, Joe vaguely acknowledging the occasion as an 
impressive and ceremonious one, went on ahead to open the front door. Our 
conference was held in the state parlour, which was feebly lighted by one 
candle.
It began with the strange gentleman's sitting down at the table, drawing 
the candle to him, and looking over some entries in his pocket-book. He 
then put up the pocket-book and set the candle a little aside: after 
peering round it into the darkness at Joe and me, to ascertain which was 
which.
'My name,' he said, 'is Jaggers, and I am a lawyer in London. I am pretty 
well known. I have unusual business to transact with you, and I commence by 
explaining that it is not of my originating. If my advice had been asked, I 
should not have been here. It was not asked, and you see me here. What I 
have to do as the confidential agent of another, I do. No less, no more.'
Finding that he could not see us very well from where he sat, he got up, 
and threw one leg over the back of a chair and leaned upon it; thus having 
one foot on the seat of the chair, and one foot on the ground.
'Now, Joseph Gargery, I am the bearer of an offer to relieve you of this 
young fellow your apprentice. You would not object to cancel his 
indentures, at his request and for his good? You would want nothing for so 
doing?'
'Lord forbid that I should want anything for not standing in Pip's way,' 
said Joe, staring.
'Lord forbidding is pious, but not to the purpose,' returned Mr Jaggers. 
'The question is, Would you want anything? Do you want anything?'
'The answer is,' returned Joe, sternly, 'No.'
I thought Mr Jaggers glanced at Joe, as if he considered him a fool for his 
disinterestedness. But I was too much bewildered between breathless 
curiosity and surprise, to be sure of it.
'Very well,' said Mr Jaggers. 'Recollect the admission you have made, and 
don't try to go from it presently.'
'Who's a-going to try?' retorted Joe.
'I don't say anybody is. Do you keep a dog?'
'Yes, I do keep a dog.'
'Bear in mind then, that Brag is a good dog, but Holdfast is a better. Bear 
that in mind, will you?' repeated Mr Jaggers, shutting his eyes and nodding 
his head at Joe, as if he were forgiving him something. 'Now, I return to 
this young fellow. And the communication I have got to make is, that he has 
great expectations.'
Joe and I gasped, and looked at one another.
'I am instructed to communicate to him,' said Mr Jaggers, throwing his 
finger at me sideways, 'that he will come into a handsome property. 
Further, that it is the desire of the present possessor of that property, 
that he be immediately removed from his present sphere of life and from 
this place, and be brought up as a gentleman - in a word, as a young fellow 
of great expectations.'
My dream was out; my wild fancy was surpassed by sober reality; Miss 
Havisham was going to make my fortune on a grand scale.
'Now, Mr Pip,' pursued the lawyer, 'I address the rest of what I have to 
say, to you. You are to understand, first, that it is the request of the 
person from whom I take my instructions, that you always bear the name of 
Pip. You will have no objection, I dare say, to your great expectations 
being encumbered with that easy condition. But if you have any objection, 
this is the time to mention it.'
My heart was beating so fast, and there was such a singing in my ears, that 
I could scarcely stammer I had no objection.
'I should think not! Now you are to understand, secondly, Mr Pip, that the 
name of the person who is your liberal benefactor remains a profound 
secret, until the person chooses to reveal it. I am empowered to mention 
that it is the intention of the person to reveal it at first hand by word 
of mouth to yourself. When or where that intention may be carried out, I 
cannot say; no one can say. It may be years hence. Now, you are distinctly 
to understand that you are most positively prohibited from making any 
inquiry on this head, or any allusion or reference, however distant, to any 
individual whomsoever as the individual, in all the communications you may 
have with me. If you have a suspicion in your own breast, keep that 
suspicion in your own breast. It is not the least to the purpose what the 
reasons of this prohibition are; they may be the strongest and gravest 
reasons, or they may be mere whim. This is not for you to inquire into. The 
condition is laid down. Your acceptance of it, and your observance of it as 
binding, is the only remaining condition that I am charged with, by the 
person from whom I take my instructions, and for whom I am not otherwise 
responsible. That person is the person from whom you derive your 
expectations, and the secret is solely held by that person and by me. 
Again, not a very difficult condition with which to encumber such a rise in 
fortune; but if you have any objection to it, this is the time to mention 
it. Speak out.'
Once more, I stammered with difficulty that I had no objection.
'I should think not! Now, Mr Pip, I have done with stipulations.' Though he 
called me Mr Pip, and began rather to make up to me, he still could not get 
rid of a certain air of bullying suspicion; and even now he occasionally 
shut his eyes and threw his finger at me while he spoke, as much as to 
express that he knew all kinds of things to my disparagement, if he only 
chose to mention them. 'We come next, to mere details of arrangement. You 
must know that, although I have used the term "expectations" more than 
once, you are not endowed with expectations only. There is already lodged 
in my hands, a sum of money amply sufficient for your suitable education 
and maintenance. You will please consider me your guardian. Oh!' for I was 
going to thank him, 'I tell you at once, I am paid for my services, or I 
shouldn't render them. It is considered that you must be better educated, 
in accordance with your altered position, and that you will be alive to the 
importance and necessity of at once entering on that advantage.'
I said I had always longed for it.
'Never mind what you have always longed for, Mr Pip,' he retorted; 'keep to 
the record. If you long for it now, that's enough. Am I answered that you 
are ready to be placed at once, under some proper tutor? Is that it?'
I stammered yes, that was it.
'Good. Now, your inclinations are to be consulted. I don't think that wise, 
mind, but it's my trust. Have you ever heard of any tutor whom you would 
prefer to another?'
I had never heard of any tutor but Biddy and Mr Wopsle's great-aunt; so, I 
replied in the negative.
'There is a certain tutor, of whom I have some knowledge, who I think might 
suit the purpose,' said Mr Jaggers. 'I don't recommend him, observe; 
because I never recommend anybody. The gentleman I speak of, is one Mr 
Matthew Pocket.'
Ah! I caught at the name directly. Miss Havisham's relation. The Matthew 
whom Mr and Mrs Camilla had spoken of. The Matthew whose place was to be at 
Miss Havisham's head, when she lay dead, in her bride's dress on the 
bride's table.
'You know the name?' said Mr Jaggers, looking shrewdly at me, and then 
shutting up his eyes while he waited for my answer.
My answer was, that I had heard of the name.
'Oh!' said he. 'You have heard of the name. But the question is, what do 
you say of it?'
I said, or tried to say, that I was much obliged to him for his 
recommendation -
'No, my young friend!' he interrupted, shaking his great head very slowly. 
'Recollect yourself!'
Not recollecting myself, I began again that I was much obliged to him for 
his recommendation -
'No, my young friend,' he interrupted, shaking his head and frowning and 
smiling both at once; 'no, no, no; it's very well done, but it won't do; 
you are too young to fix me with it. Recommendation is not the word, Mr 
Pip. Try another.'
Correcting myself, I said that I was much obliged to him for his mention of 
Mr Matthew Pocket -
'That's more like it!' cried Mr Jaggers.
 - And (I added), I would gladly try that gentleman.
'Good. You had better try him in his own house. The way shall be prepared 
for you, and you can see him son first, who is in London. When will you 
come to London?'
I said (glancing at Joe, who stood looking on, motionless), that I supposed 
I could come directly.
'First,' said Mr Jaggers, 'you should have some new clothes to come in, and 
they should not be working clothes. Say this day week. You'll want some 
money. Shall I leave you twenty guineas?'
He produced a long purse, with the greatest coolness, and counted them out 
in the table and pushed them over to me. This was the first time he had 
taken his leg from the chair. He sat astride of the chair when he had 
pushed the money over, and sat swinging his purse and eyeing Joe.
'Well, Joseph Gargery? You look dumbfounded?'
'I am!' said Joe, in a very decided manner.
'It was understood that you wanted nothing for yourself, remember?'
'It were understood,' said Joe. 'And it are understood. And it ever will be 
similar according.'
'But what,' said Mr Jaggers, swinging his purse, 'what if it was in my 
instructions to make you a present, as compensation?'
'As compensation what for?' Joe demanded.
'For the loss of his services.'
Joe laid his hand upon my shoulder with the touch of a woman. I have often 
thought him since, like the steam-hammer, that can crush a man or pat an 
egg-shell, in his combination of strength with gentleness. 'Pip is that 
hearty welcome,' said Joe, 'to go free with his services, to honour and 
fortun', as no words can tell him. But if you think as Money can make 
compensation to me for the loss of the little child - what come to the 
forge - and ever the best of friends! - '
O dear good Joe, whom I was so ready to leave and so unthankful to, I see 
you again, with your muscular blacksmith's arm before your eyes, and your 
broad chest heaving, and your voice dying away. O dear good faithful tender 
Joe, I feel the loving tremble of your hand upon my arm, as solemnly this 
day as if it had been the rustle of an angel's wing!
But I encouraged Joe at the time. I was lost in the mazes of my future 
fortunes, and could not retrace the by-paths we had trodden together. I 
begged Joe to be comforted, for (as he said) we had ever been the best of 
friends, and (as I said) we ever would be so. Joe scooped his eyes with his 
disengaged wrist, as if he were bent on gouging himself, but said not 
another word.
Mr Jaggers had looked on at this, as one who recognised in Joe the village 
idiot, and in me his keeper. When it was over, he said, weighing in his 
hand the purse he had ceased to swing:
'Now, Joseph Gargery, I warn you this is your last chance. No half measures 
with me. If you mean to take a present that I have it in charge to make 
you, speak out, and you shall have it. If on the contrary you mean to say -
' Here, to his great amazement, he was stopped by Joe's suddenly working 
round him with every demonstration of a fell pugilistic purpose.
'Which I meantersay,' cried Joe, 'that if you come into my place bull-
baiting and badgering me, come out! Which I meantersay as sech if you're a 
man, come on! Which I meantersay that what I say, I meantersay and stand or 
fall by!'
I drew Joe away, and he immediately became placable; merely stating to me, 
in an obliging manner and as a polite expostulatory notice to any one whom 
it might happen to concern, that he were not a going to be bull-baited and 
badgered in his own place. Mr Jaggers had risen when Joe demonstrated, and 
had backed near the door. Without evincing any inclination to come in 
again, he there delivered his valedictory remarks. They were these:
'Well, Mr Pip, I think the sooner you leave here - as you are to be a 
gentleman - the better. Let it stand for this day week, and you shall 
receive my printed address in the meantime. You can take a hackney-coach at 
the stage-coach office in London, and come straight to me. Understand, that 
I express no opinion, one way or other, on the trust I undertake. I am paid 
for undertaking it, and I do so. Now, understand that, finally. Understand 
that!'
He was throwing his finger at both of us, and I think would have gone on, 
but for his seeming to think Joe dangerous, and going off.
Something came into my head which induced me to run after him, as he was 
going down to the Jolly Bargemen where he had left a hired carriage.
'I beg your pardon, Mr Jaggers.'
'Halloa!' said he, facing round, 'what's the matter?'
'I wish to be quite right, Mr Jaggers, and to keep to your directions; so I 
thought I had better ask. Would there be any objection to my taking leave 
of any one I know, about here, before I go away?'
'No,' said he, looking as if he hardly understood me.
'I don't mean in the village only, but up-town?'
'No,' said he. 'No objection.'
I thanked him and ran home again, and there I found that Joe had already 
locked the front door and vacated the state parlour, and was seated by the 
kitchen fire with a hand on each knee, gazing intently at the burning 
coals. I too sat down before the fire and gazed at the coals, and nothing 
was said for a long time.
My sister was in her cushioned chair in her corner, and Biddy sat at her 
needlework before the fire, and Joe sat next Biddy, and I sat next Joe in 
the corner opposite my sister. The more I looked into the glowing coals, 
the more incapable I became of looking at Joe; the longer the silence 
lasted, the more unable I felt to speak.
At length I got out, 'Joe, have you told Biddy?'
'No, Pip,' returned Joe, still looking at the fire, and holding his knees 
tight, as if he had private information that they intended to make off 
somewhere, 'which I left it to yourself, Pip.'
'I would rather you told, Joe.'
'Pip's a gentleman of fortun' then,' said Joe, 'and God bless him in it!'
Biddy dropped her work, and looked at me. Joe held his knees and looked at 
me. I looked at both of them. After a pause, they both heartily 
congratulated me; but there was a certain touch of sadness in their 
congratulations, that I rather resented.
I took it upon myself to impress Biddy (and through Biddy, Joe) with the 
grave obligation I considered my friends under, to know nothing and say 
nothing about the maker of my fortune. It would all come out in good time, 
I observed, and in the meanwhile nothing was to be said, save that I had 
come into great expectations from a mysterious patron. Biddy nodded her 
head thoughtfully at the fire as she took up her work again, and said she 
would be very particular; and Joe, still detaining his knees, said, 'Ay, 
ay, I'll be ekervally partickler, Pip;' and then they congratulated me 
again, and went on to express so much wonder at the notion of my being a 
gentleman, that I didn't half like it.
Infinite pains were then taken by Biddy to convey to my sister some idea of 
what had happened. To the best of my belief, those efforts entirely failed. 
She laughed and nodded her head a great many times, and even repeated after 
Biddy, the words 'Pip' and 'Property.' But I doubt if they had more meaning 
in them than an election cry, and I cannot suggest a darker picture of her 
state of mind.
I never could have believed it without experience, but as Joe and Biddy 
became more at their cheerful ease again, I became quite gloomy. 
Dissatisfied with my fortune, of course I could not be; but it is possible 
that I may have been, without quite knowing it, dissatisfied with myself.
Anyhow, I sat with my elbow on my knee and my face upon my hand, looking 
into the fire, as those two talked about my going away, and about what they 
should do without me, and all that. And whenever I caught one of them 
looking at me, though never so pleasantly (and they often looked at me - 
particularly Biddy), I felt offended: as if they were expressing some 
mistrust of me. Though Heaven knows they never did by word or sign.
At those times I would get up and look out at the door; for, our kitchen 
door opened at once upon the night, and stood open on summer evenings to 
air the room. The very stars to which I then raised my eyes, I am afraid I 
took to be but poor and humble stars for glittering on the rustic objects 
among which I had passed my life.
'Saturday night,' said I, when we sat at our supper of bread-and-cheese and 
beer. 'Five more days, and then the day before the day! They'll soon go.'
'Yes, Pip,' observed Joe, whose voice sounded hollow in his beer mug. 
'They'll soon go.'
'Soon, soon go,' said Biddy.
'I have been thinking, Joe, that when I go down on Monday, and order my new 
clothes, I shall tell the tailor that I'll come and put them on there, or 
that I'll have them sent to Mr Pumblechook's. It would be very disagreeable 
to be stared at by all the people here.'
'Mr and Mrs Hubble might like to see you in your new genteel figure too, 
Pip,' said Joe, industriously cutting his bread, with his cheese on it, in 
the palm of his left hand, and glancing at my untasted supper as if he 
thought of the time when we used to compare slices. 'So might Wopsle. And 
the Jolly Bargemen might take it as a compliment.'
'That's just what I don't want, Joe. They would make such a business of it -
 such a coarse and common business - that I couldn't bear myself.'
'Ah, that indeed, Pip!' said Joe. 'If you couldn't abear yourself - '
Biddy asked me here, as she sat holding my sister's plate, 'Have you 
thought about when you'll show yourself to Mr Gargery, and your sister, and 
me? You will show yourself to us; won't you?'
'Biddy,' I returned with some resentment, 'you are so exceedingly quick 
that it's difficult to keep up with you.'
('She always were quick,' observed Joe.)
'If you had waited another moment, Biddy, you would have heard me say that 
I shall bring my clothes here in a bundle one evening - most likely on the 
evening before I go away.'
Biddy said no more. Handsomely forgiving her, I soon exchanged an 
affectionate good-night with her and Joe, and went up to bed. When I got 
into my little room, I sat down and took a long look at it, as a mean 
little room that I should soon be parted from and raised above, for ever, 
It was furnished with fresh young remembrances too, and even at the same 
moment I fell into much the same confused division of mind between it and 
the better rooms to which I was going, as I had been in so often between 
the forge and Miss Havisham's, and Biddy and Estella.
The sun had been shining brightly all day on the roof of my attic, and the 
room was warm. As I put the window open and stood looking out, I saw Joe 
come slowly forth at the dark door below, and take a turn or two in the 
air; and then I saw Biddy come, and bring him a pipe and light it for him. 
He never smoked so late, and it seemed to hint to me that he wanted 
comforting, for some reason or other.
He presently stood at the door immediately beneath me, smoking his pipe, 
and Biddy stood there too, quietly talking to him, and I knew that they 
talked of me, for I heard my name mentioned in an endearing tone by both of 
them more than once. I would not have listened for more, if I could have 
heard more: so, I drew away from the window, and sat down in my one chair 
by the bedside, feeling it very sorrowful and strange that this first night 
of my bright fortunes should be the loneliest I had ever known.
Looking towards the open window, I saw light wreaths from Joe's pipe 
floating there, and I fancied it was like a blessing from Joe - not 
obtruded on me or paraded before me, but pervading the air we shared 
together. I put my light out, and crept into bed; and it was an uneasy bed 
now, and I never slept the old sound sleep in it any more.


Chapter 19

Morning made a considerable difference in my general prospect of Life, and 
brightened it so much that it scarcely seemed the same. What lay heaviest 
on my mind, was, the consideration that six days intervened between me and 
the day of departure; for, I could not divest myself of a misgiving that 
something might happen to London in the meanwhile, and that, when I got 
there, it would be either greatly deteriorated or clean gone.
Joe and Biddy were very sympathetic and pleasant when I spoke of our 
approaching separation; but they only referred to it when I did. After 
breakfast, Joe brought out my indentures from the press in the best 
parlour, and we put them in the fire, and I felt that I was free. With all 
the novelty of my emancipation on me, I went to church with Joe, and 
thought, perhaps the clergyman wouldn't have read that about the rich man 
and the kingdom of Heaven, if he had known all.
After our early dinner I strolled out alone, purposing of finish off the 
marshes at once, and get them done with. As I passed the church, I felt (as 
I had felt during service in the morning) a sublime compassion for the poor 
creatures who were destined to go there, Sunday after Sunday, all their 
lives through, and to lie obscurely at last among the low green mounds. I 
promised myself that I would do something for them one of these days, and 
formed a plan in outline for bestowing a dinner of roast-beef and plum-
pudding, a pint of ale, and a gallon of condescension, upon everybody in 
the village.
If I had often thought before, with something allied to shame, of my 
companionship with the fugitive whom I had once seen limping among those 
graves, what were my thoughts on this Sunday, when the place recalled the 
wretch, ragged and shivering, with his felon iron and badge! My comfort 
was, that it happened a long time ago, and that he had doubtless been 
transported a long way off, and that he was dead to me, and might be 
veritably dead into the bargain.
No more low wet grounds, no more dykes and sluices, no more of these 
grazing cattle - though they seemed, in their dull manner, to wear a more 
respectful air now, and to face round, in order that they might stare as 
long as possible at the possessor of such great expectations - farewell, 
monotonous acquaintances of my childhood, henceforth I was for London and 
greatness: not for smith's work in general and for you! I made my exultant 
way to the old Battery, and, lying down there to consider the question 
whether Miss Havisham intended me for Estella, fell asleep.
When I awoke, I was much surprised to find Joe sitting beside me, smoking 
his pipe. He greeted me with a cheerful smile on my opening my eyes, and 
said:
'As being the last time, Pip, I thought I'd foller.'
'And Joe, I am very glad you did so.'
'Thank'ee, Pip.'
'You may be sure, dear Joe,' I went on, after we had shaken hands, 'that I 
shall never forget you.'
'No, no, Pip!' said Joe, in a comfortable tone, 'I'm sure of that. Ay, ay, 
old chap! Bless you, it were only necessary to get it well round in a man's 
mind, to be certain on it. But it took a bit of time to get it well round, 
the change come so oncommon plump; didn't it?'
Somehow, I was not best pleased with Joe's being so mightily secure of me. 
I should have liked him to have betrayed emotion, or to have said, 'It does 
you credit, Pip,' or something of that sort. Therefore, I made no remark on 
Joe's first head: merely saying as to his second, that the tidings had 
indeed come suddenly, but that I had always wanted to be a gentleman, and 
had often and often speculated on what I would do, if I were one.
'Have you though?' said Joe. 'Astonishing!'
'It's a pity now, Joe,' said I, 'that you did not get on a little more, 
when we had our lessons here; isn't it?'
'Well, I don't know,' returned Joe. 'I'm so awful dull. I'm only master of 
my own trade. It were always a pity as I was so awful dull; but it's no 
more of a pity now, than it was - this day twelvemonth - don't you see?'
What I had meant was, that when I came into my property and was able to do 
something for Joe, it would have been much more agreeable if he had been 
better qualified for a rise in station. He was so perfectly innocent of my 
meaning, however, that I thought I would mention it to Biddy in preference.
So, when we had walked home and had had tea, I took Biddy into our little 
garden by the side of the lane, and, after throwing out in a general way 
for elevation of her spirits, that I should never forget her, said I had a 
favour to ask of her.
'And it is, Biddy,' said I, 'that you will not omit any opportunity of 
helping Joe on, a little.'
'How helping him on?' asked Biddy, with a steady sort of glance.
'Well! Joe is a dear good fellow - in fact, I think he is the dearest 
fellow that ever lived - but he is rather backward in some things. For 
instance, Biddy, in his learning and his manners.'
Although I was looking at Biddy as I spoke, and although she opened her 
eyes very wide when I had spoken, she did not look at me.
'Oh, his manners! won't his manners do, then?' asked Biddy, plucking a 
black-currant leaf.
'My dear Biddy, they do very well here - '
'Oh! they do very well here?' interrupted Biddy, looking closely at the 
leaf in her hand.
'Hear me out - but if I were to remove Joe into a higher sphere, as I shall 
hope to remove him when I fully come into my property, they would hardly do 
him justice.'
'And don't you think he knows that?' asked Biddy.
It was such a very provoking question (for it had never in the most distant 
manner occurred to me), that I said, snappishly, 'Biddy, what do you mean?'
Biddy having rubbed the leaf to pieces between her hands - and the smell of 
a black-currant bush has ever since recalled to me that evening in the 
little garden by the side of the lane - said, 'Have you never considered 
that he may be proud?'
'Proud?' I repeated, with disdainful emphasis.
'Oh! there are many kinds of pride,' said Biddy, looking full at me and 
shaking her head; 'pride is not all of one kind - '
'Well? What are you stopping for?' said I.
'Not all of one kind,' resumed Biddy. 'He may be too proud to let any one 
take him out of a place that he is competent to fill, and fills well and 
with respect. To tell you the truth, I think he is: though it sounds bold 
in me to say so, for you must know him far better than I do.'
'Now, Biddy,' said I, 'I am very sorry to see this in you. I did not expect 
to see this in you. You are envious, Biddy, and grudging. You are 
dissatisfied on account of my rise in fortune, and you can't help showing 
it.'
'If you have the heart to think so,' returned Biddy, 'say so. Say so over 
and over again, if you have the heart to think so.'
'If you have the heart to be so, you mean, Biddy,' said I, in a virtuous 
and superior tone; 'don't put it off upon me. I am very sorry to see it, 
and it's a - it's a bad side of human nature. I did intend to ask you to 
use any little opportunities you might have after I was gone, of improving 
dear Joe. But after this, I ask you nothing. I am extremely sorry to see 
this in you, Biddy,' I repeated. 'It's a - it's a bad side of human 
nature.'
'Whether you scold me or approve of me,' returned poor Biddy, 'you may 
equally depend upon my trying to do all that lies in my power, here, at all 
times. And whatever opinion you take away of me, shall make no difference 
in my remembrance of you. Yet a gentleman should not be unjust neither,' 
said Biddy, turning away her head.
I again warmly repeated that it was a bad side of human nature (in which 
sentiment, waiving its application, I have since seen reason to think I was 
right), and I walked down the little path away from Biddy, and Biddy went 
into the house, and I went out at the garden gate and took a dejected 
stroll until supper-time; again feeling it very sorrowful and strange that 
this, the second night of my bright fortunes, should be as lonely and 
unsatisfactory as the first.
But, morning once more brightened my view, and I extended my clemency to 
Biddy, and we dropped the subject. Putting on the best clothes I had, I 
went into town as early as I could hope to find the shops open, and 
presented myself before Mr Trabb, the tailor: who was having his breakfast 
in the parlour behind his shop, and who did not think it worth his while to 
come out to me, but called me in to him.
'Well!' said Mr Trabb, in a hail-fellow-well-met kind of way. 'How are you, 
and what can I do for you?'
Mr Trabb had sliced his hot roll into three feather beds, and was slipping 
butter in between the blankets, and covering it up. He was a prosperous old 
bachelor, and his open window looked into a prosperous little garden and 
orchard, and there was a prosperous iron safe let into the wall at the side 
of his fireplace, and I did not doubt that heaps of his prosperity were put 
away in it in bags.
'Mr Trabb,' said I, 'it's an unpleasant thing to have to mention, because 
it looks like boasting; but I have come into a handsome property.'
A change passed over Mr Trabb. He forgot the butter in bed, got up from the 
bedside, and wiped his fingers on the tablecloth, exclaiming, 'Lord bless 
my soul!'
'I am going up to my guardian in London,' said I, casually drawing some 
guineas out of my pocket and looking at them; 'and I want a fashionable 
suit of clothes to go in. I wish to pay for them,' I added - otherwise I 
thought he might only pretend to make them - 'with ready money.'
'My dear sir,' said Mr Trabb, as he respectfully bent his body, opened his 
arms, and took the liberty of touching me on the outside of each elbow, 
'don't hurt me by mentioning that. May I venture to congratulate you? Would 
you do me the favour of stepping into the shop?'
Mr Trabb's boy was the most audacious boy in all that countryside. When I 
had entered he was sweeping the shop, and he had sweetened his labours by 
sweeping over me. He was still sweeping when I came out into the shop with 
Mr Trabb, and he knocked the broom against all possible corners and 
obstacles, to express (as I understood it) equality with any blacksmith, 
alive or dead.
'Hold that noise,' said Mr Trabb, with the greatest sternness, 'or I'll 
knock your head off! Do me the favour to be seated, sir. Now, this,' said 
Mr Trabb, taking down a roll of cloth, and tiding it out in a flowing 
manner over the counter, preparatory to getting his hand under it to show 
the gloss, 'is a very sweet article. I can recommend it for your purpose, 
sir, because it really is extra super. But you shall see some others. Give 
me Number Four, you!' (To the boy, and with a dreadfully severe stare: 
foreseeing the danger of that miscreant's brushing me with it, or making 
some other sign of familiarity.)
Mr Trabb never removed his stern eye from the boy until he had deposited 
number four on the counter and was at a safe distance again. Then, he 
commanded him to bring number five, and number eight. 'And let me have none 
of your tricks here,' said Mr Trabb, 'or you shall repent it, you young 
scoundrel, the longest day you have to live.'
Mr Trabb then bent over number four, and in a sort of deferential 
confidence recommended it to me as a light article for summer wear, an 
article much in vogue among the nobility and gentry, and article that it 
would ever be an honour to him to reflect upon a distinguished fellow-
townsman's (if he might claim me for a fellow-townsman) having worn. 'Are 
you bringing numbers five and eight, you vagabond,' said Mr Trabb to the 
boy after that, 'or shall I kick you out of the shop and bring them 
myself?'
I selected the materials for a suit, with the assistance of Mr Trabb's 
judgment, and re-entered the parlour to be measured. For, although Mr Trabb 
had my measure already, and had previously been quite contented with it, he 
said apologetically that it 'wouldn't do under existing circumstances, sir -
 wouldn't do at all.' So, Mr Trabb measured and calculated me, in the 
parlour, as if I were an estate and he the finest species of surveyor, and 
gave himself such a world of trouble that I felt that no suit of clothes 
could possibly remunerate him for his pains. When he had at last done and 
had appointed to send the articles to Mr Pumblechook's on the Thursday 
evening, he said, with his hand upon the parlour lock, 'I know, sir, that 
London gentlemen cannot be expected to patronise local work, as a rule; but 
if you would give me a turn now and then in the quality of a townsman, I 
should greatly esteem it. Good morning, sir, much obliged. - Door!'
The last word was flung at the boy, who had not the least notion what it 
meant. But I saw him collapse as his master rubbed me out with his hands, 
and my first decided experience of the stupendous power of money, was, that 
it had morally laid upon his back, Trabb's boy.
After this memorable event, I went to the hatter's, and the book-maker's, 
and the hosier's, and felt rather like Mother Hubbard's dog whose outfit 
required the services of so many trades. I also went to the coach-office 
and took my place for seven o'clock on Saturday morning. It was not 
necessary to explain everywhere that I had come into a handsome property; 
but whenever I said anything to that effect, it followed that the 
officiating tradesman ceased to have his attention diverted through the 
window by the High-street, and concentrated his mind upon me. When I had 
ordered everything I wanted, I directed my steps towards Pumblechook's, 
and, as I approached that gentleman's place of business, I saw him standing 
at his door.
He was waiting for me with great impatience. He had been out early with the 
chaise-cart, and had called at the forge and heard the news. He had 
prepared a collation for me in the Barnwell parlour, and he too ordered his 
shopman to 'come out of the gangway' as my sacred person passed.
'My dear friend,' said Mr Pumblechook, taking me by both hands, when he and 
I and the collation were alone, 'I give you joy of your good fortune. Well 
deserved, well deserved!'
This was coming to the point, and I thought it a sensible way of expressing 
himself.
'To think,' said Mr Pumblechook, after snorting admiration at me for some 
moments, 'that I should have been the humble instrument of leading up to 
this, is a proud reward.'
I begged Mr Pumblechook to remember that nothing was to be ever said or 
hinted, on that point.
'My dear young friend,' said Mr Pumblechook, 'if you will allow me to call 
you so - '
I murmured 'Certainly,' and Mr Pumblechook took me by both hands again, and 
communicated a movement to his waistcoat, which had an emotional 
appearance, though it was rather low down, 'My dear young friend, rely upon 
my doing my little all in your absence, by keeping the fact before the mind 
of Joseph. - Joseph!' said Mr Pumblechook, in the way of a compassionate 
adjuration. 'Joseph!! Joseph!!!' Thereupon he shook his head and tapped it, 
expressing his sense of deficiency in Joseph.
'But my dear young friend,' said Mr Pumblechook, 'you must be hungry, you 
must be exhausted. Be seated. Here is a chicken had round from the Boar, 
here is a tongue had round from the Boar, here's one or two little things 
had round from the Boar, that I hope you may not despise. But do I,' said 
Mr Pumblechook, getting up again the moment after he had sat down, 'see 
afore me, him as I ever sported with in his times of happy infancy? And may 
I - may I - ?'
This May I, meant might he shake hands? I consented, and he was fervent, 
and then sat down again.
'Here is wine,' said Mr Pumblechook. 'Let us drink, Thanks to Fortune, and 
may she ever pick out her favourites with equal judgment! And yet I 
cannot,' said Mr Pumblechook, getting up again, 'see afore me One - and 
likewise drink to One - without again expressing - May I - may I - ?'
I said he might, and he shook hands with me again, and emptied his glass 
and turned it upside down. I did the same; and if I had turned myself 
upside down before drinking, the wine could not have gone more direct to my 
head.
Mr Pumblechook helped me to the liver wing, and to the best slice of tongue 
(none of those out-of-the-way No Thoroughfares of Pork now), and took, 
comparatively speaking, no care of himself at all. 'Ah! poultry, poultry! 
You little thought,' said Mr Pumblechook, apostrophising the fowl in the 
dish, 'when you was a young fledgling, what was in store for you. You 
little thought you was to be refreshment beneath this humble roof for one 
as - Call it a weakness, if you will,' said Mr Pumblechook, getting up 
again, 'but may I? may I - ?'
It began to be unnecessary to repeat the form of saying he might, so he did 
it at once. How he ever did it so often without wounding himself with my 
knife, I don't know.
'And your sister,' he resumed, after a little steady eating, 'which had the 
honour of bringing you up by hand! It's a sad picter, to reflect that she's 
no longer equal to fully understanding the honour. May - '
I saw he was about to come at me again, and I stopped him.
'We'll drink her health,' said I.
'Ah!' cried Mr Pumblechook, leaning back in his chair, quite flaccid with 
admiration, 'that's the way you know 'em, sir!' (I don't know who Sir was, 
but he certainly was not I, and there was no third person present); 'that's 
the way you know the noble-minded, sir! Ever forgiving and ever affable. It 
might,' said the servile Pumblechook, putting down his untasted glass in a 
hurry and getting up again, 'to a common person, have the appearance of 
repeating - but may I - ?'
When he had done it, he resumed his seat and drank to my sister. 'Let us 
never be blind,' said Mr Pumblechook, 'to her faults of temper, but it is 
to be hoped she meant well.'
At about this time, I began to observe that he was getting flushed in the 
face; as to myself, I felt all face, steeped in wine and smarting.
I mentioned to Mr Pumblechook that I wished to have my new clothes sent to 
his house, and he was ecstatic on my so distinguishing him. I mentioned my 
reason for desiring to avoid observation in the village, and he lauded it 
to the skies. There was nobody but himself, he intimated, worthy of my 
confidence, and - in short, might he? Then he asked me tenderly if I 
remembered our boyish games at sums, and how we had gone together to have 
me bound apprentice, and, in effect, how he had ever been my favourite 
fancy and my chosen friend? If I had taken ten times as many glasses of 
wine as I had, I should have known that he never had stood in that relation 
towards me, and should in my heart of hearts have repudiated the idea. Yet 
for all that, I remember feeling convinced that I had been much mistaken in 
him, and that he was a sensible practical good-hearted prime fellow.
By degrees he fell to reposing such great confidence in me, as to ask my 
advice in reference to his own affairs. He mentioned that there was an 
opportunity for a great amalgamation and monopoly of the corn and seed 
trade on those premises, if enlarged, such as had never occurred before in 
that, or any other neighbourhood. What alone was wanting to the realization 
of a vast fortune, he considered to be More Capital. Those were the two 
little words, more capital. Now it appeared to him (Pumblechook) that if 
that capital were got into the business, through a sleeping partner, sir - 
which sleeping partner would have nothing to do but walk in, by self or 
deputy, whenever he pleased, and examine the books - and walk in twice a 
year and take his profits away in his pocket, to the tune of fifty per 
cent. - it appeared to him that that might be an opening for a young 
gentleman of spirit combined with property, which would be worthy of his 
attention. But what did I think? He had great confidence in my opinion, and 
what did I think? I gave it as my opinion. 'Wait a bit!' The united 
vastness and distinctness of this view so struck him, that he no longer 
asked if he might shake hands with me, but said he really must - and did.
We drank all the wine, and Mr Pumblechook pledged himself over and over 
again to keep Joseph up to the mark (I don't know what mark), and to render 
me efficient and constant service (I don't know what service). He also made 
known to me for the first time in my life, and certainly after having kept 
his secret wonderfully well, that he had always said of me, 'That boy is no 
common boy, and mark me, his fortun' will be no common fortun'.' He said 
with a tearful smile that it was a singular thing to think of now, and I 
said so too. Finally, I went out into the air, with a dim perception that 
there was something unwonted in the conduct of the sunshine, and found that 
I had slumberously got to the turn-pike without having taken any account of 
the road.
There, I was roused by Mr Pumblechook's hailing me. He was a long way down 
the sunny street, and was making expressive gestures for me to stop. I 
stopped, and he came up breathless.
'No, my dear friend,' said he, when he had recovered wind for speech. 'Not 
if I can help it. This occasion shall not entirely pass without that 
affability on your part. - May I, as an old friend and well-wisher? May I?'
We shook hands for the hundredth time at least, and he ordered a young 
carter out of my way with the greatest indignation. Then, he blessed me and 
stood waving his hand to me until I had passed the crook in the road; and 
then I turned into a field and had a long nap under a hedge before I 
pursued my way home.
I had scant luggage to take with me to London, for little of the little I 
possessed was adapted to my new station. But, I began packing that same 
afternoon, and wildly packed up things that I knew I should want next 
morning, in a fiction that there was not a moment to be lost.
So, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, passed; and on Friday morning I went 
to Mr Pumblechook's, to put on my new clothes and pay my visit to Miss 
Havisham. Mr Pumblechook's own room was given up to me to dress in, and was 
decorated with clean towels expressly for the event. My clothes were rather 
a disappointment, of course. Probably every new and eagerly expected 
garment ever put on since clothes came in, fell a trifle short of the 
wearer's expectation. But after I had had my new suit on, some half an 
hour, and had gone through an immensity of posturing with Mr Pumblechook's 
very limited dressing-glass, in the futile endeavour to see my legs, it 
seemed to fit me better. It being market morning at a neighbouring town 
some ten miles off, Mr Pumblechook was not at home. I had not told him 
exactly when I meant to leave, and was not likely to shake hands with him 
again before departing. This was all as it should be, and I went out in my 
new array: fearfully ashamed of having to pass the shopman, and suspicious 
after all that I was at a personal disadvantage, something like Joe's in 
his Sunday suit.
I went circuitously to Miss Havisham's by all the back ways, and rang at 
the bell constrainedly, on account of the stiff long fingers of my gloves. 
Sarah Pocket came to the gate, and positively reeled back when she saw me 
so changed; her walnut-shell countenance likewise, turned from brown to 
green and yellow.
'You?' said she. 'You, good gracious! What do you want?'
'I am going to London, Miss Pocket,' said I, 'and want to say good-bye to 
Miss Havisham.'
I was not expected, for she left me locked in the yard, while she went to 
ask if I were to be admitted. After a very short delay, she returned and 
took me up, staring at me all the way.
Miss Havisham was taking exercise in the room with the long spread table, 
leaning on her crutch stick. The room was lighted as of yore, and at the 
sound of our entrance, she stopped and turned. She was then just abreast of 
the rotted bride-cake.
'Don't go, Sarah,' she said. 'Well, Pip?'
'I start for London, Miss Havisham, tomorrow,' I was exceedingly careful 
what I said, 'and I thought you would kindly not mind my taking leave of 
you.'
'This is a gay figure, Pip,' said she, making her crutch stick play round 
me, as if she, the fairy godmother who had changed me, were bestowing the 
finishing gift.
'I have come into such good fortune since I saw you last, Miss Havisham,' I 
murmured. 'And I am so grateful for it, Miss Havisham!'
'Ay, ay!' said she, looking at the discomfited and envious Sarah, with 
delight. 'I have seen Mr Jaggers. I have heard about it, Pip. So you go 
tomorrow?'
'Yes, Miss Havisham.'
'And you are adopted by a rich person?'
'Yes, Miss Havisham.'
'Not named?'
'No, Miss Havisham.'
'And Mr Jaggers is made your guardian?'
'Yes, Miss Havisham.'
She quite gloated on these questions and answers, so keen was her enjoyment 
of Sarah Pocket's jealous dismay. 'Well!' she went on; 'you have a 
promising career before you. Be good - deserve it - and abide by Mr 
Jaggers's instructions.' She looked at me, and looked at Sarah, and Sarah's 
countenance wrung out of her watchful face a cruel smile. 'Good-bye, Pip! - 
you will always keep the name of Pip, you know.'
'Yes, Miss Havisham.'
'Good-bye, Pip!'
She stretched out her hand, and I went down on my knee and put it to my 
lips. I had not considered how I should take leave of her; it came 
naturally to me at the moment, to do this. She looked at Sarah Pocket with 
triumph in her weird eyes, and so I left my fairy godmother, with both her 
hands on her crutch stick, standing in the midst of the dimly lighted room 
beside the rotten bridecake that was hidden in cobwebs.
Sarah Pocket conducted me down, as if I were a ghost who must be seen out. 
She could not get over my appearance, and was in the last degree 
confounded. I said 'Good-bye, Miss Pocket;' but she merely stared, and did 
not seem collected enough to know that I had spoken. Clear of the house, I 
made the best of my way back to Pumblechook's, took off my new clothes, 
made them into a bundle, and went back home in my older dress, carrying it -
 to speak the truth - much more at my ease too, though I had the bundle to 
carry.
And now, those six days which were to have run out so slowly, had run out 
fast and were gone, and tomorrow looked me in the face more steadily than I 
could look at it. As the six evenings had dwindled away, to five, to four, 
to three, to two, I had become more and more appreciative of the society of 
Joe and Biddy. On this last evening, I dressed my self out in my new 
clothes, for their delight, and sat in my splendour until bedtime. We had a 
hot supper on the occasion, graced by the inevitable roast fowl, and we had 
some flip to finish with. We were all very low, and none the higher for 
pretending to be in spirits.
I was to leave our village at five in the morning, carrying my little hand-
portmanteau, and I had told Joe that I wished to walk away all alone. I am 
afraid - sore afraid - that this purpose originated in my sense of the 
contrast there would be between me and Joe, if we went to the coach 
together. I had pretended with myself that there was nothing of this taint 
in the arrangement; but when I went up to my little room on this last 
night, I felt compelled to admit that it might be so, and had an impulse 
upon me to go down again and entreat Joe to walk with me in the morning. I 
did not.
All night there were coaches in my broken sleep, going to wrong places 
instead of to London, and having in the traces, now dogs, now cats, now 
pigs, now men - never horses. Fantastic failures of journeys occupied me 
until the day dawned and the birds were singing. Then, I got up and partly 
dressed, and sat at the window to take a last look out, and in taking it 
fell asleep.
Biddy was astir so early to get my breakfast, that, although I did not 
sleep at the window an hour, I smelt the smoke of the kitchen fire when I 
started up with a terrible idea that it must be late in the afternoon. But 
long after that, and long after I had heard the clinking of the teacups and 
was quite ready, I wanted the resolution to go down stairs. After all, I 
remained up there, repeatedly unlocking and unstrapping my small 
portmanteau and locking and strapping it up again, until Biddy called to me 
that I was late.
It was a hurried breakfast with no taste in it. I got up from the meal, 
saying with a sort of briskness, as if it had only just occurred to me, 
'Well! I suppose I must be off!' and then I kissed my sister who was 
laughing and nodding and shaking in her usual chair, and kissed Biddy, and 
threw my arms around Joe's neck. Then I took up my little portmanteau and 
walked out. The last I saw of them was, when I presently heard a scuffle 
behind me, and looking back, saw Joe throwing an old shoe after me and 
Biddy throwing another old shoe. I stopped then, to wave my hat, and dear 
old Joe waved his strong right arm above his head, crying huskily 
'Hooroar!' and Biddy put her apron to her face.
I walked away at a good pace, thinking it was easier to go than I had 
supposed it would be, and reflecting that it would never have done to have 
had an old shoe thrown after the coach, in sight of all the High-street. I 
whistled and made nothing of going. But the village was very peaceful and 
quiet, and the light mists were solemnly rising, as if to show me the 
world, and I had been so innocent and little there, and all beyond was so 
unknown and great, that in a moment with a strong heave and sob I broke 
into tears. It was by the finger-post at the end of the village, and I laid 
my hand upon it, and said, 'Good-bye O my dear, dear friend!'
Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon 
the blinding dust of earth, overlying our hard hearts. I was better after I 
had cried, than before - more sorry, more aware of my own ingratitude, more 
gentle. If I had cried before, I should have had Joe with me then.
So subdued I was by those tears, and by their breaking out again in the 
course of the quiet walk, that when I was on the coach, and it was clear of 
the town, I deliberated with an aching heart whether I would not get down 
when we changed horses and walk back, and have another evening at home, and 
a better parting. We changed, and I had not made up my mind, and still 
reflected for my comfort that it would be quite practicable to get down and 
walk back, when we changed again. And while I was occupied with these 
deliberations, I would fancy an exact resemblance to Joe in some man coming 
along the road towards us, and my heart would beat high. - As if he could 
possibly be there!
We changed again, and yet again, and it was now too late and too far to go 
back, and I went on. And the mists had all solemnly risen now, and the 
world lay spread before me.

THIS IS THE END OF THE FIRST STAGE OF PIP'S EXPECTATIONS.


Chapter 20

The journey from our town to the metropolis, was a journey of about five 
hours. It was a little past midday when the four-horse stagecoach by which 
I was a passenger, got into the ravel of traffic frayed out about the Cross 
Keys, Wood-street, Cheapside, London.
We Britons had at that time particularly settled that it was treasonable to 
doubt our having and our being the best of everything: otherwise, while I 
was scared by the immensity of London, I think I might have had some faint 
doubts whether it was not rather ugly, crooked, narrow, and dirty.
Mr Jaggers had duly sent me his address; it was, Little Britain, and he had 
written after it on his card, 'just out of Smithfield, and close by the 
coach-office.' Nevertheless, a hackney-coachman, who seemed to have as many 
capes to his greasy greatcoat as he was years old, packed me up in his 
coach and hemmed me in with a folding and jingling barrier of steps, as if 
he were going to take me fifty miles. His getting on his box, which I 
remember to have been decorated with an old weather-stained pea-green 
hammer-cloth moth-eaten into rags, was quite a work of time. It was a 
wonderful equipage, with six great coronets outside, and ragged things 
behind for I don't know how many footmen to hold on by, and a harrow below 
them, to prevent amateur footmen from yielding to the temptation.
I had scarcely had time to enjoy the coach and to think how like a straw-
yard it was, and yet how like a rag-shop, and to wonder why the horses' 
nose-bags were kept inside, when I observed the coachman beginning to get 
down, as if we were going to stop presently. And stop we presently did, in 
a gloomy street, at certain offices with an open door, whereon was painted 
MR JAGGERS.
'How much?' I asked the coachman.
The coachman answered, 'A shilling - unless you wish to make it more.'
I naturally said I had no wish to make it more.
'Then it must be a shilling,' observed the coachman. 'I don't want to get 
into trouble. I know him!' He darkly closed an eye at Mr Jaggers's name, 
and shook his head.
When he had got his shilling, and had in course of time completed the 
ascent to his box, and had got away (which appeared to relieve his mind), I 
went into the front office with my little portmanteau in my hand and asked, 
Was Mr Jaggers at home?
'He is not,' returned the clerk. 'He is in Court at present. Am I 
addressing Mr Pip?'
I signified that he was addressing Mr Pip.
'Mr Jaggers left word would you wait in his room. He couldn't say how long 
he might be, having a case on. But it stands to reason, his time being 
valuable, that he won't be longer than he can help.'
With those words, the clerk opened a door, and ushered me into an inner 
chamber at the back. Here, we found a gentleman with one eye, in a 
velveteen suit and knee-breeches, who wiped his nose with his sleeve on 
being interrupted in the perusal of the newspaper.
'Go and wait outside, Mike,' said the clerk.
I began to say that I hoped I was not interrupting - when the clerk shoved 
this gentleman out with as little ceremony as I ever saw used, and tossing 
his fur cap out after him, left me alone.
Mr Jaggers's room was lighted by a skylight only, and was a most dismal 
place; the skylight, eccentrically patched like a broken head, and the 
distorted adjoining houses looking as if they had twisted themselves to 
peep down at me through it. There were not so many papers about, as I 
should have expected to see; and there were some odd objects about, that I 
should not have expected to see - such as an old rusty pistol, a sword in a 
scabbard, several strange-looking boxes and packages, and two dreadful 
casts on a shelf, of faces peculiarly swollen, and twitchy about the nose. 
Mr Jaggers's own high-backed chair was of deadly black horse-hair, with 
rows of brass nails round it, like a coffin; and I fancied I could see how 
he leaned back in it, and bit his forefinger at the clients. The room was 
but small, and the clients seemed to have had a habit of backing up against 
the wall: the wall, especially opposite to Mr Jaggers's chair, being greasy 
with shoulders. I recalled, too, that the one-eyed gentleman had shuffled 
forth against the wall when I was the innocent cause of his being turned 
out.
I sat down in the cliental chair placed over against Mr Jaggers's chair, 
and became fascinated by the dismal atmosphere of the place. I called to 
mind that the clerk had the same air of knowing something to everybody 
else's disadvantage, as his master had. I wondered how many other clerks 
there were upstairs, and whether they all claimed to have the same 
detrimental mastery of their fellow-creatures. I wondered what was the 
history of all the odd litter about the room, and how it came there. I 
wondered whether the two swollen faces were of Mr Jaggers's family, and, if 
he were so unfortunate as to have had a pair of such ill-looking relations, 
why he stuck them on that dusty perch for the blacks and flies to settle 
on, instead of giving them a place at home. Of course I had no experience 
of a London summer day, and my spirits may have been oppressed by the hot 
exhausted air, and by the dust and grit that lay thick on everything. But I 
sat wondering and waiting in Mr Jaggers's close room, until I really could 
not bear the two casts on the shelf above Mr Jaggers's chair, and got up 
and went out.
When I told the clerk that I would take a turn in the air while I waited, 
he advised me to go round the corner and I should come into Smithfield. So, 
I came into Smithfield; and the shameful place, being all asmear with filth 
and fat and blood and foam, seemed to stick to me. So, I rubbed it off with 
all possible speed by turning into a street where I saw the great black 
dome of Saint Paul's bulging at me from behind a grim stone building which 
a bystander said was Newgate Prison. Following the wall of the jail, I 
found the roadway covered with straw to deaden the noise of passing 
vehicles; and from this, and from the quantity of people standing about, 
smelling strongly of spirits and beer, I inferred that the trials were on.
While I looked about me here, an exceedingly dirty and partially drunk 
minister of justice asked me if I would like to step in and hear a trial or 
so: informing me that he could give me a front place for half-a-crown, 
whence I should command a full view of the Lord Chief Justice in his wig 
and robes - mentioning that awful personage like waxwork, and presently 
offering him at the reduced price of eighteenpence. As I declined the 
proposal on the plea of an appointment, he was so good as to take me into a 
yard and show me where the gallows was kept, and also where people were 
publicly whipped, and then he showed me the Debtors' Door, out of which 
culprits came to be hanged: heightening the interest of that dreadful 
portal by giving me to understand that 'four on 'em' would come out at that 
door the day after tomorrow at eight in the morning, to be killed in a row. 
This was horrible, and gave me a sickening idea of London: the more so as 
the Lord Chief Justice's proprietor wore (from his hat down to his boots 
and up again to his pocket-handkerchief inclusive) mildewed clothes, which 
had evidently not belonged to him originally, and which, I took it into my 
head, he had bought cheap of the executioner. Under these circumstances I 
thought myself well rid of him for a shilling.
I dropped into the office to ask if Mr Jaggers had come in yet, and I found 
he had not, and I strolled out again. This time, I made the tour of Little 
Britain, and turned into Bartholomew Close; and now I became aware that 
other people were waiting about for Mr Jaggers, as well as I. There were 
two men of secret appearance lounging in Bartholomew Close, and 
thoughtfully fitting their feet into the cracks of the pavement as they 
talked together, one of whom said to the other when they first passed me, 
that 'Jaggers would do it if it was to be done.' There was a knot of three 
men and two women standing at a corner, and one of the women was crying on 
her dirty shawl, and the other comforted her by saying, as she pulled her 
own shawl over her shoulders, 'Jaggers is for him, 'Melia, and what more 
could you have?' There was a red-eyed little Jew who came into the Close 
while I was loitering there, in company with a second little Jew whom he 
sent upon an errand; and while the messenger was gone, I remarked this Jew, 
who was of a highly excitable temperament, performing a jig of anxiety 
under a lamp-post and accompanying himself, in a kind of frenzy, with the 
words, 'Oh Jaggerth, Jaggerth, Jaggerth! all otherth ith Cag-Maggerth, give 
me Jaggerth!' These testimonies to the popularity of my guardian made a 
deep impression on me, and I admired and wondered more than ever.
At length, as I was looking out at the iron gate of Bartholomew Close into 
Little Britain, I saw Mr Jaggers coming across the road towards me. All the 
others who were waiting, saw him at the same time, and there was quite a 
rush at him. Mr Jaggers, putting a hand on my shoulder and walking me on at 
his side without saying anything to me, addressed himself to his followers.
First, he took the two secret men.
'Now, I have nothing to say to you,' said Mr Jaggers, throwing his finger 
at them. 'I want to know no more than I know. As to the result, it's a toss-
up. I told you from the first it was toss-up. Have you paid Wemmick?'
'We made the money up this morning, sir,' said one of the men, 
submissively, while the other perused Mr Jaggers's face.
'I don't ask you when you made it up, or where, or whether you made it up 
at all. Has Wemmick got it?'
'Yes, sir,' said both the men together.
'Very well; then you may go. Now, I won't have it!' said Mr Jaggers, waving 
his hand at them to put them behind him. 'If you say a word to me, I'll 
throw up the case.'
'We thought, Mr Jaggers -' one of the men began, pulling off his hat.
'That's what I told you not to do,' said Mr Jaggers. 'You thought! I think 
for you; that's enough for you. If I want you, I know where to find you; I 
don't want you to find me. Now I won't have it. I won't hear a word.'
The two men looked at one another as Mr Jaggers waved them behind again, 
and humbly fell back and were heard no more.
'And now you!' said Mr Jaggers, suddenly stopping, and turning on the two 
women with the shawls, from whom the three men had meekly separated. - 'Oh! 
Amelia, is it?'
'Yes, Mr Jaggers.'
'And do you remember,' retorted Mr Jaggers, 'that but for me you wouldn't 
be here and couldn't be here?'
'Oh yes, sir!' exclaimed both women together. 'Lord bless you, sir, well we 
knows that!'
'Then why,' said Mr Jaggers, 'do you come here?'
'My Bill, sir!' the crying woman pleaded.
'Now, I tell you what!' said Mr Jaggers. 'Once for all. If you don't know 
that your Bill's in good hands, I know it. And if you come here, bothering 
about your Bill, I'll make an example of both your Bill and you, and let 
him slip through my fingers. Have you paid Wemmick?'
'Oh yes, sir! Every farden.'
'Very well. Then you have done all you have got to do. Say another word - 
one single word - and Wemmick shall give you your money back.'
This terrible threat caused the two women to fall off immediately. No one 
remained now but the excitable Jew, who had already raised the skirts of Mr 
Jaggers's coat to his lips several times.
'I don't know this man!' said Mr Jaggers, in the same devastating strain: 
'What does this fellow want?'
'Ma thear Mithter Jaggerth. Hown brother to Habraham Latharuth?'
'Who's he?' said Mr Jaggers. 'Let go of my coat.'
The suitor, kissing the hem of the garment again before relinquishing it, 
replied, 'Habraham Latharuth, on thuthpithion of plate.'
'You're too late,' said Mr Jaggers. 'I am over the way.'
'Holy father, Mithter Jaggerth!' cried my excitable acquaintance, turning 
white, 'don't thay you're again Habraham Latharuth!'
'I am,' said Mr Jaggers, 'and there's an end of it. Get out of the way.'
'Mithter Jaggerth! Half a moment! My hown cuthen'th gone to Mithter Wemmick 
at thith prethent minute, to hoffer him hany termth. Mithter Jaggerth! Half 
a quarter of a moment! If you'd have the condethenthun to be bought off 
from the t'other thide - at hany thuperior prithe! - money no object! - 
Mithter Jaggerth - Mithter -!'
My guardian threw his supplicant off with supreme indifference, and left 
him dancing on the pavement as if it were red-hot. Without further 
interruption, we reached the front office, where we found the clerk and the 
man in velveteen with the fur cap.
'Here's Mike,' said the clerk, getting down from his stool, and approaching 
Mr Jaggers confidentially.
'Oh!' said Mr Jaggers, turning to the man, who was pulling a lock of hair 
in the middle of his forehead, like the Bull in Cock Robin pulling at the 
bell-rope; 'your man comes on this afternoon. Well?'
'Well, Mas'r Jaggers,' returned Mike, in the voice of a sufferer from a 
constitutional cold; 'arter a deal o' trouble, I've found one, sir, as 
might do.'
'What is he prepared to swear?'
'Well, Mas'r Jaggers,' said Mike, wiping his nose on his fur cap this time; 
'in a general way, anythink.'
Mr Jaggers suddenly became most irate. 'Now, I warned you before,' said he, 
throwing his forefinger at the terrified client, 'that if you ever presumed 
to talk in that way here, I'd make an example of you. You infernal 
scoundrel, how dare you tell ME that?'
The client looked scared, but bewildered too, as if he were unconscious 
what he had done.
'Spooney!' said the clerk, in a low voice, giving him a stir with his 
elbow. 'Soft Head! Need you say it face to face?'
'Now, I ask you, you blundering booby,' said my guardian, very sternly, 
'once more and for the last time, what the man you have brought here is 
prepared to swear?'
Mike looked hard at my guardian, as if he were trying to learn a lesson 
from his face, and slowly replied, 'Ayther to character, or to having been 
in his company and never left him all the night in question.'
'Now, be careful. In what station of life is this man?'
Mike looked at his cap, and looked at the floor, and looked at the ceiling, 
and looked at the clerk, and even looked at me, before beginning to reply 
in a nervous manner, 'We've dressed him up like -' when my guardian 
blustered out:
'What? You WILL, will you?'
('Spooney!' added the clerk again, with another stir.)
After some helpless casting about, Mike brightened and began again:
'He is dressed like a 'spectable pieman. A sort of a pastry-cook.'
'Is he here?' asked my guardian.
'I left him,' said Mike, 'a settin on some doorsteps round the corner.'
'Take him past that window, and let me see him.'
The window indicated, was the office window. We all three went to it, 
behind the wire blind, and presently saw the client go by in an accidental 
manner, with a murderous-looking tall individual, in a short suit of white 
linen and a paper cap. This guileless confectioner was not by any means 
sober, and had a black eye in the green stage of recovery, which was 
painted over.
'Tell him to take his witness away directly,' said my guardian to the 
clerk, in extreme disgust, 'and ask him what he means by bringing such a 
fellow as that.'
My guardian then took me into his own room, and while he lunched, standing, 
from a sandwich-box and a pocket flask of sherry (he seemed to bully his 
very sandwich as he ate it), informed me what arrangements he had made for 
me. I was to go to 'Barnard's Inn,' to young Mr Pocket's rooms, where a bed 
had been sent in for my accommodation; I was to remain with young Mr Pocket 
until Monday; on Monday I was to go with him to his father's house on a 
visit, that I might try how I liked it. Also, I was told what my allowance 
was to be - it was a very liberal one - and had handed to me from one of my 
guardian's drawers, the cards of certain tradesmen with whom I was to deal 
for all kinds of clothes, and such other things as I could in reason want. 
'You will find your credit good, Mr Pip,' said my guardian, whose flask of 
sherry smelt like a whole cask-full, as he hastily refreshed himself, 'but 
I shall by this means be able to check your bills, and to pull you up if I 
find you outrunning the constable. Of course you'll go wrong somehow, but 
that's no fault of mine.'
After I had pondered a little over this encouraging sentiment, I asked Mr 
Jaggers if I could send for a coach? He said it was not worth while, I was 
so near my destination; Wemmick should walk round with me, if I pleased.
I then found that Wemmick was the clerk in the next room. Another clerk was 
rung down from upstairs to take his place while he was out, and I 
accompanied him into the street, after shaking hands with my guardian. We 
found a new set of people lingering outside, but Wemmick made a way among 
them by saying coolly yet decisively, 'I tell you it's no use; he won't 
have a word to say to one of you;' and we soon got clear of them, and went 
on side by side.


Chapter 21

Casting my eyes on Mr Wemmick as we went along, to see what he was like in 
the light of day, I found him to be a dry man, rather short in stature, 
with a square wooden face, whose expression seemed to have been imperfectly 
chipped out with a dull-edged chisel. There were some marks in it that 
might have been dimples, if the material had been softer and the instrument 
finer, but which, as it was, were only dints. The chisel had made three or 
four of these attempts at embellishment over his nose, but had given them 
up without an effort to smooth them off. I judged him to be a bachelor from 
the frayed condition of his linen, and he appeared to have sustained a good 
many bereavements; for, he wore at least four mourning rings, besides a 
brooch representing a lady and a weeping willow at a tomb with an urn on 
it. I noticed, too, that several rings and seals hung at his watch chain, 
as if he were quite laden with remembrances of departed friends. He had 
glittering eyes - small, keen, and black - and thin wide mottled lips. He 
had had them, to the best of my belief, from forty to fifty years.
'So you were never in London before?' said Mr Wemmick to me.
'No,' said I.
'I was new here once,' said Mr Wemmick. 'Rum to think of now!'
'You are well acquainted with it now?'
'Why, yes,' said Mr Wemmick. 'I know the moves of it.'
'Is it a very wicked place?' I asked, more for the sake of saying something 
than for information.
'You may get cheated, robbed, and murdered, in London. But there are plenty 
of people anywhere, who'll do that for you.'
'If there is bad blood between you and them,' said I, to soften it off a 
little.
'Oh! I don't know about bad blood,' returned Mr Wemmick; 'there's not much 
bad blood about. They'll do it, if there's anything to be got by it.'
'That makes it worse.'
'You think so?' returned Mr Wemmick. 'Much about the same, I should say.'
He wore his hat on the back of his head, and looked straight before him: 
walking in a self-contained way as if there were nothing in the streets to 
claim his attention. His mouth was such a post-office of a mouth that he 
had a mechanical appearance of smiling. We had got to the top of Holborn 
Hill before I knew that it was merely a mechanical appearance, and that he 
was not smiling at all.
'Do you know where Mr Matthew Pocket lives?' I asked Mr Wemmick.
'Yes,' said he, nodding in the direction. 'At Hammersmith, west of London.'
'Is that far?'
'Well! Say five miles.'
'Do you know him?'
'Why, you're a regular cross-examiner!' said Mr Wemmick, looking at me with 
an approving air. 'Yes, I know him. I know him!'
There was an air of toleration or depreciation about his utterance of these 
words, that rather depressed me; and I was still looking sideways at his 
block of a face in search of any encouraging note to the text, when he said 
here we were at Barnard's Inn. My depression was not alleviated by the 
announcement, for, I had supposed that establishment to be an hotel kept by 
Mr Barnard, to which the Blue Boar in our town was a mere public-house. 
Whereas I now found Barnard to be a disembodied spirit, or a fiction, and 
his inn the dingiest collection of shabby buildings ever squeezed together 
in a rank corner as a club for Tom-cats.
We entered this haven through a wicket-gate, and were disgorged by an 
introductory passage into a melancholy little square that looked to me like 
a flat burying-ground. I thought it had the most dismal trees in it, and 
the most dismal sparrows, and the most dismal cats, and the most dismal 
houses (in number half a dozen or so), that I had ever seen. I thought the 
windows of the sets of chambers into which those houses were divided, were 
in every stage of dilapidated blind and curtain, crippled flowerpot, 
cracked glass, dusty decay, and miserable makeshift; while To Let, To Let, 
To Let, glared at me from empty rooms, as if no new wretches ever came 
there, and the vengeance of the soul of Barnard were being slowly appeased 
by the gradual suicide of the present occupants and their unholy interment 
under the gravel. A frouzy mourning of soot and smoke attired this forlorn 
creation of Barnard, and it had strewn ashes on its head, and was 
undergoing penance and humiliation as a mere dust-hole. Thus far my sense 
of sight; while dry rot and wet rot and all the silent rots that rot in 
neglected roof and cellar - rot of rat and mouse and bug and coaching-
stables near at hand besides - addressed themselves faintly to my sense of 
smell, and moaned, 'Try Barnard's Mixture.'
So imperfect was this realization of the first of my great expectations, 
that I looked in dismay at Mr Wemmick. 'Ah!' said he, mistaking me; 'the 
retirement reminds you of the country. So it does me.'
He led me into a corner and conducted me up a flight of stairs - which 
appeared to me to be slowly collapsing into sawdust, so that one of those 
days the upper lodgers would look out at their doors and find themselves 
without the means of coming down - to a set of chambers on the top floor. 
MR POCKET, JUN., was painted on the door, and there was a label on the 
letter-box, 'Return shortly.'
'He hardly thought you'd come so soon,' Mr Wemmick explained. 'You don't 
want me any more?'
'No, thank you,' said I.
'As I keep the cash,' Mr Wemmick observed, 'we shall most likely meet 
pretty often. Good day.'
'Good day.'
I put out my hand, and Mr Wemmick at first looked at it as if he thought I 
wanted something. Then he looked at me, and said, correcting himself,
'To be sure! Yes. You're in the habit of shaking hands?'
I was rather confused, thinking it must be out of the London fashion, but 
said yes.
'I have got so out of it!' said Mr Wemmick - 'except at last. Very glad, 
I'm sure, to make your acquaintance. Good day!'
When we had shaken hands and he was gone, I opened the staircase window and 
had nearly beheaded myself, for, the lines had rotted away, and it came 
down like the guillotine. Happily it was so quick that I had not put my 
head out. After this escape, I was content to take a foggy view of the Inn 
through the window's encrusting dirt, and to stand dolefully looking out, 
saying to myself that London was decidedly overrated.
Mr Pocket, Junior's, idea of Shortly was not mine, for I had nearly 
maddened myself with looking out for half an hour, and had written my name 
with my finger several times in the dirt of every pane in the window, 
before I heard footsteps on the stairs. Gradually there arose before me the 
hat, head, neckcloth, waistcoat, trousers, boots, of a member of society of 
about my own standing. He had a paper-bag under each arm and a pottle of 
strawberries in one hand, and was out of breath.
'Mr Pip?' said he.
'Mr Pocket?' said I.
'Dear me!' he exclaimed. 'I am extremely sorry; but I knew there was a 
coach from your part of the country at midday, and I thought you would come 
by that one. The fact is, I have been out on your account - not that that 
is any excuse - for I thought, coming from the country, you might like a 
little fruit after dinner, and I went to Convent Garden Market to get it 
good.'
For a reason that I had, I felt as if my eyes would start out of my head. I 
acknowledged his attention incoherently, and began to think this was a 
dream.
'Dear me!' said Mr Pocket, Junior. 'This door sticks so!'
As he was fast making jam of his fruit by wrestling with the door while the 
paper-bags were under his arms, I begged him to allow me to hold them. He 
relinquished them with an agreeable smile, and combated with the door as if 
it were a wild beast. It yielded so suddenly at last, that he staggered 
back upon me, and I staggered back upon the opposite door, and we both 
laughed. But still I felt as if my eyes must start out of my head, and as 
if this must be a dream.
'Pray come in,' said Mr Pocket, Junior. 'Allow me to lead the way. I am 
rather bare here, but I hope you'll be able to make out tolerably well till 
Monday. My father thought you would get on more agreeably through tomorrow 
with me than with him, and might like to take a walk about London. I am 
sure I shall be very happy to show London to you. As to our table, you 
won't find that bad, I hope, for it will be supplied from our coffee-house 
here, and (it is only right I should add) at your expense, such being Mr 
Jaggers's directions. AS to our lodging, it's not by any means splendid, 
because I have my own bread to earn, and my father hasn't anything to give 
me, and I shouldn't be willing to take it, if he had. This is our sitting-
room - just such chairs and tables and carpet and so forth, you see, as 
they could spare from home. You mustn't give me credit for the tablecloth 
and spoons and castors, because they come for you from the coffee-house. 
This is my little bedroom; rather musty, but Barnard's is musty. This is 
your bedroom; the furniture's hired for the occasion, but I trust it will 
answer the purpose; if you should want anything, I'll go and fetch it. The 
chambers are retired, and we shall be alone together, but we shan't fight, 
I dare say. But, dear me, I beg your pardon, you're holding the fruit all 
this time. Pray let me take these bags from you. I am quite ashamed.'
As I stood opposite to Mr Pocket, Junior, delivering him the bags, One, 
Two, I saw the starting appearance come into his own eyes that I knew to be 
in mine, and he said, falling back:
'Lord bless me, you're the prowling boy!'
'And you,' said I, 'are the pale young gentleman!'


Chapter 22

The pale young gentleman and I stood contemplating one another in Barnard's 
Inn, until we both burst out laughing. 'The idea of its being you!' said 
he. 'The idea of its being you!' said I. And then we contemplated one 
another afresh, and laughed again. 'Well!' said the pale young gentleman, 
reaching out his hand good-humouredly, 'it's all over now, I hope, and it 
will be magnanimous in you if you'll forgive me for having knocked you 
about so.'
I derived from this speech that Mr Herbert Pocket (for Herbert was the pale 
young gentleman's name) still rather confounded his intention with his 
execution. But I made a modest reply, and we shook hands warmly.
'You hadn't come into your good fortune at that time?' said Herbert Pocket.
'No,' said I.
'No,' he acquiesced: 'I heard it had happened very lately. I was rather on 
the look-out for good-fortune then.'
'Indeed?'
'Yes. Miss Havisham had sent for me, to see if she could take a fancy to 
me. But she couldn't - at all events, she didn't.'
I thought it polite to remark that I was surprised to hear that.
'Bad taste,' said Herbert, laughing, 'but a fact. Yes, she had sent for me 
on a trial visit, and if I had come out of it successfully, I suppose I 
should have been provided for; perhaps I should have been what-you-may-
called it to Estella.'
'What's that?' I asked, with sudden gravity.
He was arranging his fruit in plates while we talked, which divided his 
attention, and was the cause of his having made this lapse of a word. 
'Affianced,' he explained, still busy with the fruit. 'Betrothed. Engaged. 
What's-his-named. Any word of that sort.'
'How did you bear your disappointment?' I asked.
'Pooh!' said he, 'I didn't care much for it. She's a Tartar.'
'Miss Havisham?'
'I don't say no to that, but I meant Estella. That girl's hard and haughty 
and capricious to the last degree, and has been brought up by Miss Havisham 
to wreak revenge on all the male sex.'
'What relation is she to Miss Havisham?'
'None,' said he. 'Only adopted.'
'Why should she wreak revenge on all the male sex? What revenge?'
'Lord, Mr Pip!' said he. 'Don't you know?'
'No,' said I.
'Dear me! It's quite a story, and shall be saved till dinner-time.
And now let me take the liberty of asking you a question. How did you come 
there, that day?'
I told him, and he was attentive until I had finished, and then burst out 
laughing again, and asked me if I was sore afterwards? I didn't ask him if 
he was, for my conviction on that point was perfectly established.
'Mr Jaggers is your guardian, I understand?' he went on.
'Yes.'
'You know he is Miss Havisham's man of business and solicitor, and has her 
confidence when nobody else has?'
This was bringing me (I felt) towards dangerous ground. I answered with a 
constraint I made no attempt to disguise, that I had seen Mr Jaggers in 
Miss Havisham's house on the very day of our combat, but never at any other 
time, and that I believed he had no recollection of having ever seen me 
there.
'He was so obliging as to suggest my father for your tutor, and he called 
on my father to propose it. Of course he knew about my father from his 
connection with Miss Havisham. My father is Miss Havisham's cousin; not 
that that implies familiar intercourse between them, for he is a bad 
courtier and will not propitiate her.'
Herbert Pocket had a frank and easy way with him that was very taking. I 
had never seen any one then, and I have never seen any one since, who more 
strongly expressed to me, in every look and tone, a natural incapacity to 
do anything secret and mean. There was something wonderfully hopeful about 
his general air, and something that at the same time whispered to me he 
would never be very successful or rich. I don't know how this was. I became 
imbued with the notion on that first occasion before we sat down to dinner, 
but I cannot define by what means.
He was still a pale young gentleman, and had a certain conquered languor 
about him in the midst of his spirits and briskness, that did not seem 
indicative of natural strength. He had not a handsome face, but it was 
better than handsome: being extremely amiable and cheerful. His figure was 
a little ungainly, as in the days when my knuckles had taken such liberties 
with it, but it looked as if it would always be light and young. Whether Mr 
Trabb's local work would have sat more gracefully on him than on me, may be 
a question; but I am conscious that he carried off his rather old clothes, 
much better than I carried off my new suit.
As he was so communicative, I felt that reserve on my part would be a bad 
return unsuited to our years. I therefore told him my small story, and laid 
stress on my being forbidden to inquire who my benefactor was. I further 
mentioned that as I had been brought up a blacksmith in a country place, 
and knew very little of the ways of politeness, I would take it as a great 
kindness in him if he would give me a hint whenever he saw me at a loss or 
going wrong.
'With pleasure,' said he, 'though I venture to prophesy that you'll want 
very few hints. I dare say we shall be often together, and I should like to 
banish any needless restraint between us. Will you do me the favour to 
begin at once to call me by my Christian name, Herbert?'
I thanked him, and said I would. I informed him in exchange that my 
Christian name was Philip.
'I don't take to Philip,' said he, smiling, 'for it sounds like a moral boy 
out of the spelling-book, who was so lazy that he fell into a pond, or so 
fat that he couldn't see out of his eyes, or so avaricious that he locked 
up his cake till the mice ate it, or so determined to go a bird's-nesting 
that he got himself eaten by bears who lived handy in the neighbourhood. I 
tell you what I should like. We are so harmonious, and you have been a 
blacksmith - would you mind it?'
'I shouldn't mind anything that you propose,' I answered, 'but I don't 
understand you.'
'Would you mind Handel for a familiar name? There's a charming piece of 
music by Handel, called the Harmonious Blacksmith.'
'I should like it very much.'
'Then, my dear Handel,' said he, turning round as the door opened, 'here is 
the dinner, and I must beg of you to take the top of the table, because the 
dinner is of your providing.'
This I would not hear of, so he took the top, and I faced him. It was a 
nice little dinner - seemed to me then, a very Lord Mayor's Feast - and it 
acquired additional relish from being eaten under those independent 
circumstances, with no old people by, and with London all around us. This 
again was heightened by a certain gypsy character that set the banquet off; 
for, while the table was, as Mr Pumblechook might have said, the lap of 
luxury - being entirely furnished forth from the coffee-house - the 
circumjacent region of sitting-room was of a comparatively pastureless and 
shifty character: imposing on the waiter the wandering habits of putting 
the covers on the floor (where he fell over them), the melted butter in the 
armchair, the bread on the bookshelves, the cheese in the coal-scuttle, and 
the boiled fowl into my bed in the next room - where I found much of its 
parsley and butter in a state of congelation when I retired for the night. 
All this made the feast delightful, and when the waiter was not there to 
watch me, my pleasure was without alloy.
We had made some progress in the dinner, when I reminded Herbert of his 
promise to tell me about Miss Havisham.
'True,' he replied. 'I'll redeem it at once. Let me introduce the topic, 
Handel, by mentioning that in London it is not the custom to put the knife 
in the mouth - for fear of accidents - and that while the fork is reserved 
for that use, it is not put further in than necessary. It is scarcely worth 
mentioning, only it's as well to do as other people do. Also, the spoon is 
not generally used over-hand, but under. This has two advantages. You get 
at your mouth better (which after all is the object), and you save a good 
deal of the attitude of opening oysters, on the part of the right elbow.'
He offered these friendly suggestions in such a lively way, that we both 
laughed and I scarcely blushed.
'Now,' he pursued, 'concerning Miss Havisham. Miss Havisham, you must know, 
was a spoilt child. Her mother died when she was a baby, and her father 
denied her nothing. Her father was a country gentleman down in your part of 
the world, and was a brewer. I don't know why it should be a crack thing to 
be a brewer; but it is indisputable that while you cannot possibly be 
genteel and bake, you may be as genteel as never was and brew. You see it 
every day.'
'Yet a gentleman may not keep a public-house; may he?' said I.
'Not on any account,' returned Herbert; 'but a public-house may keep a 
gentleman. Well! Mr Havisham was very rich and very proud. So was his 
daughter.'
'Miss Havisham was an only child?' I hazarded.
'Stop a moment, I am coming to that. No, she was not an only child; she had 
a half-brother. Her father privately married again - his cook, I rather 
think.'
'I thought he was proud,' said I.
'My good Handel, so he was. He married his second wife privately, because 
he was proud, and in course of time she died. When she was dead, I 
apprehend he first told his daughter what he had done, and then the son 
became a part of the family, residing in the house you are acquainted with. 
As the son grew a young man, he turned out riotous, extravagant, undutiful -
 altogether bad. At last his father disinherited him; but he softened when 
he was dying, and left him well off, though not nearly so well off as Miss 
Havisham. - Take another glass of wine, and excuse my mentioning that 
society as a body does not expect one to be so strictly conscientious in 
emptying one's glass, as to turn it bottom upwards with the rim on one's 
nose.'
I had been doing this, in an excess of attention to his recital. I thanked 
him, and apologised. He said, 'Not at all,' and resumed.
'Miss Havisham was now an heiress, and you may suppose was looked after as 
a great match. Her half-brother had now ample means again, but what with 
debts and what with new madness wasted them most fearfully again. There 
were stronger differences between him and her, than there had been between 
him and his father, and it is suspected that he cherished a deep and mortal 
grudge against her, as having influenced the father's anger. Now, I come to 
the cruel part of the story - merely breaking off, my dear Handel, to 
remark that a dinner-napkin will not go into a tumbler.'
Why I was trying to pack mine into my tumbler, I am wholly unable to say. I 
only know that I found myself, with a perseverance worthy of a much better 
cause, making the most strenuous exertions to compress it within those 
limits. Again I thanked him and apologised, and again he said in the 
cheerfullest manner, 'Not at all, I am sure!' and resumed.
'There appeared upon the scene - say at the races, or the public balls, or 
anywhere else you like - a certain man, who made love to Miss Havisham. I 
never saw him, for this happened five-and-twenty years ago (before you and 
I were, Handel), but I have heard my father mention that he was a showy-
man, and the kind of man for the purpose. But that he was not to be, 
without ignorance or prejudice, mistaken for a gentleman, my father most 
strongly asseverates; because it is a principle of his that no man who was 
not a true gentleman at heart, ever was, since the world began, a true 
gentleman in manner. He says, no varnish can hide the grain of the wood; 
and that the more varnish you put on, the more the grain will express 
itself. Well! This man pursued Miss Havisham closely, and professed to be 
devoted to her. I believe she had not shown much susceptibility up to that 
time; but all the susceptibility she possessed, certainly came out then, 
and she passionately loved him. There is no doubt that she perfectly 
idolised him. He practised on her affection in that systematic way, that he 
got great sums of money from her, and he induced her to buy her brother out 
of a share in the brewery (which had been weakly left him by his father) at 
an immense price, on the plea that when he was her husband he must hold and 
manage it all. Your guardian was not at that time in Miss Havisham's 
councils, and she was too haughty and too much in love, to be advised by 
any one. Her relations were poor and scheming, with the exception of my 
father; he was poor enough, but not time-serving or jealous. The only 
independent one among them, he warned her that she was doing too much for 
this man, and was placing herself too unreservedly in his power. She took 
the first opportunity of angrily ordering my father out of the house, in 
his presence, and my father has never seen her since.'
I thought of her having said, 'Matthew will come and see me at last when I 
am laid dead upon that table;' and I asked Herbert whether his father was 
so inveterate against her?
'It's not that,' said he, 'but she charged him, in the presence of her 
intended husband, with being disappointed in the hope of fawning upon her 
for his own advancement, and, if he were to go to her now, it would look 
true - even to him - and even to her. To return to the man and make an end 
of him. The marriage day was fixed, the wedding dresses were bought, the 
wedding tour was planned out, the wedding guests were invited. The day 
came, but not the bridegroom. He wrote her a letter - '
'Which she received,' I struck in, 'when she was dressing for her marriage? 
At twenty minutes to nine?'
'At the hour and minute,' said Herbert, nodding, 'at which she afterwards 
stopped all the clocks. What was in it, further than that it most 
heartlessly broke the marriage off, I can't tell you, because I don't know. 
When she recovered from a bad illness that she had, she laid the whole 
place waste, as you have seen it, and she has never since looked upon the 
light of day.'
'Is that all the story?' I asked, after considering it.
'All I know of it; and indeed I only know so much, through piecing it out 
for myself; for my father always avoids it, and, even when Miss Havisham 
invited me to go there, told me no more of it than it was absolutely 
requisite I should understand. But I have forgotten one thing. It has been 
supposed that the man to whom she gave her misplaced confidence, acted 
throughout in concert with her half-brother; that it was a conspiracy 
between them; and that they shared the profits.'
'I wonder he didn't marry her and get all the property,' said I.
'He may have been married already, and her cruel mortification may have 
been a part of her half-brother's scheme,' said Herbert.
'Mind! I don't know that.'
'What became of the two men?' I asked, after again considering the subject.
'They fell into deeper shame and degradation - if there can be deeper - and 
ruin.'
'Are they alive now?'
'I don't know.'
'You said just now, that Estella was not related to Miss Havisham, but 
adopted. When adopted?'
Herbert shrugged his shoulders. 'There has always been an Estella, since I 
have heard of a Miss Havisham. I know no more. And now, Handel,' said he, 
finally throwing off the story as it were, 'there is a perfectly open 
understanding between us. All that I know about Miss Havisham, you know.'
'And all that I know,' I retorted, 'you know.'
'I fully believe it. So there can be no competition or perplexity between 
you and me. And as to the condition on which you hold your advancement in 
life - namely, that you are not to inquire or discuss to whom you owe it - 
you may be very sure that it will never be encroached upon, or even 
approached, by me, or by any one belonging to me.'
In truth, he said this with so much delicacy, that I felt the subject done 
with, even though I should be under his father's roof for years and years 
to come. Yet he said it with so much meaning, too, that I felt he as 
perfectly understood Miss Havisham to be my benefactress, as I understood 
the fact myself.
It had not occurred to me before, that he had led up to the theme for the 
purpose of clearing it out of our way; but we were so much the lighter and 
easier for having broached it, that I now perceived this to be the case. We 
were very gay and sociable, and I asked him, in the course of conversation, 
what he was? He replied, 'A capitalist - an Insurer of Ships.' I suppose he 
saw me glancing about the room in search of some tokens of Shipping, or 
capital, for he added, 'In the City.'
I had grand ideas of the wealth and importance of Insurers of Ships in the 
City, and I began to think with awe, of having laid a young Insurer on his 
back, blackened his enterprising eye, and cut his responsible head open. 
But, again, there came upon me, for my relief, that odd impression that 
Herbert Pocket would never be very successful or rich.
'I shall not rest satisfied with merely employing my capital in insuring 
ships. I shall buy up some good Life Assurance shares, and cut into the 
Direction. I shall also do a little in the mining way. None of these things 
will interfere with my chartering a few thousand tons on my own account. I 
think I shall trade,' said he, leaning back in his chair, 'to the East 
Indies, for silks, shawls, spices, dyes, drugs, and precious woods. It's an 
interesting trade.'
'And the profits are large?' said I.
'Tremendous!' said he.
I wavered again, and began to think here were greater expectations than my 
own.
'I think I shall trade, also,' said he, putting his thumbs in his waistcoat 
pockets, 'to the West Indies, for sugar, tobacco, and rum. Also to Ceylon, 
specially for elephants' tusks.'
'You will want a good many ships,' said I.
'A perfect fleet,' said he.
Quite overpowered by the magnificence of these transactions, I asked him 
where the ships he insured mostly traded to at present?
'I haven't begun insuring yet,' he replied. 'I am looking about me.'
Somehow, that pursuit seemed more in keeping with Barnard's Inn. I said (in 
a tone of conviction), 'Ah-h!'
'Yes. I am in a counting-house, and looking about me.'
'Is a counting-house profitable?' I asked.
'To - do you mean to the young fellow who's in it?' he asked, in reply.
'Yes; to you.'
'Why, n-no: not to me.' He said this with the air of one carefully 
reckoning up and striking a balance. 'Not directly profitable. That is, it 
doesn't pay me anything, and I have to - keep myself.'
This certainly had not a profitable appearance, and I shook my head as if I 
would imply that it would be difficult to lay by much accumulative capital 
from such a source of income.
'But the thing is,' said Herbert Pocket, 'that you look about you. That's 
the grand thing. You are in a counting-house, you know, and you look about 
you.'
It struck me as a singular implication that you couldn't be out of a 
counting-house, you know, and look about you; but I silently deferred to 
his experience.
'Then the time comes,' said Herbert, 'when you see your opening. And you go 
in, and you swoop upon it and you make your capital, and then there you 
are! When you have once made your capital, you have nothing to do but 
employ it.'
This was very like his way of conducting that encounter in the garden; very 
like. His manner of bearing his poverty, too, exactly corresponded to his 
manner of bearing that defeat. It seemed to me that he took all blows and 
buffets now, with just the same air as he had taken mine then. It was 
evident that he had nothing around him but the simplest necessaries, for 
everything that I remarked upon turned out to have been sent in on my 
account from the coffee-house or somewhere else.
Yet, having already made his fortune in his own mind, he was so unassuming 
with it that I felt quite grateful to him for not being puffed up. It was a 
pleasant addition to his naturally pleasant ways, and we got on famously. 
In the evening we went out for a walk in the streets, and went half-price 
to the Theatre; and next day we went to church at Westminster Abbey, and in 
the afternoon we walked in the Parks; and I wondered who shod all the 
horses there, and wished Joe did.
On a moderate computation, it was many months, that Sunday, since I had 
left Joe and Biddy. The space interposed between myself and them, partook 
of that expansion, and our marshes were any distance off. That I could have 
been at our old church in my old church-going clothes, on the very last 
Sunday that ever was, seemed a combination of impossibilities, geographical 
and social, solar and lunar. Yet in the London streets, so crowded with 
people and so brilliantly lighted in the dusk of evening, there were 
depressing hints of reproaches for that I had put the poor old kitchen at 
home so far away; and in the dead of night, the footsteps of some incapable 
impostor of a porter mooning about Barnard's Inn, under pretence of 
watching it, fell hollow on my heart.
On the Monday morning at a quarter before nine, Herbert went to the 
counting-house to report himself - to look about him, too, I suppose - and 
I bore him company. He was to come away in an hour or two to attend me to 
Hammersmith, and I was to wait about for him. It appeared to me that the 
eggs from which young Insurers were hatched, were incubated in dust and 
heat, like the eggs of ostriches, judging from the places to which those 
incipient giants repaired on a Monday morning. Nor did the counting-house 
where Herbert assisted, show in my eyes as at all a good Observatory; being 
a back second floor up a yard, of a grimy presence in all particulars, and 
with a look into another back second floor, rather than a look out.
I waited about until it was noon, and I went upon 'Change, and I saw fluey 
men sitting there under the bills about shipping, whom I took to be great 
merchants, though I couldn't understand why they should all be out of 
spirits. When Herbert came, we went and had lunch at a celebrated house 
which I then quite venerated, but now believe to have been the most abject 
superstition in Europe, and where I could not help noticing, even then, 
that there was much more gravy on the tablecloths and knives and waiters' 
clothes, than in the steaks. This collation disposed of at a moderate price 
(considering the grease: which was not charged for), we went back to 
Barnard's Inn and got my little portmanteau, and then took coach for 
Hammersmith. We arrived there at two or three o'clock in the afternoon, and 
had very little way to walk to Mr Pocket's house. Lifting the latch of a 
gate, we passed direct into a little garden overlooking the river, where Mr 
Pocket's children were playing about. And unless I deceive myself on a 
point where my interests or prepossessions are certainly not concerned, I 
saw that Mr and Mrs Pocket's children were not growing up or being brought 
up, but were tumbling up.
Mrs Pocket was sitting on a garden chair under a tree, reading, with her 
legs upon another garden chair; and Mrs Pocket's two nursemaids were 
looking about them while the children played. 'Mamma,' said Herbert, 'this 
is young Mr Pip.' Upon which Mrs Pocket received me with an appearance of 
amiable dignity.
'Master Alick and Miss Jane,' cried one of the nurses to two of the 
children, 'if you go a bouncing up against them bushes you'll fall over 
into the river and be drownded, and what'll your pa say then?'
At the same time this nurse picked up Mrs Pocket's handkerchief, and said, 
'If that don't make six times you've dropped it, Mum!' Upon which Mrs 
Pocket laughed and said, 'Thank you, Flopson,' and settling herself in one 
chair only, resumed her book. Her countenance immediately assumed a knitted 
and intent expression as if she had been reading for a week, but before she 
could have read half a dozen lines, she fixed her eyes upon me, and said, 
'I hope your mamma is quite well?' This unexpected inquiry put me into such 
a difficulty that I began saying in the absurdest way that if there had 
been any such person I had no doubt she would have been quite well and 
would have been very much obliged and would have sent her compliments, when 
the nurse came to my rescue.
'Well!' she cried, picking up the pocket handkerchief, 'if that don't make 
seven times! What ARE you a doing of this afternoon, Mum!' Mrs Pocket 
received her property, at first with a look of unutterable surprise as if 
she had never seen it before, and then with a laugh of recognition, and 
said, 'Thank you, Flopson,' and forgot me, and went on reading.
I found, now I had leisure to count them, that there were no fewer than six 
little Pockets present, in various stages of tumbling up. I had scarcely 
arrived at the total when a seventh was heard, as in the region of air, 
wailing dolefully.
'If there ain't Baby!' said Flopson, appearing to think it most surprising. 
'Make haste up, Millers.'
Millers, who was the other nurse, retired into the house, and by degrees 
the child's wailing was hushed and stopped, as if it were a young 
ventriloquist with something in its mouth. Mrs Pocket read all the time, 
and I was curious to know what the book could be.
We were waiting, I supposed, for Mr Pocket to come out to us; at any rate 
we waited there, and so I had an opportunity of observing the remarkable 
family phenomenon that whenever any of the children strayed near Mrs Pocket 
in their play, they always tripped themselves up and tumbled over her - 
always very much to her momentary astonishment, and their own more enduring 
lamentation. I was at a loss to account for this surprising circumstance, 
and could not help giving my mind to speculations about it, until by-and-by 
Millers came down with the baby, which baby was handed to Flopson, which 
Flopson was handing it to Mrs Pocket, when she too went fairly head 
foremost over Mrs Pocket, baby and all, and was caught by Herbert and 
myself.
'Gracious me, Flopson!' said Mrs Pocket, looking off her book for a moment, 
'everybody's tumbling!'
'Gracious you, indeed, Mum!' returned Flopson, very red in the face; 'what 
have you got there?'
'I got here, Flopson?' asked Mrs Pocket.
'Why, if it ain't your footstool!' cried Flopson. 'And if you keep it under 
your skirts like that, who's to help tumbling? Here! Take the baby, Mum, 
and give me your book.'
Mrs Pocket acted on the advice, and inexpertly danced the infant a little 
in her lap, while the other children played about it. This had lasted but a 
very short time, when Mrs Pocket issued summary orders that they were all 
to be taken into the house for a nap. Thus I made the second discovery on 
that first occasion, that the nurture of the little Pockets consisted of 
alternately tumbling up and lying down.
Under these circumstances, when Flopson and Millers had got the children 
into the house, like a little flock of sheep, and Mr Pocket came out of it 
to make my acquaintance, I was not much surprised to find that Mr Pocket 
was a gentleman with a rather perplexed expression of face, and with his 
very grey hair disordered on his head, as if he didn't quite see his way to 
putting anything straight.


Chapter 23

Mr Pocket said he was glad to see me, and he hoped I was not sorry to see 
him. 'For, I really am not,' he added, with his son's smile, 'an alarming 
personage.' He was a young-looking man, in spite of his perplexities and 
his very grey hair, and his manner seemed quite natural. I use the word 
natural, in the sense of its being unaffected; there was something comic in 
his distraught way, as though it would have been downright ludicrous but 
for his own perception that it was very near being so. When he had talked 
with me a little, he said to Mrs Pocket, with a rather anxious contraction 
of his eyebrows, which were black and handsome, 'Belinda, I hope you have 
welcomed Mr Pip?' And she looked up from her book, and said, 'Yes.' She 
then smiled upon me in an absent state of mind, and asked me if I liked the 
taste of orange-flower water? As the question had no bearing, near or 
remote, on any foregone or subsequent transaction, I consider it to have 
been thrown out, like her previous approaches, in general conversational 
condescension.
I found out within a few hours, and may mention at once, that Mrs Pocket 
was the only daughter of a certain quite accidental deceased Knight, who 
had invented for himself a conviction that his deceased father would have 
been made a Baronet but for somebody's determined opposition arising out of 
entirely personal motives - I forget whose, if I ever knew - the 
Sovereign's, the Prime Minister's, the Lord Chancellor's, the Archbishop of 
Canterbury's, anybody's - and had tacked himself on to the nobles of the 
earth in right of this quite supposititious fact. I believe he had been 
knighted himself for storming the English grammar at the point of the pen, 
in a desperate address engrossed on vellum, on the occasion of the laying 
of the first stone of some building or other, and for handing some Royal 
Personage either the trowel or the mortar. Be that as it may, he had 
directed Mrs Pocket to be brought up from her cradle as one who in the 
nature of things must marry a title, and who was to be guarded from the 
acquisition of plebeian domestic knowledge.
So successful a watch and ward had been established over the young lady by 
this judicious parent, that she had grown up highly ornamental, but 
perfectly helpless and useless. With her character thus happily formed, in 
the first bloom of her youth she had encountered Mr Pocket: who was also in 
the first bloom of youth, and not quite decided whether to mount to the 
Woolsack, or to roof himself in with a mitre. As his doing the one or the 
other was a mere question of time, he and Mrs Pocket had taken Time by the 
forelock (when, to judge from its length, it would seem to have wanted 
cutting), and had married without the knowledge of the judicious parent. 
The judicious parent, having nothing to bestow or withhold but his 
blessing, had handsomely settled that dower upon them after a short 
struggle, and had informed Mr Pocket that his wife was 'a treasure for a 
Prince.' Mr Pocket had invested the Prince's treasure in the ways of the 
world ever since, and it was supposed to have brought him in but 
indifferent interest. Still, Mrs Pocket was in general the object of a 
queer sort of respectful pity, because she had not married a title; while 
Mr Pocket was the object of a queer sort of forgiving reproach, because he 
had never got one.
Mr Pocket took me into the house and showed me my room: which was a 
pleasant one, and so furnished as that I could use it with comfort for my 
own private sitting-room. He then knocked at the doors of two other similar 
rooms, and introduced me to their occupants, by name Drummle and Startop. 
Drummle, an old-looking young man of a heavy order of architecture, was 
whistling. Startop, younger in years and appearance, was reading and 
holding his head, as if he thought himself in danger of exploding it with 
too strong a charge of knowledge.
Both Mr and Mrs Pocket had such a noticeable air of being in somebody 
else's hands, that I wondered who really was in possession of the house and 
let them live there, until I found this unknown power to be the servants. 
It was a smooth way of going on, perhaps, in respect of saving trouble; but 
it had the appearance of being expensive, for the servants felt it a duty 
they owed to themselves to be nice in their eating and drinking, and to 
keep a deal of company down stairs. They allowed a very liberal table to Mr 
and Mrs Pocket, yet it always appeared to me that by far the best part of 
the house to have boarded in, would have been the kitchen - always 
supposing the boarder capable of self-defence, for, before I had been there 
a week, a neighbouring lady with whom the family were personally 
unacquainted, wrote in to say that she had seen Millers slapping the baby. 
This greatly distressed Mrs Pocket, who burst into tears on receiving the 
note, and said that it was an extraordinary thing that the neighbours 
couldn't mind their own business.
By degrees I learnt, and chiefly from Herbert, that Mr Pocket had been 
educated at Harrow and at Cambridge, where he had distinguished himself; 
but that when he had had the happiness of marrying Mrs Pocket very early in 
life, he had impaired his prospects and taken up the calling of a Grinder. 
After grinding a number of dull blades - of whom it was remarkable that 
their fathers, when influential, were always going to help him to 
preferment, but always forgot to do it when the blades had left the 
Grindstone - he had wearied of that poor work and had come to London. Here, 
after gradually failing in loftier hopes, he had 'read' with divers who had 
lacked opportunities or neglected them, and had refurbished divers others 
for special occasions, and had turned his acquirements to the account of 
literary compilation and correction, and on such means, added to some very 
moderate private resources, still maintained the house I saw.
Mr and Mrs Pocket had a toady neighbour; a widow lady of that highly 
sympathetic nature that she agreed with everybody, blessed everybody, and 
shed smiles and tears on everybody, according to circumstances. This lady's 
name was Mrs Coiler, and I had the honour of taking her down to dinner on 
the day of my installation. She gave me to understand on the stairs, that 
it was a blow to dear Mrs Pocket that dear Mr Pocket should be under the 
necessity of receiving gentlemen to read with him. That did not extend to 
me, she told me in a gush of love and confidence (at that time, I had known 
her something less than five minutes); if they were all like Me, it would 
be quite another thing.
'But dear Mrs Pocket,' said Mrs Coiler, 'after her early disappointment 
(not that dear Mr Pocket was to blame in that), requires so much luxury and 
elegance - '
'Yes, ma'am,' I said, to stop her, for I was afraid she was going to cry.
'And she is of so aristocratic a disposition - '
'Yes, ma'am,' I said again, with the same object as before.
' - that it is hard,' said Mrs Coiler, 'to have dear Mr Pocket's time and 
attention diverted from dear Mrs Pocket.'
I could not help thinking that it might be harder if the butcher's time and 
attention were diverted from dear Mrs Pocket; but I said nothing, and 
indeed had enough to do in keeping a bashful watch upon my company-manners.
It came to my knowledge, through what passed between Mrs Pocket and Drummle 
while I was attentive to my knife and fork, spoon, glasses, and other 
instruments of self-destruction, that Drummle, whose Christian name was 
Bentley, was actually the next heir but one to a baronetcy. It further 
appeared that the book I had seen Mrs Pocket reading in the garden, was all 
about titles, and that she knew the exact date at which her grandpapa would 
have come into the book, if he ever had come at all. Drummle didn't say 
much, but in his limited way (he struck me as a sulky kind of fellow) he 
spoke as one of the elect, and recognised Mrs Pocket as a woman and a 
sister. No one but themselves and Mrs Coiler the toady neighbour showed any 
interest in this part of the conversation, and it appeared to me that it 
was painful to Herbert; but it promised to last a long time, when the page 
came in with the announcement of a domestic affliction. It was, in effect, 
that the cook had mislaid the beef. To my unutterable amazement, I now, for 
the first time, saw Mr Pocket relieve his mind by going through a 
performance that struck me as very extraordinary, but which made no 
impression on anybody else, and with which I soon became as familiar as the 
rest. He laid down the carving-knife and fork - being engaged in carving, 
at the moment - put his two hands into his disturbed hair, and appeared to 
make an extraordinary effort to lift himself up by it. When he had done 
this, and had not lifted himself up at all, he quietly went on with what he 
was about.
Mrs Coiler then changed the subject, and began to flatter me. I liked it 
for a few moments, but she flattered me so very grossly that the pleasure 
was soon over. She had a serpentine way of coming close at me when she 
pretended to be vitally interested in the friends and localities I had 
left, which was altogether snaky and fork-tongued; and when she made an 
occasional bounce upon Startop (who said very little to her), or upon 
Drummle (who said less), I rather envied them for being on the opposite 
side of the table.
After dinner the children were introduced, and Mrs Coiler made admiring 
comments on their eyes, noses, and legs - a sagacious way of improving 
their minds. There were four little girls, and two little boys, besides the 
baby who might have been either, and the baby's next successor who was as 
yet neither. They were brought in by Flopson and Millers, much as though 
those two non-commissioned officers had been recruiting somewhere for 
children and had enlisted these: while Mrs Pocket looked at the young 
Nobles that ought to have been, as if she rather thought she had had the 
pleasure of inspecting them before, but didn't quite know what to make of 
them.
'Here! Give me your fork, Mum, and take the baby,' said Flopson. 'Don't 
take it that way, or you'll get its head under the table.'
Thus advised, Mrs Pocket took it the other way, and got its head upon the 
table; which was announced to all present by a prodigious concussion.
'Dear, dear! Give it me back, Mum,' said Flopson; 'and Miss Jane, come and 
dance to baby, do!'
One of the little girls, a mere mite who seemed to have prematurely taken 
upon herself some charge of the others, stepped out of her place by me, and 
danced to and from the baby until it left off crying, and laughed. Then, 
all the children laughed, and Mr Pocket (who in the meantime had twice 
endeavoured to lift himself up by the hair) laughed, and we all laughed and 
were glad.
Flopson, by dint of doubling the baby at the joints like a Dutch doll, then 
got it safely into Mrs Pocket's lap, and gave it the nutcrackers to play 
with: at the same time recommending Mrs Pocket to take notice that the 
handles of that instrument were not likely to agree with its eyes, and 
sharply charging Miss Jane to look after the same. Then, the two nurses 
left the room, and had a lively scuffle on the staircase with a dissipated 
page who had waited at dinner, and who had clearly lost half his buttons at 
the gaming-table.
I was made very uneasy in my mind by Mrs Pocket's falling into a discussion 
with Drummle respecting two baronetcies, while she ate a sliced orange 
steeped in sugar and wine, and forgetting all about the baby on her lap: 
who did most appalling things with the nutcrackers. At length, little Jane 
perceiving its young brains to be imperilled, softly left her place, and 
with many small artifices coaxed the dangerous weapon away. Mrs Pocket 
finishing her orange at about the same time, and not approving of this, 
said to Jane:
'You naughty child, how dare you? Go and sit down this instant!'
'Mamma dear,' lisped the little girl, 'baby 'ood have put hith eyeth out.'
'How dare you tell me so?' retorted Mrs Pocket. 'Go and sit down in your 
chair this moment!'
Mrs Pocket's dignity was so crushing, that I felt quite abashed: as if I 
myself had done something to rouse it.
'Belinda,' remonstrated Mr Pocket, from the other end of the table, 'how 
can you be so unreasonable? Jane only interfered for the protection of 
baby.'
'I will not allow anybody to interfere,' said Mrs Pocket. 'I am surprised, 
Matthew, that you should expose me to the affront of interference.'
'Good God!' cried Mr Pocket, in an outbreak of desolate desperation. 'Are 
infants to be nutcrackered into their tombs, and is nobody to save them?'
'I will not be interfered with by Jane,' said Mrs Pocket, with a majestic 
glance at that innocent little offender. 'I hope I know my poor grandpapa's 
position. Jane, indeed!'
Mr Pocket got his hands in his hair again, and this time really did lift 
himself some inches out of his chair. 'Hear this!' he helplessly exclaimed 
to the elements. 'Babies are to be nutcrackered dead, for people's poor 
grandpapa's positions!' Then he let himself down again, and became silent.
We all looked awkwardly at the tablecloth while this was going on. A pause 
succeeded, during which the honest and irrepressible baby made a series of 
leaps and crows at little Jane, who appeared to me to be the only member of 
the family (irrespective of servants) with whom it had any decided 
acquaintance.
'Mr Drummle,' said Mrs Pocket, 'will you ring for Flopson? Jane, you 
undutiful little thing, go and lie down. Now, baby darling, come with ma!'
The baby was the soul of honour, and protested with all its might. It 
doubled itself up the wrong way over Mrs Pocket's arm, exhibited a pair of 
knitted shoes and dimpled ankles to the company in lieu of its soft face, 
and was carried out in the highest state of mutiny. And it gained its point 
after all, for I saw it through the window within a few minutes, being 
nursed by little Jane.
It happened that the other five children were left behind at the dinner-
table, through Flopson's having some private engagement, and their not 
being anybody else's business. I thus became aware of the mutual relations 
between them and Mr Pocket, which were exemplified in the following manner. 
Mr Pocket, with the normal perplexity of his face heightened and his hair 
rumpled, looked at them for some minutes, as if he couldn't make out how 
they came to be boarding and lodging in that establishment, and why they 
hadn't been billeted by Nature on somebody else. Then, in a distant, 
Missionary way he asked them certain questions - as why little Joe had that 
hole in his frill: who said, Pa, Flopson was going to mend it when she had 
time - and how little Fanny came by that whitlow: who said, Pa, Millers was 
going to poultice it when she didn't forget. Then, he melted into parental 
tenderness, and gave them a shilling apiece and told them to go and play; 
and then as they went out, with one very strong effort to lift himself up 
by the hair he dismissed the hopeless subject.
In the evening there was rowing on the river. As Drummle and Startop had 
each a boat, I resolved to set up mine, and to cut them both out. I was 
pretty good at most exercises in which country boys are adepts, but, as I 
was conscious of wanting elegance of style for the Thames - not to say for 
other waters - I at once engaged to place myself under the tuition of the 
winner of a prize-wherry who plied at our stairs, and to whom I was 
introduced by my new allies. This practical authority confused me very 
much, by saying I had the arm of a blacksmith. If he could have known how 
nearly the compliment lost him his pupil, I doubt if he would have paid it.
There was a supper-tray after we got home at night, and I think we should 
all have enjoyed ourselves, but for a rather disagreeable domestic 
occurrence. Mr Pocket was in good spirits, when a housemaid came in, and 
said, 'If you please, sir, I should wish to speak to you.'
'Speak to your master?' said Mrs Pocket, whose dignity was roused again. 
'How can you think of such a thing? Go and speak to Flopson. Or speak to me 
- at some other time.'
'Begging your pardon, ma'am,' returned the housemaid, 'I should wish to 
speak at once, and to speak to master.'
Hereupon, Mr Pocket went out of the room, and we made the best of ourselves 
until he came back.
'This is a pretty thing, Belinda!' said Mr Pocket, returning with a 
countenance expressive of grief and despair. 'Here's the cook lying 
insensibly drunk on the kitchen floor, with a large bundle of fresh butter 
made up in the cupboard ready to sell for grease!'
Mrs Pocket instantly showed much amiable emotion, and said, 'This is that 
odious Sophia's doing!'
'What do you mean, Belinda?' demanded Mr Pocket.
'Sophia has told you,' said Mrs Pocket. 'Did I not see her with my own eyes 
and hear her with my own ears, come into the room just now and ask to speak 
to you?'
'But has she not taken me down stairs, Belinda,' returned Mr Pocket, 'and 
shown me the woman, and the bundle too?'
'And do you defend her, Matthew,' said Mrs Pocket, 'for making mischief?'
Mr Pocket uttered a dismal groan.
'Am I, grandpapa's granddaughter, to be nothing in the house?' said Mrs 
Pocket. 'Besides, the cook has always been a very nice respectful woman, 
and said in the most natural manner when she came to look after the 
situation, that she felt I was born to be a Duchess.'
There was a sofa where Mr Pocket stood, and he dropped upon it in the 
attitude of the Dying Gladiator. Still in that attitude he said, with a 
hollow voice, 'Good night, Mr Pip,' when I deemed it advisable to go to bed 
and leave him.


Chapter 24

After two or three days, when I had established myself in my room and had 
gone backwards and forwards to London several times, and had ordered all I 
wanted of my tradesmen, Mr Pocket and I had a long talk together. He knew 
more of my intended career than I knew myself, for the referred to his 
having been told by Mr Jaggers that I was not designed for any profession, 
and that I should be well enough educated for my destiny if I could 'hold 
my own' with the average of young men in prosperous circumstances. I 
acquiesced, of course, knowing nothing to the contrary.
He advised my attending certain places in London, for the acquisition of 
such mere rudiments as I wanted, and my investing him with the functions of 
explainer and director of all my studies. He hoped that with intelligent 
assistance I should meet with little to discourage me, and should soon be 
able to dispense with any aid but his. Through his way of saying this, and 
much more to similar purpose, he placed himself on confidential terms with 
me in an admirable manner; and I may state at once that he was always so 
zealous and honourable in fulfilling his compact with me, that he made me 
zealous and honourable in fulfilling mine with him. If he had shown 
indifference as a master, I have no doubt I should have returned the 
compliment as a pupil; he gave me no such excuse, and each of us did the 
other justice. Nor, did I ever regard him as having anything ludicrous 
about him - or anything but what was serious, honest, and good - in his 
tutor communication with me.
When these points were settled, and so far carried out as that I had begun 
to work in earnest, it occurred to me that if I could retain my bedroom in 
Barnard's Inn, my life would be agreeably varied, while my manners would be 
none the worse for Herbert's society. Mr Pocket did not object to this 
arrangement, but urged that before any step could possibly be taken in it, 
it must be submitted to my guardian. I felt that this delicacy arose out of 
the consideration that the plan would save Herbert some expense, so I went 
off to Little Britain and imparted my wish to Mr Jaggers.
'If I could buy the furniture now hired for me,' said I, 'and one or two 
other little things, I should be quite at home there.'
'Go it!' said Mr Jaggers, with a short laugh. 'I told you you'd get on. 
Well! How much do you want?'
I said I didn't know how much.
'Come!' retorted Mr Jaggers. 'How much? Fifty pounds?'
'Oh, not nearly so much.'
'Five pounds?' said Mr Jaggers.
This was such a great fall, that I said in discomfiture, 'Oh! more than 
that.'
'More than that, eh!' retorted Mr Jaggers, lying in wait for me, with his 
hands in his pockets, his head on one side, and his eyes on the wall behind 
me; 'how much more?'
'It is so difficult to fix a sum,' said I, hesitating.
'Come!' said Mr Jaggers. 'Let's get at it. Twice five; will that do? Three 
times five; will that do? Four times five; will that do?'
I said I thought that would do handsomely.
'Four times five will do handsomely, will it?' said Mr Jaggers, knitting 
his brows. 'Now, what do you make of four times five?'
'What do I make of it?'
'Ah!' said Mr Jaggers; 'how much?'
'I suppose you make it twenty pounds,' said I, smiling.
'Never mind what I make it, my friend,' observed Mr Jaggers, with a knowing 
and contradictory toss of his head. 'I want to know what you make it.'
'Twenty pounds, of course.'
'Wemmick!' said Mr Jaggers, opening his office door. 'Take Mr Pip's written 
order, and pay him twenty pounds.'
This strongly marked way of doing business made a strongly marked 
impression on me, and that not of an agreeable kind. Mr Jaggers never 
laughed; but he wore great bright creaking boots, and, in poising himself 
on these boots, with his large head bent down and his eyebrows joined 
together, awaiting an answer, he sometimes caused the boots to creak, as if 
they laughed in a dry and suspicious way. As he happened to go out now, and 
as Wemmick was brisk and talkative, I said to Wemmick that I hardly knew 
what to make of Mr Jaggers's manner.
'Tell him that, and he'll take it as a compliment,' answered Wemmick; 'he 
don't mean that you should know what to make of it. - Oh!' for I looked 
surprised, 'it's not personal; it's professional: only professional.'
Wemmick was at his desk, lunching - and crunching - on a dry hard biscuit; 
pieces of which he threw from time to time into his slit of a mouth, as if 
he were posting them.
'Always seems to me,' said Wemmick, 'as if he had set a mantrap and was 
watching it. Suddenly - click - you're caught!'
Without remarking that mantraps were not among the amenities of life, I 
said I supposed he was very skilful?
'Deep,' said Wemmick, 'as Australia.' Pointing with his pen at the office 
floor, to express that Australia was understood, for the purposes of the 
figure, to be symmetrically on the opposite spot of the globe. 'If there 
was anything deeper,' added Wemmick, bringing his pen to paper, 'he'd be 
it.'
Then, I said I supposed he had a fine business, and Wemmick said, 'Ca-pi-
tal!' Then I asked if there were many clerks? to which he replied:
'We don't run much into clerks, because there's only one Jaggers, and 
people won't have him at second-hand. There are only four of us. Would you 
like to see 'em? You are one of us, as I may say.'
I accepted the offer. When Mr Wemmick had put all the biscuit into the 
post, and had paid me my money from a cash-box in a safe, the key of which 
safe he kept somewhere down his back and produced from his coat-collar like 
an iron pigtail, we went upstairs. The house was dark and shabby, and the 
greasy shoulders that had left their mark in Mr Jaggers's room, seemed to 
have been shuffling up and down the staircase for years. In the front first 
floor, a clerk who looked something between a publican and a rat-catcher - 
a large pale puffed swollen man - was attentively engaged with three or 
four people of shabby appearance, whom he treated as unceremoniously as 
everybody seemed to be treated who contributed to Mr Jaggers's coffers. 
'Getting evidence together,' said Mr Wemmick, as we came out, 'for the 
Bailey.' In the room over that, a little flabby terrier of a clerk with 
dangling hair (his cropping seemed to have been forgotten when he was a 
puppy) was similarly engaged with a man with weak eyes, whom Mr Wemmick 
presented to me as a smelter who kept his pot always boiling, and who would 
melt me anything I pleased - and who was in an excessive white-
perspiration, as if he had been trying his art on himself. In a back room, 
a high-shouldered man with a face-ache tied up in dirty flannel, who was 
dressed in old black clothes that bore the appearance of having been waxed, 
was stooping over his work of making fair copies of the notes of the other 
two gentlemen, for Mr Jaggers's own use.
This was all the establishment. When we went downstairs again, Wemmick led 
me into my guardian's room, and said, 'This you've seen already.'
'Pray,' said I, as the two odious casts with the twitchy leer upon them 
caught my sight again, 'whose likenesses are those?'
'These?' said Wemmick, getting upon a chair, and blowing the dust off the 
horrible heads before bringing them down. 'These are two celebrated ones. 
Famous clients of ours that got us a world of credit. This chap (why you 
must have come down in the night and been peeping into the inkstand, to get 
this blot upon your eyebrow, you old rascal!) murdered his master, and, 
considering that he wasn't brought up to evidence, didn't plan it badly.'
'Is it like him?' I asked, recoiling from the brute, as Wemmick spat upon 
his eyebrow and gave it a rub with his sleeve.
'Like him? It's himself, you know. The cast was made in Newgate, directly 
after he was taken down. You had a particular fancy for me, hadn't you, Old 
Artful?' said Wemmick. He then explained this affectionate apostrophe, by 
touching his brooch representing the lady and the weeping willow at the 
tomb with the urn upon it, and saying, 'Had it made for me, express!'
'Is the lady anybody?' said I.
'No,' returned Wemmick. 'Only his game. (You liked your bit of game, didn't 
you?) No; deuce a bit of a lady in the case, Mr Pip, except one - and she 
wasn't of this slender ladylike sort, and you wouldn't have caught her 
looking after this urn - unless there was something to drink in it.' 
Wemmick's attention being thus directed to his brooch, he put down the 
cast, and polished the brooch with his pocket-handkerchief.
'Did that other creature come to the same end?' I asked. 'He has the same 
look.'
'You're right,' said Wemmick; 'it's the genuine look. Much as if one 
nostril was caught up with a horsehair and a little fish-hook. Yes, he came 
to the same end; quite the natural end here, I assure you. He forged wills, 
this blade did, if he didn't also put the supposed testators to sleep too. 
You were a gentlemanly Cove, though' (Mr Wemmick was again apostrophising), 
'and you said you could write Greek. Yah, Bounceable! What a liar you were! 
I never met such a liar as you!' Before putting his late friend on his 
shelf again, Wemmick touched the largest of his mourning rings and said, 
'Sent out to buy it for me, only the day before.'
While he was putting up the other cast and coming down from the chair, the 
thought crossed my mind that all his personal jewellery was derived from 
like sources. As he had shown no diffidence on the subject, I ventured on 
the liberty of asking him the question, when he stood before me, dusting 
his hands.
'Oh yes,' he returned, 'these are all gifts of that kind. One brings 
another, you see; that's the way of it. I always take 'em. They're 
curiosities. And they're property. They may not be worth much, but, after 
all, they're property and portable. It don't signify to you with your 
brilliant look-out, but as to myself, my guiding-star always is, "Get hold 
of portable property".'
When I had rendered homage to this light, he went on to say, in a friendly 
manner:
'If at any odd time when you have nothing better to do, you wouldn't mind 
coming over to see me at Walworth, I could offer you a bed, and I should 
consider it an honour. I have not much to show you; but such two or three 
curiosities as I have got, you might like to look over; and I am fond of a 
bit of garden and a summer-house.'
I said I should be delighted to accept his hospitality.
'Thank'ee,' said he; 'then we'll consider that it's to come off, when 
convenient to you. Have you dined with Mr Jaggers yet?'
'Not yet.'
'Well,' said Wemmick, 'he'll give you wine, and good wine. I'll give you 
punch, and not bad punch. and now I'll tell you something. When you go to 
dine with Mr Jaggers, look at his housekeeper.'
'Shall I see something very uncommon?'
'Well,' said Wemmick, 'you'll see a wild beast tamed. Not so very uncommon, 
you'll tell me. I reply, that depends on the original wildness of the 
beast, and the amount of taming. It won't lower your opinion of Mr 
Jaggers's powers. Keep your eye on it.'
I told him I would do so, with all the interest and curiosity that his 
preparation awakened. As I was taking my departure, he asked me if I would 
like to devote five minutes to seeing Mr Jaggers 'at it?'
For several reasons, and not least because I didn't clearly know what Mr 
Jaggers would be found to be 'at,' I replied in the affirmative. We dived 
into the City, and came up in a crowded police-court, where a blood-
relation (in the murderous sense) of the deceased with the fanciful taste 
in brooches, was standing at the bar, uncomfortably chewing something; 
while my guardian had a woman under examination or cross-examination - I 
don't know which - and was striking her, and the bench, and everybody 
present, with awe. If anybody, of whatsoever degree, said a word that he 
didn't approve of, he instantly required to have it 'taken down.' If 
anybody wouldn't make an admission, he said, 'I'll have it out of you!' and 
if anybody made an admission, he said, 'Now I have got you!' the 
magistrates shivered under a single bite of his finger. Thieves and thief-
takers hung in dread rapture on his words, and shrank when a hair of his 
eyebrows turned in their direction. Which side he was on, I couldn't make 
out, for he seemed to me to be grinding the whole place in a mill; I only 
know that when I stole out on tiptoe, he was not on the side of the bench; 
for, he was making the legs of the old gentleman who presided, quite 
convulsive under the table, by his denunciations of his conduct as the 
representative of British law and justice in that chair that day.


Chapter 25

Bentley Drummle, who was so sulky a fellow that he even took up a book as 
if its writer had done him an injury, did not take up an acquaintance in a 
more agreeable spirit. Heavy in figure, movement, and comprehension - in 
the sluggish complexion of his face, and in the large awkward tongue that 
seemed to loll about in his mouth as he himself lolled about in a room - he 
was idle, proud, niggardly, reserved, and suspicious. He came of rich 
people down in Somersetshire, who had nursed this combination of qualities 
until they made the discovery that it was just of age and a blockhead. 
Thus, Bentley Drummle had come to Mr Pocket when he was a head taller than 
that gentleman, and half a dozen heads thicker than most gentlemen.
Startop had been spoilt by a weak mother and kept at home when he ought to 
have been at school, but he was devotedly attached to her, and admired her 
beyond measure. He had a woman's delicacy of feature, and was - 'as you may 
see, though you never saw her,' said Herbert to me - exactly like his 
mother. It was but natural that I should take to him much more kindly than 
to Drummle, and that, even in the earliest evenings of our boating, he and 
I should pull homeward abreast of one another, conversing from boat to 
boat, while Bentley Drummle came up in our wake alone, under the 
overhanging banks and among the rushes. He would always creep in-shore like 
some uncomfortable amphibious creature, even when the tide would have sent 
him fast upon his way; and I always think of him as coming after us in the 
dark or by the back-water, when our own two boats were breaking the sunset 
or the moonlight in mid-stream.
Herbert was my intimate companion and friend. I presented him with a half-
share in my boat, which was the occasion of his often coming down to 
Hammersmith; and my possession of a half-share in his chambers often took 
me up to London. We used to walk between the two places at all hours. I 
have an affection for the road yet (though it is not so pleasant a road as 
it was then), formed in the impressibility of untried youth and hope.
When I had been in Mr Pocket's family a month or two, Mr and Mrs Camilla 
turned up. Camilla was Mr Pocket's sister. Georgiana, whom I had seen at 
Miss Havisham's on the same occasion, also turned up. she was a cousin - an 
indigestive single woman, who called her rigidity religion, and her liver 
love. These people hated me with the hatred of cupidity and disappointment. 
As a matter of course, they fawned upon me in my prosperity with the basest 
meanness. Towards Mr Pocket, as a grown-up infant with no notion of his own 
interests, they showed the complacent forbearance I had heard them express. 
Mrs Pocket they held in contempt; but they allowed the poor soul to have 
been heavily disappointed in life, because that shed a feeble reflected 
light upon themselves.
These were the surroundings among which I settled down, and applied myself 
to my education. I soon contracted expensive habits, and began to spend an 
amount of money that within a few short months I should have thought almost 
fabulous; but through good and evil I stuck to my books. There was no other 
merit in this, than my having sense enough to feel my deficiencies. Between 
Mr Pocket and Herbert I got on fast; and, with one or the other always at 
my elbow to give me the start I wanted, and clear obstructions out of my 
road, I must have been as great a dolt as Drummle if I had done less.
I had not seen Mr Wemmick for some weeks, when I thought I would write him 
a note and propose to go home with him on a certain evening. He replied 
that it would give him much pleasure, and that he would expect me at the 
office at six o'clock. Thither I went, and there I found him, putting the 
key of his safe down his back as the clock struck.
'Did you think of walking down to Walworth?' said he.
'Certainly,' said I, 'if you approve.'
'Very much,' was Wemmick's reply, 'for I have had my legs under the desk 
all day, and shall be glad to stretch them. Now, I'll tell you what I have 
got for supper, Mr Pip. I have got a stewed steak - which is of home 
preparation - and a cold roast fowl - which is from the cook's-shop. I 
think it's tender, because the master of the shop was a Juryman in some 
cases of ours the other day, and we let him down easy. I reminded him of it 
when I bought the fowl, and I said, "Pick us out a good one, old Briton, 
because if we had chosen to keep you in the box another day or two, we 
could easily have done it." He said to that, "Let me make you a present of 
the best fowl in the shop." I let him, of course. As far as it goes, it's 
property and portable. You don't object to an aged parent, I hope?'
I really thought he was still speaking of the fowl, until he added, 
'Because I have got an aged parent at my place.' I then said what 
politeness required.
'So, you haven't dined with Mr Jaggers yet?' he pursued, as we walked 
along.
'Not yet.'
'He told me so this afternoon when he heard you were coming. I expect 
you'll have an invitation tomorrow. He's going to ask your pals, too. Three 
of 'em; ain't there?'
Although I was not in the habit of counting Drummle as one of my intimate 
associates, I answered, 'Yes.'
'Well, he's going to ask the whole gang;' I hardly felt complimented by the 
word; 'and whatever he gives you, he'll give you good. Don't look forward 
to variety, but you'll have excellence. And there's another rum thing in 
his house,' proceeded Wemmick, after a moment's pause, as if the remark 
followed on the housekeeper understood; 'he never lets a door or window be 
fastened at night.'
'Is he never robbed?'
'That's it!' returned Wemmick. 'He says, and gives it out publicly, "I want 
to see the man who'll rob me." Lord bless you, I have heard him, a hundred 
times if I have heard him once, say to regular cracksmen in our front 
office, "You know where I live; now, no bolt is ever drawn there; why don't 
you do a stroke of business with me? Come; can't I tempt you?" Not a man of 
them, sir, would be bold enough to try it on, for love or money.'
'They dread him so much?' said I.
'Dread him,' said Wemmick. 'I believe you they dread him. Not but what he's 
artful, even in his defiance of them. No silver, sir. Britannia metal, 
every spoon.'
'So they wouldn't have much,' I observed, 'even if they - '
'Ah! But he would have much,' said Wemmick, cutting me short, 'and they 
know it. He'd have their lives, and the lives of scores of 'em. He'd have 
all he could get. And it's impossible to say what he couldn't get, if he 
gave his mind to it.'
I was falling into meditation on my guardian's greatness, when Wemmick 
remarked:
'As to the absence of plate, that's only his natural depth, you know. A 
river's its natural depth, and he's his natural depth. Look at his watch-
chain. That's real enough.'
'It's very massive,' said I.
'Massive?' repeated Wemmick. 'I think so. And his watch is a gold repeater, 
and worth a hundred pound if it's worth a penny. Mr Pip, there are about 
seven hundred thieves in this town who know all about that watch; there's 
not a man, a woman, or a child, among them, who wouldn't identify the 
smallest link in that chain, and drop it as if it was red-hot, if inveigled 
into touching it.'
At first with such discourse, and afterwards with conversation of a more 
general nature, did Mr Wemmick and I beguile the time and the road, until 
he gave me to understand that we had arrived in the district of Walworth.
It appeared to be a collection of back lanes, ditches, and little gardens, 
and to present the aspect of a rather dull retirement. Wemmick's house was 
a little wooden cottage in the midst of plots of garden, and the top of it 
was cut out and painted like a battery mounted with guns.
'My own doing,' said Wemmick. 'Looks pretty; don't it?'
I highly commended it, I think it was the smallest house I ever saw; with 
the queerest gothic windows (by far the greater part of them sham), and a 
gothic door, almost too small to get in at.
'That's a real flag-staff, you see,' said Wemmick, 'and on Sundays I run up 
a real flag. Then look here. After I have crossed this bridge, I hoist it 
up - so - and cut off the communication.'
The bridge was a plank, and it crossed a chasm about four feet wide and two 
deep. But it was very pleasant to see the pride with which he hoisted it up 
and made it fast; smiling as he did so, with a relish and not merely 
mechanically.
'At nine o'clock every night, Greenwich time,' said Wemmick, 'the gun 
fires. There he is, you see! And when you hear him go, I think you'll say 
he's a Stinger.'
The piece of ordnance referred to, was mounted in a separate fortress, 
constructed of lattice-work. It was protected from the weather by an 
ingenious little tarpaulin contrivance in the nature of an umbrella.
'Then, at the back,' said Wemmick, 'out of sight, so as not to impede the 
idea of fortifications - for it's a principle with me, if you have an idea, 
carry it out and keep it up - I don't know whether that's your opinion - '
I said, decidedly.
' - At the back, there's a pig, and there are fowls and rabbits; then, I 
knock together my own little frame, you see, and grow cucumbers; and you'll 
judge at supper what sort of a salad I can raise. So, sir,' said Wemmick, 
smiling again, but seriously too, as he shook his head, 'if you can suppose 
the little place besieged, it would hold out a devil of a time in point of 
provisions.'
Then, he conducted me to a bower about a dozen yards off, but which was 
approached by such ingenious twists of path that it took quite a long time 
to get at; and in this retreat our glasses were already set forth. Our 
punch was cooling in an ornamental lake, on whose margin the bower was 
raised. This piece of water (with an island in the middle which might have 
been the salad for supper) was of a circular form, and he had constructed a 
fountain in it, which, when you set a little mill going and took a cork out 
of a pipe, played to that powerful extent that it made the back of your 
hand quite wet.
'I am my own engineer, and my own carpenter, and my own plumber, and my own 
gardener, and my own Jack of all Trades,' said Wemmick, in acknowledging my 
compliments. 'Well; it's a good thing, you know. It brushes the Newgate 
cobwebs away, and pleases the Aged. You wouldn't mind being at once 
introduced to the Aged, would you? It wouldn't put you out?'
I expressed the readiness I felt, and we went into the castle. There, we 
found, sitting by a fire, a very old man in a flannel coat: clean, 
cheerful, comfortable, and well cared for, but intensely deaf.
'Well aged parent,' said Wemmick, shaking hands with him in a cordial and 
jocose way, 'how am you?'
'All right, John; all right!' replied the old man.
'Here's Mr Pip, aged parent,' said Wemmick, 'and I wish you could hear his 
name. Nod away at him, Mr Pip; that's what he likes. Nod away at him, if 
you please, like winking!'
'This is a fine place of my son's, sir,' cried the old man, while I nodded 
as hard as I possibly could. 'This is a pretty pleasure-ground, sir. This 
spot and these beautiful works upon it ought to be kept together by the 
Nation, after my son's time, for the people's enjoyment.'
'You're as proud of it as Punch; ain't you, Aged?' said Wemmick, 
contemplating the old man, with his hard face really softened; 'there's a 
nod for you;' giving him a tremendous one; 'there's another for you;' 
giving him a still more tremendous one; 'you like that, don't you? If 
you're not tired, Mr Pip - though I know it's tiring to strangers - will 
you tip him one more? You can't think how it pleases him.'
I tipped him several more, and he was in great spirits. We left him 
bestirring himself to feed the fowls, and we sat down to our punch in the 
arbour; where Wemmick told me as he smoked a pipe that it had taken him a 
good many years to bring the property up to its present pitch of 
perfection.
'Is it your own, Mr Wemmick?'
'O yes,' said Wemmick, 'I have got hold of it, a bit at a time. It's a 
freehold, by George!'
'Is it, indeed? I hope Mr Jaggers admires it?'
'Never seen it,' said Wemmick. 'Never heard of it. Never seen the Aged. 
Never heard of him. No; the office is one thing, and private life is 
another. When I go into the office, I leave the Castle behind me, and when 
I come into the Castle, I leave the office behind me. If it's not in any 
way disagreeable to you, you'll oblige me by doing the same. I don't wish 
it professionally spoken about.'
Of course I felt my good faith involved in the observance of his request. 
The punch being very nice, we sat there drinking it and talking, until it 
was almost nine o'clock. 'Getting near gun-fire,' said Wemmick then, as he 
laid down his pipe; 'it's the Aged's treat.'
Proceeding into the Castle again, we found the Aged heating the poker, with 
expectant eyes, as a preliminary to the performance of this great nightly 
ceremony. Wemmick stood with his watch in his hand, until the moment was 
come for him to take the red-hot poker from the Aged, and repair of the 
battery. He took it, and went out, and presently the Stinger went off with 
a Bang that shook the crazy little box of a cottage as if it must fall to 
pieces, and made every glass and teacup in it ring. Upon this, the Aged - 
who I believe would have been blown out of his armchair but for holding on 
by the elbows - cried out exultingly, 'He's fired! I heerd him!' and I 
nodded at the old gentleman until it is no figure of speech to declare that 
I absolutely could not see him.
The interval between that time and supper, Wemmick devoted to showing me 
his collection of curiosities. They were mostly of a felonious character; 
comprising the pen with which a celebrated forgery had been committed, a 
distinguished razor or two, some locks of hair, and several manuscript 
confessions written under condemnation - upon which Mr Wemmick set 
particular value as being, to use his own words, 'every one of 'em Lies, 
sir.' These were agreeably dispersed among small specimens of china and 
glass, various neat trifles made by the proprietor of the museum, and some 
tobacco-stoppers carved by the Aged. They were all displayed in that 
chamber of the Castle into which I had been first inducted, and which 
served, not only as the general sitting-room but as the kitchen too, if I 
might judge from a saucepan on the hob, and a brazen bijou over the 
fireplace designed for the suspension of a roasting-jack.
There was a neat little girl in attendance, who looked after the Aged in 
the day. When she had laid the supper-cloth, the bridge was lowered to give 
her means of egress, and she withdrew for the night. The supper was 
excellent; and though the Castle was rather subject to dry-rot insomuch 
that it tasted like a bad nut, and though the pig might have been farther 
off, I was heartily pleased with my whole entertainment. Nor was there any 
drawback on my little turret bedroom, beyond there being such a very thin 
ceiling between me and the flag-staff, that when I lay down on my back in 
bed, it seemed as if I had to balance that pole on my forehead all night.
Wemmick was up early in the morning, and I am afraid I heard him cleaning 
my boots. After that, he fell to gardening, and I saw him from my gothic 
window pretending to employ the Aged, and nodding at him in a most devoted 
manner. Our breakfast was as good as the supper, and at half-past eight 
precisely we started for Little Britain. By degrees, Wemmick got dryer and 
harder as we went along, and his mouth tightened into a post-office again. 
At last, when we got to his place of business and he pulled out his key 
from his coat-collar, he looked as unconscious of his Walworth property as 
if the Castle and the drawbridge and the arbour and the lake and the 
fountain and the Aged, had all been blown into space together by the last 
discharge of the Stinger.


Chapter 26

It fell out as Wemmick had told me it would, that I had an early 
opportunity of comparing my guardian's establishment with that of his 
cashier and clerk. My guardian was in his room, washing his hands with his 
scented soap, when I went into the office from Walworth; and he called me 
to him, and gave me the invitation for myself and friends which Wemmick had 
prepared me to receive. 'No ceremony,' he stipulated, 'and no dinner dress, 
and say tomorrow.' I asked him where we should come to (for I had no idea 
where he lived), and I believe it was in his general objection to make 
anything like an admission, that he replied, 'Come here, and I'll take you 
home with me.' I embrace this opportunity of remarking that he washed his 
clients off, as if he were a surgeon or a dentist. He had a closet in his 
room, fitted up for the purpose, which smelt of the scented soap like a 
perfumer's shop. It had an unusually large jack-towel on a roller inside 
the door, and he would wash his hands, and wipe them and dry them all over 
this towel, whenever he came in from a police-court or dismissed a client 
from his room. When I and my friends repaired to him at six o'clock next 
day, he seemed to have been engaged on a case of a darker complexion than 
usual, for, we found him with his head butted into this closet, not only 
washing his hands, but laving his face and gargling his throat. And even 
when he had done all that, and had gone all round the jack-towel, he took 
out his penknife and scraped the case out of his nails before he put his 
coat on.
There were some people slinking about as usual when we passed out into the 
street, who were evidently anxious to speak with him; but there was 
something so conclusive in the halo of scented soap which encircled his 
presence, that they gave it up for that day. As we walked along westward, 
he was recognised ever and again by some face in the crowd of the streets, 
and whenever that happened he talked louder to me; but he never otherwise 
recognised anybody, or took notice that anybody recognised him.
He conducted us to Gerrard-street, Soho, to a house on the south side of 
that street. Rather a stately house of its kind, but dolefully in want of 
painting, and with dirty windows. He took out his key and opened the door, 
and we all went into a stone hall, bare, gloomy, and little used. So, up a 
dark brown staircase into a series of three dark brown rooms on the first 
floor. There were carved garlands on the panelled walls, and as he stood 
among them giving us welcome, I know what kind of loops I thought they 
looked like.
Dinner was laid in the best of these rooms; the second was his dressing-
room; the third, his bedroom. He told us that he held the whole house, but 
rarely used more of it than we saw. The table was comfortably laid - no 
silver in the service, of course - and at the side of his chair was a 
capacious dumb-waiter, with a variety of bottles and decanters on it, and 
four dishes of fruit for dessert. I noticed throughout, that he kept 
everything under his own hand, and distributed everything himself.
There was a bookcase in the room; I saw, from the backs of the books, that 
they were about evidence, criminal law, criminal biography, trials, acts of 
parliament, and such things. The furniture was all very solid and good, 
like his watch-chain. It had an official look, however, and there was 
nothing merely ornamental to be seen. In a corner, was a little table of 
papers with a shaded lamp: so that he seemed to bring the office home with 
him in that respect too, and to wheel it out of an evening and fall to 
work.
As he had scarcely seen my three companions until now - for, he and I had 
walked together - he stood on the hearth-rug, after ringing the bell, and 
took a searching look at them. To my surprise, he seemed at once to be 
principally if not solely interested in Drummle.
'Pip,' said he, putting his large hand on my shoulder and moving me to the 
window, 'I don't know one from the other. Who's the Spider?'
'The spider?' said I.
'The blotchy, sprawly, sulky fellow.'
'That's Bentley Drummle,' I replied; 'the one with the delicate face is 
Startop.'
Not making the least account of 'the one with the delicate face,' he 
returned, 'Bentley Drummle is his name, is it? I like the look of that 
fellow.'
He immediately began to talk to Drummle: not at all deterred by his 
replying in his heavy reticent way, but apparently led on by it to screw 
discourse out of him. I was looking at the two, when there came between me 
and them, the housekeeper, with the first dish for the table.
She was a woman of about forty, I supposed - but I may have thought her 
younger than she was. Rather tall, of a lithe nimble figure, extremely 
pale, with large faded eyes, and a quantity of streaming hair. I cannot say 
whether any diseased affection of the heart caused her lips to be parted as 
if she were panting, and her face to bear a curious expression of 
suddenness and flutter; but I know that I had been to see Macbeth at the 
theatre, a night or two before, and that her face looked to me as if it 
were all disturbed by fiery air, like the faces I had seen rise out of the 
Witches' caldron.
She set the dish on, touched my guardian quietly on the arm with a finger 
to notify that dinner was ready, and vanished. We took our seats at the 
round table, and my guardian kept Drummle on one side of him, while Startop 
sat on the other. It was a noble dish of fish that the housekeeper had put 
on table, and we had a joint of equally choice mutton afterwards, and then 
an equally choice bird. Sauces, wines, all the accessories we wanted, and 
all of the best, were given out by our host from his dumb-waiter; and when 
they had made the circuit of the table, he always put them back again. 
Similarly, he dealt us clean plates and knives and forks, for each course, 
and dropped those just disused into two baskets on the ground by his chair. 
No other attendant than the housekeeper appeared. She set on every dish; 
and I always saw in her face, a face rising out of the caldron. Years 
afterwards, I made a dreadful likeness of that woman, by causing a face 
that had no other natural resemblance to it than it derived from flowing 
hair, to pass behind a bowl of flaming spirits in a dark room.
Induced to take particular notice of the housekeeper, both by her own 
striking appearance and by Wemmick's preparation, I observed that whenever 
she was in the room, she kept her eyes attentively on my guardian, and that 
she would remove her hands from any dish she put before him, hesitatingly, 
as if she dreaded his calling her back, and wanted him to speak when she 
was nigh, if he had anything to say. I fancied that I could detect in his 
manner a consciousness of this, and a purpose of always holding her in 
suspense.
Dinner went off gaily, and, although my guardian seemed to follow rather 
than originate subjects, I knew that he wrenched the weakest part of our 
dispositions out of us. For myself, I found that I was expressing my 
tendency to lavish expenditure, and to patronise Herbert, and to boast of 
my great prospects, before I quite knew that I had opened my lips. It was 
so with all of us, but with no one more than Drummle: the development of 
whose inclination to gird in a grudging and suspicious way at the rest, was 
screwed out of him before the fish was taken off.
It was not then, but when we had got to the cheese, that our conversation 
turned upon our rowing feats, and that Drummle was rallied for coming up 
behind of a night in that slow amphibious way of his. Drummle upon this, 
informed our host that he much preferred our room to our company, and that 
as to skill he was more than our master, and that as to strength he could 
scatter us like chaff. By some invisible agency, my guardian wound him up 
to a pitch little short of ferocity about this trifle; and he fell to 
baring and spanning his arm to show how muscular it was, and we all fell to 
baring and spanning our arms in a ridiculous manner.
Now, the housekeeper was at that time clearing the table; my guardian, 
taking no heed of her, but with the side of his face turned from her, was 
leaning back in his chair biting the side of his forefinger and showing an 
interest in Drummle, that, to me, was quite inexplicable. Suddenly, he 
clapped his large hand on the housekeeper's, like a trap, as she stretched 
it across the table. So suddenly and smartly did he do this, that we all 
stopped in our foolish contention.
'If you talk of strength,' said Mr Jaggers, 'I'll show you a wrist. Molly, 
let them see your wrist.'
Her entrapped hand was on the table, but she had already put her other hand 
behind her waist. 'Master,' she said, in a low voice, with her eyes 
attentively and entreatingly fixed upon him. 'Don't.'
'I'll show you a wrist,' repeated Mr Jaggers, with an immovable 
determination to show it. 'Molly, let them see your wrist.'
'Master,' she again murmured. 'Please!'
'Molly,' said Mr Jaggers, not looking at her, but obstinately looking at 
the opposite side of the room, 'let them see both your wrists. Show them. 
Come!'
He took his hand from hers, and turned that wrist up on the table. She 
brought her other hand from behind her, and held the two out side by side. 
The last wrist was much disfigured - deeply scarred and scarred across and 
across. When she held her hands out, she took her eyes from Mr Jaggers, and 
turned them watchfully on every one of the rest of us in succession.
'There's power here,' said Mr Jaggers, coolly tracing out the sinews with 
his forefinger. 'Very few men have the power of wrist that this woman has. 
It's remarkable what mere force of grip there is in these hands. I have had 
occasion to notice many hands; but I never saw stronger in that respect, 
man's or woman's, than these.'
While he said these words in a leisurely critical style, she continued to 
look at every one of us in regular succession as we sat. The moment he 
ceased, she looked at him again. 'That'll do, Molly,' said Mr Jaggers, 
giving her a slight nod; 'you have been admired, and can go.' She withdrew 
her hands and went out of the room, and Mr Jaggers, putting the decanters 
on from his dumbwaiter, filled his glass and passed round the wine.
'At half-past nine, gentlemen,' said he, 'we must break up. Pray make the 
best use of your time. I am glad to see you all. Mr Drummle, I drink to 
you.'
If his object in singling out Drummle were to bring him out still more, it 
perfectly succeeded. In a sulky triumph, Drummle showed his morose 
depreciation of the rest of us, in a more and more offensive degree until 
he became downright intolerable. Through all his stages, Mr Jaggers 
followed him with the same strange interest. He actually seemed to serve as 
a zest to Mr Jaggers's wine.
In our boyish want of discretion I dare say we took too much to drink, and 
I know we talked too much. we became particularly hot upon some boorish 
sneer of Drummle's, to the effect that we were too free with our money. It 
led to my remarking, with more zeal than discretion, that it came with a 
bad grace from him, to whom Startop had lent money in my presence but a 
week or so before.
'Well,' retorted Drummle; 'he'll be paid.'
'I don't mean to imply that he won't,' said I, 'but it might make you hold 
your tongue about us and our money, I should think.'
'You should think!' retorted Drummle. 'Oh Lord!'
'I dare say,' I went on, meaning to be very severe, 'that you wouldn't lend 
money to any of us, if we wanted it.'
'You are right,' said Drummle. 'I wouldn't lend one of you a sixpence. I 
wouldn't lend anybody a sixpence.'
'Rather mean to borrow under those circumstances, I should say.'
'You should say,' repeated Drummle. 'Oh Lord!'
This was so very aggravating - the more especially as I found myself making 
no way against his surly obtuseness - that I said, disregarding Herbert's 
efforts to check me:
'Come, Mr Drummle, since we are on the subject, I'll tell you what passed 
between Herbert here and me, when you borrowed that money.'
'I don't want to know what passed between Herbert there and you,' growled 
Drummle. And I think he added in a lower growl, that we might both go to 
the devil and shake ourselves.
'I'll tell you, however,' said I, 'whether you want to know or not. We said 
that as you put it in your pocket very glad to get it, you seemed to be 
immensely amused at his being so weak as to lend it.'
Drummle laughed outright, and sat laughing in our faces, with his hands in 
his pockets and his round shoulders raised: plainly signifying that it was 
quite true, and that he despised us, as asses all.
Hereupon Startop took him in hand, though with a much better grace than I 
had shown, and exhorted him to be a little more agreeable. Startop, being a 
lively bright young fellow, and Drummle being the exact opposite, the 
latter was always disposed to resent him as a direct personal affront. He 
now retorted in a coarse lumpish way, and Startop tried to turn the 
discussion aside with some small pleasantry that made us all laugh. 
Resenting this little success more than anything, Drummle, without any 
threat or warning, pulled his hands out of his pockets, dropped his round 
shoulders, swore, took up a large glass, and would have flung it at his 
adversary's head, but for our entertainer's dextrously seizing it at the 
instant when it was raised for that purpose.
'Gentlemen,' said Mr Jaggers, deliberately putting down the glass, and 
hauling out his gold repeater by its massive chain, 'I am exceedingly sorry 
to announce that it's half-past nine.'
On this hint we all rose to depart. Before we got to the street door, 
Startop was cheerily calling Drummle 'old boy,' as if nothing had happened. 
But the old boy was so far from responding, that he would not even walk to 
Hammersmith on the same side of the way; so, Herbert and I, who remained in 
town, saw them going down the street on opposite sides; Startop leading, 
and Drummle lagging behind in the shadow of the houses, much as he was wont 
to follow in his boat.
As the door was not yet shut, I thought I would leave Herbert there for a 
moment, and run upstairs again to say a word to my guardian. I found him in 
his dressing-room surrounded by his stock of boots, already hard at it, 
washing his hands of us.
I told him I had come up again to say how sorry I was that anything 
disagreeable should have occurred, and that I hoped he would not blame me 
much.
'Pooh!' said he, sluicing his face, and speaking through the water-drops; 
'it's nothing, Pip. I like that Spider though.'
He had turned towards me now, and was shaking his head, and blowing, and 
towelling himself.
'I am glad you like him, sir,' said I - 'but I don't.'
'No, no,' my guardian assented; 'don't have too much to do with him. Keep 
as clear of him as you can. But I like the fellow, Pip; he is one of the 
true sort. Why, if I was a fortune-teller - '
Looking out of the towel, he caught my eye.
'But I am not a fortune-teller,' he said, letting his head drop into a 
festoon of towel, and towelling away at his two ears. 'You know what I am, 
don't you? Good-night, Pip.'
'Good-night, sir.'
In about a month after that, the Spider's time with Mr Pocket was up for 
good, and, to the great relief of all the house but Mrs Pocket, he went 
home to the family hole.


Chapter 27


MY DEAR MR PIP,
I write this by request of Mr Gargery, for to let you know that he is going 
to London in company with Mr Wopsle and would be glad if agreeable to be 
allowed to see you. He would call at Barnard's Hotel Tuesday morning  9 
o'clock, when if not agreeable please leave word. Your poor sister is much 
the same as when you left. We talk of you in the kitchen every night, and 
wonder what you are saying and doing. If now considered in the light of a 
liberty, excuse it for the love of poor old days. No more, dear Mr Pip, 
from
Your ever obliged, and affectionate servant,
BIDDY.

P.S. He wishes me most particular to write what larks. He says you will 
understand. I hope and do not doubt it will be agreeable to see him even 
though a gentleman, for you had ever a good heart and he is a worthy worthy 
man. I have read him all, excepting only the last little sentence, and he 
wishes me most particular to write again what larks.'

I received this letter by post on Monday morning, and therefore its 
appointment was for next day. Let me confess exactly, with what feelings I 
looked forward to Joe's coming.
Not with pleasure, though I was bound to him by so many ties; no; with 
considerable disturbance, some mortification, and a keen sense of 
incongruity. If I could have kept him away by paying money, I certainly 
would have paid money. My greatest reassurance was, that he was coming to 
Barnard's Inn, not to Hammersmith, and consequently would not fall in 
Bentley Drummle's way. I had little objection to his being seen by Herbert 
or his father, for both of whom I had a respect; but I had the sharpest 
sensitiveness as to his being seen by Drummle, whom I held in contempt. So, 
throughout life, our worst weaknesses and meannesses are usually committed 
for the sake of the people whom we most despise.
I had begun to be always decorating the chambers in some quite unnecessary 
and inappropriate way or other, and very expensive those wrestles with 
Barnard proved to be. By this time, the rooms were vastly different from 
what I had found them, and I enjoyed the honour of occupying a few 
prominent pages in the books of a neighbouring upholsterer. I had got on so 
fast of late, that I had even started a boy in boots - top boots - in 
bondage and slavery to whom I might have been said to pass my days. For, 
after I had made the monster (out of the refuse of my washerwoman's family) 
and had clothed him with a blue coat, canary waistcoat, white cravat, 
creamy breeches, and the boots already mentioned, I had to find him a 
little to do and a great deal to eat; and with both of those horrible 
requirements he haunted my existence.
This avenging phantom was ordered to be on duty at eight on Tuesday morning 
in the hall (it was two feet square, as charged for floor-cloth), and 
Herbert suggested certain things for breakfast that he thought Joe would 
like. While I felt sincerely obliged to him for being so interested and 
considerate, I had an odd half-provoked sense of suspicion upon me, that if 
Joe had been coming to see him, he wouldn't have been quite so brisk about 
it.
However, I came into town on the Monday night to be ready for Joe, and I 
got up early in the morning, and caused the sitting-room and breakfast-
table to assume their most splendid appearance. Unfortunately the morning 
was drizzly, and an angel could not have concealed the fact the Barnard was 
shedding sooty tears outside the window, like some weak giant of a Sweep.
As the time approached I should have liked to run away, but the Avenger 
pursuant to orders was in the hall, and presently I heard Joe on the 
staircase. I knew it was Joe, by his clumsy manner of coming upstairs - his 
state boots being always too big for him - and by the time it took him to 
read the names on the other floors in the course of his ascent. When at 
last he stopped outside our door, I could hear his finger tracing over the 
painted letters of my name, and I afterwards distinctly heard him breathing 
in at the keyhole. Finally he gave a faint single rap, and Pepper - such 
was the compromising name of the avenging boy - announced 'Mr Gargery!' I 
thought he never would have done wiping his feet, and that I must have gone 
out to lift him off the mat, but at last he came in.
'Joe, how are you, Joe?'
'Pip, how AIR you, Pip?'
With his good honest face all glowing and shining, and his hat put down on 
the floor between us, he caught both my hands and worked them straight up 
and down, as if I had been the last patented Pump.
'I am glad to see you, Joe. Give me your hat.'
But Joe, taking it up carefully with both hands, like a bird's-nest with 
eggs in it, wouldn't hear of parting with that piece of property, and 
persisted in standing talking over it in a most uncomfortable way.
'Which you have that growed,' said Joe, 'and that swelled, and that gentle-
folked;' Joe considered a little before he discovered this word; 'as to be 
sure you are a honour to your king and country.'
'And you, Joe, look wonderfully well.'
'Thank God,' said Joe, 'I'm ekerval to most. And your sister, she's no 
worse than she were. And Biddy, she's ever right and ready. And all friends 
is no backerder, if not no forarder. 'Ceptin' Wopsle; he's had a drop.'
All this time (still with both hands taking great care of the bird's-nest), 
Joe was rolling his eyes round and round the room, and round and round the 
flowered pattern of my dressing-gown.
'Had a drop, Joe?'
'Why yes,' said Joe, lowering his voice, 'he's left the Church, and went 
into the playacting. Which the playacting have likeways brought him to 
London along with me. And his wish were,' said Joe, getting the bird's-nest 
under his left arm for the moment and groping in it for an egg with his 
right; 'if no offence, as I would 'and you that.'
I took what Joe gave me, and found it to be the crumpled playbill of a 
small metropolitan theatre, announcing the first appearance, in that very 
week, of 'the celebrated Provincial Amateur of Roscian renown, whose unique 
performance in the highest tragic walk of our National Bard has lately 
occasioned so great a sensation in local dramatic circles.'
'Were you at his performance, Joe?' I inquired.
'I were,' said Joe, with emphasis and solemnity.
'Was there a great sensation?'
'Why,' said Joe, 'yes, there certainly were a peck of orange peel. 
Partickler, when he see the ghost. Though I put it to yourself, sir, 
whether it were calc'lated to keep a man up to his work with a good hart, 
to be continiwally cutting in betwixt him and the Ghost with "Amen!" A man 
may have had a misfortun' and been in the Church,' said Joe, lowering his 
voice to an argumentative and feeling tone, 'but that is no reason why you 
should put him out at such a time. Which I meantersay, if the ghost of a 
man's own father cannot be allowed to claim his attention, what can, Sir? 
Still more, when his mourning 'at is unfortunately made so small as that 
the weight of the black feathers brings it off, try to keep it on how you 
may.'
A ghost-seeing effect in Joe's own countenance informed me that Herbert had 
entered the room. So, I presented Joe to Herbert, who held out his hand; 
but Joe backed from it, and held on by the bird's-nest.
'Your servant, Sir,' said Joe, 'which I hope as you and Pip' - here his eye 
fell on the Avenger, who was putting some toast on table, and so plainly 
denoted an intention to make that young gentleman one of the family, that I 
frowned it down and confused him more - 'I meantersay, you two gentlemen - 
which I hope as you get your 'elths in this close spot? For the present may 
be a werry good inn, according to London opinions,' said Joe, 
confidentially, 'and I believe its character do stand i; but I wouldn't 
keep a pig in it myself - not in the case that I wished him to fatten 
wholesome and to eat with a meller flavour on him.'
Having borne this flattering testimony to the merits of our dwelling-place, 
and having incidentally shown this tendency to call me 'sir,' Joe, being 
invited to sit down to table, looked all round the room for a suitable spot 
on which to deposit his hat - as if it were only on some very few rare 
substances in nature that it could find a resting place - and ultimately 
stood it on an extreme corner of the chimney-piece, from which it ever 
afterwards fell off at intervals.
'Do you take tea, or coffee, Mr Gargery?' asked Herbert, who always 
presided of a morning.
'Thank'ee, Sir,' said Joe, stiff from head to foot, 'I'll take whichever is 
most agreeable to yourself.'
'What do you say to coffee?'
'Thank'ee, Sir,' returned Joe, evidently dispirited by the proposal, 'since 
you are so kind as make chice of coffee, I will not run contrairy to your 
own opinions. But don't you never find it a little 'eating?'
'Say tea then,' said Herbert, pouring it out.
Here Joe's hat tumbled off the mantel-piece, and he started out of his 
chair and picked it up, and fitted it to the same exact spot. As if it were 
an absolute point of good breeding that it should tumble off again soon.
'When did you come to town, Mr Gargery?'
'Were it yesterday afternoon?' said Joe, after coughing behind his hand, as 
if he had had time to catch the whooping-cough since he came. 'No it were 
not. Yes it were. Yes. It were yesterday afternoon' (with an appearance of 
mingled wisdom, relief, and strict impartiality).
'Have you seen anything of London, yet?'
'Why, yes, Sir,' said Joe, 'me and Wopsle went off straight to look at the 
Blacking Ware'us. But we didn't find that it come up to its likeness in the 
red bills at the shop doors; which I meantersay,' added Joe, in an 
explanatory manner, 'as it is there drawd too architectooralooral.'
I really believe Joe would have prolonged this word (mightily expressive to 
my mind of some architecture that I know) into a perfect Chorus, but for 
his attention being providentially attracted by his hat, which was 
toppling. Indeed, it demanded from him a constant attention, and a 
quickness of eye and hand, very like that exacted by wicket-keeping. He 
made extraordinary play with it, and showed the greatest skill; now, 
rushing at it and catching it neatly as it dropped; now, merely stopping it 
midway, beating it up, and humouring it in various parts of the room and 
against a good deal of the pattern of the paper on the wall, before he felt 
it safe to close with it; finally, splashing it into the slop-basin, where 
I took the liberty of laying hands upon it.
As to his shirt-collar, and his coat-collar, they were perplexing to 
reflect upon - insoluble mysteries both. Why should a man scrape himself to 
that extent, before he could consider himself full dressed? Why should he 
suppose it necessary to be purified by suffering for his holiday clothes? 
Then he fell into such unaccountable fits of meditation, with his fork 
midway between his plate and his mouth; had his eyes attracted in such 
strange directions; was afflicted with such remarkable coughs; sat so far 
from the table, and dropped so much more than he ate, and pretended that he 
hadn't dropped it; that I was heartily glad when Herbert left us for the 
city.
I had neither the good sense nor the good feeling to know that this was all 
my fault, and that if I had been easier with Joe, Joe would have been 
easier with me. I felt impatient of him and out of temper with him; in 
which condition he heaped coals of fire on my head.
'Us two being now alone, Sir,' - began Joe.
'Joe,' I interrupted, pettishly, 'how can you call me, Sir?'
Joe looked at me for a single instant with something faintly like reproach. 
Utterly preposterous as his cravat was, and as his collars were, I was 
conscious of a sort of dignity in the look.
'Us two being now alone,' resumed Joe, 'and me having the intentions and 
abilities to stay not many minutes more, I will now conclude - leastways 
begin - to mention what have led to my having had the present honour. For 
was it not,' said Joe, with his old air of lucid exposition, 'that my only 
wish were to be useful to you, I should not have had the honour of breaking 
wittles in the company and abode of gentlemen.'
I was so unwilling to see the look again, that I made no remonstrance 
against this tone.
'Well, Sir,' pursued Joe, 'this is how it were. I were at the Bargemen 
t'other night, Pip;' whenever he subsided into affection, he called me Pip, 
and whenever he relapsed into politeness he called me Sir; 'when there come 
up in his shay-cart, Pumblechook. Which that same identical,' said Joe, 
going down a new track, 'do comb my 'air the wrong way sometimes, awful, by 
giving out up and down town as it were him which ever had your infant 
companionation and were looked upon as a playfellow by yourself.'
'Nonsense. It was you, Joe.'
'Which I fully believed it were, Pip,' said Joe, slightly tossing his head, 
'though it signify little now, Sir. Well, Pip; this same identical, which 
his manners is given to blusterous, come to me at the Bargemen (wot a pipe 
and a pint of beer do give refreshment to the working-man, Sir, and do not 
over stimilate), and his word were, "Joseph, Miss Havisham she wish to 
speak to you."'
'Miss Havisham, Joe?'
'"She wish," were Pumblechook's word, "to speak to you."' Joe sat and 
rolled his eyes at the ceiling.
'Yes, Joe? Go on, please.'
'Next day, Sir,' said Joe, looking at me as if I were a long way off, 
'having cleaned myself, I go and I see Miss A.'
'Miss A., Joe? Miss Havisham?'
'Which I say, Sir,' replied Joe, with an air of legal formality, as if he 
were making his will, 'Miss A., or otherways Havisham. Her expression air 
then as follering: "Mr Gargery. You air in correspondence with Mr Pip?" 
Having had a letter from you, I were able to say "I am." (When I married 
your sister, Sir, I said "I will;" and when I answered your friend, Pip, I 
said "I am.") "Would you tell him, then," said she, "that which Estella has 
come home and would be glad to see him."'
I felt my face fire up as I looked at Joe. I hope one remote cause of its 
firing, may have been my consciousness that if I had known his errand, I 
should have given him more encouragement.
'Biddy,' pursued Joe, 'when I got home and asked her fur to write the 
message to you, a little hung back. Biddy says, "I know he will be very 
glad to have it by word of mouth, it is holidaytime, you want to see him, 
go!" I have now concluded, Sir,' said Joe, rising from his chair, 'and, 
Pip, I wish you ever well and ever prospering to a greater and a greater 
heighth.'
'But you are not going now, Joe?'
'Yes I am,' said Joe.
'But you are coming back to dinner, Joe?'
'No I am not,' said Joe.
Our eyes met, and all the 'Sir' melted out of that manly heart as he gave 
me his hand.
'Pip, dear old chap, life is made of ever so many partings welded together, 
as I may say, and one man's a blacksmith, and one's a whitesmith, and one's 
a goldsmith, and one's a coppersmith. Diwisions among such must come, and 
must be met as they come. If there's been any fault at all today, it's 
mine. You and me is not two figures to be together in London; nor yet 
anywheres else but what is private, and beknown, and understood among 
friends. It ain't that I am proud, but that I want to be right, as you 
shall never see me no more in these clothes. I'm wrong in these clothes. 
I'm wrong out of the forge, the kitchen, or off th' meshes. You won't find 
half so much fault in me if you think of me in my forge dress, with my 
hammer in my hand, or even my pipe. You won't find half so much fault in me 
if, supposing as you should ever wish to see me, you come and put your head 
in at the forge window and see Joe the blacksmith, there, at the old anvil, 
in the old burnt apron, sticking to the old work. I'm awful dull, but I 
hope I've beat out something nigh the rights of this at last. And so GOD 
bless you, dear old Pip, old chap, GOD bless you!'
I had not been mistaken in my fancy that there was a simple dignity in him. 
The fashion of his dress could no more come in its way when he spoke these 
words, than it could come in its way in Heaven. He touched me gently on the 
forehead, and went out. As soon as I could recover myself sufficiently, I 
hurried out after him and looked for him in the neighbouring streets; but 
he was gone.


Chapter 28

It was clear that I must repair to our town next day, and in the first flow 
of my repentance it was equally clear that I must stay at Joe's. But, when 
I had secured my box-place by tomorrow's coach and had been down to Mr 
Pocket's and back, I was not by any means convinced on the last point, and 
began to invent reasons and make excuses for putting up at the Blue Boar. I 
should be an inconvenience at Joe's; I was not expected, and my bed would 
not be ready; I should be too far from Miss Havisham's, and she was 
exacting and mightn't like it. All other swindlers upon earth are nothing 
to the self-swindlers, and with such pretences did I cheat myself. Surely a 
curious thing. That I should innocently take a bad half-crown of somebody 
else's manufacture, is reasonable enough; but that I should knowingly 
reckon the spurious coin of my own make, as good money! An obliging 
stranger, under pretence of compactly folding up my banknotes for 
security's sake, abstracts the notes and gives me nutshells; but what is 
his sleight of hand to mine, when I fold up my own nutshells and pass them 
on myself as notes!
Having settled that I must go to the Blue Boar, my mind was much disturbed 
by indecision whether or no to take the Avenger. It was tempting to think 
of that expensive Mercenary publicly airing his boots in the archway of the 
Blue Boar's posting-yard; it was almost solemn to imagine him casually 
produced in the tailor's shop and confounding the disrespectful senses of 
Trabb's boy. On the other hand, Trabb's boy might worm himself into his 
intimacy and tell him things; or, reckless and desperate wretch as I knew 
he could be, might hoot him in the High-street, My patroness, too, might 
hear of him, and not approve. On the whole, I resolved to leave the Avenger 
behind.
It was the afternoon coach by which I had taken my place, and, as winter 
had now come round, I should not arrive at my destination until two or 
three hours after dark. Our time of starting from the Cross Keys was two 
o'clock. I arrived on the ground with a quarter of an hour to spare, 
attended by the Avenger - if I may connect that expression with one who 
never attended on me if he could possibly help it.
At that time it was customary to carry Convicts down to the dockyards by 
stage-coach. As I had often heard of them in the capacity of outside 
passengers, and had more than once seen them on the high road dangling 
their ironed legs over the coach roof, I had no cause to be surprised when 
Herbert, meeting me in the yard, came up and told me there were two 
convicts going down with me. But I had a reason that was an old reason now, 
for constitutionally faltering whenever I heard the world convict.
'You don't mind them, Handel?' said Herbert.
'Oh no!'
'I thought you seemed as if you didn't like them?'
'I can't pretend that I do like them, and I suppose you don't particularly. 
But I don't mind them.'
'See! There they are,' said Herbert, 'coming out of the Tap. What a 
degraded and vile sight it is!'
They had been treating their guard, I suppose, for they had a gaoler with 
them, and all three came out wiping their mouths on their hands. The two 
convicts were handcuffed together, and had irons on their legs - irons of a 
pattern that I knew well. They wore the dress that I likewise knew well. 
Their keeper had a brace of pistols, and carried a thick-knobbed bludgeon 
under his arm; but he was on terms of good understanding with them, and 
stood, with them beside him, looking on at the putting-to of the horses, 
rather with an air as if the convicts were an interesting Exhibition not 
formally open at the moment, and he the Curator. One was a taller and 
stouter man than the other, and appeared as a matter of course, according 
to the mysterious ways of the world both convict and free, to have had 
allotted to him the smaller suit of clothes. His arms and legs were like 
great pincushions of those shapes, and his attire disguised him absurdly; 
but I knew his half-closed eye at one glance. There stood the man whom I 
had seen on the settle at the Three Jolly Bargemen on a Saturday night, and 
who had brought me down with his invisible gun!
It was easy to make sure that as yet he knew me no more than if he had 
never seen me in his life. He looked across at me, and his eye appraised my 
watch-chain, and then he incidentally spat and said something to the other 
convict, and they laughed and slued themselves round with a clink of their 
coupling manacle, and looked at something else. The great numbers on their 
backs, as if they were street doors; their coarse mangy ungainly outer 
surface, as if they were lower animals; their ironed legs, apologetically 
garlanded with pocket-handkerchiefs; and the way in which all present 
looked at them and kept from them; made them (as Herbert had said) a most 
disagreeable and degraded spectacle.
But this was not the worst of it. It came out that the whole of the back of 
the coach had been taken by a family removing from London, and that there 
were no places for the two prisoners but on the seat in front, behind the 
coachman. Hereupon, a choleric gentleman, who had taken the fourth place on 
that seat, flew into a most violent passion, and said that it was a breach 
of contract to mix him up with such villainous company, and that it was 
poisonous and pernicious and infamous and shameful, and I don't know what 
else. At this time the coach was ready and the coachman impatient, and we 
were all preparing to get up, and the prisoners had come over with their 
keeper - bringing with them that curious flavour of bread-poultice, baize, 
rope-yarn, and hearthstone, which attends the convict presence.
'Don't take it so much amiss. sir,' pleaded the keeper to the angry 
passenger; 'I'll sit next you myself. I'll put 'em on the outside of the 
row. They won't interfere with you, sir. You needn't know they're there.'
'And don't blame me,' growled the convict I had recognised. 'I don't want 
to go. I am quite ready to stay behind. As fur as I am concerned any one's 
welcome to my place.'
'Or mine,' said the other, gruffly. 'I wouldn't have incommoded none of 
you, if I'd had my way.' Then, they both laughed, and began cracking nuts, 
and spitting the shells about. - As I really think I should have liked to 
do myself, if I had been in their place and so despised.
At length, it was voted that there was no help for the angry gentleman, and 
that he must either go in his chance company or remain behind. So, he got 
into his place, still making complaints, and the keeper got into the place 
next him, and the convicts hauled themselves up as well as they could, and 
the convict I had recognised sat behind me with his breath on the hair of 
my head.
'Good-bye, Handel!' Herbert called out as we started. I thought what a 
blessed fortune it was, that he had found another name for me than Pip.
It is impossible to express with what acuteness I felt the convict's 
breathing, not only on the back of my head, but all along my spine. The 
sensation was like being touched in the marrow with some pungent and 
searching acid, it set my very teeth on edge. He seemed to have more 
breathing business to do than another man, and to make more noise in doing 
it; and I was conscious of growing high-shoulderd on one side, in my 
shrinking endeavours to fend him off.
The weather was miserably raw, and the two cursed the cold. It made us all 
lethargic before we had gone far, and when we had left the Hanknot House 
behind, we habitually dozed and shivered and were silent. I dozed off, 
myself, in considering the question whether I ought to restore a couple of 
pounds sterling to this creature before losing sight of him, and how it 
could best be done. In the act of dipping forward as if I were going to 
bathe among the horses, I woke in a fright and took the question up again.
But I must have lost it longer than I had thought, since, although I could 
recognise nothing in the darkness and the fitful lights and shadows of our 
lamps, I traced marsh country in the cold damp wind that blew at us. 
Cowering forward for warmth and to make me a screen against the wind, the 
convicts were closer to me than before. They very first words I heard them 
interchange as I became conscious were the words of my own thought, 'Two 
One Pound notes.'
'How did he get 'em?' said he convict I had never seen.
'How should I know?' returned the other. 'He had 'em stowed away somehows. 
Giv him by friends, I expect.'
'I wish,' said the other, with a bitter curse upon the cold, 'that I had 
'em here.'
'Two one pound notes, or friends?'
'Two one pound notes. I'd sell all the friends I ever had, for one, and 
think it a blessed good bargain. Well? So he says - ?'
'So he says,' resumed the convict I had recognised - 'it was all said and 
done in half a minute, behind a pile of timber in the Dockyard - "You're a 
going to be discharged?" Yes, I was. Would I find out that boy that had fed 
him and kep his secret, and give him them two one pound notes? Yes, I 
would. And I did.'
'More fool you,' growled the other. 'I'd have spent 'em on a Man, in 
wittles and drink. He must have been a green one. Mean to say he knowed 
nothing of you?'
'Not a ha'porth. Different gangs and different ships. He was tried again 
for prison breaking, and got made a Lifer.'
'And was that - Honour! - the only time you worked out, in this part of the 
country?'
'The only time.'
'What might have been your opinion of the place?'
'A most beastly place. Mudbank, mist, swamp, and work; work, swamp, mist, 
and mudbank.'
They both execrated the place in very strong language, and gradually 
growled themselves out, and had nothing left to say.
After overhearing this dialogue, I should assuredly have got down and been 
left in the solitude and darkness of the highway, but for feeling certain 
that the man had no suspicion of my identity. Indeed, I was not only so 
changed in the course of nature, but so differently dressed and so 
differently circumstanced, that it was not at all likely he could have 
known me without accidental help. Still, the coincidence of our being 
together on the coach, was sufficiently strange to fill me with a dread 
that some other coincidence might at any moment connect me, in his hearing, 
with my name. For this reason, I resolved to alight as soon as we touched 
the town, and put myself out of his hearing. This device I executed 
successfully. My little portmanteau was in the boot under my feet; I had 
but to turn a hinge to get it out: I threw it down before me, got down 
after it, and was left at the first lamp on the first stones of the town 
pavement. As to the convicts, they went their way with the coach, and I 
knew at what point they would be spirited off to the river. In my fancy, I 
saw the boat with its convict crew waiting for them at the slime-washed 
stairs, - again heard the gruff 'Give way, you!' like and order to dogs - 
again saw the wicked Noah's Ark lying out on the black water.
I could not have said what I was afraid of, for my fear was altogether 
undefined and vague, but there was great fear upon me. As I walked on to 
the hotel, I felt that a dread, much exceeding the mere apprehension of a 
painful of disagreeable recognition, made me tremble. I am confident that 
it took no distinctness of shape, and that it was the revival for a few 
minutes of the terror of childhood.
The coffee-room at the Blue Boar was empty, and I had not only ordered my 
dinner there, but had sat down to it, before the waiter knew me. As soon as 
he had apologised for the remissness of his memory, he asked me if he 
should send Boots for Mr Pumblechook?
'No,' said I, 'certainly not.'
The waiter (it was he who had brought up the Great Remonstrance from the 
Commercials, on the day when I was bound) appeared surprised, and took the 
earliest opportunity of putting a dirty old copy of a local newspaper so 
directly in my way, that I took it up and read this paragraph:
Our readers will learn, not altogether without interest, in reference to 
the recent romantic rise in fortune of a young artificer in iron of this 
neighbourhood (what a theme, by the way, for the magic pen of our as yet 
not universally acknowledged townsman TOOBY, the poet of our columns!) that 
the youth's earliest patron, companion, and friend, was a highly-respected 
individual not entirely unconnected with the corn and seed trade, and whose 
eminently convenient and commodious business premises are situate within a 
hundred miles of the High-street. It is not wholly irrespective of our 
personal feelings that we record HIM as the Mentor of our young Telemachus, 
for it is good to know that our town produced the founder of the latter's 
fortunes. Does the thought-contracted brow of the local Sage or the 
lustrous eye of local Beauty inquire whose fortunes? We believe that 
Quintin Matsys was the BLACKSMITH of Antwerp. VERB. SAP.

I entertain a conviction, based upon large experience, that if in the days 
of my prosperity I had gone to the North Pole, I should have met somebody 
there, wandering Esquimaux or civilised man, who would have told me that 
Pumblechook was my earliest patron and the founder of my fortunes.


Chapter 29

Betimes in the morning I was up and out. It was too early yet to go to Miss 
Havisham's, so I loitered into the country on Miss Havisham's side of town -
 which was not Joe's side; I could go there tomorrow - thinking about my 
patroness, and painting brilliant pictures of her plans for me.
She had adopted Estella, she has as good as adopted me, and it could not 
fail to be her intention to bring us together. She reserved it for me to 
restore the desolate house, admit the sunshine into the dark rooms, set the 
clocks a going and the cold hearths a blazing, tear down the cobwebs, 
destroy the vermin - in short, do all the shining deeds of the young Knight 
of romance, and marry the Princess. I had stopped to look at the house as I 
passed; and its seared red brick walls, blocked windows, and strong green 
ivy clasping even the stacks of chimneys with its twigs and tendons, as if 
with sinewy old arms, had made up a rich attractive mystery, of which I was 
the hero. Estella was the inspiration of it, and the heart of it, of 
course. But, though she had taken such strong possession of me, though my 
fancy and my hope were so set upon her, though her influence on my boyish 
life and character had been all-powerful, I did not, even that romantic 
morning, invest her with any attributes save those she possessed. I mention 
this in this place, of a fixed purpose, because it is the clue by which I 
am to be followed into my poor labyrinth. According to my experience, the 
conventional notion of a lover cannot be always true. The unqualified truth 
is, that when I loved Estella with the love of man, I loved her simply 
because I found her irresistible. Once for all; I knew to my sorrow, often 
and often, if not always, that I loved her against reason, against promise, 
against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement 
that could be. Once for all; I loved her none the less because I knew it, 
and it had no more influence in restraining me, than if I had devoutly 
believed her to be human perfection.
I so shaped out my walk as to arrive at the gate at my old time. When I had 
rung at the bell with an unsteady hand, I turned my back upon the gate, 
while I tried to get my breath and keep the beating of my heart moderately 
quiet. I heard the side door open, and steps come across the court-yard; 
but I pretended not to hear, even when the gate swung on its rusty hinges.
Being at last touched on the shoulder, I started and turned. I started much 
more naturally then, to find myself confronted by a man in a sober grey 
dress. The last man I should have expected to see in that place of porter 
at Miss Havisham's door.
'Orlick!'
'Ah, young master, there's more changes than yours. But come in, come in. 
It's opposed to my orders to hold the gate open.'
I entered and he swung it, and locked it, and took the key out. 'Yes!' said 
he, facing round, after doggedly preceding me a few steps towards the 
house. 'Here I am!'
'How did you come here?'
'I come her,' he retorted, 'on my legs. I had my box brought alongside me 
in a barrow.'
'Are you here for good?'
'I ain't her for harm, young master, I suppose?'
I was not so sure of that. I had leisure to entertain the retort in my 
mind, while he slowly lifted his heavy glance from the pavement, up my legs 
and arms, to my face.
'Then you have left the forge?' I said.
'Do this look like a forge?' replied Orlick, sending his glance all round 
him with an air of injury. 'Now, do it look like it?'
I asked him how long he had left Gargery's forge?
'One day is so like another here,' he replied, 'that I don't know without 
casting it up. However, I come her some time since you left.'
'I could have told you that, Orlick.'
'Ah!' said he, dryly. 'But then you've got to be a scholar.'
By this time we had come to the house, where I found his room to be one 
just within the side door, with a little window in it looking on the court-
yard. In its small proportions, it was not unlike the kind of place usually 
assigned to a gate-porter in Paris. Certain keys were hanging on the wall, 
to which he now added the gate-key; and his patchwork-covered bed was in a 
little inner division or recess. The whole had a slovenly confined and 
sleepy look, like a cage for a human dormouse: while he, looming dark and 
heavy in the shadow of a corner by the window, looked like the human 
dormouse for whom it was fitted up - as indeed he was.
'I never saw this room before,' I remarked; 'but there used to be no Porter 
here.'
'No,' said he; 'not till it got about that there was no protection on the 
premises, and it come to be considered dangerous, with convicts and Tag and 
Rag and Bobtail going up and down. And then I was recommended to the place 
as a man who could give another man as good as he brought, and I took it. 
It's easier than bellowsing and hammering. - That's loaded, that is.'
My eye had been caught by a gun with a brass bound stock over the chimney-
piece, and his eye had followed mine.
'Well,' said I, not desirous of more conversation, 'shall I go up to Miss 
Havisham?'
'Burn me, if I know!' he retorted, first stretching himself and then 
shaking himself; 'my orders ends here, young master. I give this here bell 
a rap with this here hammer, and you go on along the passage till you meet 
somebody.'
'I am expected, I believe?'
'Burn me twice over, if I can say!' said he.
Upon that, I turned down the long passage which I had first trodden in my 
thick boots, and he made his bell sound. At the end of the passage, while 
the bell was still reverberating, I found Sarah Pocket: who appeared to 
have now become constitutionally green and yellow by reason of me.
'Oh!' said she. 'You, is it, Mr Pip?'
'It is, Miss Pocket. I am glad to tell you that Mr Pocket and family are 
all well.'
'Are they any wiser?' said Sarah, with a dismal shake of the head; 'they 
had better be wiser, than well. Ah, Matthew, Matthew! You know your way, 
sir?'
Tolerably, for I had gone up the staircase in the dark, many a time. I 
ascended it now, in lighter boots than of yore, and tapped in my old way at 
the door of Miss Havisham's room. 'Pip's rap,' I heard her say, 
immediately; 'come in, Pip.'
She was in her chair near the old table, in the old dress, with her two 
hands crossed on her stick, her chin resting on them, and her eyes on the 
fire. Sitting near her, with the white shoe that had never been worn, in 
her hand, and her head bent as she looked at it, was an elegant lady whom I 
had never seen.
'Come in, Pip,' Miss Havisham continued to mutter, without looking round or 
up; 'come in, Pip, how do you do, Pip? so you kiss my hand as if I were a 
queen, eh? - Well?'
She looked up at me suddenly, only moving her eyes, and repeated in a 
grimly playful manner,
'Well?'
'I heard, Miss Havisham,' said I, rather at a loss, 'that you were so kind 
as to wish me to come and see you, and I came directly.'
'Well?'
The lady whom I had never seen before, lifted up her eyes and looked archly 
at me, and then I saw that the eyes were Estella's eyes. But she was so 
much changed, was so much more beautiful, so much more womanly, in all 
things winning admiration had made such wonderful advance, that I seemed to 
have made none. I fancied, as I looked at her, that I slipped hopelessly 
back into the coarse and common boy again. O the sense of distance and 
disparity that came upon me, and the inaccessibility that came about her!
She gave me her hand. I stammered something about the pleasure I felt in 
seeing her again, and about my having looked forward to it for a long, long 
time.
'Do you find her much changed, Pip?' asked Miss Havisham, with her greedy 
look, and striking her stick upon a chair that stood between them, as a 
sign to me to sit down there.
'When I came in, Miss Havisham, I thought there was nothing of Estella in 
the face or figure; but now it all settles down so curiously into the old - 
'
'What? You are not going to say into the old Estella?' Miss Havisham 
interrupted. 'She was proud and insulting, and you wanted to go away from 
her. Don't you remember?'
I said confusedly that that was long ago, and that I knew no better then, 
and the like. Estella smiled with perfect composure, and said she had no 
doubt of my having been quite right, and of her having been very 
disagreeable.
'Is he changed?' Miss Havisham asked her.
'Very much,' said Estella, looking at me.
'Less coarse and common?' said Miss Havisham, playing with Estella's hair.
Estella laughed, and looked at the shoe in her hand, and laughed again, and 
looked at me, and put the shoe down. She treated me as a boy still, but she 
lured me on.
We sat in the dreamy room among the old strange influences which had so 
wrought upon me, and I learnt that she had but just come home from France, 
and that she was going to London. Proud and wilful as of old, she had 
brought those qualities into such subjection to her beauty that it was 
impossible and out of nature - or I thought so - to separate them from her 
beauty. Truly it was impossible to dissociate her presence from all those 
wretched hankerings after money and gentility that had disturbed my boyhood 
- from all those ill-regulated aspirations that had first made me ashamed 
of home and Joe - from all those visions that had raised her face in the 
glowing fire, struck in out of the iron on the anvil, extracted it from the 
darkness of night to look in at the wooden window of the forge and flit 
away. In a word, it was impossible for me to separate her, in the past or 
in the present, from the innermost life of my life.
It was settled that I should stay there all the rest of the day, and return 
to the hotel at night, and to London tomorrow. When we had conversed for a 
while, Miss Havisham sent us two out to walk in the neglected garden: on 
our coming in by-and-by, she said, I should wheel her about a little as in 
times of yore.
So, Estella and I went out into the garden by the gate through which I had 
strayed to my encounter with the pale young gentleman, now Herbert; I, 
trembling in spirit and worshipping the very hem of her dress; she, quite 
composed and most decidedly not worshipping the hem of mine. As we drew 
near to the place of encounter, she stopped and said:
'I must have been a singular little creature to hide and see that fight 
that day: but I did, and I enjoyed it very much.'
'You rewarded me very much.'
'Did I?' she replied, in an incidental and forgetful way. 'I remember I 
entertained a great objection to your adversary, because I took it ill that 
he should be brought here to pester me with his company.'
'He and I are great friends now.'
'Are you? I think I recollect though, that you read with his father?'
'Yes.'
I made the admission with reluctance, for it seemed to have a boyish look, 
and she already treated me more than enough like a boy.
'Since your change of fortune and prospects, you have changed your 
companions,' said Estella.
'Naturally,' said I.
'And necessarily,' she added, in a haughty tone; 'what was fit company for 
you once, would be quite unfit company for you now.'
In my conscience, I doubt very much whether I had any lingering intention 
left, of going to see Joe; but if I had, this observation put it to flight.
'You had no idea of your impending good fortune, in those times?' said 
Estella, with a slight wave of her hand, signifying in the fighting times.
'Not the least.'
The air of completeness and superiority with which she walked at my side, 
and the air of youthfulness and submission with which I walked at hers, 
made a contrast that I strongly felt. It would have rankled in me more than 
it did, if I had not regarded myself as eliciting it by being so set apart 
for her and assigned to her.
The garden was too overgrown and rank for walking in with ease, and after 
we had made the round of it twice or thrice, we came out again into the 
brewery yard. I showed her to a nicety where I had seen her walking on the 
casks, that first old day, and she said, with a cold and careless look in 
that direction, 'Did I?' I reminded her where she had come out of the house 
and given me my meat and drink, and she said, 'I don't remember.' 'Not 
remember that you made me cry?' said I. 'No,' said she, and shook her head 
and looked about her. I verily believe that her not remembering and not 
minding in the least, made me cry again, inwardly - and that is the 
sharpest crying of all.
'You must know,' said Estella, condescending to me as a brilliant and 
beautiful woman might, 'that I have no heart - if that has anything to do 
with my memory.'
I got through some jargon to the effect that I took the liberty of doubting 
that. That I knew better. That there could be no such beauty without it.
'Oh! I have a heart to be stabbed in or shot in, I have no doubt,' said 
Estella, 'and, of course, if it ceased to beat I should cease to be. But 
you know what I mean. I have no softness there, no - sympathy - sentiment - 
nonsense.'
What was it that was borne in upon my mind when she stood still and looked 
attentively at me? Anything that I had seen in Miss Havisham? No. In some 
of her looks and gestures there was that tinge of resemblance to Miss 
Havisham which may often be noticed to have been acquired by children, from 
grown person with whom they have been much associated and secluded, and 
which, when childhood is passed, will produce a remarkable occasional 
likeness of expression between faces that are otherwise quite different. 
And yet I could not trace this to Miss Havisham. I looked again, and though 
she was still looking at me, the suggestion was gone.
What was it?
'I am serious,' said Estella, not so much with a frown (for her brow was 
smooth) as with a darkening of her face; 'if we are to be thrown much 
together, you had better believe it at once. No!' imperiously stopping me 
as I opened my lips. 'I have not bestowed my tenderness anywhere. I have 
never had any such thing.'
In another moment we were in the brewery so long disused, as she pointed to 
the high gallery where I had seen her going out on that same first day, and 
told me she remembered to have been up there, and to have seen me standing 
scared below. As my eyes followed her white hand, again the same dim 
suggestion that I could not possibly grasp, crossed me. My involuntary 
start occasioned her to lay her hand upon my arm. Instantly the ghost 
passed once more, and was gone.
What was it?
'What is the matter?' asked Estella. 'Are you scared again?'
'I should be, if I believed what you said just now,' I replied, to turn it 
off.
'Then you don't? Very well. It is said, at any rate. Miss Havisham will 
soon be expecting you at your old post, though I think that might be laid 
aside now, with other old belongings. Let us make one more round of the 
garden, and then go in. Come! You shall not shed tears for my cruelty 
today; you shall be my Page, and give me your shoulder.'
Her handsome dress had trailed upon the ground. She held it in one hand 
now, and with the other lightly touched my shoulder as we walked. We walked 
round the ruined garden twice or thrice more, and it was all in bloom for 
me. If the green and yellow growth of weed in the chinks of the old wall 
had been the most precious flowers that ever blew, it could not have been 
more cherished in my remembrance.
There was no discrepancy of years between us, to remove her far from me; we 
were of nearly the same age, though of course the age told for more in her 
case than in mine; but the air of inaccessibility which her beauty and her 
manner gave her, tormented me in the midst of my delight, and at the height 
of the assurance I felt that out patroness had chosen us for one another. 
Wretched boy!
At last we went back into the house, and there I heard, with surprise, that 
my guardian had come down to see Miss Havisham on business, and would come 
back to dinner. The old wintry branches of chandeliers in the room where 
the mouldering table was spread, had been lighted while we were out, and 
Miss Havisham was in her chair and waiting for me.
It was like pushing the chair itself back into the past, when we began the 
old slow circuit round about the ashes of the bridal feast. But, in the 
funereal room, with that figure of the grave fallen back in the chair 
fixing its eyes upon her, Estella looked more bright and beautiful than 
before, and I was under stronger enchantment.
The time so melted away, that our early dinner-hour drew close at hand, and 
Estella left us to prepare herself. We had stopped near the centre of the 
long table, and Miss Havisham, with one of her withered arms stretched out 
of the chair, rested that clenched hand upon the yellow cloth. As Estella 
looked back over her shoulder before going out at the door, Miss Havisham 
kissed that hand to her, with a ravenous intensity that was of its kind 
quite dreadful.
Then, Estella being gone and we two left alone, she turned to me, and said 
in a whisper:
'Is she beautiful, graceful, well-grown? Do you admire her?'
'Everybody must who sees her, Miss Havisham.'
She drew an arm round my neck, and drew my head close down to hers as she 
sat in the chair. 'Love her, love her, love her! How does she use you?'
Before I could answer (if I could have answered so difficult a question at 
all), she repeated, 'Love her, love her, love her! If she favours you, love 
her. If she wounds you, love her. If she tears your heart to pieces - and 
as it gets older and stronger, it will tear deeper - love her, love her, 
love her!'
Never had I seen such passionate eagerness as was joined to her utterance 
of these words. I could feel the muscles of the thin arm round my neck, 
swell with the vehemence that possessed her.
'Hear me, Pip! I adopted her to be loved. I bred her and educated her, to 
be loved. I developed her into what she is, that she might be loved. Love 
her!'
She said the word often enough, and there could be no doubt that she meant 
to say it; but if the often repeated word had been hate instead of love - 
despair - revenge - dire death - it could not have sounded from her lips 
more like a curse.
'I'll tell you,' said she, in the same hurried passionate whisper, 'what 
real love is. It is blind devotion, unquestioning self-humiliation, utter 
submission, trust and belief against yourself and against the whole world, 
giving up your whole heart and soul to the smiter - as I did!'
When she came to that, and to a wild cry that followed that, I caught her 
round the waist. For she rose up in the chair, in her shroud of a dress, 
and struck at the air as if she would as soon have struck herself against 
the wall and fallen dead.
All this passed in a few seconds. As I drew her down into her chair, I was 
conscious of a scent that I knew, and turning, saw my guardian in the room.
He always carried (I have not yet mentioned it, I think) a pocket-
handkerchief of rich silk and of imposing proportions, which was of great 
value to him in his profession. I have seen him so terrify a client or a 
witness by ceremoniously unfolding this pocket-handkerchief as if he were 
immediately going to blow his nose, and then pausing, as if he knew he 
should not have time to do it before such client or witness committed 
himself, that the self-committal has followed directly, quite as a matter 
of course. When I saw him in the room, he had this expressive pocket-
handkerchief in both hands, and was looking at us. On meeting my eye, he 
said plainly, by a momentary and silent pause in that attitude, 'Indeed? 
Singular!' and then put the handkerchief to its right use with wonderful 
effect.
Miss Havisham had seen him as soon as I, and was (like everybody else) 
afraid of him. She made a strong attempt to compose herself, and stammered 
that he was as punctual as ever.
'As punctual as ever,' he repeated, coming up to us. '(How do you do, Pip? 
Shall I give you ride, Miss Havisham? Once round?) And so you are here, 
Pip?'
I told him when I had arrived, and how Miss Havisham had wished me to come 
and see Estella. To which he replied, 'Ah! Very fine young lady!' Then he 
pushed Miss Havisham in her chair before him, with one of his large hands, 
and put the other in his trousers-pocket as if the pocket were full of 
secrets.
'Well, Pip! How often have you seen Miss Estella before?' said he, when he 
came to a stop.
'How often?'
'Ah! How many times? Ten thousand times?'
'Oh! Certainly not so many.'
'Twice?'
'Jaggers,' interposed Miss Havisham, much to my relief; 'leave my Pip 
alone, and go with him to your dinner.'
He complied, and we groped our way down the dark stairs together. While we 
were still on our way to those detached apartments across the paved yard at 
the back, he asked me how often I had seen Miss Havisham eat and drink; 
offering me a breadth of choice, as usual, between a hundred times and 
once.
I considered, and said, 'Never.'
'And never will, Pip,' he retorted, with a frowning smile. 'She has never 
allowed herself to be seen doing either, since she lived this present life 
of hers. She wanders about in the night, and then lays hands on such food 
as she takes.'
'Pray, sir,' said I, 'may I ask you a question?'
'You may,' said he, 'and I may decline to answer it. Put your question.'
'Estella's name. Is it Havisham or - ?' I had nothing to add.
'Or what?' said he.
'Is it Havisham?'
'It is Havisham.'
This brought us to the dinner-table, where she and Sarah Pocket awaited us. 
Mr Jaggers presided, Estella sat opposite to him, I faced my green and 
yellow friend. We dined very well, and were waited on by a maid-servant 
whom I had never seen in all my comings and goings, but who, for anything I 
know, had been in that mysterious house the whole time. After dinner, a 
bottle of choice old port was placed before my guardian (he was evidently 
well acquainted with the vintage), and the two ladies left us.
Anything to equal the determined reticence of Mr Jaggers under that roof, I 
never saw elsewhere, even in him. He kept his very looks to himself, and 
scarcely directed his eyes to Estella's face once during dinner. When she 
spoke to him, he listened, and in due course answered, but never looked at 
her, that I could see. On the other hand, she often looked at him, with 
interest and curiosity, if not distrust, but his face never, showed the 
least consciousness. Throughout dinner he took a dry delight in making 
Sarah Pocket greener and yellower, by often referring in conversation with 
me to my expectations; but here, again, he showed no consciousness, and 
even made it appear that he extorted - and even did extort, though I don't 
know how - those references out of my innocent self.
And when he and I were left alone together, he sat with an air upon him of 
general lying by in consequence of information he possessed, that really 
was too much for me. He cross-examined his very wine when he had nothing 
else in hand. He held it between himself and the candle, tasted the port, 
rolled it in his mouth, swallowed it, looked at his glass again, smelt the 
port, tried it, drank it, filled again, and cross-examined the glass again, 
until I was as nervous as if I had known the wine to be telling him 
something to my disadvantage. Three or four times I feebly thought I would 
start conversation; but whenever he saw me going to ask him anything, he 
looked at me with his glass in his hand, and rolling his wine about in his 
mouth, as if requesting me to take notice that it was of no use, for he 
couldn't answer.
I think Miss Pocket was conscious that the sight of me involved her in the 
danger of being goaded to madness, and perhaps tearing off her cap - which 
was a very hideous one, in the nature of a muslin mop - and strewing the 
ground with her hair - which assuredly had never grown on her head. She did 
not appear when we afterwards went up to Miss Havisham's room, and we four 
played at whist. In the interval, Miss Havisham, in a fantastic way, had 
put some of the most beautiful jewels from her dressing-table into 
Estella's hair, and about her bosom and arms; and I saw even my guardian 
look at her from under his thick eyebrows, and raise them a little, when 
her loveliness was before him, with those rich flushes of glitter and 
colour in it.
Of the manner and extent to which he took our trumps into custody, and came 
out with mean little cards at the ends of hands, before which the glory of 
our Kings and Queens was utterly abased, I say nothing; nor, of the feeling 
that I had, respecting his looking upon us personally in the light of three 
very obvious and poor riddles that he had found out long ago. What I 
suffered from, was the incompatibility between his cold presence and my 
feelings towards Estella. It was not that I knew I could never bear to 
speak to him about her, that I knew I could never bear to hear him creak 
his boots at her, that I knew I could never bear to see him wash his hands 
of her; it was, that my admiration should be within a foot or two of him - 
it was, that my feelings should be in the same place with him - that, was 
the agonizing circumstance.
We played until nine o'clock, and then it was arranged that when Estella 
came to London I should be forewarned of her coming and should meet her at 
the coach; and then I took leave of her, and touched her and left her.
My guardian lay at the Boar in the next room to mine. Far into the night, 
Miss Havisham's words, 'Love her, love her, love her!' sounded in my ears. 
I adapted them for my own repetition, and said to my pillow, 'I love her, I 
love her, I love her!' hundreds of times. Then, a burst of gratitude came 
upon me, that she should be destined for me, once the blacksmith's boy. 
Then, I thought if she were, as I feared, by no means rapturously grateful 
for that destiny yet, when would she begin to be interested in me? When 
should I awaken the heart within her, that was mute and sleeping now?
Ah me! I thought those were high and great emotions. But I never thought 
there was anything low and small in my keeping away from Joe, because I 
knew she would be contemptuous of him. It was but a day gone, and Joe had 
brought the tears into my eyes; they had soon dried, God forgive me! soon 
dried.


Chapter 30

After well considering the matter while I was dressing at the Blue Boar in 
the morning, I resolved to tell my guardian that I doubted Orlick's being 
the right sort of man to fill a post of trust at Miss Havisham's. 'Why, of 
course he is not the right sort of man, Pip,' said my guardian, comfortably 
satisfied beforehand on the general head, 'because the man who fills the 
post of trust never is the right sort of man.' It seemed quite to put him 
into spirits, to find that this particular post was not exceptionally held 
by the right sort of man, and he listened in a satisfied manner while I 
told him what knowledge I had of Orlick. 'Very good, Pip,' he observed, 
when I had concluded, 'I'll go round presently, and pay our friend off.' 
Rather alarmed by this summary action, I was for a little delay, and even 
hinted that our friend himself might be difficult to deal with. 'Oh no he 
won't,' said my guardian, making his pocket-handkerchief-point, with 
perfect confidence; 'I should like to see him argue the question with me.'
As we were going back together to London by the midday coach, and as I 
breakfasted under such terrors of Pumblechook that I could scarcely hold my 
cup, this gave me an opportunity of saying that I wanted a walk, and that I 
would go on along the London Road while Mr Jaggers was occupied, if he 
would let the coachman know that I would get into my place when overtaken. 
I was thus enabled to fly from the Blue Boar immediately after breakfast. 
By then making a loop of about a couple of miles into the open country at 
the back of Pumblechook's premises, I got round into the High-street again, 
a little beyond that pitfall, and felt myself in comparative security.
It was interesting to be in the quiet old town once more, and it was not 
disagreeable to be here and there suddenly recognised and stared after. One 
or two of the trades-people even darted out of their shops and went a 
little way down the street before me, that they might turn, as if they had 
forgotten something, and pass me face to face - on which occasions I don't 
know whether they or I made the worse pretence; they of not doing it, or I 
of not seeing it. Still my position was a distinguished one, and I was not 
at all dissatisfied with it, until Fate threw me in the way of that 
unlimited miscreant, Trabb's boy.
Casting my eyes along the street at a certain point of my progress, I 
beheld Trabb's boy approaching, lashing himself with an empty blue bag. 
Deeming that a serene and unconscious contemplation of him would best 
beseem me, and would be most likely to quell his evil mind, I advanced with 
that expression of countenance, and was rather congratulating myself on my 
success, when suddenly the knees of Trabb's boy smote together, his hair 
uprose, his cap fell off, he trembled violently in every limb, staggered 
out into the road, and crying to the populace, 'Hold me! I'm so 
frightened!' feigned to be in a paroxysm of terror and contrition, 
occasioned by the dignity of my appearance. As I passed him, his teeth 
loudly chattered in his head, and with every mark of extreme humiliation, 
he prostrated himself in the dust.
This was a hard thing to bear, but this was nothing. I had not advanced 
another two hundred yards, when, to my inexpressible terror, amazement, and 
indignation, I again beheld Trabb's boy approaching. He was coming round a 
narrow corner. His blue bag was slung over his shoulder, honest industry 
beamed in his eyes, a determination to proceed to Trabb's with cheerful 
briskness was indicated in his gait. With a shock he became aware of me, 
and was severely visited as before; but this time his motion was rotatory, 
and he staggered round and round me with knees more afflicted, and with 
uplifted hands as if beseeching for mercy. His sufferings were hailed with 
the greatest joy by a knot of spectators, and I felt utterly confounded.
I had not got as much further down the street as the post-office, when I 
again beheld Trabb's boy shooting round by a back way. This time, he was 
entirely changed. He wore the blue bag in the manner of my greatcoat, and 
was strutting along the pavement towards me on the opposite side of the 
street, attended by a company of delighted young friends to whom he from 
time to time exclaimed, with a wave of his hand, 'Don't know yah!' Words 
cannot state the amount of aggravation and injury wreaked upon me by 
Trabb's boy, when, passing abreast of me, he pulled up his shirt-collar, 
twined his side-hair, stuck an arm akimbo, and smirked extravagantly by, 
wriggling his elbows and body, and drawling to his attendants, 'Don't know 
yah, don't know yah, pon my soul don't know yah!' The disgrace attendant on 
his immediately afterwards taking to crowing and pursuing me across the 
bridge with crows, as from an exceedingly dejected fowl who had known me 
when I was a blacksmith, culminated the disgrace with which I left the 
town, and was, so to speak, ejected by it into the open country.
But unless I had taken the life of Trabb's boy on that occasion, I really 
do not even now see what I could have done save endure. To have struggled 
with him in the street, or to have exacted any lower recompense from him 
than his heart's best blood, would have been futile and degrading. 
Moreover, he was a boy whom no man could hurt; an invulnerable and dodging 
serpent who, when chased into a corner, flew out again between his captor's 
legs, scornfully yelping. I wrote, however, to Mr Trabb by next day's post, 
to say that Mr Pip must decline to deal further with one who could so far 
forget what he owed to the best interests of society, as to employ a boy 
who excited Loathing in every respectable mind.
The coach, with Mr Jaggers inside, came up in due time, and I took my box-
seat again, and arrived in London safe - but not sound, for my heart was 
gone. As soon as I arrived, I sent a penitential codfish and barrel of 
oysters to Joe (as reparation for not having gone myself), and then went on 
to Barnard's Inn.
I found Herbert dining on cold meat, and delighted to welcome me back. 
Having despatched The Avenger to the coffee-house for an addition to the 
dinner, I felt that I must open my breast that very evening to my friend 
and chum. As confidence was out of the question with The Avenger in the 
hall, which could merely be regarded in the light of an ante-chamber to the 
keyhole, I sent him to the Play. A better proof of the severity of my 
bondage to that taskmaster could scarcely be afforded, than the degrading 
shifts to which I was constantly driven to find him employment. So mean is 
extremity, that I sometimes sent him to Hyde Park Corner to see what 
o'clock it was.
Dinner done and we sitting with our feet upon the fender, I said to 
Herbert, 'My dear Herbert, I have something very particular to tell you.'
'My dear Handel,' he returned, 'I shall esteem and respect your 
confidence.'
'It concerns myself, Herbert,' said I, 'and one other person.'
Herbert crossed his feet, looked at the fire with his head on one side, and 
having looked at it in vain for some time, looked at me because I didn't go 
on.
'Herbert,' said I, laying my hand upon his knee, 'I love - I adore - 
Estella.'
Instead of being transfixed, Herbert replied in an easy matter-of course 
way, 'Exactly. Well?'
'Well, Herbert? Is that all you say? Well?'
'What next, I mean?' said Herbert. 'Of course I know that.'
'How do you know it?' said I.
'How do I know it, Handel? Why, from you.'
'I never told you.'
'Told me! You have never told me when you have got your hair cut, but I 
have had senses to perceive it. You have always adored her, ever since I 
have known you. You brought your adoration and your portmanteau here, 
together. Told me! Why, you have always told me all day long. When you told 
me your own story, you told me plainly that you began adoring her the first 
time you saw her, when you were very young indeed.'
'Very well, then,' said I, to whom this was a new and not unwelcome light, 
'I have never left off adoring her. And she has come back, a most beautiful 
and most elegant creature. And I saw her yesterday. And if I adored her 
before, I now doubly adore her.'
'Lucky for you then, Handel,' said Herbert, 'that you are picked out for 
her and allotted to her. Without encroaching on forbidden ground, we may 
venture to say that there can be no doubt between ourselves of that fact. 
Have you any idea yet, of Estella's views on the adoration question?'
I shook my head gloomily. 'Oh! She is thousands of miles away, from me,' 
said I.
'Patience, my dear Handel: time enough, time enough. But you have something 
more to say?'
'I am ashamed to say it,' I returned, 'and yet it's no worse to say it than 
to think it. You call me a lucky fellow. Of course, I am. I was a 
blacksmith's boy but yesterday; I am - what shall I say I am - today?'
'Say, a good fellow, if you want a phrase,' returned Herbert, smiling, and 
clapping his hand on the back of mine, 'a good fellow, with impetuosity and 
hesitation, boldness and diffidence, action and dreaming, curiously mixed 
in him.'
I stopped for a moment to consider whether there really was this mixture in 
my character. On the whole, I by no means recognised the analysis, but 
thought it not worth disputing.
'When I ask what I am to call myself today, Herbert,' I went on, 'I suggest 
what I have in my thoughts. You say I am lucky. I know I have done nothing 
to raise myself in life, and that Fortune alone has raised me; that is 
being very lucky. And yet, when I think of Estella - '
('And when don't you, you know?' Herbert threw in, with his eyes on the 
fire; which I thought kind and sympathetic of him.)
' - Then, my dear Herbert, I cannot tell you how dependent and uncertain I 
feel, and how exposed to hundreds of chances. Avoiding forbidden ground, as 
you did just now, I may still say that on the constancy of one person 
(naming no person) all my expectations depend. And at the best, how 
indefinite and unsatisfactory, only to know so vaguely what they are!' In 
saying this, I relieved my mind of what had always been there, more or 
less, though no doubt most since yesterday.
'Now, Handel,' Herbert replied, in his gay hopeful way, 'it seems to me 
that in the despondency of the tender passion, we are looking into our gift-
horse's mouth with a magnifying-glass. Likewise, it seems to me that, 
concentrating our attention on the examination, we altogether overlook one 
of the best points of the animal. Didn't you tell me that your guardian, Mr 
Jaggers, told you in the beginning, that you were not endowed with 
expectations only? And even if he had not told you so - though that is a 
very large If, I grant - could you believe that of all men in London, Mr 
Jaggers is the man to hold his present relations towards you unless he were 
sure of his ground?'
I said I could not deny that this was a strong point. I said it (people 
often do so, in such cases) like a rather reluctant concession to truth and 
justice; - as if I wanted to deny it!
'I should think it was a strong point,' said Herbert, 'and I should think 
you would be puzzled to imagine a stronger; as to the rest, you must bide 
your guardian's time, and he must bide his client's time. You'll be one-and-
twenty before you know where you are, and then perhaps you'll get some 
further enlightenment. At all events, you'll be nearer getting it, for it 
must come at last.'
'What a hopeful disposition you have!' said I, gratefully admiring his 
cheery ways.
'I ought to have,' said Herbert, 'for I have not much else. I must 
acknowledge, by-the-bye, that the good sense of what I have just said is 
not my own, but my father's. The only remark I ever heard him make on your 
story, was the final one: "The thing is settled and done, or Mr Jaggers 
would not be in it." And now before I say anything more about my father, or 
my father's son, and repay confidence with confidence, I want to make 
myself seriously disagreeable to you for a moment - positively repulsive.'
'You won't succeed,' said I.
'Oh yes I shall!' said he. 'One, two, three, and now I am in for it. 
Handel, my good fellow;' though he spoke in this light tone, he was very 
much in earnest: 'I have been thinking since we have been talking with our 
feet on this fender, that Estella surely cannot be a condition of your 
inheritance, if she was never referred to by your guardian. Am I right in 
so understanding what you have told me, as that he never referred to her, 
directly or indirectly, in any way? Never even hinted, for instance, that 
your patron might have views as to your marriage ultimately?'
'Never.'
'Now, Handel, I am quite free from the flavour of sour grapes, upon my soul 
and honour! Not being bound to her, can you not detach yourself from her? - 
I told you I should be disagreeable.'
I turned my head aside, for, with a rush and a sweep, like the old marsh 
winds coming up from the sea, a feeling like that which had subdued me on 
the morning when I left the forge, when the mists were solemnly rising, and 
when I laid my hand upon the village finger-post, smote upon my heart 
again. There was silence between us for a little while.
'Yes; but my dear Handel,' Herbert went on, as if we had been talking 
instead of silent, 'its having been so strongly rooted in the breast of a 
boy whom nature and circumstances made so romantic, renders it very 
serious. Think of her bringing-up, and think of Miss Havisham. Think of 
what she is herself (now I am repulsive and you abominate me). This may 
lead to miserable things.'
'I know it, Herbert,' said I, with my head still turned away, 'but I can't 
help it.'
'You can't detach yourself?'
'No. Impossible!'
'You can't try, Handel?'
'No. Impossible!'
'Well!' said Herbert, getting up with a lively shake as if he had been 
asleep, and stirring the fire; 'now I'll endeavour to make myself agreeable 
again!'
So he went round the room and shook the curtains out, put the chairs in 
their places, tidied the books and so forth that were lying about, looked 
into the hall, peeped into the letter-box, shut the door, and came back to 
his chair by the fire: where he sat down, nursing his left leg in both 
arms.
'I was going to say a word or two, Handel, concerning my father and my 
father's son. I am afraid it is scarcely necessary for my father's son to 
remark that my father's establishment is not particularly brilliant in its 
housekeeping.'
'There is always plenty, Herbert,' said I: to say something encouraging.
'Oh yes! and so the dustman says, I believe, with the strongest approval, 
and so does the marine-store shop in the back street. Gravely, Handel, for 
the subject is grave enough, you know how it is, as well as I do. I suppose 
there was a time once when my father had not given matters up; but if ever 
there was, the time is gone. May I ask you if you have ever had an 
opportunity of remarking, down in your part of the country, that the 
children of not exactly suitable marriages, are always most particularly 
anxious to be married?'
This was such a singular question, that I asked him in return, 'Is it so?'
'I don't know,' said Herbert, 'that's what I want to know. Because it is 
decidedly the case with us. My poor sister Charlotte who was next me and 
died before she was fourteen, was a striking example. Little Jane is the 
same. In her desire to be matrimonially established, you might suppose her 
to have passed her short existence in the perpetual contemplation of 
domestic bliss. Little Alick in a frock has already made arrangements for 
his union with a suitable young person at Kew. And indeed, I think we are 
all engaged, except the baby.'
'Then you are?' said I.
'I am,' said Herbert; 'but it's a secret.'
I assured him of my keeping the secret, and begged to be favoured with 
further particulars. He had spoken so sensibly and feelingly of my weakness 
that I wanted to know something about his strength.
'May I ask the name?' I said.
'Name of Clara,' said Herbert.
'Live in London?'
'Yes. perhaps I ought to mention,' said Herbert, who had become curiously 
crestfallen and meek, since we entered on the interesting theme, 'that she 
is rather below my mother's nonsensical family notions. Her father had to 
do with the victualling of passenger-ships. I think he was a species of 
purser.'
'What is he now?' said I.
'He's an invalid now,' replied Herbert.
'Living on - ?'
'On the first floor,' said Herbert. Which was not at all what I meant, for 
I had intended my question to apply to his means. 'I have never seen him, 
for he has always kept his room overhead, since I have known Clara. But I 
have heard him constantly. He makes tremendous rows - roars, and pegs at 
the floor with some frightful instrument.' In looking at me and then 
laughing heartily, Herbert for the time recovered his usual lively manner.
'Don't you expect to see him?' said I.
'Oh yes, I constantly expect to see him,' returned Herbert, 'because I 
never hear him, without expecting him to come tumbling through the ceiling. 
But I don't know how long the rafters may hold.'
When he had once more laughed heartily, he became meek again, and told me 
that the moment he began to realise Capital, it was his intention to marry 
this young lady. He added as a self-evident proposition, engendering low 
spirits, 'But you can't marry, you know, while you're looking about you.'
As we contemplated the fire, and as I thought what a difficult vision to 
realise this same Capital sometimes was, I put my hands in my pockets. A 
folded piece of paper in one of them attracting my attention, I opened it 
and found it to be the playbill I had received from Joe, relative to the 
celebrated provincial amateur of Roscian renown. 'And bless my heart,' I 
involuntarily added aloud, 'it's tonight!'
This changed the subject in an instant, and made us hurriedly resolve to go 
to the play. So, when I had pledged myself to comfort and abet Herbert in 
the affair of his heart by all practicable and impracticable means, and 
when Herbert had told me that his affianced already knew me by reputation 
and that I should be presented to her, and when we had warmly shaken hands 
upon our mutual confidence, we blew out our candles, made up our fire, 
locked our door, and issued forth in quest of Mr Wopsle and Denmark.


Chapter 31

On our arrival in Denmark, we found the king and queen of that country 
elevated in two armchairs on a kitchen-table, holding a Court. The whole of 
the Danish nobility were in attendance; consisting of a noble boy in the 
wash-leather boots of a gigantic ancestor, a venerable Peer with a dirty 
face who seemed to have risen from the people late in life, and the Danish 
chivalry with a comb in its hair and a pair of white silk legs, and 
presenting on the whole a feminine appearance. My gifted townsman stood 
gloomily apart, with folded arms, and I could have wished that his curls 
and forehead had been more probable.
Several curious little circumstances transpired as the action proceeded. 
The late king of the country not only appeared to have been troubled with a 
cough at the time of his decease, but to have taken it with him to the 
tomb, and to have brought it back. The royal phantom also carried a ghostly 
manuscript round its truncheon, to which it had the appearance of 
occasionally referring, and that, too, with an air of anxiety and a 
tendency to lose the place of reference which were suggestive of a state of 
mortality. It was this, I conceive, which led to the Shade's being advised 
by the gallery to 'turn over!' - a recommendation which it took extremely 
ill. It was likewise to be noted of this majestic spirit that whereas it 
always appeared with an air of having been out a long time and walked an 
immense distance, it perceptibly came from a closely contiguous wall. This 
occasioned its terrors to be received derisively. The Queen of Denmark, a 
very buxom lady, though no doubt historically brazen, was considered by the 
public to have too much brass about her; her chin being attached to her 
diadem by a broad band of that metal (as if she had a gorgeous toothache), 
her waist being encircled by another, and each of her arms by another, so 
that she was openly mentioned as 'the kettledrum.' The noble boy in the 
ancestral boots, was inconsistent; representing himself, as it were in one 
breath, as an able seaman, a strolling actor, a grave-digger, a clergyman, 
and a person of the utmost importance at a Court fencing-match, on the 
authority of whose practised eye and nice discrimination the finest strokes 
were judged. This gradually led to a want of toleration for him, and even - 
on his being detected in holy orders, and declining to perform the funeral 
service - to the general indignation taking the form of nuts. Lastly, 
Ophelia was a prey to such slow musical madness, that when, in course of 
time, she had taken off her white muslin scarf, folded it up, and buried 
it, a sulky man who had been long cooling his impatient nose against an 
iron bar in the front row of the gallery, growled, 'Now the baby's put to 
bed let's have supper!' Which, to say the least of it, was out of keeping.
Upon my unfortunate townsman all these incidents accumulated with playful 
effect. Whenever that undecided Prince had to ask a question or state a 
doubt, the public helped him out with it. As for example; on the question 
whether 'twas nobler in the mind to suffer, some roared yes, and some no, 
and some inclining to both opinions said 'toss up for it;' and quite a 
Debating Society arose. When he asked what should such fellows as he do 
crawling between earth and heaven, he was encouraged with loud cries of 
'Hear, hear!' When he appeared with his stocking disordered (its disorder 
expressed, according to usage, by one very neat fold in the top, which I 
suppose to be always got up with a flat iron), a conversation took place in 
the gallery respecting the paleness of his leg, and whether it was 
occasioned by the turn the ghost had given him. On his taking the recorders 
- very like a little black flute that had just been played in the orchestra 
and handed out at the door - he was called upon unanimously for Rule 
Britannia. When he recommended the player not to saw the air thus, the 
sulky man said, 'And don't you do it, neither; you're a deal worse than 
him!' And I grieve to add that peals of laughter greeted Mr Wopsle on every 
one of these occasions.
But his greatest trials were in the churchyard: which had the appearance of 
a primeval forest, with a kind of small ecclesiastical wash-house on one 
side, and a turnpike gate on the other. Mr Wopsle in a comprehensive black 
cloak, being descried entering at the turnpike, the gravedigger was 
admonished in a friendly way, 'Look out! Here's the undertaker a coming, to 
see how you're a getting on with your work!' I believe it is well known in 
a constitutional country that Mr Wopsle could not possibly have returned 
the skull, after moralising over it, without dusting his fingers on a white 
napkin taken from his breast; but even that innocent and indispensable 
action did not pass without the comment 'Wai-ter!' The arrival of the body 
for interment (in an empty black box with the lid tumbling open), was the 
signal for a general joy which was much enhanced by the discovery, among 
the bearers, of an individual obnoxious to identification. The joy attended 
Mr Wopsle through his struggle with Laertes on the brink of the orchestra 
and the grave, and slackened no more until he had tumbled the king off the 
kitchen-table, and had died by inches from the ankles upward.
We had made some pale efforts in the beginning to applaud Mr Wopsle; but 
they were too hopeless to be persisted in. Therefore we had sat, feeling 
keenly for him, but laughing, nevertheless, from ear to ear. I laughed in 
spite of myself all the time, the whole thing was so droll; and yet I had a 
latent impression that there was something decidedly fine in Mr Wopsle's 
elocution - not for old associations' sake, I am afraid, but because it was 
very slow, very dreary, very uphill and downhill, and very unlike any way 
in which any man in any natural circumstances of life or death ever 
expressed himself about anything. When the tragedy was over, and he had 
been called for and hooted, I said to Herbert, 'Let us go at once, or 
perhaps we shall meet him.'
We made all the haste we could downstairs, but we were not quick enough 
either. Standing at the door was a Jewish man with an unnatural heavy smear 
of eyebrow, who caught my eyes as we advanced, and said, when we came up 
with him:
'Mr Pip and friend?'
Identity of Mr Pip and friend confessed.
'Mr Waldengarver?,' said the man, 'would be glad to have the honour.'
'Waldengarver?' I repeated - when Herbert murmured in my ear, 'Probably 
Wopsle.'
'Oh!' said I. 'Yes. Shall we follow you?'
'A few steps, please.' When we were in a side alley, he turned and asked, 
'How did you think he looked? - I dressed him.'
I don't know what he had looked like, except a funeral; with the addition 
of a large Danish sun or star hanging round his neck by a blue ribbon, that 
had given him the appearance of being insured in some extraordinary Fire 
Office. But I said he had looked very nice.
'When he come to the grave,' said our conductor, 'he showed his cloak 
beautiful. But, judging from the wing, it looked to me that when he see the 
ghost in the queen's apartment, he might have made more of his stockings.'
I modestly assented, and we all fell through a little dirty swing door, 
into a sort of hot packing-case immediately behind it. Here Mr Wopsle was 
divesting himself of his Danish garments, and here there was just room for 
us to look at him over one another's shoulders, by keeping the packing-case 
door, or lid, wide open.
'Gentlemen,' said Mr Wopsle, 'I am proud to see you. I hope, Mr Pip, you 
will excuse my sending round. I had the happiness to know you in former 
times, and the Drama has ever had a claim which has ever been acknowledged, 
on the noble and the affluent.'
Meanwhile, Mr Waldengarver, in a frightful perspiration, was trying to get 
himself out of his princely sables.
'Skin the stockings off, Mr Waldengarver,' said the owner of that property, 
'or you'll bust 'em. Bust 'em, and you'll bust five-and-thirty shillings. 
Shakespeare never was complimented with a finer pair. Keep quiet in your 
chair now, and leave 'em to me.'
With that, he went upon his knees, and began to flay his victim; who, on 
the first stocking coming off, would certainly have fallen over backward 
with his chair, but for there being no room to fall anyhow.
I had been afraid until then to say a word about the play. But then, Mr 
Waldengarver looked up at us complacently, and said:
'Gentlemen, how did it seem to you, to go, in front?'
Herbert said from behind (at the same time poking me), 'capitally.' So I 
said 'capitally.'
'How did you like my reading of the character, gentlemen?' said Mr 
Waldengarver, almost, if not quite, with patronage.
Herbert said from behind (again poking me), 'massive and concrete.' So I 
said boldly, as if I had originated it, and must beg to insist upon it, 
'massive and concrete.'
'I am glad to have your approbation, gentlemen,' said Mr Waldengarver, with 
an air of dignity, in spite of his being ground against the wall at the 
time, and holding on by the seat of the chair.
'But I'll tell you one thing, Mr Waldengarver,' said the man who was on his 
knees, 'in which you're out in your reading. Now mind! I don't care who 
says contrairy; I tell you so. You're out in your reading of Hamlet when 
you get your legs in profile. The last Hamlet as I dressed, made the same 
mistakes in his reading at rehearsal, till I got him to put a large red 
wafer on each of his shins, and then at that rehearsal (which was the last) 
I went in front, sir, to the back of the pit, and whenever his reading 
brought him into profile, I called out "I don't see no wafers!" And at 
night his reading was lovely.'
Mr Waldengarver smiled at me, as much as to say 'a faithful dependent - I 
overlook his folly;' and then said aloud, 'My view is a little classic and 
thoughtful for them here; but they will improve, they will improve.'
Herbert and I said together, Oh, no doubt they would improve.
'Did you observe, gentlemen,' said Mr Waldengarver, 'that there was a man 
in the gallery who endeavoured to cast derision on the service - I mean, 
the representation?'
We basely replied that we rather thought we had noticed such a man. I 
added, 'He was drunk, no doubt.'
'Oh dear no, sir,' said Mr Wopsle, 'not drunk. His employer would see to 
that, sir. His employer would not allow him to be drunk.'
'You know his employer?' said I.
Mr Wopsle shut his eyes, and opened them again; performing both ceremonies 
very slowly. 'You must have observed, gentlemen,' said he, 'an ignorant and 
a blatant ass, with a rasping throat and a countenance expressive of low 
malignity, who went through - I will not say sustained - the role (if I may 
use a French expression) of Claudius King of Denmark. That is his employer, 
gentlemen. Such is the profession!'
Without distinctly knowing whether I should have been more sorry for Mr 
Wopsle if he had been in despair, I was so sorry for him as it was, that I 
took the opportunity of his turning round to have his braces put on - which 
jostled us out at the doorway - to ask Herbert what he thought of having 
him home to supper? Herbert said he thought it would be kind to do so; 
therefore I invited him, and he went to Barnard's with us, wrapped up to 
the eyes, and we did our best for him, and he sat until two o'clock in the 
morning, reviewing his success and developing his plans. I forget in detail 
what they were, but I have a general recollection that he was to begin with 
reviving the Drama, and to end with crushing it; inasmuch as his decease 
would leave it utterly bereft and without a chance or hope.
Miserably I went to bed after all, and miserably thought of Estella, and 
miserably dreamed that my expectations were all cancelled, and that I had 
to give my hand in marriage to Herbert's Clara, or play Hamlet to Miss 
Havisham's Ghost, before twenty thousand people, without knowing twenty 
words of it.


Chapter 32

One day when I was busy with my books and Mr Pocket, I received a note by 
the post, the mere outside of which threw me into a great flutter; for, 
though I had never seen the handwriting in which it was addressed, I 
divined whose hand it was. It had no set beginning, as Dear Mr Pip, or Dear 
Pip, or Dear Sir, or Dear Anything, but ran thus:

'I am to come to London the day after tomorrow by the midday coach. I 
believe it was settled you should meet me? At all events Miss Havisham has 
that impression, and I write in obedience to it. She sends you her regard.
Yours, ESTELLA.'

If there had been time, I should probably have ordered several suits of 
clothes for this occasion; but as there was not, I was fain to be content 
with those I had. My appetite vanished instantly, and I knew no peace or 
rest until the day arrived. Not that is arrival brought me either; for, 
then I was worse than ever, and began haunting the coach-office in wood-
street, Cheapside, before the coach had left the Blue Boar in our town. For 
all that I knew this perfectly well, I still felt as if it were not safe to 
let the coach-office be out of my sight longer than five minutes at a time; 
and in this condition of unreason I had performed the first half-hour of a 
watch of four or five hours, when Wemmick ran against me.
'Halloa, Mr Pip,' said he; 'how do you do? I should hardly have thought 
this was your beat.'
I explained that I was waiting to meet somebody who was coming up by coach, 
and I inquired after the Castle and the Aged.
'Both flourishing thank ye,' said Wemmick, 'and particularly the Aged. He's 
in wonderful feather. He'll be eighty-two next birthday. I have a notion of 
firing eighty-two times, if the neighbourhood shouldn't complain, and that 
cannon of mine should prove equal to the pressure. However, this is not 
London talk. where do you think I am going to?'
'To the office?' said I, for he was tending in that direction.
'Next thing to it,' returned Wemmick, 'I am going to Newgate. We are in a 
banker's-parcel case just at present, and I have been down the road taking 
as squint at the scene of action, and thereupon must have a word or two 
with our client.'
'Did your client commit the robbery?' I asked
'Bless your soul and body, no,' answered Wemmick, very dryly. 'But he is 
accused of it. So might you or I be. Either of us might be accused of it, 
you know.'
'Only neither of us is,' I remarked.
'Yah!' said Wemmick, touching me on the breast with his forefinger; 'you're 
a deep one, Mr Pip! Would you like to have a look at Newgate? Have you time 
to spare?'
I had so much time to spare, that the proposal came as a relief, 
notwithstanding its irreconcilability with my latent desire to keep my eye 
on the coach-office. Muttering that I would make the inquiry whether I had 
time to walk with him, I went into the office, and ascertained from the 
clerk with the nicest precision and much to the trying of his temper, the 
earliest moment at which the coach could be expected - which I knew 
beforehand, quite as well as he. I then rejoined Mr Wemmick, and affecting 
to consult my watch and to be surprised by the information I had received, 
accepted his offer.
We were at Newgate in a few minutes, and we passed through the lodge where 
some fetters were hanging up on the bare walls among the prison rules, into 
the interior of the jail. At that time, jails were much neglected, and the 
period of exaggerated reaction consequent on all public wrong-doing - and 
which is always its heaviest and longest punishment - was still far off. 
So, felons were not lodged and fed better than soldiers (to say nothing of 
paupers), and seldom set fire to their prisons with the excusable object of 
improving the flavour of their soup. It was visiting time when Wemmick took 
me in; and a potman was going his rounds with beer; and the prisoners, 
behind bars in yards, were buying beer, and talking to friends; and a 
frouzy, ugly, disorderly, depressing scene it was.
It struck me that Wemmick walked among the prisoners, much as a gardener 
might walk among his plants. This was first put into my head by his seeing 
a shoot that had come up in the night, and saying, 'What, Captain Tom? Are 
you there? Ah, indeed!' and also, 'Is that Black Bill behind the cistern? 
Why I didn't look for you these two months; how do you find yourself?' 
Equally in his stopping at the bars and attending to anxious whisperers - 
always singly - Wemmick with his post-office in an immovable state, looked 
at them while in conference, as if he were taking particular notice of the 
advance they had made, since last observed, towards coming out in full blow 
at their trial.
He was highly popular, and I found that he took the familiar department of 
Mr Jaggers's business: though something of the state of Mr Jaggers hung 
about him too, forbidding approach beyond certain limits. His personal 
recognition of each successive client was comprised in a nod, and in his 
settling his hat a little easier on his head with both hands, and then 
tightening the post-office, and putting his hands in his pockets. In one or 
two instances, there was difficulty respecting the raising of fees, and 
then Mr Wemmick, backing as far as possible from the insufficient money 
produced, said, 'it's no use, my boy. I'm only a subordinate. I can't take 
it. Don't go on in that way with a subordinate. If you are unable to make 
up your quantum, my boy, you had better address yourself to a principal; 
there are plenty of principals in the profession, you know, and what is not 
worth the while of one, may be worth the while of another; that's my 
recommendation to you, speaking as a subordinate. Don't try on useless 
measures. Why should you? Now, who's next?'
Thus, we walked through Wemmick's greenhouse, until he turned to me and 
said, 'Notice the man I shall shake hands with.' I should have done so, 
without the preparation, as he had shaken hands with no one yet.
Almost as soon as he had spoken, a portly upright man(whom I can see now, 
as I write) in a well-worn olive-coloured frock-coat, with a peculiar 
pallor over-spreading the red in his complexion, and eyes that went 
wandering about when he tried to fix them, came up to a corner of the bars, 
and put his hand to his hat - which had a greasy and fatty surface like 
cold broth - with a half-serious and half-jocose military salute.
'Colonel, to you!' said Wemmick; 'how are you, Colonel?'
'All right, Mr Wemmick.'
'Everything was done that could be done, but the evidence was too strong 
for us, Colonel.'
'Yes, it was too strong, sir - but I don't care.'
'No, no,' said Wemmick, coolly, 'you don't care.' Then, turning to me, 
'Served His Majesty this man. Was a soldier in the line and bought his 
discharge.'
I said, 'Indeed?' and the man's eyes looked at me, and then looked over my 
head, and then looked all round me, and then he drew his hand across his 
lips and laughed.
'I think I shall be out of this on Monday, sir,' he said to Wemmick.
'Perhaps,' returned my friend, 'but there's no knowing.'
'I am glad to have the chance of bidding you good-bye, Mr Wemmick,' said 
the man, stretching out his hand between two bars.
'Thank ye,' said Wemmick, shaking hands with him. 'Same to you, Colonel.'
'If what I had upon me when taken, had been real, Mr Wemmick,' said the 
man, unwilling to let his hand go, 'I should have asked the favour of your 
wearing another ring - in acknowledgment of your attentions.'
'I'll accept the will for the deed,' said Wemmick. 'By-the-bye; you were 
quite a pigeon-fancier.' The man looked up at the sky. 'I am told you had a 
remarkable breed of tumblers. could you commission any friend of yours to 
bring me a pair, of you've no further use for 'em?'
'It shall be done, sir?'
'All right,' said Wemmick, 'they shall be taken care of. Good afternoon, 
Colonel. Good-bye!' They shook hands again, and as we walked away Wemmick 
said to me, 'A Coiner, a very good workman. The Recorder's report is made 
today, and he is sure to be executed on Monday. Still you see, as far as it 
goes, a pair of pigeons are portable property, all the same.' With that, he 
looked back, and nodded at this dead plant, and then cast his eyes about 
him in walking out of the yard, as if he were considering what other pot 
would go best in its place.
As we came out of the prison through the lodge, I found that the great 
importance of my guardian was appreciated by the turnkeys, no less than by 
those whom they held in charge. 'Well, Mr Wemmick,' said the turnkey, who 
kept us between the two studded and spiked lodge gates, and who carefully 
locked one before he unlocked the other, 'what's Mr Jaggers going to do 
with that waterside murder? Is he going to make it manslaughter, or what's 
he going to make of it?'
'Why don't you ask him?' returned Wemmick.
'Oh yes, I dare say!' said the turnkey.
'Now, that's the way with them here. Mr Pip,' remarked Wemmick, turning to 
me with his post-office elongated. 'They don't mind what they ask of me, 
the subordinate; but you'll never catch 'em asking any questions of my 
principal.'
'Is this young gentleman one of the 'prentices or articled ones of your 
office?' asked the turnkey, with a grin at Mr Wemmick's humour.
'There he goes again, you see!' cried Wemmick, 'I told you so! Asks another 
question of the subordinate before his first is dry! Well, supposing Mr pip 
is one of them?'
'Why then,' said the turnkey, grinning again, 'he knows what Mr Jaggers 
is.'
'Yah!' cried Wemmick, suddenly hitting out at the turnkey in a facetious 
way, 'you're dumb as one of your own keys when you have to do with my 
principal, you know you are. Let us out, you old fox, or I'll get him to 
bring an action against you for false imprisonment.'
The turnkey laughed, and gave us good day, and stood laughing at us over 
the spikes of the wicket when we descended the steps into the street.
'Mind you, Mr Pip,' said Wemmick, gravely in my ear, as he took my arm to 
be more confidential; 'I don't know that Mr Jaggers does a better thing 
than the way in which he keeps himself so high. He's always so high. His 
constant height is of a piece with his immense abilities. That Colonel 
durst no more take leave of him, than that turnkey durst ask him his 
intentions respecting a case. Then, between his height and them, he slips 
in his subordinate - don't you see? - and so he has 'em, soul and body.'
I was very much impressed, and not for the first time, by my guardian's 
subtlety. To confess the truth, I very heartily wished, and not for the 
first time, that I had had some other guardian of minor abilities.
Mr Wemmick and I parted at the office in Little Britain, where suppliants 
for Mr Jaggers's notice were lingering about as usual, and I returned to my 
watch in the street of the coach-office, with some three hours on hand. I 
consumed the whole time in thinking how strange it was that I should be 
encompassed by all this taint of prison and crime; that, in my childhood 
out on our lonely marshes on a winter evening I should have first 
encountered it; that, it should have reappeared on two occasions, starting 
out like a stain that was faded but not gone; that, it should in this new 
way pervade my fortune and advancement. While my mind was thus engaged, I 
thought of the beautiful young Estella, proud and refined, coming towards 
me, and I thought with absolute abhorrence of the contrast between the jail 
and her. I wished that Wemmick had not met me, or that I had not yielded to 
him and gone with him, so that, of all days in the year on this day, I 
might not have had Newgate in my breath and on my clothes. I beat the 
prison dust off my feet as I sauntered to and fro, and I shook it out of my 
dress, and I exhaled its air from my lungs. So contaminated did I feel, 
remembering who was coming, that the coach came quickly after all, and I 
was not yet free from the soiling consciousness of Mr Wemmick's 
conservatory, when I saw her face at the coach window and her hand waving 
to me.
What was the nameless shadow which again in that one instant had passed?


Chapter 33

In her furred travelling-dress, Estella seemed more delicately beautiful 
than she had ever seemed yet, even in my eyes. Her manner was more winning 
than she had cared to let it be to me before, and I thought I saw Miss 
Havisham's influence in the change.
We stood in the Inn Yard while she pointed out her luggage to me, and when 
it was all collected I remembered - having forgotten everything but herself 
in the meanwhile - that I knew nothing of her destination
'I am going to Richmond,' she told me. 'Our lesson is, that there are two 
Richmonds, one in Surrey and one Yorkshire, and that mine is the Surrey 
Richmond. The distance is ten miles. I am to have a carriage, and you are 
to take me. This is my purse, and you are to pay my charges out of it. Oh, 
you must take the purse! We have no choice, you and I, but to obey our 
instructions. We are not free to follow our own devices, you and I.'
As she looked at me in giving me the purse, I hoped there was an inner 
meaning in her words. She said them slightingly, but not with displeasure.
'A carriage will have to be sent for, Estella. Will you rest here a 
little?'
'Yes, I am to rest here a little, and I am to drink some tea, and you are 
to take care of me the while.'
She drew her arm through mine, as if it must be done, and I requested a 
waiter who had been staring at the coach like a man who had never seen such 
a thing in his life, to show us a private sitting-room. Upon that, he 
pulled out a napkin, as if it were a magic clue without which he couldn't 
find the way upstairs, and led us to the black hole of the establishment: 
fitted up with a diminishing mirror (quite a superfluous article 
considering the hole's proportions), an anchovy sauce-cruet, and somebody's 
patterns. On my objecting to this retreat, he took us into another room 
with a dinner-table for thirty, and in the grate a scorched leaf of a copy-
book under a bushel of coal-dust. Having looked at this extinct 
conflagration and shaken his head, he took my order: which, proving to be 
merely 'Some tea for the lady,' sent him out of the room in a very low 
state of mind.
I was, and I am, sensible that the air of this chamber, in its strong 
combination of stable with soup-stock, might have led one to infer that the 
coaching department was not doing well, and that the enterprising 
proprietor was boiling down the horses for the refreshment department. Yet 
the room was all in all to me, Estella being in it. I thought that with her 
I could have been happy there for life. (I was not at all happy there at 
the time, observe, and I knew it well.)
'Where are you going to, at Richmond?' I asked Estella.
'I am going to live,' said she, 'at a great expense, with a lady there, who 
has the power - or says she has - of taking me about, and introducing me, 
and showing people to me and showing me to people.'
'I suppose you will be glad of variety and admiration?'
'Yes, I suppose so.'
She answered so carelessly, that I said, 'You speak of yourself as if you 
were some one else.'
'Where did you learn how I speak of others? Come, come,' said Estella, 
smiling delightfully, 'you must not expect me to go to school to you; I 
must talk in my own way. How do you thrive with Mr Pocket?'
'I live quite pleasantly there; at least -' It appeared to me that I was 
losing a chance.
'At least?' repeated Estella.
'As pleasantly as I could anywhere, away from you.'
'You silly boy,' said Estella, quite composedly, 'how can you talk such 
nonsense? Your friend Mr Matthew, I believe, is superior to the rest of his 
family?'
'Very superior indeed. He is nobody's enemy - '
'Don't add but his own,' interposed Estella, 'for I hate that class of man. 
But he really is disinterested, and above small jealousy and spite, I have 
heard?'
'I am sure I have every reason to say so.'
'You have not every reason to say so of the rest of his people,' said 
Estella, nodding at me with an expression of face that was at once grave 
and rallying, 'for they beset Miss Havisham with reports and insinuations 
to your disadvantage. They watch you, misrepresent you, write letters about 
you (anonymous sometimes), and you are the torment and the occupation of 
their lives. You can scarcely realise to yourself the hatred those people 
feel for you.'
'They do me no harm, I hope?'
Instead of answering, Estella burst out laughing. This was very singular to 
me, and I looked at her in considerable perplexity. When she left off - and 
she had not laughed languidly, but with real enjoyment - I said, in my 
diffident way with her:
'I hope I may suppose that you would not be amused if they did me any 
harm.'
'No, no you may be sure of that,' said Estella. 'You may be certain that I 
laugh because they fail. Oh, those people with Miss Havisham, and the 
tortures they undergo!' She laughed again, and even now when she had told 
me why, her laughter was very singular to me, for I could not doubt its 
being genuine, and yet it seemed too much for the occasion. I thought there 
must really be something more here than I knew; she saw the thought in my 
mind, and answered it.
'It is not easy for even you.' said Estella, 'to know what satisfaction it 
gives me to see those people thwarted, or what an enjoyable sense of the 
ridiculous I have when they are made ridiculous. For you were not brought 
up in that strange house from a mere baby. - I was. You had not your little 
wits sharpened by their intriguing against you, suppressed and defenceless, 
under the mask of sympathy and pity and what not that is soft and soothing. 
- I had. You did not gradually open your round childish eyes wider and 
wider to the discovery of that impostor of a woman who calculates her 
stores of peace of mind for when she wakes up in the night. - I did.'
I was no laughing matter with Estella now, nor was she summoning these 
remembrances from any shallow place. I would not have been the cause of 
that look of hers, for all my expectations in a heap.
'Two things I can tell you,' said Estella. 'First, notwithstanding the 
proverb that constant dropping will wear away a stone, you may set your 
mind at rest that these people never will - never would, in hundred years - 
impair your ground with Miss Havisham, in any particular, great or small. 
Second, I am beholden to you as the cause of their being so busy and so 
mean in vain, and there is my hand upon it.'
As she gave it me playfully - for her darker mood had been but momentary - 
I held it and put it to my lips. 'You ridiculous boy,' said Estella, 'will 
you never take warning? Or do you kiss my hand in the same spirit in which 
I once let you kiss my cheek?'
'What spirit was that?' said I.
'I must think a moment A spirit of contempt for the fawners and plotters.'
'If I say yes, may I kiss the cheek again?'
'You should have asked before you touched the hand. But, yes, if you like.'
I leaned down, and her calm face was like a statue's. 'Now,' said Estella, 
gliding away the instant I touched her cheek, 'you are to take care that I 
have some tea, and you are to take me to Richmond.'
Her reverting to this tone as if our association were forced upon us and we 
were mere puppets, gave me pain; but everything in our intercourse did give 
me pain. Whatever her tone with me happened to be, I could put no trust in 
it, and build no hope on it; and yet I went on against trust and against 
hope. Why repeat it a thousand times? So it always was.
I rang for the tea, and the waiter, reappearing with his magic clue, 
brought in by degrees some fifty adjuncts to that refreshment but of tea 
not a glimpse. A tea-board, cups and saucers, plates, knives and forks 
(including carvers), spoons (various), saltcellars, a meek little muffin 
confined with the utmost precaution under a strong iron cover, Moses in the 
bullrushes typified by a soft bit of butter in a quantity of parsley, a 
pale loaf with a powdered head, two proof impressions of the bars of the 
kitchen fireplace on triangular bits of bread, and ultimately a fat family 
urn: which the waiter staggered in with, expressing in his countenance 
burden and suffering. After a prolonged absence at this stage of the 
entertainment, he at length came back with a casket of precious appearance 
containing twigs. These I steeped in hot water, and so from the whole of 
these appliances extracted one cup of I don't know what, for Estella.
The bill paid, and the waiter remembered, and the ostler not forgotten, and 
the chambermaid taken into consideration - in a word, the whole house 
bribed into a state of contempt and animosity, and Estella's purse much 
lightened - we got into our post-coach and drove away. Turning into 
Cheapside and rattling up Newgate-street, we were soon under the walls of 
which I was so ashamed.
'What place is that?' Estella asked me.
I made a foolish pretence of not at first recognising it, and then told 
her. As she looked at it, and drew in her head again, murmuring 'Wretches!' 
I would not have confessed to my visit for any consideration.
'Mr Jaggers,' said I, by way of putting it neatly on somebody else, 'has 
the reputation of being more in the secrets of that dismal place than any 
man in London.'
'He is more in the secrets of every place, I think,' said Estella, in a low 
voice.
'You have been accustomed to see him often, I suppose?'
'I have been accustomed to see him at uncertain intervals, ever since I can 
remember. But I know him no better now, that I did before I could speak 
plainly. What is your own experience of him? Do you advance with him?'
'Once habituated to his distrustful manner,' said I, 'I have done very 
well.'
'Are you intimate?'
'I have dined with him at his private house.'
'I fancy,' said Estella, shrinking 'that must be a curious place.'
'It is a curious place.'
I should have been chary of discussing my guardian too freely even with 
her; but I should have gone on with the subject so far as to describe the 
dinner in Gerrard-street, if we had not then come into a sudden glare of 
gas. It seemed, while it lasted, to be all alight and alive with that 
inexplicable feeling I had had before; and when we were out of it, I was as 
much dazed for a few moments as if I had been in Lightning.
So, we fell into other talk, and it was principally about the way by which 
we were travelling, and about what parts of London lay on this side of it, 
and what on that. The great city was almost new to her, she told me, for 
she had never left Miss Havisham's neighbourhood until she had gone to 
France, and she had merely passed through London then in going and 
returning. I asked her if my guardian had any charge of her while she 
remained here? To that she emphatically said 'God forbid!' and no more.
It was impossible for me to avoid seeing that she cared to attract me; that 
she made herself winning; and would have won me even if the task had needed 
pains. Yet this made me none the happier, for, even if she had not taken 
that tone of our being disposed of by others, I should have felt that she 
held my heart in her hand because she wilfully chose to do it, and not 
because it would have wrung any tenderness in her, to crush it and throw it 
away.
When we passed through Hammersmith, I showed her where Mr Matthew Pocket 
lived, and said it was no great way from Richmond, and that I hoped I 
should see her sometimes.
'Oh yes, you are see me; you are to come when you think proper; you are to 
be mentioned to the family; indeed you are already mentioned.'
I inquired was it a large household she was going to be a member of?
'No; there are only two; mother and daughter. The mother is a lady of some 
station, though not averse to increasing her income.'
'I wonder Miss Havisham could part with you again so soon.'
'It is a part of Miss Havisham's plans for me, Pip,' said Estella, with a 
sigh, as if she were tired; 'I am to write to her constantly and see her 
regularly and report how I go on - I and the jewels - for they are nearly 
all mine now.'
It was the first time she had ever called me by my name. Of course she did 
so, purposely, and knew that I should treasure it up.
We came to Richmond all too soon, and our destination there, was a house by 
the Green; a staid old house, where hoops and powder and patches, 
embroidered coats rolled stockings ruffles and swords, had had their court 
days many a time. Some ancient trees before the house were still cut into 
fashions as formal and unnatural as the hoops and wigs and stiff skirts; 
but their own allotted places in the great procession of the dead were not 
far off, and they would soon drop into them and go the silent way of the 
rest.
A bell with an old voice - which I dare say in its time had often said to 
the house, Here is the green farthingale, Here is the diamond-hilted sword, 
Here are the shoes with red heels and the blue solitaire, - sounded gravely 
in the moonlight, and two cherry-coloured maids came fluttering out to 
receive Estella. The doorway soon absorbed her boxes, and she gave me her 
hand and a smile, and said good night, and was absorbed likewise. And still 
I stood looking at the house, thinking how happy I should be if I lived 
there with her, and knowing that I never was happy with her, but always 
miserable.
I got into the carriage to be taken back to Hammersmith, and I got in with 
a bad heart-ache, and I got out with a worse heart-ache. At our own door, I 
found little Jane Pocket coming home from a little party escorted by her 
little lover; and I envied her little lover, in spite of his being subject 
to Flopson.
Mr Pocket was out lecturing; for, he was a most delightful lecturer on 
domestic economy, and his treatises on the management of children and 
servants were considered the very best text-books on those themes. But, Mrs 
Pocket was at home, and was in a little difficulty, on account of the 
baby's having been accommodated with a needle-case to keep him quiet during 
the unaccountable absence (with a relative in the Foot Guards) of Millers. 
And more needles were missing, than it could be regarded as quite wholesome 
for a patient of such tender years either to apply externally or to take as 
a tonic
Mr Pocket being justly celebrated for giving most excellent practical 
advice, and for having a clear and sound perception of things and a highly 
judicious mind, I had some notion in my heartache of begging him to accept 
my confidence. But, happening to look up at Mrs Pocket as she sat reading 
her book of dignities after prescribing Bed as a sovereign remedy for baby, 
I thought - Well - No, I wouldn't.


Chapter 34

As I had grown accustomed to my expectations, I had insensibly begun to 
notice their effect upon myself and those around me. Their influence on my 
own character, I disguised from my recognition as much as possible, but I 
knew very well that it was not all good. I lived in a state of chronic 
uneasiness respecting my behaviour to Joe. My conscience was not by any 
means comfortable about Biddy. When I woke up in the night - like Camilla - 
I used to think, with a weariness on my spirits, that I should have been 
happier and better if I had never seen Miss Havisham's face, and had risen 
to manhood content to be partners with Joe in the honest old forge. Many a 
time of an evening, when I sat alone looking at the fire, I thought, after 
all, there was no fire like the forge fire and the kitchen fire at home.
Yet Estella was so inseparable from all my restlessness and disquiet of 
mind, that I really fell into confusion as to the limits of my own part in 
its production. That is to say, supposing I had had no expectations, and 
yet had had Estella to think of, I could not make out to my satisfaction 
that I should have done much better. Now, concerning the influence of my 
position on others, I was in no such difficulty, and so I perceived - 
though dimly enough perhaps - that it was not beneficial to anybody, and, 
above all, that it was not beneficial to Herbert. My lavish habits led his 
easy nature into expenses that he could not afford, corrupted the 
simplicity of his life, and disturbed his peace with anxieties and regrets. 
I was not at all remorseful for having unwittingly set those other branches 
of the Pocket family to the poor arts they practised: because such 
littlenesses were their natural bent, and would have been evoked by anybody 
else, if I had left them slumbering. But Herbert's was a very different 
case, and it often caused me a twinge to think that I had done him evil 
service in crowding his sparely-furnished chambers with incongruous 
upholstery work, and placing the canary-breasted Avenger at his disposal
So now, as an infallible way of making little ease great ease, I began to 
contract a quantity of debt. I could hardly begin but Herbert must begin 
too, so he soon followed. At Startop's suggestion, we put ourselves down 
for election into a club called The Finches of the Grove: the object of 
which institution I have never divined, if it were not that the members 
should dine expensively once a fortnight, to quarrel among themselves as 
much as possible after dinner, and to cause six waiters to get drunk on the 
stairs. I Know that these gratifying social ends were so invariably 
accomplished, that Herbert and I understood nothing else to be referred to 
in the first standing toast of the society: which ran 'Gentlemen, may the 
present promotion of good feeling ever reign predominant among the Finches 
of the Grove.'
The Finches spent their money foolishly (the Hotel we dined at was in 
Covent-garden), and the first Finch I saw, when I had the honour of joining 
the Grove, was Bentley Drummle: at that time floundering about town in a 
cab of his own, and doing a great deal of damage to the posts at the street 
corners. Occasionally, he shot himself out of his equipage head-foremost 
over the apron; and I saw him on one occasion deliver himself at the door 
of the Grove in this unintentional way - like coals. But here I anticipate 
a little for I was not a Finch, and could not be, according to the sacred 
laws of the society, until I came of age.
In my confidence in my own resources, I would willingly have taken 
Herbert's expenses on myself; but Herbert was proud, and I could make no 
such proposal to him. So, he got into difficulties in every direction, and 
continued to look about him. When we gradually fell into keeping late hours 
and late company, I noticed that he looked about him with a desponding eye 
at breakfast-time; that he began to look about him more hopefully about 
midday; that he drooped when he came into dinner; that he seemed to descry 
Capital in the distance rather clearly, after dinner; that he all but 
realised Capital towards midnight; and that at about two o'clock in the 
morning, he became so deeply despondent again as to talk of buying a rifle 
and going to America, with a general purpose of compelling buffaloes to 
make his fortune.
I was usually at Hammersmith about half the week, and when I was at 
Hammersmith I haunted Richmond: whereof separately by-and-by. Herbert would 
often come to Hammersmith when I was there, and I think at those seasons 
his father would occasionally have some passing perception that the opening 
he was looking for, had not appeared yet. But in the general tumbling up of 
the family, his tumbling out in life somewhere, was a thing to transact 
itself somehow. In the meantime Mr Pocket grew greyer, and tried oftener to 
lift himself out of his perplexities by the hair. While Mrs Pocket tripped 
up the family with her footstool, read her book of dignities, lost her 
pocket-handkerchief, told us about her grandpapa, and taught the young idea 
how to shoot, by shooting it into bed whenever it attracted her notice.
As I am now generalising a period of my life with the object of clearing my 
way before me, I can scarcely do so better than by at once completing the 
description of our usual manners and customs at Barnard's Inn
We spent as much money as we could, and got as little for it as people 
could make up their minds to give us. We were always more or less 
miserable, and most of our acquaintance were in the same condition. There 
was a gay fiction among us that we were constantly enjoying ourselves, and 
a skeleton truth that we never did. To the best of my belief, our case was 
in the last aspect a rather common one.
Every morning, with an air ever new, Herbert went into the City to look 
about him. I often paid him a visit in the dark back-room in which he 
consorted with an ink-jar, a hat-peg, a coal-box, a string-box, an almanac, 
a desk and stool, and a ruler; and I do not remember that I ever saw him do 
anything else but look about him. If we all did what we undertake to do, as 
faithfully as Herbert did, we might live in a Republic of the Virtues. He 
had nothing else to do, poor fellow, except at a certain hour of every 
afternoon to 'go to Lloyd's' - in observance of a ceremony of seeing his 
principal, I think. He never did anything else in connection with Lloyd's 
that I could find out, except come back again. When he felt his case 
unusually serious, and that he positively must find an opening, he would go 
on 'Change at a busy time, and walk in and out, in a kind of gloomy country 
dance figure, among the assembled magnates. 'For,' says Herbert to me, 
coming home to dinner on one of those special occasions, 'I find the truth 
to be, Handel, that an opening won't come to one, but one must go to it - 
so I have been.'
If we had been less attached to one another, I think we must have hated one 
another regularly every morning. I detested the chambers beyond expression 
at that period of repentance, and could not endure the sight of the 
Avenger's livery: which had a more expensive and a less remunerative 
appearance then, than at any other time in the four-and-twenty hours. As we 
got more and more into debt breakfast became a hollower and hollower form, 
and, being on one occasion at breakfast-time threatened (by letter) with 
legal proceedings, 'not unwholly unconnected,' as my local paper might put 
it, 'with jewellery,' I went so far as to seize the Avenger by his blue 
collar and shake him off his feet - so that he was actually in the air, 
like a booted Cupid - for presuming to suppose that we wanted a roll.
At certain times - meaning at uncertain times, for they depended on our 
humour - I would say to Herbert, as if it were a remarkable discovery:
'My dear Herbert, we are getting on badly.'
'My dear Handel,' Herbert would say to me, in all sincerity, if you will 
believe me, those very words were on my lips, by a strange coincidence.'
'Then, Herbert,' I would respond, 'let us look into out affairs.'
We always derived profound satisfaction from making an appointment for this 
purpose. I always thought this was business, this was the way to confront 
the thing, this was the way to take the foe by the throat. And I know 
Herbert thought so too.
We ordered something rather special for dinner, with a bottle of something 
similarly out of the common way, in order that our minds might be fortified 
for the occasion, and we might come well up to the mark. Dinner over, we 
produced a bundle of pens, a copious supply of ink, and a goodly show of 
writing and blotting paper. For, there was something very comfortable in 
having plenty of stationery.
I would then take a sheet of paper, and write across the top of it, in a 
neat hand, the heading, 'Memorandum of Pip's debts;' with Barnard's Inn and 
the date very carefully added. Herbert would also take a sheet of paper, 
and write across it with similar formalities, 'Memorandum of Herbert's 
debts.'
Each of us would then refer to a confused heap of papers at his side, which 
had been thrown into drawers, worn into holes in Pockets, half-burnt in 
lighting candles, stuck for weeks into the looking-glass, and otherwise 
damaged. The sound of our pens going, refreshed us exceedingly, insomuch 
that I sometimes found it difficult to distinguish between this edifying 
business proceeding and actually paying the money. In point of meritorious 
character, the two things seemed about equal.
When we had written a little while, I would ask Herbert how he got on? 
Herbert probably would have been scratching his head in a most rueful 
manner at the sight of his accumulating figures.
'They are mounting up, Handel,' Herbert would say; 'upon my life, they are 
mounting up.'
'Be firm, Herbert,' I would retort, plying my own pen with great assiduity. 
'Look the thing in the face. Look into your affairs. Stare them out of 
countenance.'
'So I would, Handel, only they are staring me out of countenance.'
However, my determined manner would have its effect, and Herbert would fall 
to work again. After a time he would give up once more, on the plea that he 
had not got Cobbs's bill, or Lobbs's, or Nobbs's, as the case might be.
'Then, Herbert, estimate; estimate it in round numbers, and put it down.'
'What a fellow of resource you are!' my friend would reply, with 
admiration. 'Really your business powers are very remarkable.'
I thought so too. I established with myself on these occasions, the 
reputation of a first-rate man of business - prompt, decisive, energetic, 
clear, cool-headed. When I had got all my responsibilities down upon my 
list, I compared each with the bill, and ticked it off. My self-approval 
when I ticked an entry was quite a luxurious sensation. When I had no more 
ticks to make, I folded all my bills up uniformly, docketed each on the 
back, and tied the whole into a symmetrical bundle. Then I did the same for 
Herbert (who modestly said he had not my administrative genius), and felt 
that I had brought his affairs into a focus for him.
My business habits had one other bright feature, which I called 'leaving a 
Margin.' For example; supposing Herbert's debts to be one hundred and sixty-
four pounds four-and-twopence, I would say, 'Leave a margin, and put them 
down at two hundred.' Or, supposing my own to be four times as much, I 
would leave a margin, and put them down at seven hundred. I had the highest 
opinion of the wisdom of this same Margin, but I am bound to acknowledge 
that on looking back, I deem it to have been an expensive device. For, we 
always ran into new debt immediately, to the full extent of the margin, and 
sometimes, in the sense of freedom and solvency it imparted, got pretty far 
on into another margin.
But there was a calm, a rest, a virtuous hush, consequent on these 
examinations of our affairs that gave me, for the time, an admirable 
opinion of myself. Soothed by my exertions, my method, and Herbert's 
compliments, I would sit with his symmetrical bundle and my own on the 
table before me among the stationary, and feel like a Bank of some sort, 
rather than a private individual.
We shut our outer door on these solemn occasions, in order that we might 
not be interrupted. I had fallen into my serene state one evening, when we 
heard a letter dropped through the slit in the said door, and fall on the 
ground. 'It's for you, Handel,' said Herbert, going out and coming back 
with it, 'and I hope there is nothing the matter.' This was in allusion to 
its heavy black seal and border.
The letter was signed TRABB & CO., and its contents were simply, that I was 
an honoured sir, and that they begged to inform me that Mrs J. Gargery had 
departed this life on Monday last, at twenty minutes past six in the 
evening, and that my attendance was requested at the interment on Monday 
next at three o'clock in the afternoon.


Chapter 35

It was the first time that a grave had opened in my road of life, and the 
gap it made in the smooth ground was wonderful. The figure of my sister in 
her chair by the kitchen fire, haunted me night and day. That the place 
could possibly be, without her, was something my mind seemed unable to 
compass; and whereas she had seldom or never been in my thoughts of late, I 
had now the strangest ideas that she was coming towards me in the street, 
or that she would presently knock at the door. In my rooms too, with which 
she had never been at all associated, there was at once the blankness of 
death and a perpetual suggestion of the sound of her voice or the turn of 
her face or figure, as if she were still alive and had been often there.
Whatever my fortunes might have been, I could scarcely have recalled my 
sister with much tenderness. But I suppose there is a shock of regret which 
may exist without much tenderness. Under its influence (and perhaps to make 
up for the want of the softer feeling) I was seized with a violent 
indignation against the assailant from whom she had suffered so much; and I 
felt that on sufficient proof I could have revengefully pursued Orlick, or 
any one else, to the last extremity.
Having written to Joe, to offer consolation, and to assure him that I 
should come to the funeral, I passed the intermediate days in the curious 
state of mind I have glanced at. I went down early in the morning, and 
alighted at the Blue Boar in good time to walk over to the forge.
It was fine summer weather again, and, as I walked along, the times when I 
was a little helpless creature, and my sister did not spare me, vividly 
returned. But they returned with a gentle tone upon them that softened even 
the edge of Tickler. For now, the very breath of the beans and clover 
whispered to my heart that the day must come when it would be well for my 
memory that others walking in the sunshine should be softened as they 
thought of me.
At last I came within sight of the house, and saw that Trabb and Co. had 
put in a funereal execution and taken possession. Two dismally absurd 
persons, each ostentatiously exhibiting a crutch done up in a black bandage 
- as if that instrument could possibly communicate any comfort to anybody - 
were posted at the front door; and in one of them I recognised a postboy 
discharged from the Boar for turning a young couple into a sawpit on their 
bridal morning, in consequence of intoxication rendering it necessary for 
him to ride his horse clasped round the neck with both arms. All the 
children of the village, and most of the women, were admiring these sable 
warders and the closed windows of the house and forge; and as I came up, 
one of the two warders (the postboy) knocked at the door - implying that I 
was far too much exhausted by grief, to have strength remaining to knock 
for myself.
Another sable warder (a carpenter, who had once eaten two geese for a 
wager) opened the door, and showed me into the best parlour. Here, Mr Trabb 
had taken unto himself the best table, and had got all the leaves up, and 
was holding a kind of black Bazaar, with the aid of a quantity of black 
pins. At the moment of my arrival, he had just finished putting somebody's 
hat into black long-clothes, like an African baby; so he held out his hand 
for mine. But I, misled by the action, and confused by the occasion, shook 
hands with him with every testimony of warm affection.
Poor dear Joe, entangled in a little black cloak tied in a large bow under 
his chin, was seated apart at the upper end of the room; where, as chief 
mourner, he had evidently been stationed by Trabb. When I bent down and 
said to him, 'Dear Joe, how are you?' he said, 'Pip, old chap, you knowed 
her when she were a fine figure of a -' and clasped my hand and said no 
more.
Biddy, looking very neat and modest in her black dress, went quietly here 
and there, and was very helpful. When I had spoken to Biddy, as I thought 
it not a time for talking I went and sat down near Joe, and there began to 
wonder in what part of the house it - she - my sister - was. The air of the 
parlour being faint with the smell of sweet cake, I looked about for the 
table of refreshments; it was scarcely visible until one had got accustomed 
to the gloom, but there was a cut-up plum-cake upon it, and there were cut-
up oranges, and sandwiches, and biscuits, and two decanters that I knew 
very well as ornaments, but had never seen used in all my life; one full of 
port, and one of sherry. Standing at this table, I became conscious of the 
servile Pumblechook in a black cloak and several yards of hatband, who was 
alternately stuffing himself, and making obsequious movements to catch my 
attention. The moment he succeeded, he came over to me (breathing sherry 
and crumbs), and said in a subdued voice, 'May I, dear sir?' and did. I 
then descried Mr and Mrs Hubble; the last-named in a decent speechless 
paroxysm in a corner. We were all going to 'follow,' and were all in course 
of being tied up separately (by Trabb) into ridiculous bundles.
'Which I meantersay, Pip,' Joe whispered me, as we were being what Mr Trabb 
called 'formed' in the parlour, two and two - and it was dreadfully like a 
preparation for some grim kind of dance; 'which I meantersay, sir, as I 
would in preference have carried her to the church myself, along with three 
or four friendly ones wot come to it with willing harts and arms, but it 
were considered wot the neighbours would look down on such and would be of 
opinions as it were wanting in respect.'
'Pocket-handkerchiefs out, all!' cried Mr Trabb at this point, in a 
depressed business-like voice. 'Pocket-handkerchiefs out! We are ready!'
So, we all put our pocket-handkerchiefs to our faces, as if our noses were 
bleeding, and filed out two and two; Joe and I; Biddy and Pumblechook; Mr 
and Mrs Hubble. The remains of my poor sister had been brought round by the 
kitchen door, and, it being a point of Undertaking ceremony that the six 
bearers must be stifled and blinded under a horrible black velvet housing 
with a white border, the whole looked like a blind monster with twelve 
human legs, shuffling and blundering along, under the guidance of two 
keepers - the postboy and his comrade.
The neighbourhood, however, highly approved of these arrangements, and we 
were much admired as we went through the village; the more youthful and 
vigorous part of the community making dashes now and then to cut us off, 
and lying in wait to intercept us at points of vantage. At such times the 
more exuberant among them called out in an excited manner on our emergence 
round some corner of expectancy, 'Here they come!' 'Here they are!' and we 
were all but cheered. In this progress I was much annoyed by the abject 
Pumblechook, who, being behind me, persisted all the way as a delicate 
attention in arranging my streaming hatband, and smoothing my cloak. My 
thoughts were further distracted by the excessive pride of Mr and Mrs 
Hubble, who were surpassingly conceited and vainglorious in being members 
of so distinguished a procession.
And now, the range of marshes lay clear before us, with the sails of the 
ships on the river growing out of it; and we went into the churchyard, 
close to the graves of my unknown parents, Philip Pirrip, late of this 
parish, and Also Georgiana, Wife of the Above. And there, my sister was 
laid quietly in the earth while the larks sang high above it, and the light 
wind strewed it with beautiful shadows of clouds and trees.
Of the conduct of the worldly-minded Pumblechook while this was doing, I 
desire to say no more than it was all addressed to me; and that even when 
those noble passages were read which remind humanity how it brought nothing 
into the world and can take nothing out, and how it fleeth like a shadow 
and never continueth long in one stay, I heard him cough a reservation of 
the case of a young gentleman who came unexpectedly into large property. 
When we got back, he had the hardihood to tell me that he wished my sister 
could have known I had done her so much honour, and to hint that she would 
have considered it reasonably purchased at the price of her death. After 
that, he drank all the rest of the sherry, and Mr Hubble drank the port, 
and the two talked (which I have since observed to be customary in such 
cases) as if they were of quite another race from the deceased, and were 
notoriously immortal. Finally, he went away with Mr and Mrs Hubble - to 
make an evening of it, I felt sure, and to tell the Jolly Bargemen that he 
was the founder of my fortunes and my earliest benefactor.
When they were all gone, and when Trabb and his men - but not his boy: I 
looked for him - had crammed their mummery into bags, and were gone too, 
the house felt wholesomer. Soon afterwards, Biddy, Joe, and I, had a cold 
dinner together; but we dined in the best parlour, not in the old kitchen, 
and Joe was so exceedingly particular what he did with his knife and fork 
and the saltcellar and what not, that there was great restraint upon us. 
But after dinner, when I made him take his pipe, and when I had loitered 
with him about the forge, and when we sat down together on the great block 
of stone outside it, we got on better. I noticed that after the funeral Joe 
changed his clothes so far, as to make a compromise between his Sunday 
dress and working dress: in which the dear fellow looked natural, and like 
the Man he was.
He was very much pleased by my asking if I might sleep in my own little 
room, and I was pleased too; for, I felt that I had done rather a great 
thing in making the request. When the shadows of evening were closing in, I 
took an opportunity of getting into the garden with Biddy for a little 
talk.
'Biddy,' said I, 'I think you might have written to me about these sad 
matters.'
'Do you, Mr Pip?' said Biddy. 'I should have written if I had thought 
that.'
'Don't suppose that I mean to be unkind, Biddy, when I say I consider that 
you ought to have thought that.'
'Do you, Mr Pip?'
She was so quiet, and had such an orderly, good, and pretty way with her, 
that I did not like the thought of making her cry again. After looking a 
little at her downcast eyes as she walked beside me, I gave up that point.
'I suppose it will be difficult for you to remain here now, Biddy dear?'
'Oh! I can't do so, Mr Pip,' said Biddy, in a tone of regret, but still of 
quiet conviction. 'I have been speaking to Mrs Hubble, and I am going to 
her tomorrow. I hope we shall be able to take some care of Mr Gargery, 
together, until he settles down.'
'How are you going to live, Biddy? If you want any mo-'
'How am I going to live?' repeated Biddy, striking in, with a momentary 
flush upon her face. 'I'll tell you, Mr Pip. I am going to try to get the 
place of mistress in the new school nearly finished here. I can be well 
recommended by all the neighbours, and I hope I can be industrious and 
patient, and teach myself while I teach others. You know, Mr Pip,' pursued 
Biddy, with a smile, as she raised her eyes to my face, 'the new schools 
are not like the old, but I learnt a good deal from you after that time, 
and have had time since then to improve.'
'I think you would always improve, Biddy, under any circumstances.'
'Ah! Except in my bad side of human nature,' murmured Biddy.
It was not so much a reproach, as an irresistible thinking aloud. Well! I 
thought I would give up that point too. So, I walked a little further with 
Biddy, looking silently at her downcast eyes.
'I have not heard the particulars of my sister's death, Biddy.'
'They are very slight, poor thing. She had been in one of her bad states - 
though they had got better of late, rather than worse - for four days, when 
she came out of it in the evening, just at teatime, and said quite plainly, 
"Joe." As she had never said any word for a long while, I ran and fetched 
in Mr Gargery from the forge. She made signs to me that she wanted him to 
sit down close to her, and wanted me to put her arms round his neck. So I 
put them round his neck, and she laid her head down on his shoulder quite 
content and satisfied. And so she presently said "Joe" again, and once 
"Pardon," and once "Pip." And so she never lifted her head up any more, and 
it was just an hour later when we laid it down on her own bed, because we 
found she was gone.'
Biddy cried; the darkening garden, and the lane, and the stars that were 
coming out, were blurred in my own sight.
'Nothing was ever discovered, Biddy?'
'Nothing.'
'Do you know what is become of Orlick?'
'I should think from the colour of his clothes that he is working in the 
quarries.'
'Of course you have seen him then? - Why are you looking at that dark tree 
in the lane?'
'I saw him there, on the night she died.'
'That was not the last time either, Biddy?'
'No; I have seen him there, since we have been walking here. - It is of no 
use,' said Biddy, laying her hand upon my arm, as I was for running out, 
'you know I would not deceive you; he was not there a minute, and he is 
gone.'
It revived my utmost indignation to find that she was still pursued by this 
fellow, and I felt inveterate against him. I told her so, and told her that 
I would spend any money or take any pains to drive him out of that country. 
By degrees she led me into more temperate talk, and she told me how Joe 
loved me, and how Joe never complained of anything - she didn't say, of me; 
she had no need; I knew what she meant - but ever did his duty in his way 
of life, with a strong hand, quiet tongue, and a gentle heart.
'Indeed, it would be hard to say too much for him,' said I; 'and Biddy, we 
must often speak of these things, for of course I shall be often down here 
now. I am not going to leave poor Joe alone.'
Biddy said never a single word.
'Biddy, don't you hear me?'
'Yes, Mr Pip.'
'Not to mention your calling me Mr Pip - which appears to me to be in bad 
taste, Biddy - what do you mean?'
'What do I mean?' asked Biddy, timidly.
'Biddy,' said I, in a virtuously self-asserting manner, 'I must request to 
know what you mean by this?'
'By this?' said Biddy.
'Now, don't echo,' I retorted. 'You used not to echo, Biddy.'
'Used not!' said Biddy. 'O Mr Pip! Used!'
Well! I rather thought I would give up that point too. After another silent 
turn in the garden, I fell back on the main position.
'Biddy,' said I, 'I made a remark respecting my coming down here often, to 
see Joe, which you received with a marked silence. Have the goodness, 
Biddy, to tell me why.'
'Are you quite sure, then, that you WILL come to see him often?' asked 
Biddy, stopping in the narrow garden walk, and looking at me under the 
stars with a clear and honest eye.
'Oh dear me!' said I, as if I found myself compelled to give up Biddy in 
despair. 'This really is a very bad side of human nature! Don't say any 
more, if you please, Biddy. This shocks me very much.'
For which cogent reason I kept Biddy at a distance during supper, and, when 
I went up to my own old little room, took as stately a leave of her as I 
could, in my murmuring soul, deem reconcilable with the churchyard and the 
event of the day. As often as I was restless in the night, and that was 
every quarter of an hour, I reflected what an unkindness, what an injury, 
what an injustice, Biddy had done me.
Early in the morning, I was to go. Early in the morning, I was out, and 
looking in, unseen, at one of the wooden windows of the forge. There I 
stood, for minutes, looking at Joe, already at work with a glow of health 
and strength upon his face that made it show as if the bright sun of the 
life in store for him were shining on it.
'Good-bye, dear Joe! - No, don't wipe it off - for God's sake, give me your 
blackened hand! - I shall be down soon, and often.'
'Never too soon, sir,' said Joe, 'and never too often, Pip!'
Biddy was waiting for me at the kitchen door, with a mug of new milk and a 
crust of bread. 'Biddy,' said I, when I gave her my hand at parting, 'I am 
not angry, but I am hurt.'
'No, don't be hurt,' she pleaded quite pathetically; 'let only me be hurt, 
if I have been ungenerous.'
Once more, the mists were rising as I walked away. If they disclosed to me, 
as I suspect they did, that I should not come back, and that Biddy was 
quite right, all I can say is - they were quite right too.


Chapter 36

Herbert and I went on from bad to worse, in the way of increasing our 
debts, looking into our affairs, leaving Margins, and the like exemplary 
transactions; and Time went on, whether or no, as he has a way of doing; 
and I came of age - in fulfilment of Herbert's prediction, that I should do 
so before I knew where I was.
Herbert himself had come of age, eight months before me. As he had nothing 
else than his majority to come into, the event did not make a profound 
sensation in Barnard's Inn. But we had looked forward to my one-and-
twentieth birthday, with a crowd of speculations and anticipations, for we 
had both considered that my guardian could hardly help saying something 
definite on that occasion.
I had taken care to have it well understood in Little Britain, when my 
birthday was. On the day before it, I received an official note from 
Wemmick, informing me that Mr Jaggers would be glad if I would call upon 
him at five in the afternoon of the auspicious day. This convinced us that 
something great was to happen, and threw me into an unusual flutter when I 
repaired to my guardian's office, a model of punctuality.
In the outer office Wemmick offered me his congratulations, and 
incidentally rubbed the side of his nose with a folded piece of tissue-
paper that I liked the look of. But he said nothing respecting it, and 
motioned me with a nod into my guardian's room. It was November, and my 
guardian was standing before his fire leaning his back against the chimney-
piece, with his hands under his coattails.
'Well, Pip,' said he, 'I must call you Mr Pip today. Congratulations, Mr 
Pip.'
We shook hands - he was always a remarkably short shaker - and I thanked 
him.
'Take a chair, Mr Pip,' said my guardian.
As I sat down, and he preserved his attitude and bent his brows at his 
boots, I felt at a disadvantage, which reminded me of that old time when I 
had been put upon a tombstone. The two ghastly casts on the shelf were not 
far from him, and their expression was as if they were making a stupid 
apoplectic attempt to attend to the conversation.
'Now my young friend,' my guardian began, as if I were a witness in the 
box, 'I am going to have a word or two with you.'
'If you please, sir.'
'What do you suppose,' said Mr Jaggers, bending forward to look at the 
ground, and then throwing his head back to look at the ceiling, 'what do 
you suppose you are living at the rate of?'
'At the rate of, sir?'
'At,' repeated Mr Jaggers, still looking at the ceiling, 'the - rate - of?' 
And then looked all round the room, and paused with his pocket-handkerchief 
in his hand, half way to his nose.
I had looked into my affairs so often, that I had thoroughly destroyed any 
slight notion I might ever have had of their bearings. Reluctantly, I 
confessed myself quite unable to answer the question. This reply seemed 
agreeable to Mr Jaggers, who said, 'I thought so!' and blew his nose with 
an air of satisfaction.
'Now, I have asked you a question, my friend,' said Mr Jaggers. 'Have you 
anything to ask me?'
'Of course it would be a great relief to me to ask you several questions, 
sir; but I remember your prohibition.'
'Ask one,' said Mr Jaggers.
'Is my benefactor to be made known to me today?'
'No. Ask another.'
'Is that confidence to be imparted to me soon?'
'Waive that, a moment,' said Mr Jaggers, 'and ask another.'
I looked about me, but there appeared to be now no possible escape from the 
inquiry, 'Have - I - anything to receive, sir?' On that, Mr Jaggers said, 
triumphantly, 'I thought we should come to it!' and called to Wemmick to 
give him that piece of paper. Wemmick appeared, handed it in, and 
disappeared.
'Now, Mr Pip,' said Mr Jaggers, 'attend, if you please. You have been 
drawing pretty freely here; your name occurs pretty often in Wemmick's cash-
book; but you are in debt, of course?'
'I am afraid I must say yes, sir.'
'You know you must say yes; don't you?' said Mr Jaggers.
'Yes, sir.'
'I don't ask you what you owe, because you don't know; and if you did know, 
you wouldn't tell me; you would say less. Yes, yes, my friend,' cried Mr 
Jaggers, waving his forefinger to stop me, as I made a show of protesting: 
'it's likely enough that you think you wouldn't, but you would. You'll 
excuse me, but I know better than you. Now, take this piece of paper in 
your hand. You have got it? Very good. Now, unfold it and tell me what it 
is.'
'This is a banknote,' said I, 'for five hundred pounds.'
'That is a banknote,' repeated Mr Jaggers, 'for five hundred pounds. And a 
very handsome sum of money too, I think. You consider it so?'
'How could I do otherwise!'
'Ah! But answer the question,' said Mr Jaggers.
'Undoubtedly.'
'You consider it, undoubtedly, a handsome sum of money. Now, that handsome 
sum of money, Pip, is your own. It is a present to you on this day, in 
earnest of your expectations. And at the rate of that handsome sum of money 
per annum, and at no higher rate, you are to live until the donor of the 
whole appears. That is to say, you will now take your money affairs 
entirely into your own hands, and you will draw from Wemmick one hundred 
and twenty-five pounds per quarter, until you are in communication with the 
fountain-head, and no longer with the mere agent. As I have told you 
before, I am the mere agent. I execute my instructions, and I am paid for 
doing so. I think them injudicious, but I am not paid for giving any 
opinion on their merits.'
I was beginning to express my gratitude to my benefactor for the great 
liberality with which I was treated, when Mr Jaggers stopped me. 'I am not 
paid, Pip,' said he, coolly, 'to carry your words to any one;' and then 
gathered up his coat-tails, as he had gathered up the subject, and stood 
frowning at his boots as if he suspected them of designs against him.
After a pause, I hinted:
'There was a question just now, Mr Jaggers, which you desired me to waive 
for a moment. I hope I am doing nothing wrong in asking it again?'
'What is it?' said he.
I might have known that he would never help me out; but it took me aback to 
have to shape the question afresh, as if it were quite new. 'Is it likely,' 
I said, after hesitating, 'that my patron, the fountain-head you have 
spoken of, Mr Jaggers, will soon -' there I delicately stopped.
'Will soon what?' asked Mr Jaggers. 'That's no question as it stands, you 
know.'
'Will soon come to London,' said I, after casting about for a precise form 
of words, 'or summon me anywhere else?'
'Now here,' replied Mr Jaggers, fixing me for the first time with his dark 
deep-set eyes, 'we must revert to the evening when we first encountered one 
another in your village. What did I tell you then, Pip?'
'You told me, Mr Jaggers, that it might be years hence when that person 
appeared.'
'Just so,' said Mr Jaggers; 'that's my answer.'
As we looked full at one another, I felt my breath come quicker in my 
strong desire to get something out of him. And as I felt that it came 
quicker, and as I felt that he saw that it came quicker, I felt that I had 
less chance than ever of getting anything out of him.
'Do you suppose it will still be years hence, Mr Jaggers?'
Mr Jaggers shook his head - not in negativing the question, but in 
altogether negativing the notion that he could anyhow be got to answer it - 
and the two horrible casts of the twitched faces looked, when my eyes 
strayed up to them, as if they had come to a crisis in their suspended 
attention, and were going to sneeze.
'Come!' said Mr Jaggers, warming the backs of his legs with the backs of 
his warmed hands, 'I'll be plain with you, my friend Pip. That's a question 
I must not be asked. You'll understand that, better, when I tell you it's a 
question that might compromise me. Come! I'll go a little further with you; 
I'll say something more.'
He bent down so low to frown at his boots, that he was able to rub the 
calves of his legs in the pause he made.
'When that person discloses,' said Mr Jaggers, straightening himself, 'you 
and that person will settle your own affairs. When that person discloses, 
my part in this business will cease and determine. When that person 
discloses, it will not be necessary for me to know anything about it. And 
that's all I have got to say.'
We looked at one another until I withdrew my eyes, and looked thoughtfully 
at the floor. From this last speech I derived the notion that Miss 
Havisham, for some reason or no reason, had not taken him into her 
confidence as to her designing me for Estella; that he resented this, and 
felt a jealousy about it; or that he really did object to that scheme, and 
would have nothing to do with it. When I raised my eyes again, I found that 
he had been shrewdly looking at me all the time, and was doing so still.
'If that is all you have to say, sir,' I remarked, 'there can be nothing 
left for me to say.'
He nodded assent, and pulled out his thief-dreaded watch, and asked me 
where I was going to dine? I replied at my own chambers, with Herbert. As a 
necessary sequence, I asked him if he would favour us with his company, and 
he promptly accepted the invitation. But he insisted on walking home with 
me, in order that I might make no extra preparation for him, and first he 
had a letter or two to write, and (of course) had his hands to wash. So, I 
said I would go into the outer office and talk to Wemmick.
The fact was, that when the five hundred pounds had come into my pocket, a 
thought had come into my head which had been often there before; and it 
appeared to me that Wemmick was a good person to advise with, concerning 
such thought.
He had already locked up his safe, and made preparations for going home. He 
had left his desk, brought out his two greasy office candlesticks and stood 
them in line with the snuffers on a slab near the door, ready to be 
extinguished; he had raked his fire low, put his hat and greatcoat ready, 
and was beating himself all over the chest with his safe-key, as an 
athletic exercise after business.
'Mr Wemmick,' said I, 'I want to ask your opinion. I am very desirous to 
serve a friend.'
Wemmick tightened his post-office and shook his head, as if his opinion 
were dead against any fatal weakness of that sort.
'This friend,' I pursued, 'is trying to get on in commercial life, but has 
no money, and finds it difficult and disheartening to make a beginning. 
Now, I want somehow to help him to a beginning.'
'With money down?' said Wemmick, in a tone drier than any sawdust.
'With some money down,' I replied, for an uneasy remembrance shot across me 
of that symmetrical bundle of papers at home; 'with some money down, and 
perhaps some anticipation of my expectations.'
'Mr Pip,' said Wemmick, 'I should like just to run over with you on my 
fingers, if you please, the names of the various bridges up as high as 
Chelsea Reach. Let's see; there's London, one; Southwark, two; Blackfriars, 
three; Waterloo, four; Westminster, five; Vauxhall, six.' He had checked 
off each bridge in its turn, with the handle of his safe-key on the palm of 
his hand. 'There's as many as six, you see, to choose from.'
'I don't understand you,' said I.
'Choose your bridge, Mr Pip,' returned Wemmick, 'and take a walk upon your 
bridge, and pitch your money into the Thames over the centre arch of your 
bridge, and you know the end of it. Serve a friend with it, and you may 
know the end of it too - but it's a less pleasant and profitable end.'
I could have posted a newspaper in his mouth, he made it so wide after 
saying this.
'This is very discouraging,' said I.
'Meant to be so,' said Wemmick.
'Then is it your opinion,' I inquired, with some little indignation, 'that 
a man should never - '
' - Invest portable property in a friend?' said Wemmick. 'Certainly he 
should not. Unless he wants to get rid of the friend - and then it becomes 
a question how much portable property it may be worth to get rid of him.'
'And that,' said I, 'is your deliberate opinion, Mr Wemmick?'
'That,' he returned, 'is my deliberate opinion in this office.'
'Ah!' said I, pressing him, for I thought I saw him near a loophole here; 
'but would that be your opinion at Walworth?'
'Mr Pip,' he replied, with gravity, 'Walworth is one place, and this office 
is another. Much as the Aged is one person, and Mr Jaggers is another. They 
must not be confounded together. My Walworth sentiments must be taken at 
Walworth; none but my official sentiments can be taken in this office.'
'Very well,' said I, much relieved, 'then I shall look you up at Walworth, 
you may depend upon it.'
'Mr Pip,' he returned, 'you will be welcome there, in a private and 
personal capacity.'
We had held this conversation in a low voice, well knowing my guardian's 
ears to be the sharpest of the sharp. As he now appeared in his doorway, 
towelling his hands, Wemmick got on his greatcoat and stood by to snuff out 
the candles. We all three went into the street together, and from the 
doorstep Wemmick turned his way, and Mr Jaggers and I turned ours.
I could not help wishing more than once that evening, that Mr Jaggers had 
had an Aged in Gerrard-street, or a Stinger, or a Something, or a Somebody, 
to unbend his brows a little. It was an uncomfortable consideration on a 
twenty-first birthday, that coming of age at all seemed hardly worth while 
in such a guarded and suspicious world as he made of it. He was a thousand 
times better informed and cleverer than Wemmick, and yet I would a thousand 
times rather have had Wemmick to dinner. And Mr Jaggers made not me alone 
intensely melancholy, because, after he was gone, Herbert said of himself, 
with his eyes fixed on the fire, that he thought he must have committed a 
felony and forgotten the details of it, he felt so dejected and guilty.


Chapter 37

Deeming Sunday the best day for taking Mr Wemmick's Walworth sentiments, I 
devoted the next ensuing Sunday afternoon to a pilgrimage to the Castle. On 
arriving before the battlements, I found the Union Jack flying and the 
drawbridge up; but undeterred by this show of defiance and resistance, I 
rang at the gate, and was admitted in a most pacific manner by the Aged.
'My son, sir,' said the old man, after securing the drawbridge, 'rather had 
it in his mind that you might happen to drop in, and he left word that he 
would soon be home from his afternoon's walk. He is very regular in his 
walks, is my son. Very regular in everything, is my son.'
I nodded at the old gentleman as Wemmick himself might have nodded, and we 
went in and sat down by the fireside.
'You made acquaintance with my son, sir,' said the old man, in his chirping 
way, while he warmed his hands at the blaze, 'at his office, I expect?' I 
nodded. 'Hah! I have heerd that my son is a wonderful hand at his business, 
sir?' I nodded hard. 'Yes; so they tell me. His business is the Law?' I 
nodded harder. 'Which makes it more surprising in my son,' said the old 
man, 'for he was not brought up to the Law, but to the Wine-Coopering.'
Curious to know how the old gentleman stood informed concerning the 
reputation of Mr Jaggers, I roared that name at him. He threw me into the 
greatest confusion by laughing heartily and replying in a very sprightly 
manner, 'No, to be sure; you're right.' And to this hour I have not the 
faintest notion what he meant, or what joke he thought I had made.
As I could not sit there nodding at him perpetually, without making some 
other attempt to interest him, I shouted at inquiry whether his own calling 
in life had been 'the Wine-Coopering.' By dint of straining that term out 
of myself several times and tapping the old gentleman on the chest to 
associate it with him, I at last succeeded in making my meaning understood.
'No,' said the old gentleman; 'the warehousing, the warehousing. First, 
over yonder;' he appeared to mean up the chimney, but I believe he intended 
to refer me to Liverpool; 'and then in the City of London here. However, 
having an infirmity - for I am hard of hearing, sir - '
I expressed in pantomime the greatest astonishment.
' - Yes, hard of hearing; having that infirmity coming upon me, my son he 
went into the Law, and he took charge of me, and he by little and little 
made out this elegant and beautiful property. But returning to what you 
said, you know,' pursued the old man, again laughing heartily, 'what I say 
is, No to be sure; you're right.'
I was modestly wondering whether my utmost ingenuity would have enabled me 
to say anything that would have amused him half as much as this imaginary 
pleasantry, when I was startled by a sudden click in the wall on one side 
of the chimney, and the ghostly tumbling open of a little wooden flap with 
'JOHN' upon it. The old man, following my eyes, cried with great triumph, 
'My son's come home!' and we both went out to the drawbridge.
It was worth any money to see Wemmick waving a salute to me from the other 
side of the moat, when we might have shaken hands across it with the 
greatest ease. The Aged was so delighted to work the drawbridge, that I 
made no offer to assist him, but stood quiet until Wemmick had come across, 
and had presented me to Miss Skiffins: a lady by whom he was accompanied.
Miss Skiffins was of a wooden appearance, and was, like her escort, in the 
post-office branch of the service. She might have been some two or three 
years younger than Wemmick, and I judged her to stand possessed of portable 
property. The cut of her dress from the waist upward, both before and 
behind, made her figure very like a boy's kite; and I might have pronounced 
her gown a little too decidedly orange, and her gloves a little too 
intensely green. But she seemed to be a good sort of fellow, and showed a 
high regard for the Aged. I was not long in discovering that she was a 
frequent visitor at the Castle; for, on our going in, and my complimenting 
Wemmick on his ingenious contrivance for announcing himself to the Aged, he 
begged me to give my attention for a moment to the other side of the 
chimney, and disappeared. Presently another click came, and another little 
door tumbled open with 'Miss Skiffins' on it; then Miss Skiffins shut up 
and John tumbled open; then Miss Skiffins and John both tumbled open 
together, and finally shut up together. On Wemmick's return from working 
these mechanical appliances, I expressed the great admiration with which I 
regarded them, and he said, 'Well, you know, they're both pleasant and 
useful to the Aged. And by George, sir, it's a thing worth mentioning, that 
of all the people who come to this gate, the secret of those pulls is only 
known to the Aged, Miss Skiffins, and me!'
'And Mr Wemmick made them,' added Miss Skiffins, 'with his own hands out of 
his own head.'
While Miss Skiffins was taking off her bonnet (she retained her green 
gloves during the evening as an outward and visible sign that there was 
company), Wemmick invited me to take a walk with him round the property, 
and see how the island looked in wintertime. Thinking that he did this to 
give me an opportunity of taking his Walworth sentiments, I seized the 
opportunity as soon as we were out of the Castle.
Having thought of the matter with care, I approached my subject as if I had 
never hinted at it before. I informed Wemmick that I was anxious in behalf 
of Herbert Pocket, and I told him how we had first met, and how we had 
fought. I glanced at Herbert's home, and at his character, and at his 
having no means but such as he was dependent on his father for: those, 
uncertain and unpunctual.
I alluded to the advantages I had derived in my first rawness and ignorance 
from his society, and I confessed that I feared I had but ill repaid them, 
and that he might have done better without me and my expectations. Keeping 
Miss Havisham in the background at a great distance, I still hinted at the 
possibility of my having competed with him in his prospects, and at the 
certainty of his possessing a generous soul, and being far above any mean 
distrusts, retaliations, or designs. For all these reasons (I told 
Wemmick), and because he was my young companion and friend, and I had a 
great affection for him, I wished my own good fortune to reflect some rays 
upon him, and therefore I sought advice from Wemmick's experience and 
knowledge of men and affairs, how I could best try with my resources to 
help Herbert to some present income - say of a hundred a year, to keep him 
in good hope and heart - and gradually to buy him on to some small 
partnership. I begged Wemmick, in conclusion, to understand that my help 
must always be rendered without Herbert's knowledge or suspicion, and that 
there was no one else in the world with whom I could advise. I wound up by 
laying my hand upon his shoulder, and saying, 'I can't help confiding in 
you, though I know it must be troublesome to you; but that is your fault, 
in having ever brought me here.'
Wemmick was silent for a little while, and then said with a kind of start, 
'Well you know, Mr Pip, I must tell you one thing. This is devilish good of 
you.'
'Say you'll help me to be good then,' said I.
'Ecod,' replied Wemmick, shaking his head, 'that's not my trade.'
'Nor is this your trading-place,' said I.
'You are right,' he returned. 'You hit the nail on the head. Mr Pip, I'll 
put on my considering-cap, and I think all you want to do, may be done by 
degrees. Skiffins (that's her brother) is an accountant and agent. I'll 
look him up and go to work for you.'
'I thank you ten thousand times.'
'On the contrary,' said he, 'I thank you, for though we are strictly in our 
private and personal capacity, still it may be mentioned that there are 
Newgate cobwebs about, and it brushes them away.'
After a little further conversation to the same effect, we returned into 
the Castle where we found Miss Skiffins preparing tea. The responsible duty 
of making the toast was delegated to the Aged, and that excellent old 
gentleman was so intent upon it that he seemed to me in some danger of 
melting his eyes. It was no nominal meal that we were going to make, but a 
vigorous reality. The Aged prepared such a haystack of buttered toast, that 
I could scarcely see him over it as it simmered on an iron stand hooked on 
to the top-bar; while Miss Skiffins brewed such a jorum of tea, that the 
pig in the back premises became strongly excited, and repeatedly expressed 
his desire to participate in the entertainment.
The flag had been struck, and the gun had been fired, at the right moment 
of time, and I felt as snugly cut off from the rest of Walworth as if the 
moat were thirty feet wide by as many deep. Nothing disturbed the 
tranquillity of the Castle, but the occasional tumbling open of John and 
Miss Skiffins: which little doors were a prey to some spasmodic infirmity 
that made me sympathetically uncomfortable until I got used to it. I 
inferred from the methodical nature of Miss Skiffins's arrangements that 
she made tea there every Sunday night; and I rather suspected that a 
classic brooch she wore, representing the profile of an undesirable female 
with a very straight nose and a very new moon, was a piece of portable 
property that had been given her by Wemmick.
We ate the whole of the toast, and drank tea in proportion, and it was 
delightful to see how warm and greasy we all got after it. The Aged 
especially, might have passed for some clean old chief of a savage tribe, 
just oiled. After a short pause of repose, Miss Skiffins - in the absence 
of the little servant who, it seemed, retired to the bosom of her family on 
Sunday afternoons - washed up the tea-things, in a trifling lady-like 
amateur manner that compromised none of us. Then, she put on her gloves 
again, and we drew round the fire, and Wemmick said, 'Now Aged Parent, tip 
us the paper.'
Wemmick explained to me while the Aged got his spectacles out, that this 
was according to custom, and that it gave the old gentleman infinite 
satisfaction to read the news aloud. 'I won't offer an apology,' said 
Wemmick, 'for he isn't capable of many pleasures - are you, Aged P.?'
'All right, John, all right,' returned the old man, seeing himself spoken 
to.
'Only tip him a nod every now and then when he looks off his paper,' said 
Wemmick, 'and he'll be as happy as a king. We are all attention, Aged One.'
'All right, John, all right!' returned the cheerful old man: so busy and so 
pleased, that it really was quite charming.
The Aged's reading reminded me of the classes at Mr Wopsle's great-aunt's, 
with the pleasanter peculiarity that it seemed to come through a keyhole. 
As he wanted the candles close to him, and as he was always on the verge of 
putting either his head or the newspaper into them, he required as much 
watching as a powder-mill. But Wemmick was equally untiring and gentle in 
his vigilance, and the Aged read on, quite unconscious of his many rescues. 
Whenever he looked at us, we all expressed the greatest interest and 
amazement, and nodded until he resumed again.
As Wemmick and Miss Skiffins sat side by side, and as I sat in a shadowy 
corner, I observed a slow and gradual elongation of Mr Wemmick's mouth, 
powerfully suggestive of his slowly and gradually stealing his arm round 
Miss Skiffins's waist. In course of time I saw his hand appear on the other 
side of Miss Skiffins; but at that moment Miss Skiffins neatly stopped him 
with the green glove, unwound his arm again as if it were an article of 
dress, and with the greatest deliberation laid it on the table before her. 
Miss Skiffins's composure while she did this was one of the most remarkable 
sights I have ever seen, and if I could have thought the act consistent 
with abstraction of mind, I should have deemed that Miss Skiffins performed 
it mechanically.
By-and-by, I noticed Wemmick's arm beginning to disappear again, and 
gradually fading out of view. Shortly afterwards, his mouth began to widen 
again. After an interval of suspense on my part that was quite enthralling 
and almost painful, I saw his hand appear on the other side of Miss 
Skiffins. Instantly, Miss Skiffins stopped it with the neatness of a placid 
boxer, took off that girdle or cestus as before, and laid it on the table. 
Taking the table to represent the path of virtue, I am justified in stating 
that during the whole time of the Aged's reading, Wemmick's arm was 
straying from the path of virtue and being recalled to it by Miss Skiffins.
At last, the Aged read himself into a light slumber. This was the time for 
Wemmick to produce a little kettle, a tray of glasses, and a black bottle 
with a porcelain-topped cork, representing some clerical dignitary of a 
rubicund and social aspect. With the aid of these appliances we all had 
something warm to drink: including the Aged, who was soon awake again. Miss 
Skiffins mixed, and I observed that she and Wemmick drank out of one glass. 
Of course I knew better than to offer to see Miss Skiffins home, and under 
the circumstances I thought I had best go first: which I did, taking a 
cordial leave of the Aged, and having passed a pleasant evening.
Before a week was out, I received a note from Wemmick, dated Walworth, 
stating that he hoped he had made some advance in that matter appertaining 
to our private and personal capacities, and that he would be glad if I 
could come and see him again upon it. So, I went out to Walworth again, and 
yet again, and yet again, and I saw him by appointment in the City several 
times, but never held any communication with him on the subject in or near 
Little Britain. The upshot was, that we found a worthy young merchant or 
shipping-broker, not long established in business, who wanted intelligent 
help, and who wanted capital, and who in due course of time and receipt 
would want a partner. Between him and me, secret articles were signed of 
which Herbert was the subject, and I paid him half of my five hundred 
pounds down, and engaged for sundry other payments: some, to fall due at 
certain dates out of my income: some, contingent on my coming into my 
property. Miss Skiffins's brother conducted the negotiation. Wemmick 
pervaded it throughout, but never appeared in it.
The whole business was so cleverly managed, that Herbert had not the least 
suspicion of my hand being in it. I never shall forget the radiant face 
with which he came home one afternoon, and told me, as a mighty piece of 
news, of his having fallen in with one Clarriker (the young merchant's 
name), and of Clarriker's having shown an extraordinary inclination towards 
him, and of his belief that the opening had come at last. Day by day as his 
hopes grew stronger and his face brighter, he must have thought me a more 
and more affectionate friend, for I had the greatest difficulty in 
restraining my tears of triumph when I saw him so happy. At length, the 
thing being done, and he having that day entered Clarriker's House, and he 
having talked to me for a whole evening in a flush of pleasure and success, 
I did really cry in good earnest when I went to bed, to think that my 
expectations had done some good to somebody.
A great event in my life, the turning point of my life, now opens on my 
view. But, before I proceed to narrate it, and before I pass on to all the 
changes it involved, I must give one chapter to Estella. It is not much to 
give to the theme that so long filled my heart.


Chapter 38

If that staid old house near the Green at Richmond should ever come to be 
haunted when I am dead, it will be haunted, surely, by my ghost. O the 
many, many nights and days through which the unquiet spirit within me 
haunted that house when Estella lived there! Let my body be where it would, 
my spirit was always wandering, wandering, wandering, about that house.
The lady with whom Estella was placed, Mrs Brandley by name, was a widow, 
with one daughter several years older than Estella. The mother looked 
young, and the daughter looked old; the mother's complexion was pink, and 
the daughter's was yellow; the mother set up for frivolity, and the 
daughter for theology. They were in what is called a good position, and 
visited, and were visited by, numbers of people. Little, if any, community 
of feeling subsisted between them and Estella, but the understanding was 
established that they were necessary to her, and that she was necessary to 
them. Mrs Brandley had been a friend of Miss Havisham's before the time of 
her seclusion.
In Mrs Brandley's house and out of Mrs Brandley's house, I suffered every 
kind and degree of torture that Estella could cause me. The nature of my 
relations with her, which placed me on terms of familiarity without placing 
me on terms of favour, conduced to my distraction. She made use of me to 
tease other admirers, and she turned the very familiarity between herself 
and me, to the account of putting a constant slight on my devotion to her. 
If I had been her secretary, steward, half-brother, poor relation - if I 
had been a younger brother of her appointed husband - I could not have 
seemed to myself, further from my hopes when I was nearest to her. The 
privilege of calling her by her name and hearing her call me by mine, 
became under the circumstances an aggravation of my trials; and while I 
think it likely that it almost maddened her other lovers, I know too 
certainly that it almost maddened me.
She had admirers without end. No doubt my jealousy made an admirer of every 
one who went near her; but there were more than enough of them without 
that.
I saw her often at Richmond, I heard of her often in town, and I used often 
to take her and the Brandleys on the water; there were picnics, fete days, 
plays, operas, concerts, parties, all sorts of pleasures, through which I 
pursued her - and they were all miseries to me. I never had one hour's 
happiness in her society, and yet my mind all round the four-and-twenty 
hours was harping on the happiness of having her with me unto death.
Throughout this part of our intercourse - and it lasted, as will presently 
be seen, for what I then thought a long time - she habitually reverted to 
that tone which expressed that our association was forced upon us. There 
were other times when she would come to a sudden check in this tone and in 
all her many tones, and would seem to pity me.
'Pip, Pip,' she said one evening, coming to such a check, when we sat apart 
at a darkening window of the house in Richmond; 'will you never take 
warning?'
'Of what?'
'Of me.'
'Warning not to be attracted by you, do you mean, Estella?'
'Do I mean! If you don't know what I mean, you are blind.'
I should have replied that Love was commonly reputed blind, but for the 
reason that I always was restrained - and this was not the least of my 
miseries - by a feeling that it was ungenerous to press myself upon her, 
when she knew that she could not choose but obey Miss Havisham. My dread 
always was, that this knowledge on her part laid me under a heavy 
disadvantage with her pride, and made me the subject of a rebellious 
struggle in her bosom.
'At any rate,' said I, 'I have no warning given me just now, for you wrote 
to me to come to you, this time.'
'That's true,' said Estella, with a cold careless smile that always chilled 
me.
After looking at the twilight without, for a little while, she went on to 
say:
'The time has come round when Miss Havisham wishes to have me for a day at 
Satis. You are to take me there, and bring me back, if you will. She would 
rather I did not travel alone, and objects to receiving my maid, for she 
has a sensitive horror of being talked of by such people. Can you take me?'
'Can I take you, Estella!'
'You can then? The day after tomorrow, if you please. You are to pay all 
charges out of my purse, You hear the condition of your going?'
'And must obey,' said I.
This was all the preparation I received for that visit, or for others like 
it: Miss Havisham never wrote to me, nor had I ever so much as seen her 
handwriting. We went down on the next day but one, and we found her in the 
room where I had first beheld her, and it is needless to add that there was 
no change in Satis House.
She was even more dreadfully fond of Estella than she had been when I last 
saw them together; I repeat the word advisedly, for there was something 
positively dreadful in the energy of her looks and embraces. She hung upon 
Estella's beauty, hung upon her words, hung upon her gestures, and sat 
mumbling her own trembling fingers while she looked at her, as though she 
were devouring the beautiful creature she had reared.
From Estella she looked at me, with a searching glance that seemed to pry 
into my heart and probe its wounds. 'How does she use you, Pip; how does 
she use you?' she asked me again, with her witch-like eagerness, even in 
Estella's hearing. But, when we sat by her flickering fire at night, she 
was most weird; for then, keeping Estella's hand drawn through her arm and 
clutched in her own hand, she extorted from her, by dint of referring back 
to what Estella had told her in her regular letters, the names and 
conditions of the men whom she had fascinated; and as Miss Havisham dwelt 
upon his roll, with the intensity of a mind mortally hurt and diseased, she 
sat with her other hand on her crutch stick, and her chin on that, and her 
wan bright eyes glaring at me, a very spectre.
I saw in this, wretched though it made me, and bitter the sense of 
dependence and even of degradation that it awakened - I saw in this, that 
Estella was set to wreak Miss Havisham's revenge on men, and that she was 
not to be given to me until she had gratified it for a term. I saw in this, 
a reason for her being beforehand assigned to me. Sending her out to 
attract and torment and do mischief, Miss Havisham sent her with the 
malicious assurance that she was beyond the reach of all admirers, and that 
all who staked upon that cast were secured to lose. I saw in this, that I, 
too, was tormented by a perversion of ingenuity, even while the prize was 
reserved for me. I saw in this, the reason for my being staved off so long, 
and the reason for my late guardian's declining to commit himself to the 
formal knowledge of such a scheme. In a word, I saw in this, Miss Havisham 
as I had her then and there before my eyes, and always had had her before 
my eyes; and I saw in this, the distinct shadow of the darkened and 
unhealthy house in which her life was hidden from the sun.
The candles that lighted that room of hers were placed in sconces on the 
wall. They were high from the ground, and they burnt with the steady 
dulness of artificial light in air that is seldom renewed. As I looked 
round at them, and at the pale gloom they made, and at the stopped clock, 
and at the withered articles of bridal dress upon the table and the ground, 
and at her own awful figure with its ghostly reflection thrown large by the 
fire upon the ceiling and the wall, I saw in everything the construction 
that my mind had come to, repeated and thrown back to me. My thoughts 
passed into the great room across the landing where the table was spread, 
and I saw it written, as it were, in the falls of the cobwebs from the 
centre-piece, in the crawlings of the spiders on the cloth, in the tracks 
of the mice as they betook their little quickened hearts behind the panels, 
and in the gropings and pausings of the beetles on the floor.
It happened on the occasion of this visit that some sharp words arose 
between Estella and Miss Havisham. It was the first time I had ever seen 
them opposed.
We were seated by the fire, as just now described, and Miss Havisham still 
had Estella's arm drawn through her own, and still clutched Estella's hand 
in hers, when Estella gradually began to detach herself. She had shown a 
proud impatience more than once before, and had rather endured that fierce 
affection than accepted or returned it.
'What!' said Miss Havisham, flashing her eyes upon her, 'are you tired of 
me?'
'Only a little tired of myself,' replied Estella, disengaging her arm, and 
moving to the great chimney-piece, where she stood looking down at the 
fire.
'Speak the truth, you ingrate!' cried Miss Havisham, passionately striking 
her stick upon the floor; 'you are tired of me.'
Estella looked at her with perfect composure, and again looked down at the 
fire. Her graceful figure and her beautiful face expressed a self-possessed 
indifference to the wild heat of the other, that was almost cruel.
'You stock and stone!' exclaimed Miss Havisham. 'You cold, cold heart!'
'What?' said Estella, preserving her attitude of indifference as she leaned 
against the great chimney-piece and only moving her eyes; 'do you reproach 
me for being cold? You?'
'Are you not?' was the fierce retort.
'You should know,' said Estella. 'I am what you have made me. Take all the 
praise, take all the blame; take all the success, take all the failure; in 
short, take me.'
'O, look at her, look at her!' cried Miss Havisham, bitterly; 'Look at her, 
so hard and thankless, on the hearth where she was reared! Where I took her 
into this wretched breast when it was first bleeding from its stabs, and 
where I have lavished years of tenderness upon her!'
'At least I was no party to the compact,' said Estella, 'for if I could 
walk and speak, when it was made, it was as much as I could do. But what 
would you have? You have been very good to me, and I owe everything to you. 
What would you have?'
'Love,' replied the other.
'You have it.'
'I have not,' said Miss Havisham.
'Mother by adoption,' retorted Estella, never departing from the easy grace 
of her attitude, never raising her voice as the other did, never yielding 
either to anger or tenderness, 'Mother by adoption, I have said that I owe 
everything to you. All I possess is freely yours. All that you have given 
me, is at your command to have again. Beyond that, I have nothing. And if 
you ask me to give you what you never gave me, my gratitude and duty cannot 
do impossibilities.'
'Did I never give her love!' cried Miss Havisham, turning wildly to me. 
'Did I never give her a burning love, inseparable from jealousy at all 
times, and from sharp pain, while she speaks thus to me! Let her call me 
mad, let her call me mad!'
'Why should I call you mad,' returned Estella, 'I, of all people? Does any 
one live, who knows what set purposes you have, half as well as I do? Does 
any one live, who knows what a steady memory you have, half as well as I 
do? I who have sat on this same hearth on the little stool that is even now 
beside you there, learning your lessons and looking up into your face, when 
your face was strange and frightened me!'
'Soon forgotten!' moaned Miss Havisham. 'Times soon forgotten!'
'No, not forgotten,' retorted Estella. 'Not forgotten, but treasured up in 
my memory. When have you found me false to your teaching? When have you 
found me unmindful of your lessons? When have you found me giving admission 
here,' she touched her bosom with her hand, 'to anything that you excluded? 
Be just to me.'
'So proud, so proud!' moaned Miss Havisham, pushing away her grey hair with 
both her hands.
'Who taught me to be proud?' returned Estella. 'Who praised me when I 
learnt my lesson?'
'So hard, so hard!' moaned Miss Havisham, with her former action.
'Who taught me to be hard?' returned Estella. 'Who praised me when I learnt 
my lesson?'
'But to be proud and hard to me!' Miss Havisham quite shrieked, as she 
stretched out her arms. 'Estella, Estella, Estella, to be proud and hard to 
me!'
Estella looked at her for a moment with a kind of calm wonder, but was not 
otherwise disturbed; when the moment was past, she looked down at the fire 
again.
'I cannot think,' said Estella, raising her eyes after a silence 'why you 
should be so unreasonable when I come to see you after a separation. I have 
never forgotten your wrongs and their causes. I have never been unfaithful 
to you or your schooling. I have never shown any weakness that I can charge 
myself with.'
'Would it be weakness to return my love?' exclaimed Miss Havisham. 'But 
yes, yes, she would call it so!'
'I begin to think,' said Estella, in a musing way, after another moment of 
calm wonder, 'that I almost understand how this comes about. If you had 
brought up your adopted daughter wholly in the dark confinement of these 
rooms, and had never let her know that there was such a thing as the 
daylight by which she has never once seen your face - if you had done that, 
and then, for a purpose had wanted her to understand the daylight and know 
all about it, you would have been disappointed and angry?'
Miss Havisham, with her head in her hands, sat making a low moaning, and 
swaying herself on her chair, but gave no answer.
'Or,' said Estella, '- which is a nearer case - if you had taught her, from 
the dawn of her intelligence, with your utmost energy and might, that there 
was such a thing as daylight, but that it was made to be her enemy and 
destroyer, and she must always turn against it, for it had blighted you and 
would else blight her; - if you had done this, and then, for a purpose, had 
wanted her to take naturally to the daylight and she could not do it, you 
would have been disappointed and angry?'
Miss Havisham sat listening (or it seemed so, for I could not see her 
face), but still made no answer.
'So,' said Estella, 'I must be taken as I have been made. The success is 
not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two together make me.'
Miss Havisham had settled down, I hardly knew how, upon the floor, among 
the faded bridal relics with which it was strewn. I took advantage of the 
moment - I had sought one from the first - to leave the room, after 
beseeching Estella's attention to her, with a movement of my hand. When I 
left, Estella was yet standing by the great chimney-piece, just as she had 
stood throughout. Miss Havisham's grey hair was all adrift upon the ground, 
among the other bridal wrecks, and was a miserable sight to see.
It was with a depressed heart that I walked in the starlight for an hour 
and more, about the court-yard, and about the brewery, and about the ruined 
garden. When I at last took courage to return to the room, I found Estella 
sitting at Miss Havisham's knee, taking up some stitches in one of those 
old articles of dress that were dropping to pieces, and of which I have 
often been reminded since by the faded tatters of old banners that I have 
seen hanging up in cathedrals. Afterwards, Estella and I played at cards, 
as of yore - only we were skilful now, and played French games - and so the 
evening wore away, and I went to bed.
I lay in that separate building across the court-yard. It was the first 
time I had ever lain down to rest in Satis House, and sleep refused to come 
near me. A thousand Miss Havishams haunted me. She was on this side of my 
pillow, on that, at the head of the bed, at the foot, behind the half-
opened door of the dressing-room, in the dressing-room, in the room 
overhead, in the room beneath - everywhere. At last, when the night was 
slow to creep on towards two o'clock, I felt that I absolutely could no 
longer bear the place as a place to lie down in, and that I must get up. I 
therefore got up and put on my clothes, and went out across the yard into 
the long stone passage, designing to gain the outer court-yard and walk 
there for the relief of my mind. But, I was no sooner in the passage than I 
extinguished my candle; for, I saw Miss Havisham going along it in a 
ghostly manner, making a low cry. I followed her at a distance, and saw her 
go up the staircase. She carried a bare candle in her hand, which she had 
probably taken from one of the sconces in her own room, and was a most 
unearthly object by its light. Standing at the bottom of the staircase, I 
felt the mildewed air of the feast-chamber, without seeing her open the 
door, and I heard her walking there, and so across into her own room, and 
so across again into that, never ceasing the low cry. After a time, I tried 
in the dark both to get out, and to go back, but I could do neither until 
some streaks of day strayed in and showed me where to lay my hands. During 
the whole interval, whenever I went to the bottom of the staircase, I heard 
her footstep, saw her light pass above, and heard her ceaseless low cry.
Before we left next day, there was no revival of the difference between her 
and Estella, nor was it ever revived on any similar occasion; and there 
were four similar occasions, to the best of my remembrance. Nor, did Miss 
Havisham's manner towards Estella in anywise change, except that I believed 
it to have something like fear infused among its former characteristics.
It is impossible to turn this leaf of my life, without putting Bentley 
Drummle's name upon it; or I would, very gladly.
On a certain occasion when the Finches were assembled in force, and when 
good feeling was being promoted in the usual manner by nobody's agreeing 
with anybody else, the presiding Finch called the Grove to order, forasmuch 
as Mr Drummle had not yet toasted a lady; which, according to the solemn 
constitution of the society, it was the brute's turn to do that day. I 
thought I saw him leer in an ugly way at me while the decanters were going 
round, but as there was no love lost between us, that might easily be. What 
was my indignant surprise when he called upon the company to pledge him to 
'Estella!'
'Estella who?' said I.
'Never you mind,' retorted Drummle.
'Estella of where?' said I. 'You are bound to say of where.' Which he was, 
as a Finch.
'Of Richmond, gentlemen,' said Drummle, putting me out of the question, 
'and a peerless beauty.'
Much he knew about peerless beauties, a mean miserable idiot! I whispered 
Herbert.
'I know that lady,' said Herbert, across the table, when the toast had been 
honoured.
'Do you?' said Drummle.
'And so do I,' I added, with a scarlet face.
'Do you?' said Drummle. 'Oh, Lord!'
This was the only retort - except glass or crockery - that the heavy 
creature was capable of making; but, I became as highly incensed by it as 
if it had been barbed with wit, and I immediately rose in my place and said 
that I could not but regard it as being like the honourable Finch's 
impudence to come down to that Grove - we always talked about coming down 
to that Grove, as a neat Parliamentary turn of expression - down to that 
Grove, proposing a lady of whom he knew nothing. Mr Drummle upon this, 
starting up, demanded what I meant by that? Whereupon, I made him the 
extreme reply that I believed he knew where I was to be found.
Whether it was possible in a Christian country to get on without blood, 
after this, was a question on which the Finches were divided. The debate 
upon it grew so lively, indeed, that at least six more honourable members 
told six more, during the discussion, that they believed they knew where 
they were to be found. However, it was decided at last (the Grove being a 
Court of Honour) that if Mr Drummle would bring never so slight a 
certificate from the lady, importing that he had the honour of her 
acquaintance, Mr Pip must express his regret, as a gentleman and a Finch, 
for 'having been betrayed into a warmth which.' Next day was appointed for 
the production (lest our honour should take cold from delay), and next day 
Drummle appeared with a polite little avowal in Estella's hand, that she 
had had the honour of dancing with him several times. This left me no 
course but to regret that I had been 'betrayed into a warmth which,' and on 
the whole to repudiate, as untenable, the idea that I was to be found 
anywhere. Drummle and I then sat snorting at one another for an hour, while 
the Grove engaged in indiscriminate contradiction, and finally the 
promotion of good feeling was declared to have gone ahead at an amazing 
rate.
I tell this lightly, but it was no light thing to me. For, I cannot 
adequately express what pain it gave me to think that Estella should show 
any favour to a contemptible, clumsy, sulky booby, so very far below the 
average. To the present moment, I believe it to have been referable to some 
pure fire of generosity and disinterestedness in my love for her, that I 
could not endure the thought of her stooping to that hound. No doubt I 
should have been miserable whomsoever she had favoured; but a worthier 
object would have caused me a different kind and degrees of distress.
It was easy for me to find out, and I did soon find out, that Drummle had 
begun to follow her closely, and that she allowed him to do it. A little 
while, and he was always in pursuit of her, and he and I crossed one 
another every day. He held on, in a dull persistent way, and Estella held 
him on; now with encouragement, now with discouragement, now almost 
flattering him, now openly despising him, now knowing him very well, now 
scarcely remembering who he was.
The Spider, as Mr Jaggers had called him, was used to lying in wait, 
however, and had the patience of his tribe. Added to that, he had a 
blockhead confidence in his money and in his family greatness, which 
sometimes did him good service - almost taking the place of concentration 
and determined purpose. So, the Spider, doggedly watching Estella, 
outwatched many brighter insects, and would often uncoil himself and drop 
at the right nick of time.
At a certain Assembly Ball at Richmond (there used to be Assembly Balls at 
most places then), where Estella had outshone all other beauties, this 
blundering Drummle so hung about her, and with so much toleration on her 
part, that I resolved to speak to her concerning him. I took the next 
opportunity: which was when she was waiting for Mrs Brandley to take her 
home, and was sitting apart among some flowers, ready to go. I was with 
her, for I almost always accompanied them to and from such places.
'Are you tired, Estella?'
'Rather, Pip.'
'You should be.'
'Say rather, I should not be; for I have my letter to Satis House to write, 
before I go to sleep.'
'Recounting tonight's triumph?' said I. 'Surely a very poor one, Estella.'
'What do you mean? I didn't know there had been any.'
'Estella,' said I, 'do look at that fellow in the corner yonder, who is 
looking over here at us.'
'Why should I look at him?' returned Estella, with her eyes on me instead. 
'What is there in that fellow in the corner yonder - to use your words - 
that I need look at?'
'Indeed, that is the very question I want to ask you,' said I. 'For he has 
been hovering about you all night.'
'Moths, and all sorts of ugly creatures,' replied Estella, with a glance 
towards him, 'hover about a lighted candle. Can the candle help it?'
'No,' I returned; 'but cannot the Estella help it?'
'Well!' said she, laughing, after a moment, 'perhaps. Yes. Anything you 
like.'
'But, Estella, do hear me speak. It makes me wretched that you should 
encourage a man so generally despised as Drummle. You know he is despised.'
'Well?' said she.
'You know he is as ungainly within, as without. A deficient, ill-tempered, 
lowering, stupid fellow.'
'Well?' said she.
'You know he has nothing to recommend him but money, and a ridiculous roll 
of addle-headed predecessors; now, don't you?'
'Well?' said she again; and each time she said it, she opened her lovely 
eyes the wider.
To overcome the difficulty of getting past that monosyllable, I took it 
from her, and said, repeating it with emphasis, 'Well! Then, that is why it 
makes me wretched.'
Now, if I could have believed that she favoured Drummle with any idea of 
making me - me - wretched, I should have been in better heart about it; but 
in that habitual way of hers, she put me so entirely out of the question, 
that I could believe nothing of the kind.
'Pip,' said Estella, casting her glance over the room, 'don't be foolish 
about its effect on you. It may have its effect on others, and may be meant 
to have. It's not worth discussing.'
'Yes it is,' said I, 'because I cannot bear that people should say, "she 
throws away her graces and attractions on a mere boor, the lowest in the 
crowd."'
'I can bear it,' said Estella.
'Oh! don't be so proud, Estella, and so inflexible.'
'Calls me proud and inflexible in this breath!' said Estella, opening her 
hands. 'And in his last breath reproached me for stooping to a boor!'
'There is no doubt you do,' said I, something hurriedly, 'for I have seen 
you give him looks and smiles this very night, such as you never give to - 
me.'
'Do you want me then,' said Estella, turning suddenly with a fixed and 
serious, if not angry, look, 'to deceive and entrap you?'
'Do you deceive and entrap him, Estella?'
'Yes, and many others - all of them but you. Here is Mrs Brandley. I'll say 
no more.'

And now that I have given the one chapter to the theme that so filled my 
heart, and so often made it ache and ache again, I pass on, unhindered, to 
the event that had impended over me longer yet; the event that had begun to 
be prepared for, before I knew that the world held Estella, and in the days 
when her baby intelligence was receiving its first distortions from Miss 
Havisham's wasting hands.
In the Eastern story, the heavy slab that was to fall on the bed of state 
in the flush of conquest was slowly wrought out of the quarry, the tunnel 
for the rope to hold it in its place was slowly carried through the leagues 
of rock, the slab was slowly raised and fitted in the roof, the rope was 
rove to it and slowly taken through the miles of hollow to the great iron 
ring. All being made ready with much labour, and the hour come, the sultan 
was aroused in the dead of the night, and the sharpened axe that was to 
sever the rope from the great iron ring was put into his hand, and he 
struck with it, and the rope parted and rushed away, and the ceiling fell. 
So, in my case; all the work, near and afar, that tended to the end, had 
been accomplished; and in an instant the blow was struck, and the roof of 
my stronghold dropped upon me.


Chapter 39

I was three-and-twenty years of age. Not another word had I heard to 
enlighten me on the subject of my expectations, and my twenty-third 
birthday was a week gone. We had left Barnard's Inn more than a year, and 
lived in the Temple. Our chambers were in Garden-court, down by the river.
Mr Pocket and I had for some time parted company as to our original 
relations, though we continued on the best terms Notwithstanding my 
inability to settle to anything - which I hope arose out of the restless 
and incomplete tenure on which I held my means - I had a taste for reading, 
and read regularly so many hours a day. That matter of Herbert's was still 
progressing, and everything with me was as I have brought it down to the 
close of the last preceding chapter.
Business had taken Herbert on a journey to Marseilles. I was alone, and had 
a dull sense of being alone. Dispirited and anxious, long hoping that 
tomorrow or next week would clear my way, and long disappointed, I sadly 
missed the cheerful face and ready response of my friend.
It was wretched weather; stormy and wet, stormy and wet; and mud, mud, mud, 
deep in all the streets. Day after day, a vast heavy veil had been driving 
over London from the East, and it drove still, as if in the East there were 
an Eternity of cloud and wind. So furious had been the gusts, that high 
buildings in town had had the lead stripped off their roofs; and in the 
country, trees had been torn up, and sails of windmills carried away; and 
gloomy accounts had come in from the coast, of shipwreck and death. Violent 
blasts of rain had accompanied these rages of wind, and the day just closed 
as I sat down to read had been the worst of all.
Alterations have been made in that part of the Temple since that time, and 
it has not now so lonely a character as it had then, nor is it so exposed 
to the river. We lived at the top of the last house, and the wind rushing 
up the river shook the house that night, like discharges of cannon, or 
breakings of a sea. When the rain came with it and dashed against the 
windows, I thought, raising my eyes to them as they rocked, that I might 
have fancied myself in a storm-beaten light-house. Occasionally, the smoke 
came rolling down the chimney as though it could not bear to go out into 
such a night; and when I set the doors open and looked down the staircase, 
the staircase lamps were blown out; and when I shaded my face with my hands 
and looked through the black windows (opening them ever so little, was out 
of the question in the teeth of such wind and rain) I saw that the lamps in 
the court were blown out, and that the lamps on the bridges and the shore 
were shuddering, and that the coal fires in barges on the river were being 
carried away before the wind like red-hot splashes in the rain.
I read with my watch upon the table, purposing to close my book at eleven 
o'clock. As I shut it, Saint Paul's, and all the many church-clocks in the 
City - some leading, some accompanying, some following - struck that hour. 
The sound was curiously flawed by the wind; and I was listening, and 
thinking how the wind assailed and tore it, when I heard a footstep on the 
stair.
What nervous folly made me start, and awfully connect it with the footstep 
of my dead sister, matters not. It was past in a moment, and I listened 
again, and heard the footstep stumble in coming on. Remembering then, that 
the staircase-lights were blown out, I took up my reading-lamp and went out 
to the stair-head. Whoever was below had stopped on seeing my lamp, for all 
was quiet.
'There is some one down there, is there not?' I called out, looking down.
'Yes,' said a voice from the darkness beneath.
'What floor do you want?'
'The top. Mr Pip.'
'That is my name. - There is nothing the matter?'
'Nothing the matter,' returned the voice. And the man came on.
I stood with my lamp held out over the stair-rail, and he came slowly 
within its light. It was a shaded lamp, to shine upon a book, and its 
circle of light was very contracted; so that he was in it for a mere 
instant, and then out of it. In the instant, I had seen a face that was 
strange to me, looking up with an incomprehensible air of being touched and 
pleased by the sight of me.
Moving the lamp as the man moved, I made out that he was substantially 
dressed, but roughly; like a voyager by sea. That he had long iron-grey 
hair. That his age was about sixty. That he was a muscular man, strong on 
his legs, and that he was browned and hardened by exposure to weather. As 
he ascended the last stair or two, and the light of my lamp included us 
both, I saw, with a stupid kind of amazement, that he was holding out both 
his hands to me.
'Pray what is your business?' I asked him.
'My business?' he repeated, pausing. 'Ah! Yes. I will explain my business, 
by your leave.'
'Do you wish to come in?'
'Yes,' he replied; 'I wish to come in, Master.'
I had asked him the question inhospitably enough, for I resented the sort 
of bright and gratified recognition that still shone in his face. I 
resented it, because it seemed to imply that he expected me to respond to 
it. But, I took him into the room I had just left, and, having set the lamp 
on the table, asked him as civilly as I could, to explain himself.
He looked about him with the strangest air - an air of wondering pleasure, 
as if he had some part in the things he admired - and he pulled off a rough 
outer coat, and his hat. Then, I saw that his head was furrowed and bald, 
and that the long iron-grey hair grew only on its sides. But, I saw nothing 
that in the least explained him. On the contrary, I saw him next moment, 
once more holding out both his hands to me.
'What do you mean?' said I, half suspecting him to be mad.
He stopped in his looking at me, and slowly rubbed his right hand over his 
head. 'It's disapinting to a man,' he said, in a coarse broken voice, 
'arter having looked for'ard so distant, and come so fur; but you're not to 
blame for that - neither on us is to blame for that. I'll speak in half a 
minute. Give me half a minute, please.'
He sat down on a chair that stood before the fire, and covered his forehead 
with his large brown veinous hands. I looked at him attentively then, and 
recoiled a little from him; but I did not know him.
'There's no one nigh,' said he, looking over his shoulder; 'is there?'
'Why do you, a stranger coming into my rooms at this time of the night, ask 
that question?' said I.
'You're a game one,' he returned, shaking his head at me with a deliberate 
affection, at once most unintelligible and most exasperating; 'I'm glad 
you've grow'd up, a game one! But don't catch hold of me. You'd be sorry 
arterwards to have done it.'
I relinquished the intention he had detected, for I knew him! Even yet, I 
could not recall a single feature, but I knew him! If the wind and the rain 
had driven away the intervening years, had scattered all the intervening 
objects, had swept us to the churchyard where we first stood face to face 
on such different levels, I could not have known my convict more distinctly 
than I knew him now as he sat in the chair before the fire. No need to take 
a file from his pocket and show it to me; no need to take the handkerchief 
from his neck and twist it round his head; no need to hug himself with both 
his arms, and take a shivering turn across the room, looking back at me for 
recognition. I knew him before he gave me one of those aids, though, a 
moment before, I had not been conscious of remotely suspecting his 
identity.
He came back to where I stood, and again held out both his hands. Not 
knowing what to do - for, in my astonishment I had lost my self-possession -
 I reluctantly gave him my hands. He grasped them heartily, raised them to 
his lips, kissed them, and still held them.
'You acted noble, my boy,' said he. 'Noble, Pip! And I have never forgot 
it!'
At a change in his manner as if he were even going to embrace me, I laid a 
hand upon his breast and put him away.
'Stay!' said I. 'Keep off! If you are grateful to me for what I did when I 
was a little child, I hope you have shown your gratitude by mending your 
way of life. If you have come here to thank me, it was not necessary. 
Still, however you have found me out, there must be something good in the 
feeling that has brought you here, and I will not repulse you; but surely 
you must understand that - I - '
My attention was so attracted by the singularity of his fixed look at me, 
that the words died away on my tongue.
'You was a saying,' he observed, when we had confronted one another in 
silence, 'that surely I must understand. What, surely must I understand?'
'That I cannot wish to renew that chance intercourse with you of long ago, 
under these different circumstances. I am glad to believe you have repented 
and recovered yourself. I am glad to tell you so. I am glad that, thinking 
I deserve to be thanked, you have come to thank me. But our ways are 
different ways, none the less. You are wet, and you look weary. Will you 
drink something before you go?'
He had replaced his neckerchief loosely, and had stood, keenly observant of 
me, biting a long end of it. 'I think,' he answered, still with the end at 
his mouth and still observant of me, 'that I will drink (I thank you) afore 
I go.'
There was a tray ready on a side-table. I brought it to the table near the 
fire, and asked him what he would have? He touched one of the bottles 
without looking at it or speaking, and I made him some hot rum-and-water. I 
tried to keep my hand steady while I did so, but his look at me as he 
leaned back in his chair with the long draggled end of his neckerchief 
between his teeth - evidently forgotten - made my hand very difficult to 
master. When at last I put the glass to him, I saw with amazement that his 
eyes were full of tears.
Up to this time I had remained standing, not to disguise that I wished him 
gone. But I was softened by the softened aspect of the man, and felt a 
touch of reproach. 'I hope,' said I, hurriedly putting something into a 
glass for myself, and drawing a chair to the table, 'that you will not 
think I spoke harshly to you just now. I had no intention of doing it, and 
I am sorry for it if I did. I wish you well, and happy!'
As I put my glass to my lips, he glanced with surprise at the end of his 
neckerchief, dropping from his mouth when he opened it, and stretched out 
his hand. I gave him mine, and then he drank, and drew his sleeve across 
his eyes and forehead.
'How are you living?' I asked him.
'I've been a sheep-farmer, stock-breeder, other trades besides, away in the 
new world,' said he: 'many a thousand mile of stormy water off from this.'
'I hope you have done well?'
'I've done wonderfully well. There's others went out alonger me as has done 
well too, but no man has done nigh as well as me. I'm famous for it.'
'I am glad to hear it.'
'I hope to hear you say so, my dear boy.'
Without stopping to try to understand those words or the tone in which they 
were spoken, I turned off to a point that had just come into my mind.
'Have you ever seen a messenger you once sent to me,' I inquired, 'since he 
undertook that trust?'
'Never set eyes upon him. I warn't likely to it.'
'He came faithfully, and he brought me the two one-pound notes. I was a 
poor boy then, as you know, and to a poor boy they were a little fortune. 
But, like you, I have done well since, and you must let me pay them back. 
You can put them to some other poor boy's use.' I took out my purse.
He watched me as I laid my purse upon the table and opened it, and he 
watched me as I separated two one-pound notes from its contents. They were 
clean and new, and I spread them out and handed them over to him. Still 
watching me, he laid them one upon the other, folded them long-wise, gave 
them a twist, set fire to them at the lamp, and dropped the ashes into the 
tray.
'May I make so bold,' he said then, with a smile that was like a frown, and 
with a frown that was like a smile, 'as ask you how you have done well, 
since you and me was out on them lone shivering marshes?'
'How?'
'Ah!'
He emptied his glass, got up, and stood at the side of the fire, with his 
heavy brown hand on the mantel-shelf. He put a foot up to the bars, to dry 
and warm it, and the wet boot began to steam; but, he neither looked at it, 
nor at the fire, but steadily looked at me. It was only now that I began to 
tremble.
When my lips had parted, and had shaped some words that were without sound, 
I forced myself to tell him (though I could not do it distinctly), that I 
had been chosen to succeed to some property.
'Might a mere warmint ask what property?' said he.
I faltered, 'I don't know.'
'Might a mere warmint ask whose property?' said he.
I faltered again, 'I don't know.'
'Could I make a guess, I wonder,' said the Convict, 'at your income since 
you come of age! As to the first figure now. Five?'
With my heart beating like a heavy hammer of disordered action, I rose out 
of my chair, and stood with my hand upon the back of it, looking wildly at 
him.
'Concerning a guardian,' he went on. 'There ought to have been some 
guardian, or such-like, whiles you was a minor. Some lawyer, maybe. As to 
the first letter of that lawyer's name now. Would it be J?'
All the truth of my position came flashing on me; and its disappointments, 
dangers, disgraces, consequences of all kinds, rushed in in such a 
multitude that I was borne down by them and had to struggle for every 
breath I drew.
'Put it,' he resumed, 'as the employer of that lawyer whose name begun with 
a J, and might be Jaggers - put it as he had come over sea to Portsmouth, 
and had landed there, and had wanted to come on to you. "However, you have 
found me out," you says just now. Well! However, did I find you out? Why, I 
wrote from Portsmouth to a person in London, for particulars of your 
address. That person's name? Why, Wemmick.'
I could not have spoken one word, though it had been to save my life. I 
stood, with a hand on the chair-back and a hand on my breast, where I 
seemed to be suffocating - I stood so, looking wildly at him, until I 
grasped at the chair, when the room began to surge and turn. He caught me, 
drew me to the sofa, put me up against the cushions, and bent on one knee 
before me: bringing the face that I now well remembered, and that I 
shuddered at, very near to mine.
'Yes, Pip, dear boy, I've made a gentleman on you! It's me wot has done it! 
I swore that time, sure as ever I earned a guinea, that guinea should go to 
you. I swore arterwards, sure as ever I spec'lated and got rich, you should 
get rich. I lived rough, that you should live smooth; I worked hard, that 
you should be above work. What odds, dear boy? Do I tell it, fur you to 
feel a obligation? Not a bit. I tell it, fur you to know as that there 
hunted dunghill dog wot you kep life in, got his head so high that he could 
make a gentleman - and, Pip, you're him!'
The abhorrence in which I held the man, the dread I had of him, the 
repugnance with which I shrank from him, could not have been exceeded if he 
had been some terrible beast.
'Look'ee here, Pip. I'm your second father. You're my son - more to me nor 
any son. I've put away money, only for you to spend. When I was a hired-out 
shepherd in a solitary hut, not seeing no faces but faces of sheep till I 
half forgot wot men's and women's faces wos like, I see yourn. I drops my 
knife many a time in that hut when I was a eating my dinner or my supper, 
and I says, "Here's the boy again, a looking at me whiles I eats and 
drinks!" I see you there a many times, as plain as ever I see you on them 
misty marshes. "Lord strike me dead!" I says each time - and I goes out in 
the air to say it under the open heavens - "but wot, if I gets liberty and 
money, I'll make that boy a gentleman!" And I done it. Why, look at you, 
dear boy! Look at these here lodgings o' yourn, fit for a lord! A lord? Ah! 
You shall show money with lords for wagers, and beat' em!'
In his heat and triumph, and in his knowledge that I had been nearly 
fainting, he did not remark on my reception of all this. It was the one 
grain of relief I had.
'Look'ee here!' he went on, taking my watch out of my pocket, and turning 
towards him a ring on my finger, while I recoiled from his touch as if he 
had been a snake, 'a gold 'un and a beauty: that's a gentleman's, I hope! A 
diamond all set round with rubies; that's a gentleman's, I hope! Look at 
your linen; fine and beautiful! Look at your clothes; better ain't to be 
got! And your books too,' turning his eyes round the room, 'mounting up, on 
their shelves, by hundreds! And you read 'em; don't you? I see you'd been a 
reading of 'em when I come in. Ha, ha, ha! You shall read 'em to me, dear 
boy! And if they're in foreign languages wot I don't understand, I shall be 
just as proud as if I did.'
Again he took both my hands and put them to his lips, while my blood ran 
cold within me.
'Don't you mind talking, Pip,' said he, after again drawing his sleeve over 
his eyes and forehead, as the click came in his throat which I well 
remembered - and he was all the more horrible to me that he was so much in 
earnest; 'you can't do better nor keep quiet, dear boy. You ain't looked 
slowly forward to this as I have; you wosn't prepared for this, as I wos. 
But didn't you never think it might be me?'
'O no, no, no,' I returned, 'Never, never!'
'Well, you see it wos me, and single-handed. Never a soul in it but my own 
self and Mr Jaggers.'
'Was there no one else?' I asked.
'No,' said he, with a glance of surprise: 'who else should there be? And, 
dear boy, how good looking you have growed! There's bright eyes somewheres -
 eh? Isn't there bright eyes somewheres, wot you love the thoughts on?'
O Estella, Estella!
'They shall be yourn, dear boy, if money can buy 'em. Not that a gentleman 
like you, so well set up as you, can't win 'em off of his own game; but 
money shall back you! Let me finish wot I was a telling you, dear boy. From 
that there hut and that there hiring out, I got money left me by my master 
(which died, and had been the same as me), and got my liberty and went for 
myself. In every single thing I went for, I went for you. "Lord strike a 
blight upon it," I says, wotever it was I went for, "if it ain't for him!" 
It all prospered wonderful. As I giv' you to understand just now, I'm 
famous for it. It was the money left me, and the gains of the first few 
year wot I sent home to Mr Jaggers - all for you - when he first come arter 
you, agreeable to my letter.'
O, that he had never come! That he had left me at the forge - far from 
contented, yet, by comparison happy!
'And then, dear boy, it was a recompense to me, look'ee here, to know in 
secret that I was making a gentleman. The blood horses of them colonists 
might fling up the dust over me as I was walking; what do I say? I says to 
myself, "I'm making a better gentleman nor ever you'll be!" When one of 'em 
says to another, "He was a convict, a few year ago, and is a ignorant 
common fellow now, for all he's lucky," what do I say? I says to myself, 
"If I ain't a gentleman, nor yet ain't got no learning, I'm the owner of 
such. All on you owns stock and land; which on you owns a brought-up London 
gentleman?" This was I kep myself a going. And this way I held steady afore 
my mind that I would for certain come one day and see my boy, and make 
myself known to him, on his own ground.'
He laid his hand on my shoulder. I shuddered at the thought that for 
anything I knew, his hand might be stained with blood.
'It warn't easy, Pip, for me to leave them parts, nor yet it warn't safe. 
But I held to it, and the harder it was, the stronger I held, for I was 
determined, and my mind firm made up. At last I done it. Dear boy, I done 
it!'
I tried to collect my thoughts, but I was stunned. Throughout, I had seemed 
to myself to attend more to the wind and the rain than to him; even now, I 
could not separate his voice from those voices, though those were loud and 
his was silent.
'Where will you put me?' he asked, presently. 'I must be put somewheres, 
dear boy.'
'To sleep?' said I.
'Yes. And to sleep long and sound,' he answered; 'for I've been sea-tossed 
and sea-washed, months and months.'
'My friend and companion,' said I, rising from the sofa, 'is absent; you 
must have his room.'
'He won't come back tomorrow; will he?'
'No,' said I, answering almost mechanically, in spite of my utmost efforts; 
'not tomorrow.'
'Because, look'ee here, dear boy,' he said, dropping his voice, and laying 
a long finger on my breast in an impressive manner, 'caution is necessary.'
'How do you mean? Caution?'
'By G- , it's Death!'
'What's death?'
'I was sent for life. It's death to come back. There's been overmuch coming 
back of late years, and I should of a certainty be hanged if took.'
Nothing was needed but this; the wretched man, after loading wretched me 
with his gold and silver chains for years, had risked his life to come to 
me, and I held it there in my keeping! If I had loved him instead of 
abhorring him; if I had been attracted to him by the strongest admiration 
and affection, instead of shrinking from him with the strongest repugnance; 
it could have been no worse. On the contrary, it would have been better, 
for his preservation would then have naturally and tenderly addressed my 
heart.
My first care was to close the shutters, so that no light might be seen 
from without, and then to close and make fast the doors. While I did so, he 
stood at the table drinking rum and eating biscuit; and when I saw him thus 
engaged, I saw my convict on the marshes at his meal again. It almost 
seemed to me as if he must stoop down presently, to file at his leg.
When I had gone into Herbert's room, and had shut off any other 
communication between it and the staircase than through the room in which 
our conversation had been held, I asked him if he would go to bed? He said 
yes, but asked me for some of my 'gentleman's linen' to put on in the 
morning. I brought it out, and laid it ready for him, and my blood again 
ran cold when he again took me by both hands to give me good night.
I got away from him, without knowing how I did it, and mended the fire in 
the room where we had been together, and sat down by it, afraid to go to 
bed. For an hour or more, I remained too stunned to think; and it was not 
until I began to think, that I began fully to know how wrecked I was, and 
how the ship in which I had sailed was gone to pieces.
Miss Havisham's intentions towards me, all a mere dream; Estella not 
designed for me; I only suffered in Satis House as a convenience, a sting 
for the greedy relations, a model with a mechanical heart to practise on 
when no other practice was at hand; those were the first smarts I had. But, 
sharpest and deepest pain of all - it was for the convict, guilty of I knew 
not what crimes, and liable to be taken out of those rooms where I sat 
thinking, and hanged at the Old Bailey door, that I had deserted Joe.
I would not have gone back to Joe now, I would not have gone back to Biddy 
now, for any consideration: simply, I suppose, because my sense of my own 
worthless conduct to them was greater than every consideration. No wisdom 
on earth could have given me the comfort that I should have derived from 
their simplicity and fidelity; but I could never, never, undo what I had 
done.
In every rage of wind and rush of rain, I heard pursuers. Twice, I could 
have sworn there was a knocking and whispering at the outer door. With 
these fears upon me, I began either to imagine or recall that I had had 
mysterious warnings of this man's approach. That, for weeks gone by, I had 
passed faces in the streets which I had thought like his. That, these 
likenesses had grown more numerous, as he, coming over the sea, had drawn 
nearer. That, his wicked spirit had somehow sent these messengers to mine, 
and that now on this stormy night he was as good as his word, and with me.
Crowding up with these reflections came the reflection that I had seen him 
with my childish eyes to be a desperately violent man; that I had heard 
that other convict reiterate that he had tried to murder him; that I had 
seen him down in the ditch tearing and fighting like a wild beast. Out of 
such remembrances I brought into the light of fire, a half-formed terror 
that it might not be safe to be shut up there with him in the dead of the 
wild solitary night. This dilated until it filled the room, and impelled me 
to take a candle and go in and look at my dreadful burden.
He had rolled a handkerchief round his head, and his face was set and 
lowering in his sleep. But he was asleep, and quietly too, though he had a 
pistol lying on the pillow. Assured of this, I softly removed the key to 
the outside of his door, and turned it on him before I again sat down by 
the fire. Gradually I slipped from the chair and lay on the floor. When I 
awoke, without having parted in my sleep with the perception of my 
wretchedness, the clocks of the Eastward churches were striking five, the 
candles were wasted out, the fire was dead, and the wind and rain 
intensified the thick black darkness.

THIS IS THE END OF THE SECOND STAGE OF PIP'S EXPECTATIONS.


Chapter 40

It was fortunate for me that I had to take precautions to ensure (so far as 
I could) the safety of my dreaded visitor; for, this thought pressing on me 
when I awoke, held other thoughts in a confused concourse at a distance.
The impossibility of keeping him concealed in the chambers was self-
evident. It could not be done, and the attempt to do it would inevitably 
engender suspicion. True, I had no Avenger in my service now, but I was 
looked after by an inflammatory old female, assisted by an animated rag-bag 
whom she called her niece, and to keep a room secret from them would be to 
invite curiosity and exaggeration. They both had weak eyes, which I had 
long attributed to their chronically looking in at keyholes, and they were 
always at hand when not wanted; indeed that was their only reliable quality 
besides larceny. Not to get up a mystery with these people, I resolved to 
announce in the morning that my uncle had unexpectedly come from the 
country.
This course I decided on while I was yet groping about in the darkness for 
the means of getting a light. Not stumbling on the means after all, I was 
fain to go out to the adjacent Lodge and get the watchman there to come 
with his lantern. Now, in groping my way down the black staircase I fell 
over something, and that something was a man crouching in a corner.
As the man made no answer when I asked him what he did there, but eluded my 
touch in silence, I ran to the Lodge and urged the watchman to come 
quickly: telling him of the incident on the way back. The wind being as 
fierce as ever, we did not care to endanger the light in the lantern by 
rekindling the extinguished lamps on the staircase, but we examined the 
staircase from the bottom to the top and found no one there. It then 
occurred to me as possible that the man might have slipped into my rooms; 
so, lighting my candle at the watchman's, and leaving him standing at the 
door, I examined them carefully, including the room in which my dreaded 
guest lay asleep. All was quiet, and assuredly no other man was in those 
chambers.
It troubled me that there should have been a lurker on the stairs, on that 
night of all nights in the year, and I asked the watchman, on the chance of 
eliciting some hopeful explanation as I handed him a dram at the door, 
whether he had admitted at his gate any gentleman who had perceptibly been 
dining out? Yes, he said; at different times of the night, three. One lived 
in Fountain Court, and the other two lived in the Lane, and he had seen 
them all go home. Again, the only other man who dwelt in the house of which 
my chambers formed a part, had been in the country for some weeks; and he 
certainly had not returned in the night, because we had seen his door with 
his seal on it as we came upstairs.
'The night being so bad, sir,' said the watchman, as he gave me back my 
glass, 'uncommon few have come in at my gate. Besides them three gentlemen 
that I have named, I don't call to mind another since about eleven o'clock, 
when a stranger asked for you.'
'My uncle,' I muttered. 'Yes.'
'You saw him, sir?'
'Yes. Oh yes.'
'Likewise the person with him?'
'Person with him!' I repeated.
'I judged the person to be with him,' returned the watchman. 'The person 
stopped, when he stopped to make inquiry of me, and the person took this 
way when he took this way.'
'What sort of person?'
The watchman had not particularly noticed; he should say a working person; 
to the best of his belief, he had a dust-coloured kind of clothes on, under 
a dark coat. The watchman made more light of the matter than I did, and 
naturally; not having my reason for attaching weight to it.
When I had got rid of him, which I thought it well to do without prolonging 
explanations, my mind was much troubled by these two circumstances taken 
together. Whereas they were easy of innocent solution apart - as, for 
instance, some diner-out or diner-at-home, who had not gone near this 
watchman's gate, might have strayed to my staircase and dropped asleep 
there - and my nameless visitor might have brought some one with him to 
show him the way - still, joined, they had an ugly look to one as prone to 
distrust and fear as the changes of a few hours had made me.
I lighted my fire, which burnt with a raw pale flare at that time of the 
morning, and fell into a doze before it. I seemed to have been dozing a 
whole night when the clocks struck six. As there was full an hour and a 
half between me and daylight, I dozed again; now, waking up uneasily, with 
prolix conversations about nothing, in my ears; now, making thunder of the 
wind in the chimney; at length, falling off into a profound sleep from 
which the daylight woke me with a start.
All this time I had never been able to consider my own situation, nor could 
I do so yet. I had not the power to attend to it. I was greatly dejected 
and distressed, but in an incoherent wholesale sort of way. As to forming 
any plan for the future, I could as soon have formed an elephant. When I 
opened the shutters and looked out at the wet wild morning, all of a leaden 
hue; when I walked from room to room; when I sat down again shivering, 
before the fire, waiting for my laundress to appear; I thought how 
miserable I was, but hardly knew why, or how long I had been so, or on what 
day of the week I made the reflection, or even who I was that made it.
At last, the old woman and the niece came in - the latter with a head not 
easily distinguishable from her dusty broom - and testified surprise at 
sight of me and the fire. To whom I imparted how my uncle had come in the 
night and was then asleep, and how the breakfast preparations were to be 
modified accordingly. Then, I washed and dressed while they knocked the 
furniture about and made a dust; and so, in a sort of dream or sleep-
waking, I found myself sitting by the fire again, waiting for - Him - to 
come to breakfast.
By-and-by, his door opened and he came out. I could not bring myself to 
bear the sight of him, and I thought he had a worse look by daylight.
'I do not even know,' said I, speaking low as he took his seat at the 
table, 'by what name to call you. I have given out that you are my uncle.'
'That's it, dear boy! Call me uncle.'
'You assumed some name, I suppose, on board ship?'
'Yes, dear boy. I took the name of Provis.'
'Do you mean to keep that name?'
'Why, yes, dear boy, it's as good as another - unless you'd like another.'
'What is your real name?' I asked him in a whisper.
'Magwitch,' he answered, in the same tone; 'chrisen'd Abel.'
'What were you brought up to be?'
'A warmint, dear boy.'
He answered quite seriously, and used the word as if it denoted some 
profession.
'When you came into the Temple last night -' said I, pausing to wonder 
whether that could really have been last night, which seemed so long ago.
'Yes, dear boy?'
'When you came in at the gate and asked the watchman the way here, had you 
any one with you?'
'With me? No, dear boy.'
'But there was some one there?'
'I didn't take particular notice,' he said, dubiously, 'not knowing the 
ways of the place. But I think there was a person, too, come in alonger 
me.'
'Are you known in London?'
'I hope not!' said he, giving his neck a jerk with his forefinger that made 
me turn hot and sick.
'Were you known in London, once?'
'Not over and above, dear boy. I was in the provinces mostly.'
'Were you - tried - in London?'
'Which time?' said he, with a sharp look.
'The last time.'
He nodded. 'First knowed Mr Jaggers that way. Jaggers was for me.'
It was on my lips to ask him what he was tried for, but he took up a knife, 
gave it a flourish, and with the words, 'And what I done is worked out and 
paid for!' fell to at his breakfast.
He ate in a ravenous way that was very disagreeable, and all his actions 
were uncouth, noisy, and greedy. Some of his teeth had failed him since I 
saw him eat on the marshes, and as he turned his food in his mouth, and 
turned his head sideways to bring his strongest fangs to bear upon, he 
looked terribly like a hungry old dog. If I had begun with any appetite, he 
would have taken it away, and I should have sat much as I did - repelled 
from him by an insurmountable aversion, and gloomily looking at the cloth.
'I'm a heavy grubber, dear boy,' he said, as a polite kind of apology when 
he made an end of his meal, 'but I always was. If it had been in my 
constitution to be a lighter grubber, I might ha' got into lighter trouble. 
Similarly, I must have my smoke. When I was first hired out as shepherd 
t'other side the world, it's my belief I should ha' turned into a 
molloncolly-mad sheep myself, if I hadn't a had my smoke.'
As he said so, he got up from table, and putting his hand into the breast 
of the pea-coat he wore, brought out a short black pipe, and a handful of 
loose tobacco of the kind that is called Negro-head. Having filled his 
pipe, he put the surplus tobacco back again, as if his pocket were a 
drawer. Then, he took a live coal from the fire with the tongs, and lighted 
his pipe at it, and then turned round on the hearth-rug with his back to 
the fire, and went through his favourite action of holding out both his 
hands for mine.
'And this,' said he, dandling my hands up and down in his, as he puffed at 
his pipe; 'and this is the gentleman what I made! The real genuine One! It 
does me good fur to look at you, Pip. All I stip'late, is, to stand by and 
look at you, dear boy!'
I released my hands as soon as I could, and found that I was beginning 
slowly to settle down to the contemplation of my condition. What I was 
chained to, and how heavily, became intelligible to me, as I heard his 
hoarse voice, and sat looking up at his furrowed bald head with its iron 
grey hair at the sides.
'I mustn't see my gentleman a footing it in the mire of the streets; there 
mustn't be no mud on his boots. My gentleman must have horses, Pip! Horses 
to ride, and horses to drive, and horses for his servant to ride and drive 
as well. Shall colonists have their horses (and blood 'uns, if you please, 
good Lord!) and not my London gentleman? No, no. We'll show 'em another 
pair of shoes than that, Pip; won't us?'
He took out of his pocket a great thick pocket-book, bursting with papers, 
and tossed it on the table.
'There's something worth spending in that there book, dear boy. It's yourn. 
All I've got ain't mine; it's yourn. Don't you be afeerd on it. There's 
more where that come from. I've come to the old country fur to see my 
gentleman spend his money like a gentleman. That'll be my pleasure. My 
pleasure 'ull be fur to see him do it. And blast you all!' he wound up, 
looking round the room and snapping his fingers once with a loud snap, 
'blast you every one, from the judge in his wig, to the colonist a stirring 
up the dust, I'll show a better gentleman than the whole kit on you put 
together!'
'Stop!' said I, almost in a frenzy of fear and dislike, 'I want to speak to 
you. I want to know what is to be done. I want to know how you are to be 
kept out of danger, how long you are going to stay, what projects you 
have.'
'Look'ee here, Pip,' said he, laying his hand on my arm in a suddenly 
altered and subdued manner; 'first of all, look'ee here. I forgot myself 
half a minute ago. What I said was low; that's what it was; low. Look'ee 
here, Pip. Look over it. I ain't a going to be low.'
'First,' I resumed, half-groaning, 'what precautions can be taken against 
your being recognised and seized?'
'No, dear boy,' he said, in the same tone as before, 'that don't go first. 
Lowness goes first. I ain't took so many year to make a gentleman, not 
without knowing what's due to him. Look'ee here, Pip. I was low; that's 
what I was; low. Look over it, dear boy.'
Some sense of the grimly-ludicrous moved me to a fretful laugh, as I 
replied, 'I have looked over it. In Heaven's name, don't harp upon it!'
'Yes, but look'ee here,' he persisted. 'Dear boy, I ain't come so fur, not 
fur to be low. Now, go on, dear boy. You was a saying - '
'How are you to be guarded from the danger you have incurred?'
'Well, dear boy, the danger ain't so great. Without I was informed agen, 
the danger ain't so much to signify. There's Jaggers, and there's Wemmick, 
and there's you. Who else is there to inform?'
'Is there no chance person who might identify you in the street?' said I.
'Well,' he returned, 'there ain't many. Nor yet I don't intend to advertise 
myself in the newspapers by the name of A. M. come back from Botany Bay; 
and years have rolled away, and who's to gain by it? Still, look'ee here, 
Pip. If the danger had been fifty times as great, I should ha' come to see 
you, mind you, just the same.'
'And how long do you remain?'
'How long?' said he, taking his black pipe from his mouth, and dropping his 
jaw as he stared at me. 'I'm not a going back. I've come for good.'
'Where are you to live?' said I. 'What is to be done with you? Where will 
you be safe?'
'Dear boy,' he returned, 'there's disguising wigs can be bought for money, 
and there's hair powder, and spectacles, and black clothes - shorts and 
what not. Others has done it safe afore, and what others has done afore, 
others can do agen. As to the where and how of living, dear boy, give me 
your own opinions on it.'
'You take it smoothly now,' said I, 'but you were very serious last night, 
when you swore it was Death.'
'And so I swear it is Death,' said he, putting his pipe back in his mouth, 
'and Death by the rope, in the open street not fur from this, and it's 
serious that you should fully understand it to be so. What then, when 
that's once done? Here I am. To go back now, 'ud be as bad as to stand 
ground - worse. Besides, Pip, I'm here, because I've meant it by you, years 
and years. As to what I dare, I'm a old bird now, as has dared all manner 
of traps since first he was fledged, and I'm not afeerd to perch upon a 
scarecrow. If there's Death hid inside of it, there is, and let him come 
out, and I'll face him, and then I'll believe in him and not afore. And now 
let me have a look at my gentleman agen.'
Once more, he took me by both hands and surveyed me with an air of admiring 
proprietorship: smoking with great complacency all the while.
It appeared to me that I could do no better than secure him some quiet 
lodging hard by, of which he might take possession when Herbert returned: 
whom I expected in two or three days. That the secret must be confided to 
Herbert as a matter of unavoidable necessity, even if I could have put the 
immense relief I should derive from sharing it with him out of the 
question, was plain to me. But it was by no means so plain to Mr Provis (I 
resolved to call him by that name), who reserved his consent to Herbert's 
participation until he should have seen him and formed a favourable 
judgment of his physiognomy. 'And even then, dear boy,' said he, pulling a 
greasy little clasped black Testament out of his pocket, 'we'll have him on 
his oath.'
To state that my terrible patron carried this little black book about the 
world solely to swear people on in cases of emergency, would be to state 
what I never quite established - but this I can say, that I never knew him 
put it to any other use. The book itself had the appearance of having been 
stolen from some court of justice, and perhaps his knowledge of its 
antecedents, combined with his own experience in that wise, gave him a 
reliance on its powers as a sort of legal spell or charm. On this first 
occasion of his producing it, I recalled how he had made me swear fidelity 
in the churchyard long ago, and how he had described himself last night as 
always swearing to his resolutions in his solitude.
As he was at present dressed in a seafaring slop suit, in which he looked 
as if he had some parrots and cigars to dispose of, I next discussed with 
him what dress he should wear. He cherished an extraordinary belief in the 
virtues of 'shorts' as a disguise, and had in his own mind sketched a dress 
for himself that would have made him something between a dean and a 
dentist. It was with considerable difficulty that I won him over to the 
assumption of a dress more like a prosperous farmer's; and we arranged that 
he should cut his hair close, and wear a little powder. Lastly, as he had 
not yet been seen by the laundress or her niece, he was to keep himself out 
of their view until his change of dress was made.
It would seem a simple matter to decide on these precautions; but in my 
dazed, not to say distracted, state, it took so long, that I did not get 
out to further them, until two or three in the afternoon. He was to remain 
shut up in the chambers while I was gone, and was on no account to open the 
door.
There being to my knowledge a respectable lodging-house in Essex-street, 
the back of which looked into the Temple, and was almost within hail of my 
windows, I first of all repaired to that house, and was so fortunate as to 
secure the second floor for my uncle, Mr Provis. I then went from shop to 
shop, making such purchases as were necessary to the change in his 
appearance. This business transacted, I turned my face, on my own account, 
to Little Britain. Mr Jaggers was at his desk, but, seeing me enter, got up 
immediately and stood before his fire.
'Now, Pip,' said he, 'be careful.'
'I will, sir,' I returned. For, coming along I had thought well of what I 
was going to say.
'Don't commit yourself,' said Mr Jaggers, 'and don't commit any one. You 
understand - any one. Don't tell me anything: I don't want to know 
anything; I am not curious.'
Of course I saw that he knew the man was come.
'I merely want, Mr Jaggers,' said I, 'to assure myself that what I have 
been told, is true. I have no hope of its being untrue, but at least I may 
verify it.'
Mr Jaggers nodded. 'But did you say "told" or "informed"?' he asked me, 
with his head on one side, and not looking at me, but looking in a 
listening way at the floor. 'Told would seem to imply verbal communication. 
You can't have verbal communication with a man in New South Wales, you 
know.'
'I will say, informed, Mr Jaggers.'
'Good.'
'I have been informed by a person named Abel Magwitch, that he is the 
benefactor so long unknown to me.'
'That is the man,' said Mr Jaggers, '- in New South Wales.'
'And only he?' said I.
'And only he,' said Mr Jaggers.
'I am not so unreasonable, sir, as to think you at all responsible for my 
mistakes and wrong conclusions; but I always supposed it was Miss 
Havisham.'
'As you say, Pip,' returned Mr Jaggers, turning his eyes upon me coolly, 
and taking a bite at his forefinger, 'I am not at all responsible for 
that.'
'And yet it looked so like it, sir,' I pleaded with a downcast heart.
'Not a particle of evidence, Pip,' said Mr Jaggers, shaking his head and 
gathering up his skirts. 'Take nothing on its looks; take everything on 
evidence. There's no better rule.'
'I have no more to say,' said I, with a sigh, after standing silent for a 
little while. 'I have verified my information, and there's an end.'
'And Magwitch - in New South Wales - having at last disclosed himself,' 
said Mr Jaggers, 'you will comprehend, Pip, how rigidly throughout my 
communication with you, I have always adhered to the strict line of fact. 
There has never been the least departure from the strict line of fact. You 
are quite aware of that?'
'Quite, sir.'
'I communicated to Magwitch - in New South Wales - when he first wrote to 
me - from New South Wales - the caution that he must not expect me ever to 
deviate from the strict line of fact. I also communicated to him another 
caution. He appeared to me to have obscurely hinted in his letter at some 
distant idea he had of seeing you in England here. I cautioned him that I 
must hear no more of that; that he was not at all likely to obtain a 
pardon; that he was expatriated for the term of his natural life; and that 
his presenting himself in this country would be an act of felony, rendering 
him liable to the extreme penalty of the law. I gave Magwitch that 
caution,' said Mr Jaggers, looking hard at me; 'I wrote it to New South 
Wales. He guided himself by it, no doubt.'
'No doubt,' said I.
'I have been informed by Wemmick,' pursued Mr Jaggers, still looking hard 
at me, 'that he has received a letter, under date Portsmouth, from a 
colonist of the name of Purvis, or - '
'Or Provis,' I suggested.
'Or Provis - thank you, Pip. Perhaps it is Provis? Perhaps you know it's 
Provis?'
'Yes,' said I.
'You know it's Provis. A letter, under date Portsmouth, from a colonist of 
the name of Provis, asking for the particulars of your address, on behalf 
of Magwitch. Wemmick sent him the particulars, I understand, by return of 
post. Probably it is through Provis that you have received the explanation 
of Magwitch - in New South Wales?'
'It came through Provis,' I replied.
'Good day, Pip,' said Mr Jaggers, offering his hand; 'glad to have seen 
you. In writing by post to Magwitch - in New South Wales - or in 
communicating with him through Provis, have the goodness to mention that 
the particulars and vouchers of our long account shall be sent to you, 
together with the balance; for there is still a balance remaining. Good 
day, Pip!'
We shook hands, and he looked hard at me as long as he could see me. I 
turned at the door, and he was still looking hard at me, while the two vile 
casts on the shelf seemed to be trying to get their eyelids open, and to 
force out of their swollen throats, 'O, what a man he is!'
Wemmick was out, and though he had been at his desk he could have done 
nothing for me. I went straight back to the Temple, where I found the 
terrible Provis drinking rum-and-water and smoking negro-head, in safety.
Next day the clothes I had ordered, all came home, and he put them on. 
Whatever he put on, became him less (it dismally seemed to me) than what he 
had worn before. To my thinking, there was something in him that made it 
hopeless to attempt to disguise him. The more I dressed him and the better 
I dressed him, the more he looked like the slouching fugitive on the 
marshes. This effect on my anxious fancy was partly referable, no doubt, to 
his old face and manner growing more familiar to me; but I believe too that 
he dragged one of his legs as if there were still a weight of iron on it, 
and that from head to foot there was Convict in the very grain of the man.
The influences of his solitary hut-life were upon him besides, and gave him 
a savage air that no dress could tame; added to these, were the influences 
of his subsequent branded life among men, and, crowing all, his 
consciousness that he was dodging and hiding now. In all his ways of 
sitting and standing, and eating and drinking - of brooding about, in a 
high-shouldered reluctant style - of taking out his great horn-handled jack-
knife and wiping it on his legs and cutting his food - of lifting light 
glasses and cups to his lips, as if they were clumsy pannikins - of 
chopping a wedge off his bread, and soaking up with it the last fragments 
of gravy round and round his plate, as if to make the most of an allowance, 
and then drying his finger-ends on it, and then swallowing it - in these 
ways and a thousand other small nameless instances arising every minute in 
the day, there was Prisoner, Felon, Bondsman, plain as plain could be.
It had been his own idea to wear that touch of powder, and I had conceded 
the powder after overcoming the shorts. But I can compare the effect of it, 
when on, to nothing but the probable effect of rouge upon the dead; so 
awful was the manner in which everything in him that it was most desirable 
to repress, started through that thin layer of pretence, and seemed to come 
blazing out at the crown of his head. It was abandoned as soon as tried, 
and he wore his grizzled hair cut short.
Words cannot tell what a sense I had, at the same time, of the dreadful 
mystery that he was to me. When he fell asleep of an evening, with his 
knotted hands clenching the sides of the easy-chair, and his bald head 
tattooed with deep wrinkles falling forward on his breast, I would sit and 
look at him, wondering what he had done, and loading him with all the 
crimes in the Calendar, until the impulse was powerful on me to start up 
and fly from him. Every hour so increased my abhorrence of him, that I even 
think I might have yielded to this impulse in the first agonies of being so 
haunted, notwithstanding all he had done for me, and the risk he ran, but 
for the knowledge that Herbert must soon come back. Once, I actually did 
start out of bed in the night, and begin to dress myself in my worst 
clothes, hurriedly intending to leave him there with everything else I 
possessed, and enlist for India as a private soldier.
I doubt if a ghost could have been more terrible to me, up in those lonely 
rooms in the long evenings and long nights, with the wind and the rain 
always rushing by. A ghost could not have been taken and hanged on my 
account, and the consideration that he could be, and the dread that he 
would be, were no small addition to my horrors. When he was not asleep, or 
playing a complicated kind of patience with a ragged pack of cards of his 
own - a game that I never saw before or since, and in which he recorded his 
winnings by sticking his jack-knife into the table - when he was not 
engaged in either of these pursuits, he would ask me to read to him - 
'Foreign language, dear boy!' While I complied, he, not comprehending a 
single word, would stand before the fire surveying me with the air of an 
Exhibitor, and I would see him, between the fingers of the hand with which 
I shaded my face, appealing in dumb show to the furniture to take notice of 
my proficiency. The imaginary student pursued by the misshapen creature he 
had impiously made, was not more wretched than I, pursued by the creature 
who had made me, and recoiling from him with a stronger repulsion, the more 
he admired me and the fonder he was of me.
This is written of, I am sensible, as if it had lasted a year. It lasted 
about five days. Expecting Herbert all the time, I dared not go out, except 
when I took Provis for an airing after dark. At length, one evening when 
dinner was over and I had dropped into a slumber quite worn out - for my 
nights had been agitated and my rest broken by fearful dreams - I was 
roused by the welcome footstep on the staircase. Provis, who had been 
asleep too, staggered up at the noise I made, and in an instant I saw his 
jack-knife shining in his hand.
'Quiet! It's Herbert!' I said; and Herbert came bursting in, with the airy 
freshness of six hundred miles of France upon him.
'Handel, my dear fellow, how are you, and again how are you, and again how 
are you? I seem to have been gone a twelvemonth! Why, so I must have been, 
for you have grown quite thin and pale! Handel, my - Halloa! I beg your 
pardon.'
He was stopped in his running on and in his shaking hands with me, by 
seeing Provis. Provis, regarding him with a fixed attention, was slowly 
putting up his jack-knife, and groping in another pocket for something 
else.
'Herbert, my dear friend,' said I, shutting the double doors, while Herbert 
stood staring and wondering, 'something very strange has happened. This is -
 a visitor of mine.'
'It's all right, dear boy!' said Provis coming forward, with his little 
clasped black book, and then addressing himself to Herbert. 'Take it in 
your right hand. Lord strike you dead on the spot, if ever you split in any 
way sumever! Kiss it!'
'Do so, as he wishes it,' I said to Herbert. So, Herbert, looking at me 
with a friendly uneasiness and amazement, complied, and Provis immediately 
shaking hands with him, said, 'Now you're on your oath, you know. And never 
believe me on mine, if Pip shan't make a gentleman on you!'


Chapter 41

In vain should I attempt to describe the astonishment and disquiet of 
Herbert, when he and I and Provis sat down before the fire, and I recounted 
the whole of the secret. Enough, that I saw my own feelings reflected in 
Herbert's face, and, not least among them, my repugnance towards the man 
who had done so much for me.
What would alone have set a division between that man and us, if there had 
been no other dividing circumstance, was his triumph in my story. Saving 
his troublesome sense of having been 'low' on one occasion since his return 
- on which point he began to hold forth to Herbert, the moment my 
revelation was finished - he had no perception of the possibility of my 
finding any fault with my good fortune. His boast that he had made me a 
gentleman, and that he had come to see me support the character on his 
ample resources, was made for me quite as much as for himself; and that it 
was a highly agreeable boast to both of us, and that we must both be very 
proud of it, was a conclusion quite established in his own mind.
'Though, look'ee here, Pip's comrade,' he said to Herbert, after having 
discoursed for some time, 'I know very well that once since I come back - 
for half a minute - I've been low. I said to Pip, I knowed as I had been 
low. But don't you fret yourself on that score. I ain't made Pip a 
gentleman, and Pip ain't a going to make you a gentleman, not fur me not to 
know what's due to ye both. Dear boy, and Pip's comrade, you two may count 
upon me always having a genteel muzzle on. Muzzled I have been since that 
half a minute when I was betrayed into lowness, muzzled I am at the present 
time, muzzled I ever will be.'
Herbert said, 'Certainly,' but looked as if there were no specific 
consolation in this, and remained perplexed and dismayed. We were anxious 
for the time when he would go to his lodging, and leave us together, but he 
was evidently jealous of leaving us together, and sat late. It was midnight 
before I took him round to Essex-street, and saw him safely in at his own 
dark door. When it closed upon him, I experienced the first moment of 
relief I had known since the night of his arrival.
Never quite free from an uneasy remembrance of the man on the stairs, I had 
always looked about me in taking my guest out after dark, and in bringing 
him back; and I looked about me now. Difficult as it is in a large city to 
avoid the suspicion of being watched, when the mind is conscious of danger 
in that regard, I could not persuade myself that any of the people within 
sight cared about my movements. The few who were passing, passed on their 
several ways, and the street was empty when I turned back into the Temple. 
Nobody had come out at the gate with us, nobody went in at the gate with 
me. As I crossed by the fountain, I saw his lighted back windows looking 
bright and quiet, and, when I stood for a few moments in the doorway of the 
building where I lived, before going up the stairs, Garden-court was as 
still and lifeless as the staircase was when I ascended it.
Herbert received me with open arms, and I had never felt before, so 
blessedly, what it is to have a friend. When he had spoken some sound words 
of sympathy and encouragement, we sat down to consider the question, What 
was to be done?
The chair that Provis had occupied still remaining where it had stood - for 
he had a barrack way with him of hanging about one spot, in one unsettled 
manner, and going through one round of observances with his pipe and his 
negro-head and his jack-knife and his pack of cards, and what not, as if it 
were all put down for him on a slate - I say, his chair remaining where it 
had stood, Herbert unconsciously took it, but next moment started out of 
it, pushed it away, and took another. He had no occasion to say, after 
that, that he had conceived an aversion for my patron, neither had I 
occasion to confess my own. We interchanged that confidence without shaping 
a syllable.
'What,' said I to Herbert, when he was safe in another chair, 'what is to 
be done?'
'My poor dear Handel,' he replied, holding his head, 'I am too stunned to 
think.'
'So was I, Herbert, when the blow first fell. Still, something must be 
done. He is intent upon various new expenses - horses, and carriages, and 
lavish appearance of all kinds. He must be stopped somehow.'
'You mean that you can't accept - '
'How can I?' I interposed, as Herbert paused. 'Think of him! Look at him!'
An involuntary shudder passed over both of us.
'Yet I am afraid the dreadful truth is, Herbert, that he is attached to me, 
strongly attached to me. Was there ever such a fate!'
'My poor dear Handel,' Herbert repeated.
'Then,' said I, 'after all, stopping short here, never taking another penny 
from him, think what I owe him already! Then again: I am heavily in debt - 
very heavily for me, who have now no expectations - and I have been bred to 
no calling, and I am fit for nothing.'
'Well, well, well!' Herbert remonstrated. 'Don't say fit for nothing.'
'What am I fit for? I know only one thing that I am fit for, and that is, 
to go for a soldier. And I might have gone, my dear Herbert, but for the 
prospect of taking counsel with your friendship and affection.'
Of course I broke down there: and of course Herbert, beyond seizing a warm 
grip of my hand, pretended not to know it.
'Anyhow, my dear Handel,' said he presently, 'soldiering won't do. If you 
were to renounce this patronage and these favours, I suppose you would do 
so with some faint hope of one day repaying what you have already had. Not 
very strong, that hope, if you went soldiering! Besides, it's absurd. You 
would be infinitely better in Clarriker's house, small as it is. I am 
working up towards a partnership, you know.'
Poor fellow! He little suspected with whose money.
'But there is another question,' said Herbert. 'This is an ignorant 
determined man, who has long had one fixed idea. More than that, he seems 
to me (I may misjudge him) to be a man of a desperate and fierce 
character.'
'I know he is,' I returned. 'Let me tell you what evidence I have seen of 
it.' And I told him what I had not mentioned in my narrative; of that 
encounter with the other convict.
'See, then,' said Herbert; 'think of this! He comes here at the peril of 
his life, for the realization of his fixed idea. In the moment of 
realization, after all his toil and waiting, you cut the ground from under 
his feet, destroy his idea, and make his gains worthless to him. Do you see 
nothing that he might do, under the disappointment?'
'I have seen it, Herbert, and dreamed of it, ever since the fatal night of 
his arrival. Nothing has been in my thoughts so distinctly, as his putting 
himself in the way of being taken.'
'Then you may rely upon it,' said Herbert, 'that there would be great 
danger of his doing it. That is his power over you as long as he remains in 
England, and that would be his reckless course if you forsook him.'
I was so struck by the horror of this idea, which had weighed upon me from 
the first, and the working out of which would make me regard myself, in 
some sort, as his murderer, that I could not rest in my chair but began 
pacing to and fro. I said to Herbert, meanwhile, that even if Provis were 
recognised and taken, in spite of himself, I should be wretched as the 
cause, however innocently. Yes; even though I was so wretched in having him 
at large and near me, and even though I would far far rather have worked at 
the forge all the days of my life than I would ever have come to this!
But there was no raving off the question, What was to be done?
'The first and the main thing to be done,' said Herbert, 'is to get him out 
of England. You will have to go with him, and then he may be induced to 
go.'
'But get him where I will, could I prevent his coming back?'
'My good Handel, is it not obvious that with Newgate in the next street, 
there must be far greater hazard in your breaking your mind to him and 
making him reckless, here, than elsewhere. If a pretext to get him away 
could be made out of that other convict, or out of anything else in his 
life, now.'
'There, again!' said I, stopping before Herbert, with my open hands held 
out, as if they contained the desperation of the case. 'I know nothing of 
his life. It has almost made me mad to sit here of a night and see him 
before me, so bound up with my fortunes and misfortunes, and yet so unknown 
to me, except as the miserable wretch who terrified me two days in my 
childhood!'
Herbert got up, and linked his arm in mine, and we slowly walked to and fro 
together, studying the carpet.
'Handel,' said Herbert, stopping, 'you feel convinced that you can take no 
further benefits from him; do you?'
'Fully. Surely you would, too, if you were in my place?'
'And you feel convinced that you must break with him?'
'Herbert, can you ask me?'
'And you have, and are bound to have, that tenderness for the life he has 
risked on your account, that you must save him, if possible, from throwing 
it away. Then you must get him out of England before you stir a finger to 
extricate yourself. That done, extricate yourself, in Heaven's name, and 
we'll see it out together, dear old boy.'
It was a comfort to shake hands upon it, and walk up and down again, with 
only that done.
'Now, Herbert,' said I, 'with reference to gaining some knowledge of his 
history. There is but one way that I know of. I must ask him point-blank.'
'Yes. Ask him,' said Herbert, 'when we sit at breakfast in the morning.' 
For, he had said, on taking leave of Herbert, that he would come to 
breakfast with us.
With this project formed, we went to bed. I had the wildest dreams 
concerning him, and woke unrefreshed; I woke, too, to recover the fear 
which I had lost in the night, of his being found out as a returned 
transport. Waking, I never lost that fear.
He came round at the appointed time, took out his jack-knife, and sat down 
to his meal. He was full of plans 'for his gentleman's coming out strong, 
and like a gentleman,' and urged me to begin speedily upon the pocket-book, 
which he had left in my possession. He considered the chambers and his own 
lodging as temporary residences, and advised me to look out at once for a 
'fashionable crib' near Hyde Park, in which he could have 'a shake-down'. 
When he had made an end of his breakfast, and was wiping his knife on his 
leg, I said to him, without a word of preface:
'After you were gone last night, I told my friend of the struggle that the 
soldiers found you engaged in on the marshes, when we came up. You 
remember?'
'Remember!' said he. 'I think so!'
'We want to know something about that man - and about you. It is strange to 
know no more about either, and particularly you, than I was able to tell 
last night. Is not this as good a time as another for our knowing more?'
'Well!' he said, after consideration. 'You're on your oath, you know, Pip's 
comrade?'
'Assuredly,' replied Herbert.
'As to anything I say, you know,' he insisted. 'The oath applies to all.'
'I understand it to do so.'
'And look'ee here! Wotever I done, is worked out and paid for,' he insisted 
again.
'So be it.'
He took out his black pipe and was going to fill it with negro-head, when, 
looking at the tangle of tobacco in his hand, he seemed to think it might 
perplex the thread of his narrative. He put it back again, stuck his pipe 
in a button-hole of his coat, spread a hand on each knee, and, after 
turning an angry eye on the fire for a few silent moments, looked round at 
us and said what follows.


Chapter 42

'Dear boy and Pip's comrade. I am not a going fur to tell you my life, like 
a song or a storybook. But to give it you short and handy, I'll put it at 
once into a mouthful of English. In jail and out of jail, in jail and out 
of jail, in jail and out of jail. There, you got it. That's my life pretty 
much, down to such times as I got shipped off, arter Pip stood my friend.
'I've been done everything to, pretty well - except hanged. I've been 
locked up, as much as a silver tea-kettle. I've been carted here and carted 
there, and put out of this town and put out of that town, and stuck in the 
stocks, and whipped and worried and drove. I've no more notion where I was 
born, than you have - if so much. I first become aware of myself, down in 
Essex, a thieving turnips for my living. Summun had run away from me - a 
man - a tinker - and he'd took the fire with him, and left me wery cold.
'I know'd my name to be Magwitch, chrisen'd Abel. How did I know it? Much 
as I know'd the birds' names in the hedges to be chaffinch, sparrer, 
thrush. I might have thought it was all lies together, only as the birds' 
names come out true, I supposed mine did.
'So fur as I could find, there warn't a soul that see young Abel Magwitch, 
with us little on him as in him, but wot caught fright at him, and either 
drove him off, or took him up. I was took up, took up, took up, to that 
extent that I reg'larly grow'd up took up.
'This is the way it was, that when I was a ragged little creetur as much to 
be pitied as ever I see (not that I looked in the glass, for there warn't 
many insides of furnished houses known to me), I got the name of being 
hardened. "This is a terrible hardened one," they says to prison wisitors, 
picking out me. "May be said to live in jails, this boy. "Then they looked 
at me, and I looked at them, and they measured my head, some on 'em - they 
had better a measured my stomach - and others on 'em giv me tracts what I 
couldn't read, and made me speeches what I couldn't understand. They always 
went on agen me about the Devil. But what the Devil was I to do? I must put 
something into my stomach, mustn't I? - Howsomever, I'm a getting low, and 
I know what's due. Dear boy and Pip's comrade, don't you be afeerd of me 
being low.
'Tramping, begging, thieving, working sometimes when I could - though that 
warn't as often as you may think, till you put the question whether you 
would ha' been over-ready to give me work yourselves - a bit of a poacher, 
a bit of a labourer, a bit of a waggoner, a bit of a haymaker, a bit of a 
hawker, a bit of most things that don't pay and lead to trouble, I got to 
be a man. A deserting soldier in a Traveller's Rest, what lay hid up to the 
chin under a lot of taturs, learnt me to read; and a travelling Giant what 
signed his name at a penny a time learnt me to write. I warn't locked up as 
often now as formerly, but I wore out my good share of key-metal still.
'At Epsom races, a matter of over twenty years ago, I got acquainted wi' a 
man whose skull I'd crack wi' this poker, like the claw of a lobster, if 
I'd got it on this hob. His right name was Compeyson; and that's the man, 
dear boy, what you see me a pounding in the ditch, according to what you 
truly told your comrade arter I was gone last night.
'He set up fur a gentleman, this Compeyson, and he'd been to a public 
boarding-school and had learning. He was a smooth one to talk, and was a 
dab at the ways of gentlefolks. He was a good-looking too. It was the night 
afore the great race, when I found him on the heath, in a booth that I 
know'd on. Him and some more was a sitting among the tables when I went in, 
and the landlord (which had a knowledge of me, and was a sporting one) 
called him out, and said, "I think this is a man that might suit you" - 
meaning I was.
'Compeyson, he looks at me very noticing, and I look at him. He has a watch 
and a chain and a ring and a breast-pin and a handsome suit of clothes.
'"To judge from appearances, you're out of luck," says Compeyson to me.
'"Yes, master, and I've never been in it much." (I had come out of Kingston 
Jail last on a vagrancy committal. Not but what it might have been for 
something else; but it warn't.)
'"Luck changes," says Compeyson; "perhaps yours is going to change."
'I says, "I hope it may be so. There's room."
'"What can you do?" says Compeyson.
'"Eat and drink," I says; "if you'll find the materials."
'Compeyson laughed, looked at me again very noticing, giv me five 
shillings, and appointed me for next night. Same place.
'I went to Compeyson next night, same place, and Compeyson took me on to be 
his man and pardner. And what was Compeyson's business in which we was to 
go pardners? Compeyson's business was the swindling, handwriting forging, 
stolen banknote passing, and such-like. All sorts of traps as Compeyson 
could set with his head, and keep his own legs out of and get the profits 
from and let another man in for, was Compeyson's business. He'd no more 
heart than a iron file, he was as cold as death, and he had the head of the 
Devil afore mentioned.
'There was another in with Compeyson, as was called Arthur - not as being 
so chrisen'd, but as a surname. He was in a Decline, and was a shadow to 
look at. Him and Compeyson had been in a bad thing with a rich lady some 
years afore, and they'd made a pot of money by it; but Compeyson betted and 
gamed, and he'd have run through the king's taxes. So, Arthur was a dying, 
and a dying poor and with the horrors on him, and Compeyson's wife (which 
Compeyson kicked mostly) was a having pity on him when she could, and 
Compeyson was a having pity on nothing and nobody.
'I might a took warning by Arthur, but I didn't; and I won't pretend I was 
partick'ler - for where 'ud be the good on it, dear boy and comrade? So I 
begun wi' Compeyson, and a poor tool I was in his hands. Arthur lived at 
the top of Compeyson's house (over nigh Brentford it was), and Compeyson 
kept a careful account agen him for board and lodging, in case he should 
ever get better to work it out. But Arthur soon settled the account. The 
second or third time as ever I see him, he come a tearing down into 
Compeyson's parlour late at night, in only a flannel gown, with his hair 
all in a sweat, and he says to Compeyson's wife, "Sally, she really is 
upstairs alonger me, now, and I can't get rid of her. She's all in white," 
he says, "wi' white flowers in her hair, and she's awful mad, and she's got 
a shroud hanging over her arm, and she says she'll put it on me at five in 
the morning."
'Says Compeyson: "Why, you fool, don't you know she's got a living body? 
And how should she be up there, without coming through the door, or in at 
the window, and up the stairs?"
'"I don't know how she's there," says Arthur, shivering dreadful with the 
horrors, "but she's standing in the corner at the foot of the bed, awful 
mad. And over where her heart's brook - you broke it! - there's drops of 
blood."
'Compeyson spoke hardy, but he was always a coward. "Go up alonger this 
drivelling sick man," he says to his wife, "and Magwitch, lend her a hand, 
will you?" But he never come nigh himself.
'Compeyson's wife and me took him up to bed agen, and he raved most 
dreadful. "Why look at her!" he cries out. "She's a shaking the shroud at 
me! Don't you see her? Look at her eyes! Ain't it awful to see her so mad?" 
Next, he cries, "She'll put it on me, and then I'm done for! Take it away 
from her, take it away!" And then he catched hold of us, and kep on a 
talking to her, and answering of her, till I half believed I see her 
myself.
'Compeyson's wife, being used to him, giv him some liquor to get the 
horrors off, and by-and-by he quieted. "Oh, she's gone! Has her keeper been 
for her?" he says. "Yes," says Compeyson's wife. "Did you tell him to lock 
her and bar her in?" "Yes." "And to take that ugly thing away from her?" 
"Yes, yes, all right." "You're a good creetur," he says, "don't leave me, 
whatever you do, and thank you!"
'He rested pretty quiet till it might want a few minutes of five, and then 
he starts up with a scream, and screams out, "Here she is! She's got the 
shroud again. She's unfolding it. She's coming out of the corner. She's 
coming to the bed. Hold me, both on you - one of each side - don't let her 
touch me with it. Hah! she missed me that time. Don't let her throw it over 
my shoulders. Don't let her lift me up to get it round me. She's lifting me 
up. Keep me down!" Then he lifted himself up hard, and was dead.
'Compeyson took it easy as a good riddance for both sides. Him and me was 
soon busy, and first he swore me (being ever artful) on my own book - this 
here little black book, dear boy, what I swore your comrade on.
'Not to go into the things that Compeyson planned, and I done - which 'ud 
take a week - I'll simply say to you, dear boy, and Pip's comrade, that 
that man got me into such nets as made me his black slave. I was always in 
debt to him, always under his thumb, always a working, always a getting 
into danger. He was younger than me, but he'd got craft, and he'd got 
learning, and he overmatched me five hundred times told and no mercy. My 
Missis as I had the hard time wi' - Stop though! I ain't brought her in - '
He looked about him in a confused way, as if he had lost his place in the 
book of his remembrance; and he turned his face to the fire, and spread his 
hands broader on his knees, and lifted them off and put them on again.
'There ain't no need to go into it,' he said, looking round once more. 'The 
time wi' Compeyson was a'most as hard a time as ever I had; that said, 
all's said. Did I tell you as I was tried, alone, for misdemeanour, while 
with Compeyson?'
I answered, No.
'Well!' he said, 'I was, and got convicted. As to took up on suspicion, 
that was twice or three times in the four or five year that it lasted; but 
evidence was wanting. At last, me and Compeyson was both committed for 
felony - on a charge of putting stolen notes in circulation - and there was 
other charges behind. Compeyson says to me, "Separate defences, no 
communication," and that was all. And I was so miserable poor, that I sold 
all the clothes I had, except what hung on my back, afore I could get 
Jaggers.
'When we was put in the dock, I noticed first of all what a gentleman 
Compeyson looked, wi' his curly hair and his black clothes and his white 
pocket-handkercher, and what a common sort of a wretch I looked. When the 
prosecution opened and the evidence was put short, aforehand, I noticed how 
heavy it all bore on me, and how light on him. When the evidence was giv in 
the box, I noticed how it was always me that had come for'ard, and could be 
swore to, how it was always me that the money had been paid to, how it was 
always me that had seemed to work the thing and get the profit. But, when 
the defence come on, then I see the plan plainer; for, says the counsellor 
for Compeyson, "My lord and gentlemen, here you has afore you, side by 
side, two persons as your eyes can separate wide; one, the younger, well 
brought up, who will be spoke to as such; one, the elder, ill brought up, 
who will be spoke to as such; one, the younger, seldom if ever seen in 
these here transactions, and only suspected; t'other, the elder, always 
seen in 'em and always wi' his guilt brought home. Can you doubt, if there 
is but one in it, which is the one, and, if there is two in it, which is 
much the worst one?" And such-like. And when it come to character, warn't 
it Compeyson as had been to the school, and warn't it his school-fellows as 
was in this position and in that, and warn't it him as had been know'd by 
witnesses in such clubs and societies, and nowt to his disadvantage? And 
warn't it me as had been tried afore, and as had been know'd up hill and 
down dale in Bridewells and Lock-Ups? And when it come to speech-making, 
warn't it Compeyson as could speak to 'em wi' his face dropping every now 
and then into his white pocket-handkercher - ah! and wi' verses in his 
speech, too - and warn't it me as could only say, "Gentlemen, this man at 
my side is a most precious rascal"? And when the verdict come, warn't it 
Compeyson as was recommended to mercy on account of good character and bad 
company, and giving up all the information he could agen me, and warn't it 
me as got never a word but Guilty? And when I says to Compeyson, "Once out 
of this court, I'll smash that face of yourn!" ain't it Compeyson as prays 
the Judge to be protected, and gets two turnkeys stood betwixt us? And when 
we're sentenced, ain't it him as gets seven year, and me fourteen, and 
ain't it him as the Judge is sorry for, because he might a done so well, 
and ain't it me as the Judge perceives to be a old offender of wiolent 
passion, likely to come to worse?'
He had worked himself into a state of great excitement, but he checked it, 
took two or three short breaths, swallowed as often, and stretching out his 
hand towards me said, in a reassuring manner, 'I ain't a going to be low, 
dear boy!'
He had so heated himself that he took out his handkerchief and wiped his 
face and head and neck and hands, before he could go on.
'I had said to Compeyson that I'd smash that face of his, and I swore Lord 
smash mine! to do it. We was in the same prison-ship, but I couldn't get at 
him for long, though I tried. At last I come behind him and hit him on the 
cheek to turn him round and get a smashing one at him, when I was seen and 
seized. The black-hole of that ship warn't a strong one, to a judge of 
black-holes that could swim and dive. I escaped to the shore, and I was a 
hiding among the graves there, envying them as was in 'em and all over, 
when I first see my boy!'
He regarded me with a look of affection that made him almost abhorrent to 
me again, though I had felt great pity for him.
'By my boy, I was giv to understand as Compeyson was out on them marshes 
too. Upon my soul, I half believe he escaped in his terror, to get quit of 
me, not knowing it was me as had got ashore. I hunted him down. I smashed 
his face. "And now," says I "as the worst thing I can do, caring nothing 
for myself, I'll drag you back." And I'd have swum off, towing him by the 
hair, if it had come to that, and I'd a got him abroad without the 
soldiers.
'Of course he'd much the best of it to the last - his character was so 
good. He had escaped when he was made half-wild by me and my murderous 
intentions; and his punishment was light. I was put in irons, brought to 
trial again, and sent for life. I didn't stop for life, dear boy and Pip's 
comrade, being here.'
'He wiped himself again, as he had done before, and then slowly took his 
tangle of tobacco from his pocket, and plucked his pipe from his button-
hole, and slowly filled it, and began to smoke.
'Is he dead?' I asked, after a silence.
'Is who dead, dear boy?'
'Compeyson.'
'He hopes I am, if he's alive, you may be sure,' with a fierce look. 'I 
never heerd no more of him.'
Herbert had been writing with his pencil in the cover of a book. He softly 
pushed the book over to me, as Provis stood smoking with his eyes on the 
fire, and I read in it:

'Young Havisham's name was Arthur. Compeyson is the man who professed to be 
Miss Havisham's lover.'

I shut the book and nodded slightly to Herbert, and put the book by; but we 
neither of us said anything, and both looked at Provis as he stood smoking 
by the fire.


Chapter 43

Why should I pause to ask how much of my shrinking from Provis might be 
traced to Estella? Why should I loiter on my road, to compare the state of 
mind in which I had tried to rid myself of the stain of the prison before 
meeting her at the coach-office, with the state of mind in which I now 
reflected on the abyss between Estella in her pride and beauty, and the 
returned transport whom I harboured? The road would be none the smoother 
for it, the end would be none the better for it, he would not be helped, 
nor I extenuated.
A new fear had been engendered in my mind by his narrative; or rather, his 
narrative had given form and purpose to the fear that was already there. If 
Compeyson were alive and should discover his return, I could hardly doubt 
the consequence. That, Compeyson stood in mortal fear of him, neither of 
the two could know much better than I; and that, any such man as that man 
had been described to be, would hesitate to release himself for good from a 
dreaded enemy by the safe means of becoming an informer, was scarcely to be 
imagined.
Never had I breathed, and never would I breathe - or so I resolved - a word 
of Estella to Provis. But, I said to Herbert that before I could go abroad, 
I must see both Estella and Miss Havisham. This was when we were left alone 
on the night of the day when Provis told us his story. I resolved to go out 
to Richmond next day, and I went.
On my presenting myself at Mrs Brandley's, Estella's maid was called to 
tell that Estella had gone into the country. Where? To Satis House, as 
usual. Not as usual, I said, for she had never yet gone there without me; 
when was she coming back? There was an air of reservation in the answer 
which increased my perplexity, and the answer was, that her maid believed 
she was only coming back at all for a little while. I could make nothing of 
this, except that it was meant that I should make nothing of it, and I went 
home again in complete discomfiture.
Another night-consultation with Herbert after Provis was gone home (I 
always took him home, and always looked well about me), led us to the 
conclusion that nothing should be said about going abroad until I came back 
from Miss Havisham's. In the meantime, Herbert and I were to consider 
separately what it would be best to say; whether we should devise any 
pretence of being afraid that he was under suspicious observation; or 
whether I, who had never yet been abroad, should propose an expedition. We 
both knew that I had but to propose anything, and he would consent. We 
agreed that his remaining many days in his present hazard was not to be 
thought of.
Next day, I had the meanness to feign that I was under a binding promise to 
go down to Joe; but I was capable of almost any meanness towards Joe or his 
name. Provis was to be strictly careful while I was gone, and Herbert was 
to take the charge of him that I had taken. I was to be absent only one 
night, and, on my return, the gratification of his impatience for my 
starting as a gentleman on a greater scale, was to be begun. It occurred to 
me then, and as I afterwards found to Herbert also, that he might be best 
got away across the water, on that pretence - as, to make purchases, or the 
like.
Having thus cleared the way for my expedition to Miss Havisham's, I set off 
by the early morning coach before it was yet light, and was out on the open 
country-road when the day came creeping on, halting and whimpering and 
shivering, and wrapped in patches of clouds and rags of mist, like a 
beggar. When we drove up to the Blue Boar after a drizzly ride, whom should 
I see come out under the gateway, toothpick in hand, to look at the coach, 
but Bentley Drummle!
As he pretended not to see me, I pretended not to see him. It was a very 
lame pretence on both sides; the lamer, because we both went into the 
coffee-room, where he had just finished his breakfast, and where I ordered 
mine. It was poisonous to me to see him in the town, for I very well knew 
why he had come there.
Pretending to read a smeary newspaper long out of date, which had nothing 
half so legible in its local news, as the foreign matter of coffee, 
pickles, fish-sauces, gravy, melted butter, and wine, with which it was 
sprinkled all over, as if it had taken the measles in a highly irregular 
form, I sat at my table while he stood before the fire. By degrees it 
became an enormous injury to me that he stood before the fire, and I got 
up, determined to have my share of it. I had to put my hands behind his 
legs for the poker when I went up to the fireplace to stir the fire, but 
still pretended not to know him.
'Is this a cut?' said Mr Drummle.
'Oh!' said I, poker in hand; 'it's you, is it? How do you do? I was 
wondering who it was, who kept the fire off.'
With that, I poked tremendously, and having done so, planted myself side by 
side with Mr Dummle, my shoulders squared and my back to the fire.
'You have just come down?' said Mr Drummle, edging me a little away with 
his shoulder.
'Yes,' said I, edging him a little away with my shoulder.
'Beastly place,' said Drummle. - 'Your part of the country, I think?'
'Yes,' I assented. 'I am told it's very like your Shropshire.'
'Not in the least like it,' said Drummle.
Here Mr Drummle looked at his boots, and I looked at mine, and then Mr 
Drummle looked at my boots, and I looked at his.
'Have you been here long?' I asked, determined not to yield an inch of the 
fire.
'Long enough to be tired of it,' returned Drummle, pretending to yawn, but 
equally determined.
'Do you stay here long?'
'Can't say,' answered Mr Drummle. 'Do you?'
'Can't say,' said I.
I felt here, through a tingling in my blood, that if Mr Drummle's shoulder 
had claimed another hair's breadth of room, I should have jerked him into 
the window; equally, that if my own shoulder had urged a similar claim, Mr 
Drummle would have jerked me into the nearest box. He whistled a little. So 
did I.
'Large tract of marshes about here, I believe?' said Drummle.
'Yes. What of that?' said I.
Mr Drummle looked at me, and then at my boots, and then said, 'Oh!' and 
laughed.
'Are you amused, Mr Drummle?'
'No,' said he, 'not particularly. I am going out for a ride in the saddle. 
I mean to explore those marshes for amusement. Out-of-the-way villages 
there, they tell me. Curious little public-houses - and smithies - and 
that. Waiter!'
'Yes, sir.'
'Is that horse of mine ready?'
'Brought round to the door, sir.'
'I say. Look here, you sir. The lady won't ride today; the weather won't 
do.'
'Very good, sir.'
'And I don't dine, because I'm going to dine at the lady's.'
'Very good, sir.'
Then, Drummle glanced at me, with an insolent triumph on his great-jowled 
face that cut me to the heart, dull as he was, and so exasperated me, that 
I felt inclined to take him in my arms (as the robber in the storybook is 
said to have taken the old lady), and seat him on the fire.
One thing was manifest to both of us, and that was, that until relief came, 
neither of us could relinquish the fire. There was stood, well squared up 
before it, shoulder to shoulder and foot to foot, with our hands behind us, 
not budging an inch. The horse was visible outside in the drizzle at the 
door, my breakfast was put on table, Drummle's was cleared away, the waiter 
invited me to begin, I nodded, we both stood our ground.
'Have you been to the Grove since?' said Drummle.
'No,' said I, 'I had quite enough of the Finches the last time I was 
there.'
'Was that when we had a difference of opinion?'
'Yes,' I replied, very shortly.
'Come, come! They let you off easily enough,' sneered Drummle. 'You 
shouldn't have lost your temper.'
'Mr Drummle,' said I, 'you are not competent to give advice on that 
subject. When I lose my temper (not that I admit having done so on that 
occasion), I don't throw glasses.'
'I do,' said Drummle.
Again glancing at him once or twice, in an increased state of smouldering 
ferocity, I said:
'Mr Drummle, I did not seek this conversation, and I don't think it an 
agreeable one.'
'I am sure it's not,' said he, superciliously over his shoulder; 'I don't 
think anything about it.'
'And therefore,' I went on, 'with your leave, I will suggest that we hold 
no kind of communication in future.'
'Quite my opinion,' said Drummle, 'and what I should have suggested myself, 
or done - more likely - without suggesting. But don't lose your temper. 
Haven't you lost enough without that?'
'What do you mean, sir?'
'Wai-ter!,' said Drummle, by way of answering me.
The waiter reappeared.
'Look here, you sir. You quite understand that the young lady don't ride 
today, and that I dine at the young lady's?'
'Quite so, sir!'
When the waiter had felt my fast cooling teapot with the palm of his hand, 
and had looked imploringly at me, and had gone out, Drummle, careful not to 
move the shoulder next me, took a cigar from his pocket and bit the end 
off, but showed no sign of stirring. Choking and boiling as I was, I felt 
that we could not go a word further, without introducing Estella's name, 
which I could not endure to hear him utter; and therefore I looked stonily 
at the opposite wall, as if there were no one present, and forced myself to 
silence. How long we might have remained in this ridiculous position it is 
impossible to say, but for the incursion of three thriving farmers - laid 
on by the waiter, I think - who came into the coffee-room unbuttoning their 
greatcoats and rubbing their hands, and before whom, as they charged at the 
fire, we were obliged to give way.
I saw him through the window, seizing his horse's mane, and mounting in his 
blundering brutal manner, and sidling and backing away. I thought he was 
gone, when he came back, calling for a light for the cigar in his mouth, 
which he had forgotten. A man in a dust-coloured dress appeared with what 
was wanted - I could not have said from where: whether from the inn yard, 
or the street, or where not - and as Drummle leaned down from the saddle 
and lighted his cigar and laughed, with a jerk of his head towards the 
coffee-room windows, the slouching shoulders and ragged hair of this man, 
whose back was towards me, reminded me of Orlick.
Too heavily out of sorts to care much at the time whether it were he or no, 
or after all to touch the breakfast, I washed the weather and the journey 
from my face and hands, and went out to the memorable old house that it 
would have been so much the better for me never to have entered, never to 
have seen.


Chapter 44

In the room where the dressing-table stood, and where the wax candles burnt 
on the wall, I found Miss Havisham and Estella; Miss Havisham seated on a 
settee near the fire, and Estella on a cushion at her feet. Estella was 
knitting, and Miss Havisham was looking on. They both raised their eyes as 
I went in, and both saw an alteration in me. I derived that, from the look 
they interchanged.
'And what wind,' said Miss Havisham, 'blows you here, Pip?'
Though she looked steadily at me, I saw that she was rather confused. 
Estella, pausing a moment in her knitting with her eyes upon me, and then 
going on, I fancied that I read in the action of her fingers, as plainly as 
if she had told me in the dumb alphabet, that she perceived I had 
discovered my real benefactor.
'Miss Havisham,' said I, 'I went to Richmond yesterday, to speak to 
Estella; and finding that some wind had blown her here, I followed.'
Miss Havisham motioning to me for the third or fourth time to sit down, I 
took the chair by the dressing-table, which I had often seen her occupy. 
With all that ruin at my feet and about me, it seemed a natural place for 
me, that day.
'What I had to say to Estella, Miss Havisham, I will say before you, 
presently - in a few moments. It will not surprise you, it will not 
displease you. I am as unhappy as you can ever have meant me to be.'
Miss Havisham continued to look steadily at me. I could see in the action 
of Estella's fingers as they worked, that she attended to what I said: but 
she did not look up.
'I have found out who my patron is. It is not a fortunate discovery, and is 
not likely ever to enrich me in reputation, station, fortune, anything. 
There are reasons why I must say no more of that. It is not my secret, but 
another's.'
As I was silent for a while, looking at Estella and considering how to go 
on, Miss Havisham repeated, 'It is not your secret, but another's. Well?'
'When you first caused me to be brought here, Miss Havisham; when I 
belonged to the village over yonder, that I wish I had never left; I 
suppose I did really come here, as any other chance boy might have come - 
as a kind of servant, to gratify a want or a whim, and to be paid for it?'
'Ay, Pip,' replied Miss Havisham, steadily nodding her head; 'you did.'
'And that Mr Jaggers - '
'Mr Jaggers,' said Miss Havisham, taking me up in a firm tone, 'had nothing 
to do with it, and knew nothing of it. His being my lawyer, and his being 
the lawyer of your patron, is a coincidence. He holds the same relation 
towards numbers of people, and it might easily arise. Be that as it may, it 
did arise, and was not brought about by any one.'
Any one might have seen in her haggard face that there was no suppression 
or evasion so far.
'But when I fell into the mistake I have so long remained in, at least you 
led me on?' said I.
'Yes,' she returned, again nodding, steadily, 'I let you go on.'
'Was that kind?'
'Who am I,' cried Miss Havisham, striking her stick upon the floor and 
flashing into wrath so suddenly that Estella glanced up at her in surprise, 
'who am I, for God's sake, that I should be kind?'
It was a weak complaint to have made, and I had not meant to make it. I 
told her so, as she sat brooding after this outburst.
'Well, well, well!' she said. 'What else?'
'I was liberally paid for my old attendance here,' I said, to soothe her, 
'in being apprenticed, and I have asked these questions only for my own 
information. What follows has another (and I hope more disinterested) 
purpose. In humouring my mistake, Miss Havisham, you punished - practised 
on - perhaps you will supply whatever term expresses your intention, 
without offence - your self-seeking relations?'
'I did. Why, they would have it so! So would you. What has been my history, 
that I should be at the pains of entreating either them, or you, not to 
have it so! You made your own snares. I never made them.'
Waiting until she was quiet again - for this, too, flashed out of her in a 
wild and sudden way - I went on.
'I have been thrown among one family of your relations, Miss Havisham, and 
have been constantly among them since I went to London. I know them to have 
been as honestly under my delusion as I myself. And I should be false and 
base if I did not tell you, whether it is acceptable to you or no, and 
whether you are inclined to give credence to it or no, that you deeply 
wrong both Mr Matthew Pocket and his son Herbert, if you suppose them to be 
otherwise than generous, upright, open, and incapable of anything designing 
or mean.'
'They are your friends,' said Miss Havisham.
'They made themselves my friends,' said I, 'when they supposed me to have 
superseded them; and when Sarah Pocket, Miss Georgiana, and Mistress 
Camilla, were not my friends, I think.'
This contrasting of them with the rest seemed, I was glad to see, to do 
them good with her. She looked at me keenly for a little while, and then 
said quietly:
'What do you want for them?'
'Only,' said I, 'that you would not confound them with the others. They may 
be of the same blood, but, believe me, they are not of the same nature.'
Still looking at me keenly, Miss Havisham repeated:
'What do you want for them?'
'I am not so cunning, you see,' I said, in answer, conscious that I 
reddened a little, 'as that I could hide from you, even if I desired, that 
I do want something. Miss Havisham, if you would spare the money to do my 
friend Herbert a lasting service in life, but which from the nature of the 
case must be done without his knowledge, I could show you how.'
'Why must it be done without his knowledge?' she asked, settling her hands 
upon her stick, that she might regard me the more attentively.
'Because,' said I, 'I began the service myself, more than two years ago, 
without his knowledge, and I don't want to be betrayed. Why I fail in my 
ability to finish it, I cannot explain. It is a part of the secret which is 
another person's and not mine.'
She gradually withdrew her eyes from me, and turned them on the fire. After 
watching it for what appeared in the silence and by the light of the slowly 
wasting candles to be a long time, she was roused by the collapse of some 
of the red coals, and looked towards me again - at first, vacantly - then, 
with a gradually concentrating attention. All this time, Estella knitted 
on. When Miss Havisham had fixed her attention on me, she said, speaking as 
if there had been no lapse in our dialogue:
'What else?'
'Estella,' said I, turning to her now, and trying to command my trembling 
voice, 'you know I love you. You know that I have loved you long and 
dearly.'
She raised her eyes to my face, on being thus addressed, and her fingers 
piled their work, and she looked at me with an unmoved countenance. I saw 
that Miss Havisham glanced from me to her, and from her to me.
'I should have said this sooner, but for my long mistake. It induced me to 
hope that Miss Havisham meant us for one another. While I thought you could 
not help yourself, as it were, I refrained from saying it. But I must say 
it now.'
Preserving her unmoved countenance, and with her fingers still going, 
Estella shook her head.
'I know,' said I, in answer to that action; 'I know. I have no hope that I 
shall ever call you mine, Estella. I am ignorant what may become of me very 
soon, how poor I may be, or where I may go. Still, I love you. I have loved 
you ever since I first saw you in this house.'
Looking at me perfectly unmoved and with her fingers busy, she shook her 
head again.
'It would have been cruel in Miss Havisham, horribly cruel, to practise on 
the susceptibility of a poor boy, and to torture me through all these years 
with a vain hope and an idle pursuit, if she had reflected on the gravity 
of what she did. But I think she did not. I think that in the endurance of 
her own trial, she forgot mine, Estella.'
I saw Miss Havisham put her hand to her heart and hold it there, as she sat 
looking by turns at Estella and at me.
'It seems,' said Estella, very calmly, 'that there are sentiments, fancies -
 I don't know how to call them - which I am not able to comprehend. When 
you say you love me, I know what you mean, as a form of words; but nothing 
more. You address nothing in my breast, you touch nothing there. I don't 
care for what you say at all. I have tried to warn you of this; now, have I 
not?'
I said in a miserable manner, 'Yes.'
'Yes. But you would not be warned, for you thought I did not mean it. Now, 
did you not think so?'
'I thought and hoped you could not mean it. You, so young, untried, and 
beautiful, Estella! Surely it is not in Nature.'
'It is in my nature,' she returned. And then she added, with a stress upon 
the words, 'It is in the nature formed within me. I make a great difference 
between you and all other people when I say so much. I can do no more.'
'Is it not true,' said I, 'that Bentley Drummle is in town here, and 
pursuing you?'
'It is quite true,' she replied, referring to him with the indifference of 
utter contempt.
'That you encourage him, and ride out with him, and that he dines with you 
this very day?'
She seemed a little surprised that I should know it, but again replied, 
'Quite true.'
'You cannot love him, Estella!'
Her fingers stopped for the first time, as she retorted rather angrily, 
'What have I told you? Do you still think, in spite of it, that I do not 
mean what I say?'
'You would never marry him, Estella?'
She looked towards Miss Havisham, and considered for a moment with her work 
in her hands. Then she said, 'Why not tell you the truth? I am going to be 
married to him.'
I dropped my face into my hands, but was able to control myself better than 
I could have expected, considering what agony it gave me to hear her say 
those words. When I raised my face again, there was such a ghastly look 
upon Miss Havisham's, that it impressed me, even in my passionate hurry and 
grief.
'Estella, dearest dearest Estella, do not let Miss Havisham lead you into 
this fatal step. Put me aside for ever - you have done so, I well know - 
but bestow yourself on some worthier person than Drummle. Miss Havisham 
gives you to him, as the greatest slight and injury that could be done to 
the many far better men who admire you, and to the few who truly love you. 
Among those few, there may be one who loves you even as dearly, though he 
has not loved you as long, as I. Take him, and I can bear it better, for 
your sake!'
My earnestness awoke a wonder in her that seemed as if it would have been 
touched with compassion, if she could have rendered me at all intelligible 
to her own mind.
'I am going,' she said again, in a gentler voice, 'to be married to him. 
The preparations for my marriage are making, and I shall be married soon. 
Why do you injuriously introduce the name of my mother by adoption? It is 
my own act.'
'Your own act, Estella, to fling yourself away upon a brute?'
'On whom should I fling myself away?' she retorted, with a smile. 'Should I 
fling myself away upon the man who would the soonest feel (if people do 
feel such things) that I took nothing to him? There! It is done. I shall do 
well enough, and so will my husband. As to leading me into what you call 
this fatal step, Miss Havisham would have had me wait, and not marry yet; 
but I am tired of the life I have led, which has very few charms for me, 
and I am willing enough to change it. Say no more. We shall never 
understand each other.'
'Such a mean brute, such a stupid brute!' I urged in despair.
'Don't be afraid of my being a blessing to him,' said Estella; 'I shall not 
be that. Come! Here is my hand. Do we part on this, you visionary boy - or 
man?'
'O Estella!' I answered, as my bitter tears fell fast on her hand, do what 
I would to restrain them; 'even if I remained in England and could hold my 
head up with the rest, how could I see you Drummle's wife?'
'Nonsense,' she returned, 'nonsense. This will pass in no time.'
'Never, Estella!'
'You will get me out of your thoughts in a week.'
'Out of my thoughts! You are part of my existence, part of myself. You have 
been in every line I have ever read, since I first came here, the rough 
common boy whose poor heart you wounded even then. You have been in every 
prospect I have ever seen since - on the river, on the sails of the ships, 
on the marshes, in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in the wind, 
in the woods, in the sea, in the streets. You have been the embodiment of 
every graceful fancy that my mind has ever become acquainted with. The 
stones of which the strongest London buildings are made, are not more real, 
or more impossible to be displaced by your hands, than your presence and 
influence have been to me, there and everywhere, and will be. Estella, to 
the last hour of my life, you cannot choose but remain part of my 
character, part of the little good in me, part of the evil. But, in this 
separation I associate you only with the good, and I will faithfully hold 
you to that always, for you must have done me far more good than harm, let 
me feel now what sharp distress I may. O God bless you, God forgive you!'
In what ecstasy of unhappiness I got these broken words out of myself, I 
don't know. The rhapsody welled up within me, like blood from an inward 
wound, and gushed out. I held her hand to my lips some lingering moments, 
and so I left her. But ever afterwards, I remembered - and soon afterwards 
with stronger reason - that while Estella looked at me merely with 
incredulous wonder, the spectral figure of Miss Havisham, her hand still 
covering her heart, seemed all resolved into a ghastly stare of pity and 
remorse.
All done, all gone! So much was done and gone, that when I went out at the 
gate, the light of the day seemed of a darker colour than when I went in. 
For a while, I hid myself among some lanes and by-paths, and then struck 
off to walk all the way to London. For, I had by that time come to myself 
so far, as to consider that I could not go back to the inn and see Drummle 
there; that I could not bear to sit upon the coach and be spoken to; that I 
could do nothing half so good for myself as tire myself out.
It was past midnight when I crossed London Bridge. Pursuing the narrow 
intricacies of the streets which at that time tended westward near the 
Middlesex shore of the river, my readiest access to the Temple was close by 
the river-side, through Whitefriars. I was not expected till tomorrow, but 
I had my keys, and, if Herbert were gone to bed, could get to bed myself 
without disturbing him.
As it seldom happened that I came in at that Whitefriars gate after the 
Temple was closed, and as I was very muddy and weary, I did not take it ill 
that the night-porter examined me with much attention as he held the gate a 
little way open for me to pass in. To help his memory I mentioned my name.
'I was not quite sure, sir, but I thought so. Here's a note, sir. The 
messenger that brought it, said would you be so good as read it by my 
lantern?'
Much surprised by the request, I took the note. It was directed to Philip 
Pip, Esquire, and on the top of the superscription were the words, 'PLEASE 
READ THIS, HERE.' I opened it, the watchman holding up his light, and read 
inside, in Wemmick's writing:
'DON'T GO HOME.'


Chapter 45

Turning from the Temple gate as soon as I had read the warning, I made the 
best of my way to Fleet-street, and there got a late hackney chariot and 
drove to the Hummums in Covent Garden. In those times a bed was always to 
be got there at any hour of the night, and the chamberlain, letting me in 
at his ready wicket, lighted the candle next in order on his shelf, and 
showed me straight into the bedroom next in order on his list. It was a 
sort of vault on the ground floor at the back, with a despotic monster of a 
four-post bedstead in it, straddling over the whole place, putting one of 
his arbitrary legs into the fireplace and another into the doorway, and 
squeezing the wretched little washing-stand in quite a Divinely Righteous 
manner.
As I had asked for a night-light, the chamberlain had brought me in, before 
he left me, the good old constitutional rush-light of those virtuous days - 
an object like the ghost of a walking-cane, which instantly broke its back 
if it were touched, which nothing could ever be lighted at, and which was 
placed in solitary confinement at the bottom of a high tin tower, 
perforated with round holes that made a staringly wide-awake pattern on the 
walls. When I had got into bed, and lay there footsore, weary, and 
wretched, I found that I could no more close my own eyes than I could close 
the eyes of this foolish Argus. And thus, in the gloom and death of the 
night, we stared at one another.
What a doleful night! How anxious, how dismal, how long! There was an 
inhospitable smell in the room, of cold soot and hot dust; and, as I looked 
up into the corners of the tester over my head, I thought what a number of 
blue-bottle flies from the butchers', and earwigs from the market, and 
grubs from the country, must be holding on up there, lying by for next 
summer. This led me to speculate whether any of them ever tumbled down, and 
then I fancied that I felt light falls on my face - disagreeable turn of 
thought, suggesting other and more objectionable approaches up my back. 
When I had lain awake a little while, those extraordinary voices with which 
silence teems, began to make themselves audible. The closet whispered, the 
fireplace sighed, the little washing-stand ticked, and one guitar-string 
played occasionally in the chest of drawers. At about the same time, the 
eyes on the wall acquired a new expression, and in every one of those 
staring rounds I saw written, DON'T GO HOME.
Whatever night-fancies and night-noises crowded on me, they never warded 
off this DON'T GO HOME. It plaited itself into whatever I thought of, as a 
bodily pain would have done. Not long before, I had read in the newspapers, 
how a gentleman unknown had come to the Hummums in the night, and had gone 
to bed, and had destroyed himself, and had been found in the morning 
weltering in blood. It came into my head that he must have occupied this 
very vault of mine, and I got out of bed to assure myself that there were 
no red marks about; then opened the door to look out into the passages, and 
cheer myself with the companionship of a distant light, near which I knew 
the chamberlain to be dozing. But all this time, why I was not to go home, 
and what had happened at home, and when I should go home, and whether 
Provis was safe at home, were questions occupying my mind so busily, that 
one might have supposed there could be no more room in it for any other 
theme. Even when I thought of Estella, and how we had parted that day for 
ever, and when I recalled all the circumstances of our parting, and all her 
looks and tones, and the action of her fingers while she knitted - even 
then I was pursuing, here and there and everywhere, the caution Don't go 
home. When at last I dozed, in sheer exhaustion of mind and body, it became 
a vast shadowy verb which I had to conjugate. Imperative mood, present 
tense: Do not thou go home, let him not go home, let us not go home, do not 
ye or you go home, let not them go home. Then, potentially: I may not and I 
cannot go home; and I might not, could not, would not, and should not go 
home; until I felt that I was going distracted, and rolled over on the 
pillow, and looked at the staring rounds upon the wall again.
I had left directions that I was to be called at seven; for it was plain 
that I must see Wemmick before seeing any one else, and equally plain that 
this was a case in which his Walworth sentiments, only, could be taken. It 
was a relief to get out of the room where the night had been so miserable, 
and I needed no second knocking at the door to startle me from my uneasy 
bed.
The Castle battlements arose upon my view at eight o'clock. The little 
servant happening to be entering the fortress with two hot rolls, I passed 
through the postern and crossed the drawbridge, in her company, and so came 
without announcement into the presence of Wemmick as he was making tea for 
himself and the Aged. An open door afforded a perspective view of the Aged 
in bed.
'Halloa, Mr Pip!' said Wemmick. 'You did come home, then?'
'Yes,' I returned; 'but I didn't go home.'
'That's all right,' said he, rubbing his hands. 'I left a note for you at 
each of the Temple gates, on the chance. Which gate did you come to?'
I told him.
'I'll go round to the others in the course of the day and destroy the 
notes,' said Wemmick; 'it's a good rule never to leave documentary evidence 
of you can help it, because you don't know when it may be put in. I'm going 
to take a liberty with you. - Would you mind toasting this sausage for the 
Aged P.?'
I said I should be delighted to do it.
'Then you can go about your work, Mary Anne,' said Wemmick to the little 
servant; 'which leaves us to ourselves, don't you see, Mr Pip?' he added, 
winking, as she disappeared.
I thanked him for his friendship and caution, and our discourse proceeded 
in a low tone, while I toasted the Aged's sausage and he buttered the crumb 
of the Aged's roll.
'Now, Mr Pip, you know,' said Wemmick, 'you and I understand one another. 
We are in our private and personal capacities, and we have been engaged in 
a confidential transaction before today. Official sentiments are one thing. 
We are extra official.'
I cordially assented. I was so very nervous, that I had already lighted the 
Aged's sausage like a torch, and been obliged to blow it out.
'I accidentally heard, yesterday morning,' said Wemmick, 'being in a 
certain place where I once took you - even between you and me, it's as well 
not to mention names when avoidable - '
'Much better not,' said I. 'I understand you.'
'I heard there by chance, yesterday morning,' said Wemmick, 'that a certain 
person not altogether of uncolonial pursuits, and not unpossessed of 
portable property - I don't know who it may really be - we won't name this 
person - '
'Not necessary,' said I.
' - had made some little stir in a certain part of the world where a good 
many people go, not always in gratification of their own inclinations, and 
not quite irrespective of the government expense - '
In watching his face, I made quite a firework of the Aged's sausage, and 
greatly discomposed both my own attention and Wemmick's; for which I 
apologised.
' - by disappearing from such place, and being no more heard of 
thereabouts. From which,' said Wemmick, 'conjectures had been raised and 
theories formed. I also heard that you at your chambers in Garden-court, 
Temple, had been watched, and might be watched again.'
'By whom?' said I.
'I wouldn't go into that,' said Wemmick, evasively, 'it might clash with 
official responsibilities. I heard it, as I have in my time heard other 
curious things in the same place. I don't tell it you on information 
received. I heard it.'
He took the toasting-fork and sausage from me as he spoke, and set forth 
the Aged's breakfast neatly on a little tray. Previous to placing it before 
him, he went into the Aged's room with a clean white cloth, and tied the 
same under the old gentleman's chin, and propped him up, and put his 
nightcap on one side, and gave him quite a rakish air. Then, he placed his 
breakfast before him with great care, and said, 'All right, ain't you, Aged 
P.?' To which the cheerful Aged replied, 'All right, John, my boy, all 
right!' As there seemed to be a tacit understanding that the Aged was not 
in a presentable state, and was therefore to be considered invisible, I 
made a pretence of being in complete ignorance of these proceedings.
'This watching of me at my chambers (which I have once had reason to 
suspect),' I said to Wemmick when he came back, 'is inseparable from the 
person to whom you have adverted; is it?'
Wemmick looked very serious. 'I couldn't undertake to say that, of my own 
knowledge. I mean, I couldn't undertake to say it was at first. But it 
either is, or it will be, or it's in great danger of being.'
As I saw that he was restrained by fealty to Little Britain from saying as 
much as he could, and as I knew with thankfulness to him how far out of his 
way he went to say what he did, I could not press him. But I told him, 
after a little meditation over the fire, that I would like to ask him a 
question, subject to his answering or not answering, as he deemed right, 
and sure that his course would be right. He paused in his breakfast, and 
crossing his arms, and pinching his shirt-sleeves (his notion of indoor 
comfort was to sit without any coat), he nodded to me once, to put my 
question.
'You have heard of a man of bad character, whose true name is Compeyson?'
He answered with one other nod.
'Is he living?'
One other nod.
'Is he in London?'
He gave me one other nod, compressed the post-office exceedingly, gave me 
one last nod, and went on with his breakfast.
'Now,' said Wemmick, 'questioning being over;' which he emphasised and 
repeated for my guidance; 'I come to what I did, after hearing what I 
heard. I went to Garden-court to find you; not finding you, I went to 
Clarriker's to find Mr Herbert.'
'And him you found?' said I, with great anxiety.
'And him I found. Without mentioning any names or going into any details, I 
gave him to understand that if he was aware of anybody - Tom, Jack, or 
Richard - being about the chambers, or about the immediate neighbourhood, 
he had better get Tom, Jack, or Richard, out of the way while you were out 
of the way.'
'He would be greatly puzzled what to do?'
'He was puzzled what to do; not the less, because I gave him my opinion 
that it was not safe to try to get Tom, Jack, or Richard, too far out of 
the way at present. Mr Pip, I'll tell you something. Under existing 
circumstances there is no place like a great city when you are once in it. 
Don't break cover too soon. Lie close. Wait till things slacken, before you 
try the open, even for foreign air.'
I thanked him for his valuable advice, and asked him what Herbert had done?
'Mr Herbert,' said Wemmick, 'after being all of a heap for half an hour, 
struck out a plan. He mentioned to me as a secret, that he is courting a 
young lady who has, as no doubt you are aware, a bedridden Pa. Which Pa, 
having been in the Purser line of life, lies a-bed in a bow-window where he 
can see the ships sail up and down the river. You are acquainted with the 
young lady, most probably?'
'Not personally,' said I.
The truth was, that she had objected to me as an expensive companion who 
did Herbert no good, and that, when Herbert had first proposed to present 
me to her, she had received the proposal with such very moderate warmth, 
that Herbert had felt himself obliged to confide the state of the case to 
me, with a view to the lapse of a little time before I made her 
acquaintance. When I had begun to advance Herbert's prospects by Stealth, I 
had been able to bear this with cheerful philosophy; he and his affianced, 
for their part, had naturally not been very anxious to introduce a third 
person into their interviews; and thus, although I was assured that I had 
risen in Clara's esteem, and although the young lady and I had long 
regularly interchanged messages and remembrances by Herbert, I had never 
seen her. However, I did not trouble Wemmick with these particulars.
'The house with the bow-window,' said Wemmick, 'being by the river-side, 
down the Pool there between Limehouse and Greenwich, and being kept, it 
seems, by a very respectable widow who has a furnished upper floor to let, 
Mr Herbert put it to me, what did I think of that as a temporary tenement 
for Tom, Jack, or Richard? Now, I thought very well of it, for three 
reasons I'll give you. That is to say. Firstly. It's altogether out of all 
your beats, and is well away from the usual heap of streets great and 
small. Secondly. Without going near it yourself, you could always hear of 
the safety of Tom, Jack, or Richard, through Mr Herbert. Thirdly. After a 
while and when it might be prudent, if you should want to slip Tom, Jack, 
or Richard, on board a foreign packet-boat, there he is - ready.'
Much comforted by these considerations, I thanked Wemmick again and again, 
and begged him to proceed.
'Well, sir! Mr Herbert threw himself into the business with a will, and by 
nine o'clock last night he housed Tom, Jack, or Richard - whichever it may 
be - you and I don't want to know - quite successfully. At the old lodgings 
it was understood that he was summoned to Dover, and in fact he was taken 
down the Dover road and cornered out of it. Now, another great advantage of 
all this, is, that it was done without you, and when, if any one was 
concerning himself about your movements, you must be known to be ever so 
many miles off and quite otherwise engaged. This diverts suspicion and 
confuses it; and for the same reason I recommended that even if you came 
back last night, you should not go home. It brings in more confusion, and 
you want confusion.'
Wemmick, having finished his breakfast, here looked at his watch, and began 
to get his coat on.
'And now, Mr Pip,' said he, with his hands still in the sleeves, 'I have 
probably done the most I can do; but if I can ever do more - from a 
Walworth point of view, and in a strictly private and personal capacity - I 
shall be glad to do it. Here's the address. There can be no harm in your 
going here tonight and seeing for yourself that all is well with Tom, Jack, 
or Richard, before you go home - which is another reason for your not going 
home last night. But after you have gone home, don't go back here. You are 
very welcome, I am sure, Mr Pip;' his hands were now out of his sleeves, 
and I was shaking them; 'and let me finally impress one important point 
upon you.' He laid his hands upon my shoulders, and added in a solemn 
whisper: 'Avail yourself of this evening to lay hold of his portable 
property. You don't know what may happen to him. Don't let anything happen 
to the portable property.'
Quite despairing of making my mind clear to Wemmick on this point, I 
forbore to try.
'Time's up,' said Wemmick, 'and I must be off. If you had nothing more 
pressing to do than to keep here till dark, that's what I should advise. 
You look very much worried, and it would do you good to have a perfectly 
quiet day with the Aged - he'll be up presently - and a little bit of - you 
remember the pig?'
'Of course,' said I.
'Well; and a little bit of him. That sausage you toasted was his, and he 
was in all respects a first-rater. Do try him, if it is only for old 
acquaintance sake. Good-bye, Aged Parent!' in a cheery shout.
'All right, John; all right, my boy!' piped the old man from within.
I soon fell asleep before Wemmick's fire, and the Aged and I enjoyed one 
another's society by falling asleep before it more or less all day. We had 
loin of pork for dinner, and greens grown on the estate, and I nodded at 
the Aged with a good intention whenever I failed to do it drowsily. When it 
was quite dark, I left the Aged preparing the fire for toast; and I 
inferred from the number of teacups, as well as from his glances at the two 
little doors in the wall, that Miss Skiffins was expected.


Chapter 46

Eight o'clock had struck before I got into the air that was scented, not 
disagreeably, by the chips and shavings of the long-shore boat-builders, 
and mast oar and block makers. All that water-side region of the upper and 
lower Pool below Bridge, was unknown ground to me, and when I struck down 
by the river, I found that the spot I wanted was not where I had supposed 
it to be, and was anything but easy to find. It was called Mill Pond Bank, 
Chinks's Basin; and I had no other guide to Chinks's Basin than the Old 
Green Copper Rope-Walk.
It matters not what stranded ships repairing in dry docks I lost myself 
among, what old hulls of ships in course of being knocked to pieces, what 
ooze and slime and other dregs of tide, what yards of ship-builders and 
ship-breakers, what rusty anchors blindly biting into the ground though for 
years off duty, what mountainous country of accumulated casks and timber, 
how many rope-walks that were not the Old Green Copper. After several times 
falling short of my destination and as often over-shooting it, I came 
unexpectedly round a corner, upon Mill Pond Bank. It was a fresh kind of 
place, all circumstances considered, where the wind from the river had room 
to turn itself round; and there were two or three trees in it, and there 
was the stump of a ruined windmill, and there was the Old Green Copper Rope-
Walk - whose long and narrow vista I could trace in the moonlight, along a 
series of wooden frames set in the ground, that looked like superannuated 
haymaking-rakes which had grown old and lost most of their teeth.
Selecting from the few queer houses upon Mill Pond Bank, a house with a 
wooden front and three stories of bow-window (not bay-window, which is 
another thing), I looked at the plate upon the door, and read there, Mrs 
Whimple. That being the name I wanted, I knocked, and an elderly woman of a 
pleasant and thriving appearance responded. She was immediately deposed, 
however, by Herbert, who silently led me into the parlour and shut the 
door. It was an odd sensation to see his very familiar face established 
quite at home in that very unfamiliar room and region; and I found myself 
looking at him, much as I looked at the corner-cupboard with the glass and 
china, the shells upon the chimney-piece, and the coloured engravings on 
the wall, representing the death of Captain Cook, a ship-launch, and his 
Majesty King George the Third in a state-coachman's wig, leather-breeches, 
and top-boots, on the terrace at Windsor.
'All is well, Handel,' said Herbert, 'and he is quite satisfied, though 
eager to see you. My dear girl is with her father; and if you'll wait till 
she comes down, I'll make you known to her, and then we'll go upstairs. - 
That's her father.'
I had become aware of an alarming growling overhead, and had probably 
expressed the fact in my countenance.
'I am afraid he is a sad old rascal,' said Herbert, smiling, 'but I have 
never seen him. Don't you smell rum? He is always as it.'
'At rum?' said I.
'Yes,' returned Herbert, 'and you may suppose how mild it makes his gout. 
He persists, too, in keeping all the provisions upstairs in his room, and 
serving them out. He keeps them on shelves over his head, and will weigh 
them all. His room must be like a chandler's shop.'
While he thus spoke, the growling noise became a prolonged roar, and then 
died away.
'What else can be the consequence,' said Herbert, in explanation, 'if he 
will cut the cheese? A man with the gout in his right hand - and everywhere 
else - can't expect to get through a Double Gloucester without hurting 
himself.'
He seemed to have hurt himself very much, for he gave another furious roar.
'To have Provis for an upper lodger is quite a godsend to Mrs Whimple,' 
said Herbert, 'for of course people in general won't stand that noise. A 
curious place, Handel; isn't it?'
It was a curious place, indeed; but remarkably well kept and clean.
'Mrs Whimple,' said Herbert, when I told him so, 'is the best of 
housewives, and I really do not know what my Clara would do without her 
motherly help. For, Clara has no mother of her own, Handel, and no relation 
in the world but old Gruffandgrim.'
'Surely that's not his name, Herbert?'
'No, no,' said Herbert, 'that's my name for him. His name is Mr Barley. But 
what a blessing it is for the son of my father and mother, to love a girl 
who has no relations, and who can never bother herself, or anybody else, 
about her family!'
Herbert had told me on former occasions, and now reminded me, that he first 
knew Miss Clara Barley when she was completing her education at an 
establishment at Hammersmith, and that on her being recalled home to nurse 
her father, he and she had confided their affection to the motherly Mrs 
Whimple, by whom it had been fostered and regulated with equal kindness and 
discretion, ever since. It was understood that nothing of a tender nature 
could possibly be confided to old Barley, by reason of his being totally 
unequal to the consideration of any subject more psychological than Gout, 
Rum, and Purser's stores.
As we were thus conversing in a low tone while Old Barley's sustained growl 
vibrated in the beam that crossed the ceiling, the room door opened, and a 
very pretty slight dark-eyed girl of twenty or so, came in with a basket in 
her hand: whom Herbert tenderly relieved of the basket, and presented 
blushing, as 'Clara.' She really was a most charming girl, and might have 
passed for a captive fairy, whom that truculent Ogre, Old Barley, had 
pressed into his service.
'Look here,' said Herbert, showing me the basket, with a compassionate and 
tender smile after we had talked a little; 'here's poor Clara's supper, 
served out every night. Here's her allowance of bread, and here's her slice 
of cheese, and here's her rum - which I drink. This is Mr Barley's 
breakfast for tomorrow, served out to be cooked. Two mutton chops, three 
potatoes, some split peas, a little flour, two ounces of butter, a pinch of 
salt, and all this black pepper. It's stewed up together, and taken hot, 
and it's a nice thing for the gout, I should think!'
There was something so natural and winning in Clara's resigned way of 
looking at these stores in detail, as Herbert pointed them out, - and 
something so confiding, loving, and innocent, in her modest manner of 
yielding herself to Herbert's embracing arm - and something so gentle in 
her, so much needing protection on Mill Pond Bank, by Chinks's Basin, and 
the Old Green Copper Rope-Walk, with Old Barley growing in the beam - that 
I would not have undone the engagement between her and Herbert, for all the 
money in the pocket-book I had never opened.
I was looking at her with pleasure and admiration, when suddenly the growl 
swelled into a roar again, and a frightful bumping noise was heard above, 
as if a giant with a wooden leg were trying to bore it through the ceiling 
to come to us. Upon this Clara said to Herbert, 'Papa wants me, darling!' 
and ran away.
'There is an unconscionable old shark for you!' said Herbert. 'What do you 
suppose he wants now, Handel!?'
'I don't know,' said I. 'Something to drink?'
'That's it!' cried Herbert, as if I had made a guess of extraordinary 
merit. 'He keeps his grog ready-mixed in a little tub on the table. Wait a 
moment, and you'll hear Clara lift him up to take some. - There he goes!' 
Another roar, with a prolonged shake at the end. 'Now,' said Herbert, as it 
was succeeded by silence, 'he's drinking. Now,' said Herbert, as the growl 
resounded in the beam once more, 'he's down again on his back!'
Clara returned soon afterwards, and Herbert accompanied me upstairs to see 
our charge. As we passed Mr Barley's door, he was heard hoarsely muttering 
within, in a strain that rose and fell like wind, the following Refrain; in 
which I substitute good wishes for something quite the reverse.
'Ahoy! Bless your eyes, here's old Bill Barley. Here's old Bill Barley, 
bless your eyes. Here's old Bill Barley on the flat of his back, by the 
Lord. Lying on the flat of his back, like a drifting old dead flounder, 
here's your old Bill Barley, bless your eyes. Ahoy! Bless you.'
In this strain of consolation, Herbert informed me the invisible Barley 
would commune with himself by the day and night together; often while it 
was light, having, at the same time, one eye at a telescope which was 
fitted on his bed for the convenience of sweeping the river.
In his two cabin rooms at the top of the house, which were fresh and airy, 
and in which Mr Barley was less audible than below, I found Provis 
comfortably settled. He expressed no alarm, and seemed to feel none that 
was worth mentioning; but it struck me that he was softened - indefinably, 
for I could have said how, and could never afterwards recall how when I 
tried; but certainly.
The opportunity that the day's rest had given me for reflection, had 
resulted in my fully determining to say nothing to him respecting 
Compeyson. For anything I knew, his animosity towards the man might 
otherwise lead to his seeking him out and rushing on his own destruction. 
Therefore, when Herbert and I sat down with him by his fire, I asked him 
first of all whether he relied on Wemmick's judgment and sources of 
information?
'Ay, ay, dear boy!' he answered, with a grave nod, 'Jaggers knows.'
'Then, I have talked with Wemmick,' said I, 'and have come to tell you what 
caution he gave me and what advice.'
This I did accurately, with the reservation just mentioned; and I told him 
how Wemmick had heard, in Newgate prison (whether from officers or 
prisoners I could not say), that he was under some suspicion, and that my 
chambers had been watched; how Wemmick had recommended his keeping close 
for a time, and my keeping away from him; and what Wemmick had said about 
getting him abroad. I added, that of course, when the time came, I should 
go with him, or should follow close upon him, as might be safest in 
Wemmick's judgment. What was to follow that, I did not touch upon; neither 
indeed was I at all clear or comfortable about it in my own mind, now that 
I saw him in that softer condition, and in declared peril for my sake. As 
to altering my way of living, by enlarging my expenses, I put it to him 
whether in our present unsettled and difficult circumstances, it would not 
be simply ridiculous, if it were no worse?
He could not deny this, and indeed was very reasonable throughout. His 
coming back was a venture, he said, and he had always known it to be a 
venture. He would do nothing to make it a desperate venture, and he had 
very little fear of his safety with such good help.
Herbert, who had been looking at the fire and pondering, here said that 
something had come into his thoughts arising out of Wemmick's suggestion, 
which it might be worth while to pursue. 'We are both good watermen, 
Handel, and could take him down the river ourselves when the right time 
comes. No boat would then be hired for the purpose, and no boatmen; that 
would save at least a chance of suspicion, and any chance is worth saving. 
Never mind the season; don't you think it might be a good thing if you 
began at once to keep a boat at the Temple stairs, and were in the habit of 
rowing up and down the river? You fall into that habit, and then who 
notices or minds? Do it twenty or fifty times, and there is nothing special 
in your doing it the twenty-first or fifty-first.'
I liked this scheme, and Provis was quite elated by it. We agreed that it 
should be carried into execution, and that Provis should never recognise us 
if we came below Bridge and rowed past Mill Pond Bank. But, we further 
agreed that he should pull down the blind in that part of his window which 
gave upon the east, whenever he saw us and all was right.
Our conference being now ended, and everything arranged, I rose to go; 
remarking to Herbert that he and I had better not go home together, and 
that I would take half an hour's start of him. 'I don't like to leave you 
here,' I said to Provis, 'though I cannot doubt your being safer here than 
near me. Good-bye!'
'Dear boy,' he answered, clasping my hands, 'I don't know when we may meet 
again, and I don't like Good-bye. Say Good Night!'
'Good night! Herbert will go regularly between us, and when the time comes 
you may be certain I shall be ready. Good night, Good night!'
We thought it best that he should stay in his own rooms, and we left him on 
the landing outside his door, holding a light over the stair-rail to light 
us down stairs. Looking back at him, I thought of the first night of his 
return when our positions were reversed, and when I little supposed my 
heart could ever be as heavy and anxious at parting from him as it was now.
Old Barley was growling and swearing when we repassed his door, with no 
appearance of having ceased or of meaning to cease. When we got to the foot 
of the stairs, I asked Herbert whether he had preserved the name of Provis. 
He replied, certainly not, and that the lodger was Mr Campbell. He also 
explained that the utmost known of Mr Campbell there, was, that he 
(Herbert) had Mr Campbell consigned to him, and felt a strong personal 
interest in his being well cared for, and living a secluded life. So, when 
we went into the parlour where Mrs Whimple and Clara were seated at work, I 
said nothing of my own interest in Mr Campbell, but kept it to myself.
When I had taken leave of the pretty gentle dark-eyed girl, and of the 
motherly woman who had not outlived her honest sympathy with a little 
affair of true love, I felt as if the Old Green Copper Rope-Walk had grown 
quite a different place. Old Barley might be as old as the hills, and might 
swear like a whole field of troopers, but there were redeeming youth and 
trust and hope enough in Chinks's Basin to fill it to overflowing. And then 
I thought of Estella, and of our parting, and went home very sadly.
All things were as quiet in the Temple as ever I had seen them. The windows 
of the rooms of that side, lately occupied by Provis, were dark and still, 
and there was no lounger in Garden-court. I walked past the fountain twice 
or thrice before I descended the steps that were between me and my rooms, 
but I was quite alone. Herbert coming to my bedside when he came in - for I 
went straight to bed, dispirited and fatigued - made the same report. 
Opening one of the windows after that, he looked out into the moonlight, 
and told me that the pavement was a solemnly empty as the pavement of any 
Cathedral at that same hour.
Next day, I set myself to get the boat. It was soon done, and the boat was 
brought round to the Temple stairs, and lay where I could reach her within 
a minute or two. Then, I began to go out as for training and practice: 
sometimes alone, sometimes with Herbert. I was often out in cold, rain, and 
sleet, but nobody took much note of me after I had been out a few times. At 
first, I kept above Blackfriars Bridge; but as the hours of the tide 
changed, I took towards London Bridge. It was Old London Bridge in those 
days, and at certain states of the tide there was a race and fall of water 
there which gave it a bad reputation. But I knew well enough how to 'shoot' 
the bridge after seeing it done, and so began to row about among the 
shipping in the Pool, and down to Erith. The first time I passed Mill Pond 
Bank, Herbert and I were pulling a pair of oars; and, both in going and 
returning, we saw the blind towards the east come down. Herbert was rarely 
there less frequently than three times in a week, and he never brought me a 
single word of intelligence that was at all alarming. Still, I knew that 
there was cause for alarm, and I could not get rid of the notion of being 
watched. Once received, it is a haunting idea; how many undesigning persons 
I suspected of watching me, it would be hard to calculate.
In short, I was always full of fears for the rash man who was in hiding. 
Herbert had sometimes said to me that he found it pleasant to stand at one 
of our windows after dark, when the tide was running down, and to think 
that it was flowing, with everything it bore, towards Clara. But I thought 
with dread that it was flowing towards Magwitch, and that any black mark on 
its surface might be his pursuers, going swiftly, silently, and surely, to 
take him.


Chapter 47

Some weeks passed without bringing any change. We waited for Wemmick, and 
he made no sign. If I had never known him out of Little Britain, and had 
never enjoyed the privilege of being on a familiar footing at the Castle, I 
might have doubted him; not so for a moment, knowing him as I did.
My worldly affairs began to wear a gloomy appearance, and I was pressed for 
money by more than one creditor. Even I myself began to know the want of 
money (I mean of ready money in my own pocket), and to relieve it by 
converting some easily spared articles of jewellery into cash. But I had 
quite determined that it would be a heartless fraud to take more money from 
my patron in the existing state of my uncertain thoughts and plans. 
Therefore, I had sent him the unopened pocket-book by Herbert, to hold in 
his own keeping, and I felt a kind of satisfaction - whether it was a false 
kind or a true, I hardly know - in not having profited by his generosity 
since his revelation of himself.
As the time wore on, an impression settled heavily upon me that Estella was 
married. Fearful of having it confirmed, though it was all but a 
conviction, I avoided the newspapers, and begged Herbert (to whom I had 
confided the circumstances of our last interview) never to speak of her to 
me. Why I hoarded up this last wretched little rag of the robe of hope that 
was rent and given to the winds, how do I know! Why did you who read this, 
commit that not dissimilar inconsistency of your own, last year, last 
month, last week?
It was an unhappy life that I lived, and its one dominant anxiety, towering 
over all its other anxieties like a high mountain above a range of 
mountains, never disappeared from my view. Still, no new cause for fear 
arose. Let me start from my bed as I would, with the terror fresh upon me 
that he was discovered; let me sit listening as I would, with dread, for 
Herbert's returning step at night, lest it should be fleeter than ordinary, 
and winged with evil news; for all that, and much more to like purpose, the 
round of things went on. Condemned to inaction and a state of constant 
restlessness and suspense, I rowed about in my boat, and waited, waited, 
waited, as I best could.
There were states of the tide when, having been down the river, I could not 
get back through the eddy-chafed arches and starlings of old London Bridge; 
then, I left my boat at a wharf near the Custom House, to be brought up 
afterwards to the Temple stairs. I was not averse to doing this, as it 
served to make me and my boat a commoner incident among the water-side 
people there. From this slight occasion, sprang two meetings that I have 
now to tell of.
One afternoon, late in the month of February, I came ashore at the wharf at 
dusk. I had pulled down as far as Greenwich with the ebb tide, and had 
turned with the tide. It had been a fine bright day, but had become foggy 
as the sun dropped, and I had had to feel my way back among the shipping, 
pretty carefully. Both in going and returning, I had seen the signal in his 
window, All well.
As it was a raw evening and I was cold, I thought I would comfort myself 
with dinner at once; and as I had hours of dejection and solitude before me 
if I went home to the Temple, I thought I would afterwards go to the play. 
The theatre where Mr Wopsle had achieved his questionable triumph, was in 
that waterside neighbourhood (it is nowhere now), and to that theatre I 
resolved to go. I was aware that Mr Wopsle had not succeeded in reviving 
the Drama, but, on the contrary, had rather partaken of its decline. He had 
been ominously heard of, through the playbills, as a faithful Black, in 
connection with a little girl of noble birth, and a monkey. And Herbert had 
seen him as a predatory Tartar of comic propensities, with a face like a 
red brick, and an outrageous hat all over bells.
I dined at what Herbert and I used to call a Geographical chop-house - 
where there were maps of the world in porter-pot rims on every half-yard of 
the tablecloths, and charts of gravy on every one of the knives - to this 
day there is scarcely a single chop-house within the Lord Mayor's dominions 
which is not Geographical - and wore out the time in dozing over crumbs, 
staring at gas, and baking in a hot blast of dinners. By-and-by, I roused 
myself and went to the play.
There, I found a virtuous boatswain in his Majesty's service - a most 
excellent man, though I could have wished his trousers not quite so tight 
in some places and not quite so loose in others - who knocked all the 
little men's hats over their eyes, though he was very generous and brave, 
and who wouldn't hear of anybody's paying taxes, though he was very 
patriotic. He had a bag of money in his pocket, like a pudding in the 
cloth, and on that property married a young person in bed-furniture, with 
great rejoicings; the whole population of Portsmouth (nine in number at the 
last Census) turning out on the beach, to rub their own hands and shake 
everybody else's, and sing 'Fill, fill!' A certain dark-complexioned Swab, 
however, who wouldn't fill, or do anything else that was proposed to him, 
and whose heart was openly stated (by the boatswain) to be as black as his 
figure-head, proposed to two other Swabs to get all mankind into 
difficulties; which was so effectually done (the Swab family having 
considerable political influence) that it took half the evening to set 
things right, and then it was only brought about through an honest little 
grocer with a white hat, black gaiters, and red nose, getting into a clock, 
with a gridiron, and listening, and coming out, and knocking everybody down 
from behind with the gridiron whom he couldn't confute with what he had 
overheard. This led to Mr Wopsle's (who had never been heard of before) 
coming in with a star and garter on, as a plenipotentiary of great power 
direct from the Admiralty, to say that the Swabs were all to go to prison 
on the spot, and that he had brought the boatswain down the Union Jack, as 
a slight acknowledgment of his public services. The boatswain, unmanned for 
the first time, respectfully dried his eyes on the Jack, and then cheering 
up and addressing Mr Wopsle as Your Honour, solicited permission to take 
him by the fin. Mr Wopsle conceding his fin with a gracious dignity, was 
immediately shoved into a dusty corner while everybody danced a hornpipe; 
and from that corner, surveying the public with a discontented eye, became 
aware of me.
The second piece was the last new grand comic Christmas pantomime, in the 
first scene of which, it pained me to suspect that I detected Mr Wopsle 
with red worsted legs under a highly magnified phosphoric countenance and a 
shock of red curtain-fringe for his hair, engaged in the manufacture of 
thunderbolts in a mine, and displaying great cowardice when his gigantic 
master came home (very hoarse) to dinner. But he presently presented 
himself under worthier circumstances; for, the Genius of Youthful Love 
being in want of assistance - on account of the parental brutality of an 
ignorant farmer who opposed the choice of his daughter's heart, by 
purposely falling upon the object, in a flour sack, out of the first-floor 
window - summoned a sententious Enchanter; and he, coming up from the 
antipodes rather unsteadily, after an apparently violent journey, proved to 
be Mr Wopsle in a high-crowned hat, with a necromantic work in one volume 
under his arm. The business of this enchanter on earth, being principally 
to be talked at, sung at, butted at, danced at, and flashed at with fires 
of various colours, he had a good deal of time on his hands. And I observed 
with great surprise, that he devoted it to staring in my direction as if he 
were lost in amazement.
There was something so remarkable in the increasing glare of Mr Wopsle's 
eye, and he seemed to be turning so many things over in his mind and to 
grow so confused, that I could not make it out. I sat thinking of it, long 
after he had ascended to the clouds in a large watch-case, and still I 
could not make it out. I was still thinking of it when I came out of the 
theatre an hour afterwards, and found him waiting for me near the door.
'How do you do?' said I, shaking hands with him as we turned down the 
street together. 'I saw that you saw me.'
'Saw you, Mr Pip!' he returned. 'Yes, of course I saw you. But who else was 
there?'
'Who else?'
'It is the strangest thing,' said Mr Wopsle, drifting into his lost look 
again; 'and yet I could swear to him.'
Becoming alarmed, I entreated Mr Wopsle to explain his meaning.
'Whether I should have noticed him at first but for your being there,' said 
Mr Wopsle, going on in the same lost way, 'I can't be positive; yet I think 
I should.'
Involuntarily I looked round me, as I was accustomed to look round me when 
I went home; for, these mysterious words gave me a chill.
'Oh! He can't be in sight,' said Mr Wopsle. 'He went out, before I went 
off, I saw him go.'
Having the reason that I had, for being suspicious, I even suspected this 
poor actor. I mistrusted a design to entrap me into some admission. 
Therefore, I glanced at him as we walked on together, but said nothing.
'I had a ridiculous fancy that he must be with you, Mr Pip, till I saw that 
you were quite unconscious of him, sitting behind you there, like a ghost.'
My former chill crept over me again, but I was resolved not to speak yet, 
for it was quite consistent with his words that he might be set on to 
induce me to connect these references with Provis. Of course, I was 
perfectly sure and safe that Provis had not been there.
'I dare say you wonder at me, Mr Pip; indeed I see you do. But it is so 
very strange! You'll hardly believe what I am going to tell you. I could 
hardly believe it myself, if you told me.'
'Indeed?' said I.
'No, indeed. Mr Pip, you remember in old times a certain Christmas Day, 
when you were quite a child, and I dined at Gargery's, and some soldiers 
came to the door to get a pair of handcuffs mended?'
'I remember it very well.'
'And you remember that there was a chase after two convicts, and that we 
joined in it, and that Gargery took you on his back, and that I took the 
lead and you kept up with me as well as you could?'
'I remember it all very well.' Better than he thought - except the last 
clause.
'And you remember that we came up with the two in a ditch, and that there 
was a scuffle between them, and that one of them had been severely handled 
and much mauled about the face, by the other?'
'I see it all before me.'
'And that the soldiers lighted torches, and put the two in the centre, and 
that we went on to see the last of them, over the black marshes, with the 
torch-light shining on their faces - I am particular about that; with the 
torch-light shining on their faces, when there was an outer ring of dark 
night all about us?'
'Yes,' said I. 'I remember all that.'
'Then, Mr Pip, one of those two prisoners sat behind you tonight. I saw him 
over your shoulder.'
'Steady!' I thought. I asked him then, 'Which of the two do you suppose you 
saw?'
'The one who had been mauled,' he answered readily, 'and I'll swear I saw 
him! The more I think of him, the more certain I am of him.'
'This is very curious!' said I, with the best assumption I could put on, of 
its being nothing more to me. 'Very curious indeed!'
I cannot exaggerate the enhanced disquiet into which this conversation 
threw me, or the special and peculiar terror I felt at Compeyson's having 
been behind me 'like a ghost.' For, if he had ever been out of my thoughts 
for a few moments together since the hiding had begun, it was in those very 
moments when he was closest to me; and to think that I should be so 
unconscious and off my guard after all my care, was as if I had shut an 
avenue of a hundred doors to keep him out, and then had found him at my 
elbow. I could not doubt either that he was there, because I was there, and 
that however slight an appearance of danger there might be about us, danger 
was always near and active.
I put such questions to Mr Wopsle as, When did the man come in? He could 
not tell me that; he saw me, and over my shoulder he saw the man. It was 
not until he had seen him for some time that he began to identify him; but 
he had from the first vaguely associated him with me, and known him as 
somehow belonging to me in the old village time. How was he dressed? 
Prosperously, but not noticeably otherwise; he thought, in black. Was his 
face at all disfigured? No, he believed not. I believed not, too, for, 
although in my brooding state I had taken no especial notice of the people 
behind me, I thought it likely that a face at all disfigured would have 
attracted my attention.
When Mr Wopsle had imparted to me all that he could recall or I extract, 
and when I had treated him to a little appropriate refreshment after the 
fatigues of the evening, we parted. It was between twelve and one o'clock 
when I reached the Temple, and the gates were shut. No one was near me when 
I went in and went home.
Herbert had come in, and we held a very serious council by the fire. But 
there was nothing to be done, saving to communicate to Wemmick what I had 
that night found out, and to remind him that we waited for his hint. As I 
thought that I might compromise him if I went too often to the Castle, I 
made this communication by letter. I wrote it before I went to bed, and 
went out and posted it; and again no one was near me. Herbert and I agreed 
that we could do nothing else but be very cautious. And we were very 
cautious indeed - more cautious than before, if that were possible - and I 
for my part never went near Chinks's Basin, except when I rowed by, and 
then I only looked at Mill Pond Bank as I looked at anything else.


Chapter 48

The second of the two meetings referred to in the last chapter, occurred 
about a week after the first. I had again left my boat at the wharf below 
Bridge; the time was an hour earlier in the afternoon; and, undecided where 
to dine, I had strolled up into Cheapside, and was strolling along it, 
surely the most unsettled person in all the busy concourse, when a large 
hand was laid upon my shoulder, by some one overtaking me. It was Mr 
Jaggers's hand, and he passed it through my arm.
'As we are going in the same direction, Pip, we may walk together. Where 
are you bound for?'
'For the Temple, I think,' said I.
'Don't you know?' said Mr Jaggers.
'Well,' I returned, glad for once to get the better of him in cross-
examination, 'I do not know, for I have not made up my mind.'
'You are going to dine?' said Mr Jaggers. 'You don't mind admitting that, I 
suppose?'
'No,' I returned, 'I don't mind admitting that.'
'And are not engaged?'
'I don't mind admitting also, that I am not engaged.'
'Then,' said Mr Jaggers, 'come and dine with me.'
I was going to excuse myself, when he added, 'Wemmick's coming.' So, I 
changed my excuse into an acceptance - the few words I had uttered, serving 
for the beginning of either - and we went along Cheapside and slanted off 
to Little Britain, while the lights were springing up brilliantly in the 
shop windows, and the street lamp-lighters, scarcely finding ground enough 
to plant their ladders on in the midst of the afternoon's bustle, were 
skipping up and down and running in and out, opening more red eyes in the 
gathering fog than my rushlight tower at the Hummums had opened white eyes 
in the ghostly wall.
At the office in Little Britain there was the usual letter-writing, hand-
washing, candle-snuffing, and safe-locking, that closed the business of the 
day. As I stood idle by Mr Jaggerd's fire, its rising and falling flame 
made the two casts on the shelf look as if they were playing a diabolical 
game at bo-peep with me; while the pair of coarse fat office candles that 
dimly lighted Mr Jaggers as he wrote in a corner, were decorated with dirty 
winding-sheets, as if in remembrance of a host of hanged clients.
We went to Gerrard-street, all three together, in a hackney-coach: and as 
soon as we got there, dinner was served. Although I should not have thought 
of making, in that place, the most distant reference by so much as a look 
to Wemmick's Walworth sentiments, yet I should have had no objection to 
catching his eye now and then in a friendly way. But it was not to be done. 
He turned his eyes on Mr Jaggers whenever he raised them from the table, 
and was as dry and distant to me as if there were twin Wemmicks and this 
was the wrong one.
'Did you send that note of Miss Havisham's to Mr Pip, Wemmick?' Mr Jaggers 
asked, soon after we began dinner.
'No, sir,' returned Wemmick; 'it was going by post, when you brought Mr Pip 
into the office. Here it is.' He handed it to his principal, instead of to 
me.
'It's a note of two lines, Pip,' said Mr Jaggers, handing it on, 'sent up 
to me by Miss Havisham, on account of her not being sure of your address. 
She tells me that she wants to see you on a little matter of business you 
mentioned to her. You'll go down?'
'Yes,' said I, casting my eyes over the note, which was exactly in those 
terms.
'When do you think of going down?'
'I have an impending engagement,' said I, glancing at Wemmick, who was 
putting fish into the post-office, 'that renders me rather uncertain of my 
time. At once, I think.'
'If Mr Pip has the intention of going at once,' said Wemmick to Mr Jaggers, 
'he needn't write an answer, you know.'
Receiving this as an intimation that it was best not to delay, I settled 
that I would go tomorrow, and said so. Wemmick drank a glass of wine and 
looked with a grimly satisfied air at Mr Jaggers, but not at me.
'So, Pip! Our friend the Spider,' said Mr Jaggers, 'has played his cards. 
He has won the pool.'
It was as much as I could do to assent.
'Hah! He is a promising fellow - in his way - but he may not have it all 
his own way. The stronger will win in the end, but the stronger has to be 
found out first. If he should turn to, and beat her - '
'Surely,' I interrupted, with a burning face and heart, 'you do not 
seriously think that he is scoundrel enough for that, Mr Jaggers?'
'I didn't say so, Pip. I am putting a case. If he should turn to and beat 
her, he may possibly get the strength on his side; if it should be a 
question of intellect, he certainly will not. It would be chance work to 
give an opinion how a fellow of that sort will turn out in such 
circumstances, because it's a toss-up between two results.'
'May I ask what they are?'
'A fellow like our friend the Spider,' answered Mr Jaggers, 'either beats, 
or cringes. He may cringe and growl, or cringe and not growl; but he either 
beats or cringes. Ask Wemmick his opinion.'
'Either beats or cringes,' said Wemmick, not at all addressing himself to 
me.
'So, here's to Mrs Bentley Drummle,' said Mr Jaggers, taking a decanter of 
choicer wine from his dumb-waiter, and filing for each of us and for 
himself, 'and may the question of supremacy be settled to the lady's 
satisfaction! To the satisfaction of the lady and the gentleman, it never 
will be. Now, Molly, Molly, Molly, Molly, how slow you are today!'
She was at his elbow when he addressed her, putting a dish upon the table. 
As she withdrew her hands from it, she fell back a step or two, nervously 
muttering some excuse. And a certain action of her fingers as she spoke 
arrested my attention.
'What's the matter?' said Mr Jaggers.
'Nothing. Only the subject we were speaking of,' said I, 'was rather 
painful to me.'
The action of her fingers was like the action of knitting. She stood 
looking at her master, not understanding whether she was free to go, or 
whether he had more to say to her and would call her back if she did go. 
Her look was very intent. Surely, I had seen exactly such eyes and such 
hands, on a memorable occasion very lately!
He dismissed her, and she glided out of the room. But she remained before 
me, as plainly as if she were still there. I looked at those hands, I 
looked at those eyes, I looked at that flowing hair; and I compared them 
with other hands, other eyes, other hair, that I knew of, and with what 
those might be after twenty years of a brutal husband and a stormy life. I 
looked again at those hands and eyes of the housekeeper, and thought of the 
inexplicable feeling that had come over me when I last walked - not alone - 
in the ruined garden, and through the deserted brewery. I thought how the 
same feeling had come back when I saw a face looking at me, and a hand 
waving to me, from a stage-coach window; and how it had come back again and 
had flashed about me like Lightning, when I had passed in a carriage - not 
alone - through a sudden glare of light in a dark street. I thought how one 
link of association had helped that identification in the theatre, and how 
such a link, wanting before, had been riveted for me now, when I had passed 
by a chance swift from Estella's name to the fingers with their knitting 
action, and the attentive eyes. And I felt absolutely certain that this 
woman was Estella's mother.
Mr Jaggers had seen me with Estella, and was not likely to have missed the 
sentiments I had been at no pains to conceal. He nodded when I said the 
subject was painful to me, clapped me on the back, put round the wine 
again, and went on with his dinner.
Only twice more, did the housekeeper reappear, and then her stay in the 
room was very short, and Mr Jaggers was sharp with her. But her hands were 
Estella's hands, and her eyes were Estella's eyes, and if she had 
reappeared a hundred times I could have been neither more sure nor less 
sure that my conviction was the truth.
It was a dull evening, for Wemmick drew his wine when it came round, quite 
as a matter of business - just as he might have drawn his salary when that 
came round - and with his eyes on his chief, sat in a state of perpetual 
readiness for cross-examination. As to the quantity of wine, his post-
office was as indifferent and ready as and other post-office for its 
quantity of letters. From my point of view, he was the wrong twin all the 
time, and only externally like the Wemmick of Walworth.
We took our leave early, and left together. Even when we were groping among 
Mr Jaggers's stock of boots for our hats, I felt that the right twin was on 
his way back; and we had not gone half a dozen yards down Gerrard-street in 
the Walworth direction before I found that I was walking arm-in-arm with 
the right twin, and that the wrong twin had evaporated into the evening 
air.
'Well!' said Wemmick, 'that's over! He's a wonderful man, without his 
living likeness; but I feel that I have to screw myself up when I dine with 
him - and I dine more comfortably unscrewed.'
I felt that this was a good statement of the case, and told him so.
'Wouldn't say it to anybody but yourself,' he answered. 'I know that what 
is said between you and me, goes no further.'
I asked him if he had ever seen Miss Havisham's adopted daughter, Mrs 
Bentley Drummle? He said no. To avoid being too abrupt, I then spoke of the 
Aged, and of Miss Skiffins. He looked rather sly when I mentioned Miss 
Skiffins, and stopped in the street to blow his nose, with a roll of the 
head and a flourish not quite free from latent boastfulness.
'Wemmick,' said I, 'do you remember telling me before I first went to Mr 
Jaggers's private house, to notice that housekeeper?'
'Did I?' he replied. 'Ah, I dare say I did. Deuce take me,' he added, 
suddenly, 'I know I did. I find I am not quite unscrewed yet.'
'A wild beast tamed, you called her.'
'And what do you call her?'
'The same. How did Mr Jaggers tame her, Wemmick?'
'That's his secret. She has been with him many a long year.'
'I wish you would tell me her story. I feel a particular interest in being 
acquainted with it. You know that what is said between you and me goes no 
further.'
'Well!' Wemmick replied, 'I don't know her story - that is, I don't know 
all of it. But what I do know, I'll tell you. We are in our private and 
personal capacities, of course.'
'Of course.'
'A score or so of years ago, that woman was tried at the Old Bailey for 
murder, and was acquitted. She was a very handsome young woman, and I 
believe had some gypsy blood in her. Anyhow, I was hot enough when it was 
up, as you may suppose.'
'But she was acquitted.'
'Mr Jaggers was for her,' pursued Wemmick, with a look full of meaning, 
'and worked the case in a way quite astonishing. It was a desperate case, 
and it was comparatively early days with him then, and he worked it to 
general admiration; in fact, it may almost be said to have made him. He 
worked it himself at the police-office, day after day for many days, 
contending against even a committal; and at the trial where he couldn't 
work it himself, sat under Counsel, and - every one knew - put in all the 
salt and pepper. The murdered person was a woman; a woman, a good ten years 
older, very much larger, and very much stronger. It was a case of jealousy. 
They both led tramping lives, and this woman in Gerrard-street here had 
been married very young, over the broomstick (as we say), to a tramping 
man, and was a perfect fury in point of jealousy. The murdered woman - more 
a match for the man, certainly, in point of years - was found dead in a 
barn near Hounslow Heath. There had been a violent struggle, perhaps a 
fight. She was bruised and scratched and torn, and had been held by the 
throat at last and choked. Now, there was no reasonable evidence to 
implicate any person but this woman, and, on the improbabilities of her 
having been able to do it, Mr Jaggers principally rested his case. You may 
be sure,' said Wemmick, touching me on the sleeve, 'that he never dwelt 
upon the strength of her hands then, though he sometimes does now.'
I had told Wemmick of his showing us her wrists, that day of the dinner 
party.
'Well, sir!' Wemmick went on; 'it happened - happened, don't you see? - 
that this woman was so very artfully dressed from the time of her 
apprehension, that she looked much slighter than she really was; in 
particular, her sleeves are always remembered to have been so skilfully 
contrived that her arms had quite a delicate look. She had only a bruise or 
two about her - nothing for a tramp - but the backs of her hands were 
lacerated, and the question was, was it with fingernails? Now, Mr Jaggers 
showed that she had struggled through a great lot of brambles which were 
not as high as her face; but which she could not have got through and kept 
her hands out of; and bits of those brambles were actually found in her 
skin and put in evidence, as well as the fact that the brambles in question 
were found on examination to have been broken through, and to have little 
shreds of her dress and little spots of blood upon them here and there. But 
the boldest point he made, was this. It was attempted to be set up in proof 
of her jealousy, that she was under strong suspicion of having, at about 
the time of the murder, frantically destroyed her child by this man - some 
three years old - to revenge herself upon him. Mr Jaggers worked that, in 
this way. "We say these are not marks of fingernails, but marks of 
brambles, and we show you the brambles. You say they are marks of 
fingernails, and you set up the hypothesis that she destroyed her child. 
You must accept all consequences of that hypothesis. For anything we know, 
she may have destroyed her child, and the child in clinging to her may have 
scratched her hands. What then? You are not trying her for the murder of 
her child; why don't you? As to this case, if you will have scratches, we 
say that, for anything we know, you may have accounted for them, assuming 
for the sake of argument that you have not invented them?" To sum up, sir,' 
said Wemmick, 'Mr Jaggers was altogether too many for the Jury, and they 
gave in.'
'Has she been in his service ever since?'
'Yes; but not only that,' said Wemmick. 'She went into his service 
immediately after her acquittal, tamed as she is now. She has since been 
taught one thing and another in the way of her duties, but she was tamed 
from the beginning.'
'Do you remember the sex of the child?'
'Said to have been a girl.'
'You have nothing more to say to me tonight?'
'Nothing. I got your letter and destroyed it. Nothing.'
We exchanged a cordial Good Night, and I went home, with new matter for my 
thoughts, though with no relief from the old.


Chapter 49

Putting Miss Havisham's note in my pocket, that it might serve as my 
credentials for so soon reappearing at Satis House, in case her waywardness 
should lead her to express any surprise at seeing me, I went down again by 
the coach next day. But I alighted at the Halfway House, and breakfasted 
there, and walked the rest of the distance; for, I sought to get into the 
town quietly by the unfrequented ways, and to leave it in the same manner.
The best light of the day was gone when I passed along the quiet echoing 
courts behind the High-street. The nooks of ruin where the old monks had 
once had their refectories and gardens, and where the strong walls were now 
pressed into the service of humble sheds and stables, were almost as silent 
as the old monks in their graves. The cathedral chimes had at once a sadder 
and a more remote sound to me, as I hurried on avoiding observation, than 
they had ever had before; so, the swell of the old organ was borne to my 
ears like funeral music; and the rooks, as they hovered about the grey 
tower and swung in the bare high trees of the priory-garden, seemed to call 
to me that the place was changed, and that Estella was gone out of it for 
ever.
An elderly woman whom I had seen before as one of the servants who lived in 
the supplementary house across the back court-yard, opened the gate. The 
lighted candle stood in the dark passage within, as of old, and I took it 
up and ascended the staircase alone. Miss Havisham was not in her own room, 
but was in the larger room across the landing. Looking in at the door, 
after knocking in vain, I saw her sitting on the hearth in a ragged chair, 
close before, and lost in the contemplation of, the ashy fire.
Doing as I had often done, I went in, and stood, touching the old chimney-
piece, where she could see me when she raised her eyes. There was an air or 
utter loneliness upon her, that would have moved me to pity though she had 
wilfully done me a deeper injury than I could charge her with. As I stood 
compassionating her, and thinking how in the progress of time I too had 
come to be a part of the wrecked fortunes of that house, her eyes rested on 
me. She stared, and said in a low voice, 'Is it real?'
'It is I, Pip. Mr Jaggers gave me your note yesterday, and I have lost no 
time.'
'Thank you. Thank you.'
As I brought another of the ragged chairs to the hearth and sat down, I 
remarked a new expression on her face, as if she were afraid of me.
'I want,' she said, 'to pursue that subject you mentioned to me when you 
were last here, and to show you that I am not all stone. But perhaps you 
can never believe, now, that there is anything human in my heart?'
When I said some reassuring words, she stretched out her tremulous right 
hand, as though she was going to touch me; but she recalled it again before 
I understood the action, or knew how to receive it.
'You said, speaking for your friend, that you could tell me how to do 
something useful and good. Something that you would like done, is it not?'
'Something that I would like done very much.'
'What is it?'
I began explaining to her that secret history of the partnership. I had not 
got far into it, when I judged from her looks that she was thinking in a 
discursive way of me, rather than of what I said. It seemed to be so, for, 
when I stopped speaking, many moments passed before she showed that she was 
conscious of the fact.
'Do you break off,' she asked then, with her former air of being afraid of 
me, 'because you hate me too much to bear to speak to me?'
'No, no,' I answered, 'how can you think so, Miss Havisham! I stopped 
because I thought you were not following what I said.'
'Perhaps I was not,' she answered, putting a hand to her head. 'Begin 
again, and let me look at something else. Stay! Now tell me.'
She set her hand upon her stick, in the resolute way that sometimes was 
habitual to her, and looked at the fire with a strong expression of forcing 
herself to attend. I went on with my explanation, and told her how I had 
hoped to complete the transaction out of my means, but how in this I was 
disappointed. That part of the subject (I reminded her) involved matters 
which could form no part of my explanation, for they were the weighty 
secrets of another.
'So!' said she, assenting with her head, but not looking at me. 'And how 
much money is wanting to complete the purchase?'
I was rather afraid of stating it, for it sounded a large sum. 'Nine 
hundred pounds.'
'If I give you the money for this purpose, will you keep my secret as you 
have kept your own?'
'Quite as faithfully.'
'And your mind will be more at rest?'
'Much more at rest.'
'Are you very unhappy now?'
She asked this question, still without looking at me, but in an unwonted 
tone of sympathy. I could not reply at the moment, for my voice failed me. 
She put her left arm across the head of her stick, and softly laid her 
forehead on it.
'I am far from happy, Miss Havisham; but I have other causes of disquiet 
than any you know of. They are the secrets I have mentioned.'
After a little while, she raised her head and looked at the fire again.
'It is noble in you to tell me that you have other causes of unhappiness, 
Is it true?'
'Too true.'
'Can I only serve you, Pip, by serving your friend? Regarding that as done, 
is there nothing I can do for you yourself?'
'Nothing. I thank you for the question. I thank you even more for the tone 
of the question. But, there is nothing.'
She presently rose from her seat, and looked about the blighted room for 
the means of writing. There were non there, and she took from her pocket a 
yellow set of ivory tablets, mounted in tarnished gold, and wrote upon them 
with a pencil in a case of tarnished gold that hung from her neck.
'You are still on friendly terms with Mr Jaggers?'
'Quite. I dined with him yesterday.'
'This is an authority to him to pay you that money, to lay out at your 
irresponsible discretion for your friend. I keep no money here; but if you 
would rather Mr Jaggers knew nothing of the matter, I will send it to you.'
'Thank you, Miss Havisham; I have not the least objection to receiving it 
from him.'
She read me what she had written, and it was direct and clear, and 
evidently intended to absolve me from any suspicion of profiting by the 
receipt of the money. I took the tablets from her hand, and it trembled 
again, and it trembled more as she took off the chain to which the pencil 
was attached, and put it in mine. All this she did, without looking at me.
'My name is on the first leaf. If you can ever write under my name, "I 
forgive her," though ever so long after my broken heart is dust - pray do 
it!'
'O Miss Havisham,' said I, 'I can do it now. There have been sore mistakes; 
and my life has been a blind and thankless one; and I want forgiveness and 
direction far too much, to be bitter with you.'
She turned her face to me for the first time since she had averted it, and, 
to my amazement, I may even add to my terror, dropped on her knees at my 
feet; with her folded hands raised to me in the manner in which, when her 
poor heart was young and fresh and whole, they must often have been raised 
to heaven from her mother's side.
To see her with her white hair and her worn face kneeling at my feet, gave 
me a shock through all my frame. I entreated her to rise, and got my arms 
about her to help her up; but she only pressed that hand of mine which was 
nearest to her grasp, and hung her head over it and wept. I had never seen 
her shed a tear before, and, in the hope that the relief might do her good, 
I bent over her without speaking. She was not kneeling now, but was down 
upon the ground.
'O!' she cried, despairingly. 'What have I done! What have I done!'
'If you mean, Miss Havisham, what have you done to injure me, let me 
answer. Very little. I should have loved her under any circumstances. - Is 
she married?'
'Yes.'
It was a needless question, for a new desolation in the desolate house had 
told me so.
'What have I done! What have I done!' She wrung her hands, and crushed her 
white hair, and returned to this cry over and over again. 'What have I 
done!'
I knew not how to answer, or how to comfort her. That she had done a 
grievous thing in taking an impressionable child to mould into the form 
that her wild resentment, spurned affection, and wounded pride, found 
vengeance in, I knew full well. But that, in shutting out the light of day, 
she had shut out infinitely more; that, in seclusion, she had secluded 
herself from a thousand natural and healing influences; that, her mind, 
brooding solitary, had grown diseased, as all minds do and must and will 
that reverse the appointed order of their Maker; I knew equally well. And 
could I look upon her without compassion, seeing her punishment in the ruin 
she was, in her profound unfitness for this earth on which she was placed, 
in the vanity of sorrow which had become a master mania, like the vanity of 
penitence, the vanity of remorse, the vanity of unworthiness, and other 
monstrous vanities that have been curses in this world?
'Until you spoke to her the other day, and until I saw in you a looking-
glass that showed me what I once felt myself, I did not know what I had 
done. What have I done! What have I done!' And so again, twenty, fifty 
times over, What had she done!
'Miss Havisham,' I said, when her cry had died away, 'you may dismiss me 
from your mind and conscience. But Estella is a different case, and if you 
can ever undo any scrap of what you have done amiss in keeping a part of 
her right nature away from her, it will be better to do that, than to 
bemoan the past through a hundred years.'
'Yes, yes, I know it. But, Pip - my Dear!' There was an earnest womanly 
compassion for me in her new affection. 'My Dear! Believe this: when she 
first came to me, I meant to save her from misery like my own. At first I 
meant no more.'
'Well, well!' said I. 'I hope so.'
'But as she grew, and promised to be very beautiful, I gradually did worse, 
and with my praises, and with my jewels, and with my teachings, and with 
this figure of myself always before her a warning to back and point my 
lessons, I stole her heart away and put ice in its place.'
'Better,' I could not help saying, 'to have left her a natural heart, even 
to be bruised or broken.'
With that, Miss Havisham looked distractedly at me for a while, and then 
burst out again, What had she done!
'If you knew all my story,' she pleaded, 'you would have some compassion 
for me and a better understanding of me.'
'Miss Havisham,' I answered, as delicately as I could, 'I believe I may say 
that I do know your story, and have known it ever since I first left this 
neighbourhood. It has inspired me with great commiseration, and I hope I 
understand it and its influences. Does what has passed between us give me 
any excuse for asking you a question relative to Estella? Not as she is, 
but as she was when she first came here?'
She was seated on the ground, with her arms on the ragged chair, and her 
head leaning on them. She looked full at me when I said this, and replied, 
'Go on.'
'Whose child was Estella?'
She shook her head.
'You don't know?'
She shook her head again.
'But Mr Jaggers brought her here, or sent her here?'
'Brought her here.'
'Will you tell me how that came about?'
She answered in a low whisper and with caution: 'I had been shut up in 
these rooms a long time (I don't know how long; you know what time the 
clocks keep here), when I told him that I wanted a little girl to rear and 
love, and save from my fate. I had first seen him when I sent for him to 
lay this place waste for me; having read of him in the newspapers, before I 
and the world parted. He told me that he would look about him for such an 
orphan child. One night he brought her here asleep, and I called her 
Estella.'
'Might I ask her age then?'
'Two or three. She herself knows nothing, but that she was left an orphan 
and I adopted her.'
So convinced I was of that woman's being her mother, that I wanted no 
evidence to establish the fact in my own mind. But, to any mind, I thought, 
the connection here was clear and straight.
What more could I hope to do by prolonging the interview? I had succeeded 
on behalf of Herbert, Miss Havisham had told me all she knew of Estella, I 
had said and done what I could to ease her mind. No matter with what other 
words we parted; we parted.
Twilight was closing in when I went down stairs into the natural air. I 
called to the woman who had opened the gate when I entered, that I would 
not trouble her just yet, but would walk round the place before leaving. 
For, I had a presentiment that I should never be there again, and I felt 
that the dying light was suited to my last view of it.
By the wilderness of casks that I had walked on long ago, and on which the 
rain of years had fallen since, rotting them in many places, and leaving 
miniature swamps and pools of water upon those that stood on end, I made my 
way to the ruined garden. I went all round it; round by the corner where 
Herbert and I had fought our battle; round by the paths where Estella and I 
had walked. So cold, so lonely, so dreary all!
Taking the brewery on my way back, I raised the rusty latch of a little 
door at the garden end of it, and walked through. I was going out at the 
opposite door - not easy to open now, for the damp wood had started and 
swelled, and the hinges were yielding, and the threshold was encumbered 
with a growth of fungus - when I turned my head to look back. A childish 
association revived with wonderful force in the moment of the slight 
action, and I fancied that I saw Miss Havisham hanging to the beam. So 
strong was the impression, that I stood under the beam shuddering from head 
to foot before I knew it was a fancy - though to be sure I was there in an 
instant.
The mournfulness of the place and time, and the great terror of this 
illusion, though it was but momentary, caused me to feel an indescribable 
awe as I came out between the open wooden gates where I had once wrung my 
hair after Estella had wrung my heart. Passing on into the front court-
yard, I hesitated whether to call the woman to let me out at the locked 
gate of which she had the key, or first to go upstairs and assure myself 
that Miss Havisham was as safe and well as I had left her. I took the 
latter course and went up.
I looked into the room where I had left her, and I saw her seated in the 
ragged chair upon the hearth close to the fire, with her back towards me. 
In the moment when I was withdrawing my head to go quietly away, I saw a 
great flaming light spring up. In the same moment, I saw her running at me, 
shrieking, with a whirl of fire blazing all about her, and soaring at least 
as many feet above her head as she was high.
I had a double-caped greatcoat on, and over my arm another thick coat. That 
I got them off, closed with her, threw her down, and got them over her; 
that I dragged the great cloth from the table for the same purpose, and 
with it dragged down the heap of rottenness in the midst, and all the ugly 
things that sheltered there; that we were on the ground struggling like 
desperate enemies, and that the closer I covered her, the more wildly she 
shrieked and tried to free herself; that this occurred I knew through the 
result, but not through anything I felt, or thought, or knew I did. I knew 
nothing until I knew that we were on the floor by the great table, and that 
patches of tinder yet alight were floating in the smoky air, which, a 
moment ago, had been her faded bridal dress.
Then, I looked round and saw the disturbed beetles and spiders running away 
over the floor, and the servants coming in with breathless cries at the 
door. I still held her forcibly down with all my strength, like a prisoner 
who might escape; and I doubt if I even knew who she was, or why we had 
struggled, or that she had been in flames, or that the flames were out, 
until I saw the patches of tinder that had been her garments, no longer 
alight but falling in a black shower around us.
She was insensible, and I was afraid to have her moved, or even touched. 
Assistance was sent for and I held her until it came, as if I unreasonably 
fancied (I think I did) that if I let her go, the fire would break out 
again and consume her. When I got up, on the surgeon's coming to her with 
other aid, I was astonished to see that both my hands were burnt; for, I 
had no knowledge of it through the sense of feeling.
On examination it was pronounced that she had received serious hurts, but 
that they of themselves were far from hopeless; the danger lay mainly in 
the nervous shock. By the surgeon's directions, her bed was carried into 
that room and laid upon the great table: which happened to be well suited 
to the dressing of her injuries. When I saw her again, an hour afterwards, 
she lay indeed where I had seen her strike her stick, and had heard her say 
that she would lie one day.
Though every vestige of her dress was burnt, as they told me, she still had 
something of her old ghastly bridal appearance; for, they had covered her 
to the throat with white cotton-wool, and as she lay with a white sheet 
loosely overlying that, the phantom air of something that had been and was 
changed, was still upon her.
I found, on questioning the servants, that Estella was in Paris, and I got 
a promise from the surgeon that he would write to her by the next post. 
Miss Havisham's family I took upon myself; intending to communicate with Mr 
Matthew Pocket only, and leave him to do as he liked about informing the 
rest. This I did next day, through Herbert, as soon as I returned to town.
There was a stage, that evening, when she spoke collectedly of what had 
happened, though with a certain terrible vivacity. Towards midnight she 
began to wander in her speech, and after that it gradually set in that she 
said innumerable times in a low solemn voice, 'What have I done!' And then, 
'When she first came, I meant to save her from misery like mine.' And then, 
'Take the pencil and write under my name, "I forgive her!"' She never 
changed the order of these three sentences, but she sometimes left out a 
word in one or other of them; never putting in another word, but always 
leaving a blank and going on to the next word.
As I could do no service there, and as I had, nearer home, that pressing 
reason for anxiety and fear which even her wanderings could not drive out 
of my mind, I decided in the course of the night that I would return by the 
early morning coach: walking on a mile or so, and being taken up clear of 
the town. At about six o'clock of the morning, therefore, I leaned over her 
and touched her lips with mine, just as they said, not stopping for being 
touched, 'Take the pencil and write under my name, "I forgive her."'


Chapter 50

My hands had been dressed twice or thrice in the night, and again in the 
morning. My left arm was a good deal burned to the elbow, and, less 
severely, as high as the shoulder; it was very painful, but the flames had 
set in that direction, and I felt thankful it was no worse. My right hand 
was not so badly burnt but that I could move the fingers. It was bandaged, 
of course, but much less inconveniently than my left hand and arm; those I 
carried in a sling; and I could only wear my coat like a cloak, loose over 
my shoulders and fastened at the neck. My hair had been caught by the fire, 
but not my head or face.
When Herbert had been down to Hammersmith and seen his father, he came back 
me at our chambers, and devoted the day to attending on me. He was the 
kindest of nurses, and at stated times took off the bandages, and steeped 
them in the cooling liquid that was kept ready, and put them on again, with 
a patient tenderness that I was deeply grateful for.
At first, as I lay quiet on the sofa, I found it painfully difficult, I 
might say impossible, to get rid of the impression of the glare of the 
flames, their hurry and noise, and the fierce burning smell. If I dozed for 
a minute, I was awakened by Miss Havisham's cries, and by her running at me 
with all that height of fire above her head. This pain of the mind was much 
harder to strive against than any bodily pain I suffered; and Herbert, 
seeing that, did his utmost to hold my attention engaged.
Neither of us spoke of the boat, but we both thought of it. That was made 
apparent by our avoidance of the subject, and by our agreeing - without 
agreement - to make my recovery of the use of my hands, a question of so 
many hours, not of so many weeks.
My first question when I saw Herbert had been of course, whether all was 
well down the river? As he replied in the affirmative, with perfect 
confidence and cheerfulness, we did not resume the subject until the day 
was wearing away. But then, as Herbert changed the bandages, more by the 
light of the fire than by the outer light, he went back to it 
spontaneously.
'I sat with Provis last night, Handel, two good hours.'
'Where was Clara?'
'Dear little thing!' said Herbert. 'She was up and down with Gruffandgrim 
all the evening. He was perpetually pegging at the floor, the moment she 
left his sight. I doubt if he can hold out long though. What with rum and 
pepper - and pepper and rum - I should think his pegging must be nearly 
over.'
'And then you will be married, Herbert?'
'How can I take care of the dear child otherwise? - Lay your arm out upon 
the back of the sofa, my dear boy, and I'll sit down here, and get the 
bandage off so gradually that you shall not know when it comes. I was 
speaking of Provis. Do you know, Handel, he improves?'
'I said to you I thought he was softened when I last saw him.'
'So you did. And so he is. He was very communicative last night, and told 
me more of his life. You remember his breaking off here about some woman 
that he had had great trouble with. - Did I hurt you?'
I had started, but not under his touch. His words had given me a start.
'I had forgotten that, Herbert, but I remember it now you speak of it.'
'Well! He went into that part of his life, and a dark wild part it is. 
Shall I tell you? Or would it worry you just now?'
'Tell me by all means. Every word.'
Herbert bent forward to look at me more nearly, as if my reply had been 
rather more hurried or more eager than he could quite account for. 'Your 
head is cool?' he said, touching it.
'Quite,' said I. 'Tell me what Provis said, my dear Herbert.'
'It seems,' said Herbert, '- there's a bandage off most charmingly, and now 
comes the cool one - makes you shrink at first, my poor dear fellow, don't 
it? but it will be comfortable presently - it seems that the woman was a 
young woman, and a jealous woman, and a revengeful woman; revengeful, 
Handel, to the last degree.'
'To what last degree?'
'Murder. - Does it strike too cold on that sensitive place?'
'I don't feel it. How did she murder? Whom did she murder?'
'Why, the deed may not have merited quite so terrible a name,' said 
Herbert, 'but, she was tried for it, and Mr Jaggers defended her, and the 
reputation of that defence first made his name known to Provis. It was 
another and a stronger woman who was the victim, and there had been a 
struggle - in a barn. Who began it, or how fair it was, or how unfair, may 
be doubtful; but how it ended, is certainly not doubtful, for the victim 
was found throttled.'
'Was the woman brought in guilty?'
'No; she was acquitted. - My poor Handel, I hurt you!'
'It is impossible to be gentler, Herbert. Yes? What else?'
'This acquitted young woman and Provis had a little child: a little child 
of whom Provis was exceedingly fond. On the evening of the very night when 
the object of her jealousy was strangled as I tell you, the young woman 
presented herself before Provis for one moment, and swore that she would 
destroy the child (which was in her possession), and he should never see it 
again; then, she vanished. - There's the worst arm comfortably in the sling 
once more, and now there remains but the right hand, which is a far easier 
job. I can do it better by this light than by a stronger, for my hand is 
steadiest when I don't see the poor blistered patches too distinctly. - You 
don't think your breathing is affected, my dear boy? You seem to breathe 
quickly.'
'Perhaps I do, Herbert. Did the woman keep her oath?'
'There comes the darkest part of Provis's life. She did.'
'That is, he says she did.'
'Why, of course, my dear boy,' returned Herbert, in a tone of surprise, and 
again bending forward to get a nearer look at me. 'He says it all. I have 
no other information.'
'No, to be sure.'
'Now, whether,' pursued Herbert, 'he had used the child's mother ill, or 
whether he had used the child's mother well, Provis doesn't say; but, she 
had shared some four or five years of the wretched life he described to us 
at this fireside, and he seems to have felt pity for her, and forbearance 
towards her. Therefore, fearing he should be called upon to depose about 
this destroyed child, and so be the cause of her death, he hid himself 
(much as he grieved for the child), kept himself dark, as he says, out of 
the way and out of the trial, and was only vaguely talked of as a certain 
man called Abel, out of whom the jealousy arose. After the acquittal she 
disappeared, and thus he lost the child and the child's mother.'
'I want to ask - '
'A moment, my dear boy, and I have done. That evil genius, Compeyson, the 
worst of scoundrels among many scoundrels, knowing of his keeping out of 
the way at that time, and of his reasons for doing so, of course afterwards 
held the knowledge over his head as a means of keeping him poorer, and 
working him harder. It was clear last night that this barbed the point of 
Provis's animosity.'
'I want to know,' said I, 'and particularly, Herbert, whether he told you 
when this happened?'
'Particularly? Let me remember, then, what he said as to that. His 
expression was, "a round score o' year ago, and a'most directly after I 
took up wi' Compeyson." How old were you when you came upon him in the 
little churchyard?'
'I think in my seventh year.'
'Ay. It had happened some three or four years then, he said, and you 
brought into his mind the little girl so tragically lost, who would have 
been about your age.'
'Herbert,' said I, after a short silence, in a hurried way, 'can you see me 
best by the light of the window, or the light of the fire?'
'By the firelight,' answered Herbert, coming close again.
'Look at me.'
'I do look at you, my dear boy.'
'Touch me.'
'I do touch you, my dear boy.'
'You are not afraid that I am in any fever, or that my head is much 
disordered by the accident of last night?'
'N-no, my dear boy,' said Herbert, after taking time to examine me. 'You 
are rather excited, but you are quite yourself.'
'I know I am quite myself. And the man we have in hiding down the river, is 
Estella's Father.'


Chapter 51

What purpose I had in view when I was hot on tracing out and proving 
Estella's parentage, I cannot say. It will presently be seen that the 
question was not before me in a distinct shape, until it was put before me 
by a wiser head than my own.
But, when Herbert and I had held our momentous conversation, I was seized 
with a feverish conviction that I ought to hunt the matter down - that I 
ought not to let it rest, but that I ought to see Mr Jaggers, and come at 
the bare truth. I really do not know whether I felt that I did this for 
Estella's sake, or whether I was glad to transfer to the man in whose 
preservation I was so much concerned, some rays of the romantic interest 
that had so long surrounded her. Perhaps the latter possibility may be the 
nearer to the truth.
Any way, I could scarcely be withheld from going out to Gerrard-street that 
night. Herbert's representations that if I did, I should probably be laid 
up and stricken useless, when our fugitive's safety would depend upon me, 
alone restrained my impatience. On the understanding, again and again 
reiterated, that come what would, I was to go to Mr Jaggers tomorrow, I at 
length submitted to keep quiet, and to have my hurts looked after, and to 
stay at home. Early next morning we went out together, and at the corner of 
Giltspur-street by Smithfield, I left Herbert to go his way into the City, 
and took my way to Little Britain.
There were periodical occasions when Mr Jaggers and Wemmick went over the 
office accounts, and checked off the vouchers, and put all things straight. 
On these occasions Wemmick took his books and papers into Mr Jaggers's 
room, and one of the upstairs clerks came down into the outer office. 
Finding such clerk on Wemmick's post that morning, I knew what was going 
on; but, I was not sorry to have Mr Jaggers and Wemmick together, as 
Wemmick would then hear for himself that I said nothing to compromise him.
My appearance with my arm bandaged and my coat loose over my shoulders, 
favoured my object. Although I had sent Mr Jaggers a brief account of the 
accident as soon as I had arrived in town, yet I had to give him all the 
details now; and the speciality of the occasion caused our talk to be less 
dry and hard, and less strictly regulated by the rules of evidence, than it 
had been before. While I described the disaster, Mr Jaggers stood, 
according to his wont, before the fire. Wemmick leaned back in his chair, 
staring at me, with his hands in the pockets of his trousers, and his pen 
put horizontally into the post. The two brutal casts, always inseparable in 
my mind from the official proceedings, seemed to be congestively 
considering whether they didn't smell fire at the present moment.
My narrative finished, and their questions exhausted, I then produced Miss 
Havisham's authority to receive the nine hundred pounds for Herbert. Mr 
Jaggers's eyes retired a little deeper into his head when I handed him the 
tablets, but he presently handed them over to Wemmick, with instructions to 
draw the cheque for his signature. While that was in course of being done, 
I looked on at Wemmick as he wrote, and Mr Jaggers, poising and swaying 
himself on his well-polished boots, looked on at me. 'I am sorry, Pip,' 
said he, as I put the cheque in my pocket, when he had signed it, 'that we 
do nothing for you.'
'Miss Havisham was good enough to ask me,' I returned, 'whether she could 
do nothing for me, and I told her No.'
'Everybody should know his own business,' said Mr Jaggers. And I saw 
Wemmick's lips form the words 'portable property.'
'I should not have told her No, if I had been you,' said Mr Jaggers; 'but 
every man ought to know his own business best.'
'Every man's business,' said Wemmick, rather reproachfully towards me, 'is 
portable property.'
As I thought the time was now come for pursuing the theme I had at heart, I 
said, turning on Mr Jaggers:
'I did ask something of Miss Havisham, however, sir. I asked her to give me 
some information relative to her adopted daughter, and she gave me all she 
possessed.'
'Did she?' said Mr Jaggers, bending forward to look at his boots and then 
straightening himself. 'Hah! I don't think I should have done so, if I had 
been Miss Havisham. But she ought to know her own business best.'
'I know more of the history of Miss Havisham's adopted child, than Miss 
Havisham herself does, sir. I know her mother.'
Mr Jaggers looked at me inquiringly, and repeated 'Mother?'
'I have seen her mother within these three days.'
'Yes?' said Mr Jaggers.
'And so have you, sir. And you have seen her still more recently.'
'Yes?' said Mr Jaggers.
'Perhaps I know more of Estella's history than even you do,' said I. 'I 
know her father too.'
A certain stop that Mr Jaggers came to in his manner - he was too self-
possessed to change his manner, but he could not help its being brought to 
an indefinably attentive stop - assured me that he did not know who her 
father was. This I had strongly suspected from Provis's account (as Herbert 
had repeated it) of his having kept himself dark; which I pieced on to the 
fact that he himself was not Mr Jaggers's client until some four years 
later, and when he could have no reason for claiming his identity. But, I 
could not be sure of this unconsciousness on Mr Jaggers's part before, 
though I was quite sure of it now.
'So! You know the young lady's father, Pip?' said Mr Jaggers.
'Yes,' I replied, 'and his name is Provis - from New South Wales.'
Even Mr Jaggers started when I said those words. It was the slightest start 
that could escape a man, the most carefully repressed and the soonest 
checked, but he did start, though he made it a part of the action of taking 
out his pocket-handkerchief. How Wemmick received the announcement I am 
unable to say, for I was afraid to look at him just then, lest Mr Jaggers's 
sharpness should detect that there had been some communication unknown to 
him between us.
'And on what evidence, Pip,' asked Mr Jaggers, very coolly, as he paused 
with his handkerchief half way to his nose, 'does Provis make this claim?'
'He does not make it,' said I, 'and has never made it, and has no knowledge 
or belief that his daughter is in existence.'
For once, the powerful pocket-handkerchief failed. My reply was so 
unexpected that Mr Jaggers put the handkerchief back into his pocket 
without completing the usual performance, folded his arms, and looked with 
stern attention at me, though with an immovable face.
Then I told him all I knew, and how I knew it; with the one reservation 
that I left him to infer that I knew from Miss Havisham what I in fact knew 
from Wemmick. I was very careful indeed as to that. Nor, did I look towards 
Wemmick until I had finished all I had to tell, and had been for some time 
silently meeting Mr Jaggers's look. When I did at last turn my eyes in 
Wemmick's direction, I found that he had unposted his pen, and was intent 
upon the table before him.
'Hah!' said Mr Jaggers at last, as he moved towards the papers on the 
table, '- What item was it you were at, Wemmick, when Mr Pip came in?'
But I could not submit to be thrown off in that way, and I made a 
passionate, almost an indignant, appeal to him to be more frank and manly 
with me. I reminded him of the false hopes into which I had lapsed, the 
length of time they had lasted, and the discovery I had made: and I hinted 
at the danger that weighed upon my spirits. I represented myself as being 
surely worthy of some little confidence from him, in return for the 
confidence I had just now imparted. I said that I did not blame him, or 
suspect him, or mistrust him, but I wanted assurance of the truth from him. 
And if he asked me why I wanted it and why I thought I had any right to it, 
I would tell him, little as he cared for such poor dreams, that I had loved 
Estella dearly and long, and that, although I had lost her and must live a 
bereaved life, whatever concerned her was still nearer and dearer to me 
than anything else in the world. And seeing that Mr Jaggers stood quite 
still and silent, and apparently quite obdurate, under this appeal, I 
turned to Wemmick, and said, 'Wemmick, I know you to be a man with a gentle 
heart. I have seen your pleasant home, and your old father, and all the 
innocent cheerful playful ways with which you refresh your business life. 
And I entreat you to say a word for me to Mr Jaggers, and to represent to 
him that, all circumstances considered, he ought to be more open with me!'
I have never seen two men look more oddly at one another than Mr Jaggers 
and Wemmick did after this apostrophe. At first, a misgiving crossed me 
that Wemmick would be instantly dismissed from his employment; but, it 
melted as I saw Mr Jaggers relax into something like a smile, and Wemmick 
become bolder.
'What's all this?' said Mr Jaggers. 'You with an old father, and you with 
pleasant and playful ways?'
'Well!' returned Wemmick. 'If I don't bring 'em here, what does it matter?'
'Pip,' said Mr Jaggers, laying his hand upon my arm, and smiling openly, 
'this man must be the most cunning impostor in all London.'
'Not a bit of it,' returned Wemmick, growing bolder and bolder. 'I think 
you're another.'
Again they exchanged their former odd looks, each apparently still 
distrustful that the other was taking him in.
'You with a pleasant home?' said Mr Jaggers.
'Since it don't interfere with business,' returned Wemmick, 'let it be so. 
Now, I look at you, sir, I shouldn't wonder if you might be planning and 
contriving to have a pleasant home of your own, one of these days, when 
you're tired of all this work.'
Mr Jaggers nodded his head retrospectively two or three times, and actually 
drew a sigh. 'Pip,' said he, 'we won't talk about "poor dreams;" you know 
more about such things than I, having much fresher experience of that kind. 
But now, about this other matter. I'll put a case to you. Mind! I admit 
nothing.'
He waited for me to declare that I quite understood that he expressly said 
that he admitted nothing.
'Now, Pip,' said Mr Jaggers, 'put this case. Put the case that a woman, 
under such circumstances as you have mentioned, held her child concealed, 
and was obliged to communicate the fact to her legal adviser, on his 
representing to her that he must know, with an eye to the latitude of his 
defence, how the fact stood about that child. Put the case that at the same 
time he held a trust to find a child for an eccentric rich lady to adopt 
and bring up.'
'I follow you, sir.'
'Put the case that he lived in an atmosphere of evil, and that all he saw 
of children, was, their being generated in great numbers for certain 
destruction. Put the case that he often saw children solemnly tried at a 
criminal bar, where they were held up to be seen; put the case that he 
habitually knew of their being imprisoned, whipped, transported, neglected, 
cast out, qualified in all ways for the hangman, and growing up to be 
hanged. Put the case that pretty nigh all the children he saw in his daily 
business life, he had reason to look upon as so much spawn, to develop into 
the fish that were to come to his net - to be prosecuted, defended, 
forsworn, made orphans, bedevilled somehow.'
'I follow you, sir.'
'Put the case, Pip, that here was one pretty little child out of the heap, 
who could be saved; whom the father believed dead, and dared make no stir 
about; as to whom, over the mother, the legal adviser had this power: "I 
know what you did, and how you did it. You came so and so, this was your 
manner of attack and this the manner of resistance, you went so and so, you 
did such and such things to divert suspicion. I have tracked you through it 
all, and I tell it you all. Part with the child, unless it should be 
necessary to produce it to clear you, and then it shall be produced. Give 
the child into my hands, and I will do my best to bring you off. If you are 
saved, your child is saved too; if you are lost, your child is still 
saved." Put the case that this was done, and that the woman was cleared.'
'I understand you perfectly.'
'But that I make no admissions?'
'That you make no admissions.' And Wemmick repeated, 'No admissions.'
'Put the case, Pip, that passion and the terror of death had a little 
shaken the woman's intellects, and that when she was set at liberty, she 
was scared out of the ways of the world and went to him to be sheltered. 
Put the case that he took her in, and that he kept down the old wild 
violent nature whenever he saw an inkling of its breaking out, by asserting 
his power over her in the old way. Do you comprehend the imaginary case?'
'Quite.'
'Put the case that the child grew up, and was married for money. That the 
mother was still living. That the father was still living. That the mother 
and father unknown to one another, were dwelling within so many miles, 
furlongs, yards if you like, of one another. That the secret was still a 
secret, except that you had got wind of it. Put that last case to yourself 
very carefully.'
'I do.'
'I ask Wemmick to put it to himself very carefully.'
And Wemmick said, 'I do.'
'For whose sake would you reveal the secret? For the father's? I think he 
would not be much the better for the mother. For the mother's? I think if 
she had done such a deed she would be safer where she was. For the 
daughter's? I think it would hardly serve her, to establish her parentage 
for the information of her husband, and to drag her back to disgrace, after 
an escape of twenty years, pretty secure to last for life. But, add the 
case that you had loved her, Pip, and had made her the subject of those 
"poor dreams" which have, at one time or another, been in the heads of more 
men than you think likely, then I tell you that you had better - and would 
much sooner when you had thought well of it - chop off that bandaged left 
hand of yours with your bandaged right hand, and then pass the chopper on 
to Wemmick there, to cut that off, too.'
I looked at Wemmick, whose face was very grave. He gravely touched his lips 
with his forefinger. I did the same. Mr Jaggers did the same. 'Now, 
Wemmick,' said the latter then, resuming his usual manner, 'what item was 
it you were at, when Mr Pip came in?'
Standing by for a little, while they were at work, I observed that the odd 
looks they had cast at one another were repeated several times: with this 
difference now, that each of them seemed suspicious, not to say conscious, 
of having shown himself in a weak and unprofessional light to the other. 
For this reason, I suppose, they were now inflexible with one another; Mr 
Jaggers being highly dictatorial, and Wemmick obstinately justifying 
himself whenever there was the smallest point in abeyance for a moment. I 
had never seen them on such ill terms; for generally they got on very well 
indeed together.
But, they were both happily relieved by the opportune appearance of Mike, 
the client with the fur cap and the habit of wiping his nose on his sleeve, 
whom I had seen on the very first day of my appearance within those walls. 
This individual, who, either in his own person or in that of some member of 
his family, seemed to be always in trouble (which in that place meant 
Newgate), called to announce that his eldest daughter was taken up on 
suspicion of shop-lifting. As he imparted this melancholy circumstance to 
Wemmick, Mr Jaggers standing magisterially before the fire and taking no 
share in the proceedings, Mike's eye happened to twinkle with a tear.
'What are you about?' demanded Wemmick, with the utmost indignation. 'What 
do you come snivelling here for?'
'I didn't go to do it, Mr Wemmick.'
'You did,' said Wemmick. 'How dare you? You're not in a fit state to come 
here, if you can't come here without spluttering like a bad pen. What do 
you mean by it?'
'A man can't help his feelings, Mr Wemmick,' pleaded Mike.
'His what?' demanded Wemmick, quite savagely. 'Say that again!'
'Now, look here my man,' said Mr Jaggers, advancing a step, and pointing to 
the door. 'Get out of this office. I'll have no feelings here. Get out.'
'It serves you right,' said Wemmick, 'Get out.'
So the unfortunate Mike very humbly withdrew, and Mr Jaggers and Wemmick 
appeared to have re-established their good understanding, and went to work 
again with an air of refreshment upon them as if they had just had lunch.


Chapter 52

From Little Britain, I went, with my cheque in my pocket, to Miss 
Skiffins's brother, the accountant; and Miss Skiffins's brother, the 
accountant, going straight to Clarriker's and bringing Clarriker to me, I 
had the great satisfaction of concluding that arrangement. It was the only 
good thing I had done, and the only completed thing I had done, since I was 
first apprised of my great expectations.
Clarriker informing me on that occasion that the affairs of the House were 
steadily progressing, that he would now be able to establish a small branch-
house in the East which was much wanted for the extension of the business, 
and that Herbert in his new partnership capacity would go out and take 
charge of it, I found that I must have prepared for a separation from my 
friend, even though my own affairs had been more settled. And now indeed I 
felt as if my last anchor were loosening its hold, and I should soon be 
driving with the winds and waves.
But, there was recompense in the joy with which Herbert would come home of 
a night and tell me of these changes, little imagining that he told me no 
news, and would sketch airy pictures of himself conducting Clara Barley to 
the land of the Arabian Nights, and of me going out to join them (with a 
caravan of camels, I believe), and of our all going up the Nile and seeing 
wonders. Without being sanguine as to my own part in these bright plans, I 
felt that Herbert's way was clearing fast, and that old Bill Barley had but 
to stick to his pepper and rum, and his daughter would soon be happily 
provided for.
We had now got into the month of March. My left arm, though it presented no 
bad symptoms, took in the natural course so long to heal that I was still 
unable to get a coat on. My right arm was tolerably restored; - disfigured, 
but fairly serviceable.
On a Monday morning, when Herbert and I were at breakfast, I received the 
following letter from Wemmick by the post.

'Walworth. Burn this as soon as read. Early in the week, or say Wednesday, 
you might do what you know of, if you felt disposed to try it. Now burn.'

When I had shown this to Herbert and had put it in the fire - but not 
before we had both got it by heart - we considered what to do. For, of 
course my being disabled could now be no longer kept out of view.
'I have thought it over, again and again,' said Herbert, 'and I think I 
know a better course than taking a Thames waterman. Take Startop. A good 
fellow, a skilled hand, fond of us, and enthusiastic and honourable.'
I had thought of him, more than once.
'But how much would you tell him, Herbert?'
'It is necessary to tell him very little. Let him suppose it a mere freak, 
but a secret one, until the morning comes: then let him know that there is 
urgent reason for your getting Provis abroad and away. You go with him?'
'No doubt.'
'Where?'
It had seemed to me, in the many anxious considerations I had given the 
point, almost indifferent what port we made for - Hamburg, Rotterdam, 
Antwerp - the place signified little, so that he was got out of England. 
Any foreign steamer that fell in our way and would take us up, would do. I 
had always proposed to myself to get him well down the river in the boat; 
certainly well beyond Gravesend, which was a critical place for search or 
inquiry if suspicion were afoot. As foreign steamers would leave London at 
about the time of high-water, our plan would be to get down the river by a 
previous ebb-tide, and lie by in some quiet spot until we could pull off to 
one. The time when one would be due where we lay, wherever that might be, 
could be calculated pretty nearly, if we made inquiries beforehand.
Herbert assented to all this, and we went out immediately after breakfast 
to pursue our investigations. We found that a steamer for Hamburg was 
likely to suit our purpose best, and we directed our thoughts chiefly to 
that vessel. But we noted down what other foreign steamers would leave 
London with the same tide, and we satisfied ourselves that we knew the 
build and colour of each. We then separated for a few hours; I, to get at 
once such passports as were necessary; Herbert, to see Startop at his 
lodgings. We both did what we had to do without any hindrance, and when we 
met again at one o'clock reported done. I, for my part, was prepared with 
passports; Herbert had seen Startop, and he was more than ready to join.
Those two should pull a pair of oars, we settled, and I would steer; our 
charge would be sitter, and keep quiet; as speed was not our object, we 
should make way enough. We arranged that Herbert should not come home to 
dinner before going to Mill Pond Bank that evening; that he should not go 
there at all, tomorrow evening, Tuesday; that he should prepare Provis to 
come down to some Stairs hard by the house, on Wednesday, when he saw us 
approach, and not sooner; that all the arrangements with him should be 
concluded that Monday night; and that he should be communicated with no 
more in any way, until we took him on board.
These precautions well understood by both of us, I went home.
On opening the outer door of our chambers with my key, I found a letter in 
the box, directed to me; a very dirty letter, though not ill-written. It 
had been delivered by hand (of course since I left home), and its contents 
were these:

'If you are not afraid to come to the old marshes tonight or tomorrow night 
at Nine, and to come to the little sluice-house by the lime-kiln, you had 
better come. If you want information regarding your uncle Provis, you had 
much better come and tell no one and lose no time. You must come alone. 
Bring this with you.'

I had had load enough upon my mind before the receipt of this strange 
letter. What to do now, I could not tell. And the worst was, that I must 
decide quickly, or I should miss the afternoon coach, which would take me 
down in time for tonight. Tomorrow night I could not think of going, for it 
would be too close upon the time of the flight. And again, for anything I 
knew, the proffered information might have some important bearing on the 
flight itself.
If I had had ample time for consideration, I believe I should still have 
gone. Having hardly any time for consideration - my watch showing me that 
the coach started within half and hour - I resolved to go. I should 
certainly not have gone, but for the reference to my Uncle Provis; that, 
coming on Wemmick's letter and the morning's busy preparation, turned the 
scale.
It is so difficult to become clearly possessed of contents of almost any 
letter, in a violent hurry, that I had to read this mysterious epistle 
again, twice, before its injunction to me to be secret got mechanically 
into my mind. Yielding to it in the same mechanical kind of way, I left a 
note in pencil for Herbert, telling him that as I should be so soon going 
away, I knew not for how long, I had decided to hurry down and back, to 
ascertain for myself how Miss Havisham was faring. I had then barely time 
to get my greatcoat, lock up the chambers, and make for the coach-office by 
the short by-ways. If I had taken a hackney-chariot and gone by the 
streets, I should have missed my aim; going as I did, I caught the coach 
just as it came out of the yard. I was the only inside passenger, jolting 
away knee-deep in straw, when I came to myself.
For, I really had not been myself since the receipt of the letter; it had 
so bewildered me ensuing on the hurry of the morning. The morning hurry and 
flutter had been great, for, long and anxiously as I had waited for 
Wemmick, his hint had come like a surprise at last. And now, I began to 
wonder at myself for being in the coach, and to doubt whether I had 
sufficient reason for being there, and to consider whether I should get out 
presently and go back, and to argue against ever heeding an anonymous 
communication, and, in short, to pass through all those phases of 
contradiction and indecision to which I suppose very few hurried people are 
strangers. Still, the reference to Provis by name, mastered everything. I 
reasoned as I had reasoned already without knowing it - if that be 
reasoning - in case any harm should befall him through my not going, how 
could I ever forgive myself!
It was dark before we got down, and the journey seemed long and dreary to 
me who could see little of it inside, and who could not go outside in my 
disabled state. Avoiding the Blue Boar, I put up at an inn of minor 
reputation down the town, and ordered some dinner. While it was preparing, 
I went to Satis House and inquired for Miss Havisham; she was still very 
ill, though considered something better.
My inn had once been a part of an ancient ecclesiastical house, and I dined 
in a little octagonal common-room, like a font. As I was not able to cut my 
dinner, the old landlord with a shining bald head did it for me. This 
bringing us into conversation, he was so good as to entertain me with my 
own story - of course with the popular feature that Pumblechook was my 
earliest benefactor and the founder of my fortunes.
'Do you know the young man?' said I.
'Know him!' repeated the landlord. 'Ever since he was - no height at all.'
'Does he ever come back to this neighbourhood?'
'Ay, he comes back,' said the landlord, 'to his great friends, now and 
again, and gives the cold shoulder to the man that made him.'
'What man is that?'
'Him that I speak of,' said the landlord. 'Mr Pumblechook.'
'Is he ungrateful to no one else?'
'No doubt he would be, if he could,' returned the landlord, 'but he can't. 
And why? Because Pumblechook done everything for him.'
'Does Pumblechook say so?'
'Say so!' replied the landlord. 'He han't no call to say so.'
'But does he say so?'
'It would turn a man's blood to white wine winegar to hear him tell of it, 
sir,' said the landlord.
I thought, 'Yet Joe, dear Joe, you never tell of it. Long-suffering and 
loving Joe, you never complain. Nor you, sweet-tempered Biddy!'
'Your appetite's been touched like, by your accident,' said the landlord, 
glancing at the bandaged arm under my coat. 'Try a tenderer bit.'
'No thank you,' I replied, turning from the table to brood over the fire. 
'I can eat no more. Please take it away.'
I had never been struck at so keenly, for my thanklessness to Joe, as 
through the brazen impostor Pumblechook. The falser he, the truer Joe; the 
meaner he, the nobler Joe.
My heart was deeply and most deservedly humbled as I mused over the fire 
for an hour or more. The striking of the clock aroused me, but not from my 
dejection or remorse, and I got up and had my coat fastened round my neck, 
and went out. I had previously sought in my pockets for the letter, that I 
might refer to it again, but I could not find it, and was uneasy to think 
that it must have been dropped in the straw of the coach. I knew very well, 
however, that the appointed place was the little sluice-house by the lime-
kiln on the marshes, and the hour nine. Towards the marshes I now went 
straight, having no time to spare.


Chapter 53

It was a dark night, though the full moon rose as I left the enclosed 
lands, and passed out upon the marshes. Beyond their dark line there was a 
ribbon of clear sky, hardly broad enough to hold the red large moon. In a 
few minutes she had ascended out of that clear field, in among the piled 
mountains of cloud.
There was a melancholy wind, and the marshes were very dismal. A stranger 
would have found them insupportable, and even to me they were so oppressive 
that I hesitated, half inclined to go back. But, I knew them well, and 
could have found my way on a far darker night, and had no excuse for 
returning, being there. So, having come there against my inclination, I 
went on against it.
The direction that I took, was not that in which my old home lay, nor that 
in which we had pursued the convicts. My back was turned towards the 
distant Hulks as I walked on, and, though I could see the old lights away 
on the spits of sand, I saw them over my shoulder. I knew the lime-kiln as 
well as I knew the old Battery, but they were miles apart; so that if a 
light had been burning at each point that night, there would have been a 
long strip of the blank horizon between the two bright specks.
At first, I had to shut some gates after me, and now and then to stand 
still while the cattle that were lying in the banked-up pathway, arose and 
blundered down among the grass and reeds. But after a little while, I 
seemed to have the whole flats to myself.
It was another half-hour before I drew near to the kiln. The lime was 
burning with a sluggish stifling smell, but the fires were made up and 
left, and no workmen were visible. Hard by, was a small stone-quarry. It 
lay directly in my way, and had been worked that day, as I saw by the tools 
and barrows that were lying about.
Coming up again to the marsh level out of this excavation - for the rude 
path lay through it - I saw a light in the old sluice-house. I quickened my 
pace, and knocked at the door with my hand. Waiting for some reply, I 
looked about me, noticing how the sluice was abandoned and broken, and how 
the house - of wood with a tiled roof - would not be proof against the 
weather much longer, if it were so even now, and how the mud and ooze were 
coated with lime, and how the choking vapour of the kiln crept in a ghostly 
way towards me. Still there was no answer, and I knocked again. No answer 
still, and I tried the latch.
It rose under my hand, and the door yielded. Looking in, I saw a lighted 
candle on a table, a bench, and a mattress on a truckle bedstead. As there 
was a loft above, I called, 'Is there any one here?' but no voice answered. 
Then, I looked at my watch, and, finding that it was past nine, called 
again, 'Is there any one here?' There being still no answer, I went out at 
the door, irresolute what to do.
It was beginning to rain fast. Seeing nothing save what I had seen already, 
I turned back into the house, and stood just within the shelter of the 
doorway, looking out into the night. While I was considering that some one 
must have been there lately and must soon be coming back, or the candle 
would not be burning, it came into my head to look if the wick were long. I 
turned round to do so, and had taken up the candle in my hand, when it was 
extinguished by some violent shock, and the next thing I comprehended, was, 
that I had been caught in a strong running noose, thrown over my head from 
behind.
'Now,' said a suppressed voice with an oath, 'I've got you!'
'What is this?' I cried, struggling. 'Who is it? Help, help, help!'
Not only were my arms pulled close to my sides, but the pressure on my bad 
arm caused me exquisite pain. Sometimes, a strong man's hand, sometimes a 
strong man's breast, was set against my mouth to deaden my cries, and with 
a hot breath always close to me, I struggled ineffectually in the dark, 
while I was fastened tight to the wall. 'And now,' said the suppressed 
voice with another oath, 'call out again, and I'll make short work of you!'
Faint and sick with the pain of my injured arm, bewildered by the surprise, 
and yet conscious how easily this threat could be put in execution, I 
desisted, and tried to ease my arm were it ever so little. But, it was 
bound too tight for that. I felt as if, having been burnt before, it were 
now being boiled.
The sudden exclusion of the night and the substitution of black darkness in 
its place, warned me that the man had closed a shutter. After groping about 
for a little, he found the flint and steel he wanted, and began to strike a 
light. I strained my sight upon the sparks that fell among the tinder, and 
upon which he breathed and breathed, match in hand, but I could only see 
his lips, and the blue point of the match; even those, but fitfully. The 
tinder was damp - no wonder there - and one after another the sparks died 
out.
The man was in no hurry, and struck again with the flint and steel. As the 
sparks fell thick and bright about him, I could see his hands, and touches 
of his face, and could make out that he was seated and bending over the 
table; but nothing more. Presently I saw his blue lips again, breathing on 
the tinder, and then a flare of light flashed up, and showed me Orlick.
Whom I had looked for, I don't know. I had not looked for him. Seeing him, 
I felt that I was in a dangerous strait indeed, and I kept my eyes upon 
him.
He lighted the candle from the flaring match with great deliberation, and 
dropped the match, and trod it out. Then, he put the candle away from him 
on the table, so that he could see me, and sat with his arms folded on the 
table and looked at me. I made out that I was fastened to a stout 
perpendicular ladder a few inches from the wall - a fixture there - the 
means of ascent to the loft above.
'Now,' said he, when we had surveyed one another for some time, 'I've got 
you.'
'Unbind me. Let me go!'
'Ah!' he returned, 'I'll let you go. I'll let you go to the moon, I'll let 
you go to the stars. All in good time.'
'Why have you lured me here?'
'Don't you know?' said he, with a deadly look
'Why have you set upon me in the dark?'
'Because I mean to do it all myself. One keeps a secret better than two. Oh 
you enemy, you enemy!'
His enjoyment of the spectacle I furnished, as he sat with his arms folded 
on the table, shaking his head at me and hugging himself, had a malignity 
in it that made me tremble. As I watched him in silence, he put his hand 
into the corner at his side, and took up a gun with a brass-bound stock.
'Do you know this?' said he, making as if he would take aim at me. 'Do you 
know where you saw it afore? Speak, wolf!'
'Yes,' I answered.
'You cost me that place. You did. Speak!'
'What else could I do?'
'You did that, and that would be enough, without more. How dared you to 
come betwixt me and a young woman I liked?'
'When did I?'
'When didn't you? It was you as always give Old Orlick a bad name to her.'
'You gave it to yourself; you gained it for yourself. I could have done you 
no harm, if you had done yourself none.'
'You're a liar. And you'll take any pains, and spend any money, to drive me 
out of this country, will you?' said he, repeating my words to Biddy in the 
last interview I had with her. 'Now, I'll tell you a piece of information. 
It was never so well worth your while to get me out of this country as it 
is tonight. Ah! If it was all your money twenty times told, to the last 
brass farden!' As he shook his heavy hand at me, with his mouth snarling 
like a tiger's, I felt that it was true.
'What are you going to do to me?'
'I'm going,' said he, bringing his first down upon the table with a heavy 
blow, and rising as the blow fell, to give it greater force, 'I'm a going 
to have your life!'
He leaned forward staring at me, slowly unclenched his hand and drew it 
across his mouth as if his mouth watered for me, and sat down again.
'You was always in Old Orlick's way since ever you was a child. You goes 
out of his way, this present night. He'll have no more on you. You're 
dead.'
I felt that I had come to the brink of my grave. For a moment I looked 
wildly round my trap for any chance of escape; but there was none.
'More than that,' said he, folding his arms on the table again, 'I won't 
have a rag of you, I won't have a bone of you, left on earth. I'll put your 
body in the kiln - I'd carry two such to it, on my shoulders - and, let 
people suppose what they may of you, they shall never know nothing.'
My mind, with inconceivable rapidity, followed out all the consequences of 
such a death. Estella's father would believe I had deserted him, would be 
taken, would die accusing me; even Herbert would doubt me, when he compared 
the letter I had left for him, with the fact that I had called at Miss 
Havisham's gate for only a moment; Joe and Biddy would never know how sorry 
I had been that night; none would ever know what I had suffered, how true I 
had meant to be, what an agony I had passed through. The death close before 
me was terrible, but far more terrible than death was the dread of being 
misremembered after death. And so quick were my thoughts, that I saw myself 
despised by unborn generations - Estella's children, and their children - 
while the wretch's words were yet on his lips.
'Now, wolf,' said he, 'afore I kill you like any other beast - which is wot 
I mean to do and wot I have tied you up for - I'll have a good look at you 
and a good goad at you. Oh, you enemy!'
It had passed through my thoughts to cry out for help again; though few 
could know better than I, the solitary nature of the spot, and the 
hopelessness of aid. But as he sat gloating over me, I was supported by a 
scornful detestation of him that sealed my lips. Above all things, I 
resolved that I would not entreat him, and that I would die making some 
last poor resistance to him. Softened as my thoughts of all the rest of men 
were in that dire extremity; humbly beseeching pardon, as I did, of Heaven; 
melted at heart, as I was, by the thought that I had taken no farewell, and 
never now could take farewell, of those who were dear to me, or could 
explain myself to them, or ask for their compassion on my miserable errors; 
still, if I could have killed him, even in dying, I would have done it.
He had been drinking, and his eyes were red and bloodshot. Around his neck 
was slung a tin bottle, as I had often seen his meat and drink slung about 
him in other days. He brought the bottle to his lips, and took a fiery 
drink from it; and I smelt the strong spirits that I saw flash into his 
face.
'Wolf!' said he, folding his arms again, 'Old Orlick's a going to tell you 
somethink. It was you as did for your shrew sister.'
Again my mind, with its former inconceivable rapidity, had exhausted the 
whole subject of the attack upon my sister, her illness, and her death, 
before his slow and hesitating speech had formed these words.
'It was you, villain,' said I.
'I tell you it was your doing - I tell you it was done through you,' he 
retorted, catching up the gun, and making a blow with the stock at the 
vacant air between us. 'I come upon her from behind, as I come upon you 
tonight. I giv' it her! I left her for dead, and if there had been a lime-
kiln as nigh her as there is now nigh you, she shouldn't have come to life 
again. But it warn't Old Orlick as did it; it was you. You was favoured, 
and he was bullied and beat. Old Orlick bullied and beat, eh? Now you pays 
for it. You done it; now you pays for it.'
He drank again, and became more ferocious. I saw by his tilting of the 
bottle that there was no great quantity left in it. I distinctly understood 
that he was working himself up with its contents, to make an end of me. I 
knew that every drop it held, was a drop of my life. I knew that when I was 
changed into a part of the vapour that had crept towards me but a little 
while before, like my own warning ghost, he would do as he had done in my 
sister's case - make all haste to the town, and be seen slouching about 
there, drinking at the ale-houses. My rapid mind pursued him to the town, 
made a picture of the street with him in it, and contrasted its lights and 
life with the lonely marsh and the white vapour creeping over it, into 
which I should have dissolved.
It was not only that I could have summed up years and years and years while 
he said a dozen words, but that what he did say presented pictures to me, 
and not mere words. In the excited and exalted state of my brain, I could 
not think of a place without seeing it, or of persons without seeing them. 
It is impossible to over-state the vividness of these images, and yet I was 
so intent, all the time, upon him himself - who would not be intent on the 
tiger crouching to spring! - that I knew of the slightest action of his 
fingers.
When he had drunk this second time, he rose from the bench on which he sat, 
and pushed the table aside. Then, he took up the candle, and shading it 
with his murderous hand so as to throw its light on me, stood before me, 
looking at me and enjoying the sight.
'Wolf, I'll tell you something more. It was Old Orlick as you tumbled over 
on your stairs that night.'
I saw the staircase with its extinguished lamps. I saw the shadows of the 
heavy stair-rails, thrown by the watchman's lantern on the wall. I saw the 
rooms that I was never to see again; here, a door half open; there, a door 
closed; all the articles of furniture around.
'And why was Old Orlick there? I'll tell you something more, wolf. You and 
her have pretty well hunted me out of this country, so far as getting a 
easy living in it goes, and I've took up with new companions, and new 
masters. Some of 'em writes my letters when I wants 'em wrote - do you 
mind? - writes my letters, wolf! They writes fifty hands; they're not like 
sneaking you, as writes but one. I've had a firm mind and a firm will to 
have your life, since you was down here at your sister's burying. I han't 
seen a way to get you safe, and I've looked arter you to know your ins and 
outs. For, says Old Orlick to himself, "Somehow or another I'll have him!" 
'What! When I looks for you, I finds your uncle Provis, eh?'
Mill Pond Bank, and Chinks's Basin, and the Old Green Copper Rope-Walk, all 
so clear and plain! Provis in his rooms, the signal whose use was over, 
pretty Clara, the good motherly woman, old Bill Barley on his back, all 
drifting by, as on the swift stream of my life fast running out to sea!
'You with a uncle too! Why, I know'd you at Gargery's when you was so small 
a wolf that I could have took your weazen betwixt this finger and thumb and 
chucked you away dead (as I'd thoughts o' doing, odd times, when I see you 
loitering amongst the pollards on a Sunday), and you hadn't found no uncles 
then. No, not you! But when Old Orlick come for to hear that your uncle 
Provis had most-like wore the leg-iron wot Old Orlick had picked up, filed 
asunder, on these meshes ever so many year ago, and wot he kep by him till 
he dropped your sister with it, like a bullock, as he means to drop you - 
hey? - when he come for to hear that - hey? - '
In his savage taunting, he flared the candle so close at me, that I turned 
my face aside, to save it from the flame.
'Ah!' he cried, laughing, after doing it again, 'the burnt child dreads the 
fire! Old Orlick knowed you was burnt, Old Orlick knowed you was smuggling 
your uncle Provis away, Old Orlick's a match for you and know'd you'd come 
tonight! Now I'll tell you something more, wolf, and this ends it. There's 
them that's as good a match for your uncle Provis as Old Orlick has been 
for you. Let him 'ware them, when he's lost his nevvy! Let him 'ware them, 
when no man can't find a rag of his dear relation's clothes, nor yet a bone 
of his body. There's them that can't and that won't have Magwitch - yes, I 
know the name! - alive in the same land with them, and that's had such sure 
information of him when he was alive in another land, as that he couldn't 
and shouldn't leave it unbeknown and put them in danger. P'raps it's them 
that writes fifty hands, and that's not like sneaking you as writes but 
one. 'Ware Compeyson, Magwitch, and the gallows!'
He flared the candle at me again, smoking my face and hair, and for an 
instant blinding me, and turned his powerful back as he replaced the light 
on the table. I had thought a prayer, and had been with Joe and Biddy and 
Herbert, before he turned towards me again.
There was a clear space of a few feet between the table and the opposite 
wall. Within this space, he now slouched backwards and forwards. His great 
strength seemed to sit stronger upon him than ever before, as he did this 
with his hands hanging loose and heavy at his sides, and with his eyes 
scowling at me. I had no grain of hope left. Wild as my inward hurry was, 
and wonderful the force of the pictures that rushed by me instead of 
thoughts, I could yet clearly understand that unless he had resolved that I 
was within a few moments of surely perishing out of all human knowledge, he 
would never have told me what he had told.
Of a sudden, he stopped, took the cork out of his bottle, and tossed it 
away. Light as it was, I heard it fall like a plummet. He swallowed slowly, 
tilting up the bottle by little and little, and now he looked at me no 
more. The last few drops of liquor he poured into the palm of his hand, and 
licked up. Then, with a sudden hurry of violence and swearing horribly, he 
threw the bottle from him, and stooped; and I saw in his hand a stone-
hammer with a long heavy handle.
The resolution I had made did not desert me, for, without uttering one vain 
word of appeal to him, I shouted out with all my might, and struggled with 
all my might. It was only my head and my legs that I could move, but to 
that extent I struggled with all the force, until then unknown, that was 
within me. In the same instant I heard responsive shouts, saw figures and a 
gleam of light dash in at the door, heard voices and tumult, and saw Orlick 
emerge from a struggle of men, as if it were tumbling water, clear the 
table at a leap, and fly out into the night.
After a blank, I found that I was lying unbound, on the floor, in the same 
place, with my head on some one's knee. My eyes were fixed on the ladder 
against the wall, when I came to myself - had opened on it before my mind 
saw it - and thus as I recovered consciousness, I knew that I was in the 
place where I had lost it.
Too indifferent at first, even to look round and ascertain who supported 
me, I was lying looking at the ladder, when there came between me and it, a 
face. The face of Trabb's boy!
'I think he's all right!' said Trabb's boy, in a sober voice; 'but ain't he 
just pale though!'
At these words, the face of him who supported me looked over into mine, and 
I saw my supporter to be -
'Herbert! Great Heaven!'
'Softly,' said Herbert. 'Gently, Handel. Don't be too eager.'
'And our old comrade, Startop!' I cried, as he too bent over me.
'Remember what he is going to assist us in,' said Herbert, 'and be calm.'
The allusion made me spring up; though I dropped again from the pain in my 
arm. 'The time has not gone by, Herbert, has it? What night is tonight? How 
long have I been here?' For, I had a strange and strong misgiving that I 
had been lying there a long time - a day and a night - two days and nights -
 more.
'The time has not gone by. It is still Monday night.'
'Thank God!'
'And you have all tomorrow, Tuesday, to rest in,' said Herbert. 'But you 
can't help groaning, my dear Handel. What hurt have you got? Can you 
stand?'
'Yes, yes,' said I, 'I can walk. I have no hurt but in this throbbing arm.'
They laid it bare, and did what they could. It was violently swollen and 
inflamed, and I could scarcely endure to have it touched. But, they tore up 
their handkerchiefs to make fresh bandages, and carefully replaced it in 
the sling, until we could get to the town and obtain some cooling lotion to 
put upon it. In a little while we had shut the door of the dark and empty 
sluice-house, and were passing through the quarry on our way back. Trabb's 
boy - Trabb's overgrown young man now - went before us with a lantern, 
which was the light I had seen come in at the door. But, the moon was a 
good two hours higher than when I had last seen the sky, and the night 
though rainy was much lighter. The white vapour of the kiln was passing 
from us as we went by, and, as I had thought a prayer before, I thought a 
thanksgiving now.
Entreating Herbert to tell me how he had come to my rescue - which at first 
he had flatly refused to do, but had insisted on my remaining quiet - I 
learnt that I had in my hurry dropped the letter, open, in our chambers, 
where he, coming home to bring with him Startop whom he had met in the 
street on his way to me, found it, very soon after I was gone. Its tone 
made him uneasy, and the more so because of the inconsistency between it 
and the hasty letter I had left for him. His uneasiness increasing instead 
of subsiding after a quarter of an hour's consideration, he set off for the 
coach-office, with Startop, who volunteered his company, to make inquiry 
when the next coach went down. Finding that the afternoon coach was gone, 
and finding that his uneasiness grew into positive alarm, as obstacles came 
in his way, he resolved to follow in a post-chaise. So, he and Startop 
arrived at the Blue Boar, fully expecting there to find me, or tidings of 
me; but, finding neither, went on to Miss Havisham's, where they lost me. 
Hereupon they went back to the hotel (doubtless at about the time when I 
was hearing the popular local version of my own story), to refresh 
themselves and to get some one to guide them out upon the marshes. Among 
the loungers under the Boar's archway, happened to be Trabb's boy - true to 
his ancient habit of happening to be everywhere where he had no business - 
and Trabb's boy had seen me passing from Miss Havisham's in the direction 
of my dining-place. Thus, Trabb's boy became their guide, and with him they 
went out to the sluice-house: though by the town way to the marshes, which 
I had avoided. Now, as they went along, Herbert reflected, that I might, 
after all, have been brought there on some genuine and serviceable errand 
tending to Provis's safety, and, bethinking himself that in that case 
interruption must be mischievous, left his guide and Startop on the edge of 
the quarry, and went on by himself, and stole round the house two or three 
times, endeavouring to ascertain whether all was right within. As he could 
hear nothing but indistinct sounds of one deep rough voice (this was while 
my mind was so busy), he even at last began to doubt whether I was there, 
when suddenly I cried out loudly, and he answered the cries, and rushed in, 
closely followed by the other two.
When I told Herbert what had passed within the house, he was for our 
immediately going before a magistrate in the town, late at night as it was, 
and getting out a warrant. But, I had already considered that such a 
course, by detaining us there, or binding us to come back, might be fatal 
to Provis. There was no gainsaying this difficulty, and we relinquished all 
thoughts of pursuing Orlick at that time. For the present, under the 
circumstances, we deemed it prudent to make rather light of the matter to 
Trabb's boy; who I am convinced would have been much affected by 
disappointment, if he had known that his intervention saved me from the 
lime-kiln. Not that Trabb's boy was of a malignant nature, but that he had 
too much spare vivacity, and that it was in his constitution to want 
variety and excitement at anybody's expense. When we parted, I presented 
him with two guineas (which seemed to meet his views), and told him that I 
was sorry ever to have had an ill opinion of him (which made no impression 
on him at all).
Wednesday being so close upon us, we determined to go back to London that 
night, three in the post-chaise; the rather, as we should then be clear 
away, before the night's adventure began to be talked of. Herbert got a 
large bottle of stuff for my arm, and by dint of having this stuff dropped 
over it all the night through, I was just able to bear its pain on the 
journey. It was daylight when we reached the Temple, and I went at once to 
bed, and lay in bed all day.
My terror, as I lay there, of falling ill and being unfitted for tomorrow, 
was so besetting, that I wonder it did not disable me of itself. It would 
have done so, pretty surely, in conjunction with the mental wear and tear I 
had suffered, but for the unnatural strain upon me that tomorrow was. So 
anxiously looked forward to, charged with such consequences, its results so 
impenetrably hidden though so near.
No precaution could have been more obvious than our refraining from 
communication with him that day; yet this again increased my restlessness. 
I started at every footstep and every sound, believing that he was 
discovered and taken, and this was the messenger to tell me so. I persuaded 
myself that I knew he was taken; that there was something more upon my mind 
than a fear or a presentiment; that the fact had occurred, and I had a 
mysterious knowledge of it. As the day wore on and no ill news came, as the 
day closed in and darkness fell, my overshadowing dread of being disabled 
by illness before tomorrow morning, altogether mastered me. My burning arm 
throbbed, and my burning head throbbed, and I fancied I was beginning to 
wander. I counted up to high numbers, to make sure of myself, and repeated 
passages that I knew in prose and verse. It happened sometimes that in the 
mere escape of a fatigued mind, I dozed for some moments or forgot; then I 
would say to myself with a start, 'Now it has come, and I am turning 
delirious!'
They kept me very quiet all day, and kept my arm constantly dressed, and 
gave me cooling drinks. Whenever I fell asleep, I awoke with the notion I 
had had in the sluice-house, that a long time had elapsed and the 
opportunity to save him was gone. About midnight I got out of bed and went 
to Herbert, with the conviction that I had been asleep for four-and-twenty 
hours, and that Wednesday was past. It was the last self-exhausting effort 
of my fretfulness, for, after that, I slept soundly.
Wednesday morning was dawning when I looked out of window. The winking 
lights upon the bridges were already pale, the coming sun was like a marsh 
of fire on the horizon. The river, still dark and mysterious, was spanned 
by bridges that were turning coldly grey, with here and there at top a warm 
touch from the burning in the sky. As I looked along the clustered roofs, 
with Church towers and spires shooting into the unusually clear air, the 
sun rose up, and a veil seemed to be drawn from the river, and millions of 
sparkles burst out upon its waters. From me too, a veil seemed to be drawn, 
and I felt strong and well.
Herbert lay asleep in his bed, and our old fellow-student lay asleep on the 
sofa. I could not dress myself without help, but I made up the fire, which 
was still burning, and got some coffee ready for them. In good time they 
too started up strong and well, and we admitted the sharp morning air at 
the windows, and looked at the tide that was still flowing towards us.
'When it turns at nine o'clock,' said Herbert, cheerfully, 'look out for 
us, and stand ready, you over there at Mill Pond Bank!'


Chapter 54

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows 
cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade. We had out 
pea-coats with us, and I took a bag. Of all my worldly possessions I took 
no more than the few necessaries that filled the bag. Where I might go, 
what I might do, or when I might return, were questions utterly unknown to 
me; nor did I vex my mind with them, for it was wholly set on Provis's 
safety. I only wondered for the passing moment, as I stopped at the door 
and looked back, under what altered circumstances I should next see those 
rooms, if ever.
We loitered down to the Temple stairs, and stood loitering there, as if we 
were not quite decided to go upon the water at all. Of course I had taken 
care that the boat should be ready and everything in order. After a little 
show of indecision, which there were none to see but the two or three 
amphibious creatures belonging to our Temple stairs, we went on board and 
cast off; Herbert in the bow, I steering. It was then about high-water - 
half-past eight.
Our plan was this. The tide, beginning to run down at nine, and being with 
us until three, we intended still to creep on after it had turned, and row 
against it until dark. We should then be well in those long reaches below 
Gravesend, between Kent and Essex, where the river is broad and solitary, 
where the waterside inhabitants are very few, and where lone public-houses 
are scattered here and there, of which we could choose one for a resting-
place. There, we meant to lie by, all night. The steamer for Hamburg, and 
the steamer for Rotterdam, would start from London at about nine on 
Thursday morning. We should know at what time to expect them, according to 
where we were, and would hail the first; so that if by any accident we were 
not taken abroad, we should have another chance. We knew the distinguishing 
marks of each vessel.
The relief of being at last engaged in the execution of the purpose, was so 
great to me that I felt it difficult to realise the condition in which I 
had been a few hours before. The crisp air, the sunlight, the movement on 
the river, and the moving river itself - the road that ran with us, seeming 
to sympathise with us, animate us, and encourage us on - freshened me with 
new hope. I felt mortified to be of so little use in the boat; but, there 
were few better oarsmen than my two friends, and they rowed with a steady 
stroke that was to last all day.
At that time, the steam-traffic on the Thames was far below its present 
extent, and watermen's boats were far more numerous. Of barges, sailing 
colliers, and coasting traders, there were perhaps as many as now; but, of 
steam-ships, great and small, not a tithe or a twentieth part so many. 
Early as it was, there were plenty of scullers going here and there that 
morning, and plenty of barges dropping down with the tide; the navigation 
of the river between bridges, in an open boat, was a much easier and 
commoner matter in those days than it is in these; and we went ahead among 
many skiffs and wherries, briskly.
Old London Bridge was soon passed, and old Billingsgate market with its 
oyster-boats and Dutchmen, and the White Tower and Traitor's Gate, and we 
were in among the tiers of shipping. Here, were the Leith, Aberdeen, and 
Glasgow steamers, loading and unloading goods, and looking immensely high 
out of the water as we passed alongside; here, were colliers by the score 
and score, with the coal-whippers plunging off stages on deck, as 
counterweights to measures of coal swinging up, which were then rattled 
over the side into barges; here, at her moorings was tomorrow's steamer for 
Rotterdam, of which we took good notice; and here tomorrow's for Hamburg, 
under whose bowsprit we crossed. And now I, sitting in the stern, could see 
with a faster beating heart, Mill Pond Bank and Mill Pond stairs.
'Is he there?' said Herbert.
'Not yet.'
'Right! He was not to come down till he saw us. Can you see his signal?'
'Not well from here; but I think I see it. - Now, I see him! Pull both. 
Easy, Herbert. Oars!'
We touched the stairs lightly for a single moment, and he was on board and 
we were off again. He had a boat-cloak with him, and a black canvas bag, 
and he looked as like a river-pilot as my heart could have wished. 'Dear 
boy!' he said, putting his arm on my shoulder as he took his seat. 
'Faithful dear boy, well done. Thank ye, thank ye!'
Again among the tiers of shipping, in and out, avoiding rusty chain-cables 
frayed hempen hawsers and bobbing buoys, sinking for the moment floating 
broken baskets, scattering floating chips of wood and shaving, cleaving 
floating scum of coal, in and out, under the figure-head of the John of 
Sunderland making a speech to the winds (as is done by many Johns), and the 
Betsy of Yarmouth with a firm formality of bosom and her knobby eyes 
starting two inches out of her head, in and out, hammers going in ship-
builders' yards, saws going at timber, clashing engines going at things 
unknown, pumps going in leaky ships, capstans going, ships going out to 
sea, and unintelligible sea-creatures roaring curses over the bulwarks at 
respondent lightermen, in and out - out at last upon the clearer river, 
where the ships' boys might take their fenders in, no longer fishing in 
troubled waters with them over the side, and where the festooned sails 
might fly out to the wind.
At the Stairs where we had taken him abroad, and ever since, I had looked 
warily for any token of our being suspected. I had seen none. We certainly 
had not been, and at that time as certainly we were not, either attended or 
followed by any boat. If we had been waited on by any boat, I should have 
run in to shore, and have obliged her to go on, or to make her purpose 
evident. But, we held our own, without any appearance of molestation.
He had his boat-cloak on him, and looked, as I have said, a natural part of 
the scene. It was remarkable (but perhaps the wretched life he had led, 
accounted for it), that he was the least anxious of any of us. He was no 
indifferent, for he told me that he hoped to live to see his gentleman one 
of the best of gentlemen in a foreign country; he was not disposed to be 
passive or resigned, as I understood it; but he had no notion of meeting 
danger half way. When it came upon him, he confronted it, but it must come 
before he troubled himself.
'If you knowed, dear boy,' he said to me, 'what it is to sit here alonger 
my dear boy and have my smoke, arter having been day by day betwixt four 
walls, you'd envy me. But you don't know what it is.'
'I think I know the delights of freedom,' I answered.
'Ah,' said he, shaking his head gravely. 'But you don't know it equal to 
me. You must have been under lock and key, dear boy, to know it equal to me 
- but I ain't a going to be low.'
It occurred to me as inconsistent, that for any mastering idea, he should 
have endangered his freedom and even his life. But I reflected that perhaps 
freedom without danger was too much apart from all the habit of his 
existence to be to him what it would be to another man. I was not far out, 
since he said, after smoking a little:
'You see, dear boy, when I was over yonder, t'other side the world, I was 
always a looking to this side; and it come flat to be there, for all I was 
a growing rich. Everybody knowed Magwitch, and Magwitch could come, and 
Magwitch could go, and nobody's head would be troubled about him. They 
ain't so easy concerning me here, dear boy - wouldn't be, leastwise, if 
they knowed where I was.'
'If all goes well,' said I, 'you will be perfectly free and safe again, 
within a few hours.'
'Well,' he returned, drawing a long breath, 'I hope so.'
'And think so?'
He dipped his hand in the water over the boat's gunwale, and said, smiling 
with that softened air upon him which was not new to me:
'Ay, I s'pose I think so, dear boy. We'd be puzzled to be more quiet and 
easy-going than we are at present. But - it's a flowing so soft and 
pleasant through the water, p'raps, as makes me think it - I was a thinking 
through my smoke just then, that we can no more see to the bottom of the 
next few hours, than we can see to the bottom of this river what I catches 
hold of. Nor yet we can't no more hold their tide than I can hold this. And 
it's run through my fingers and gone, you see!' holding up his dripping 
hand.
'But for your face, I should think you were a little despondent,' said I.
'Not a bit on it, dear boy! It comes of flowing on so quiet, and of that 
there rippling at the boat's head making a sort of a Sunday tune. Maybe I'm 
a growing a trifle old besides.'
He put his pipe back in his mouth with an undisturbed expression of face, 
and sat as composed and contented as if we were already out of England. Yet 
he was as submissive to a word of advice as if he had been in constant 
terror, for, when we ran ashore to get some bottles of beer into the boat, 
and he was stepping out, I hinted that I thought he would be safest where 
he was, and he said. 'Do you, dear boy?' and quietly sat down again.
The air felt cold upon the river, but it was a bright day, and the sunshine 
was very cheering. The tide ran strong, I took care to lose none of it, and 
our steady stroke carried us on thoroughly well. By imperceptible degrees, 
as the tide ran out, we lost more and more of the nearer woods and hills, 
and dropped lower and lower between the muddy banks, but the tide was yet 
with us when we were off Gravesend. As our charge was wrapped in his cloak, 
I purposely passed within a boat or two's length of the floating Custom 
House, and so out to catch the stream, alongside of two emigrant ships, and 
under the bows of a large transport with troops on the forecastle looking 
down at us. And soon the tide began to slacken, and the craft lying at 
anchor to swing, and presently they had all swung round, and the ships that 
were taking advantage of the new tide to get up to the Pool, began to crowd 
upon us in a fleet, and we kept under the shore, as much out of the 
strength of the tide now as we could, standing carefully off from low 
shallows and mudbanks.
Our oarsmen were so fresh, by dint of having occasionally let her drive 
with the tide for a minute or two, that a quarter of an hour's rest proved 
full as much as they wanted. We got ashore among some slippery stones while 
we ate and drank what we had with us, and looked about. It was like my own 
marsh country, flat and monotonous, and with a dim horizon; while the 
winding river turned and turned, and the great floating buoys upon it 
turned and turned, and everything else seemed stranded and still. For, now, 
the last of the fleet of ships was round the last low point we had headed; 
and the last green barge, straw-laden, with a brown sail, had followed; and 
some ballast-lighters, shaped like a child's first rude imitation of a 
boat, lay low in the mud; and a little squat shoal-lighthouse on open 
piles, stood crippled in the mud on stilts and crutches; and slimy stakes 
stuck out of the mud, and slimy stones stuck out of the mud, and red 
landmarks and tidemarks stuck out of the mud, and an old landing-stage an 
old roofless building slipped into the mud, and all about us was stagnation 
and mud.
We pushed off again, and made what way we could. It was much harder work 
now, but Herbert and Startop persevered, and rowed, and rowed, and rowed, 
until the sun went down. By that time the river has lifted us a little, so 
that we could see above the bank. There was the red sun, on the low level 
of the shore, in a purple haze, fast deepening into black; and there was 
the solitary flat marsh; and far away there were the rising grounds, 
between which and us there seemed to be no life, save here and there in the 
foreground a melancholy gull.
As the night was fast falling, and as the moon, being past the full, would 
not rise early, we held a little council: a short one, for clearly our 
course was to lie by at the first lonely tavern we could find. So, they 
plied their oars once more, and I looked out for anything like a house. 
Thus we held on, speaking little, for four or five dull miles. It was very 
cold, and, a collier coming by us, with her galley-fire smoking and 
flaring, looked like a comfortable home. The night was as dark by this time 
as it would be until morning; and what light we had, seemed to come more 
from the river than the sky, as the oars in their dipping struck as a few 
reflected stars. At this dismal time we were evidently all possessed by the 
idea that we were followed. As the tide made, it flapped heavily at 
irregular intervals against the shore; and whenever such a sound came, one 
or other of us was sure to start and look in that direction. Here and 
there, the set of the current had worn down the bank into a little creek, 
and we were all suspicious of such places, and eyed them nervously. 
Sometimes, 'What was that ripple?' one of us would say in a low voice. Or 
another, 'Is that a boat yonder?' And afterwards, we would fall into a dead 
silence, and I would sit impatiently thinking with what an unusual amount 
of noise the oars worked in the thowels.
At length we descried a light and a roof, and presently afterwards ran 
alongside a little causeway made of stones that had been picked up hard by. 
Leaving the rest in the boat, I stepped ashore, and found the light to be 
in a window of a public-house. It was a dirty place enough, and I dare say 
not unknown to smuggling adventurers; but there was a good fire in the 
kitchen, and there were eggs and bacon to eat, and various liquors to 
drink. Also, there were two double-bedded rooms - 'such as they were,' the 
landlord said. No other company was in the house than the landlord, his 
wife, and a grizzled male creature, the 'Jack' of the little causeway, who 
was as slimy and smeary as if he had been low-water mark too.
With this assistant, I went down to the boat again, and we all came ashore, 
and brought out the oars, and rudder, and boat-hook, and all else, and 
hauled her up for the night. We made a very good meal by the kitchen fire, 
and then apportioned the bedrooms: Herbert and Startop were to occupy one; 
I and our charge the other. We found the air as carefully excluded from 
both, as if air were fatal to life; and there were more dirty clothes and 
bandboxes under the beds than I should have thought the family possessed. 
But, we considered ourselves well off, notwithstanding, for a more solitary 
place we could not have found.
While we were comforting ourselves by the fire after our meal, the Jack - 
who was sitting in a corner, and who had a bloated pair of shoes on, which 
he had exhibited while we were eating our eggs and bacon, as interesting 
relics that he had taken a few days ago from the feet of a drowned seaman 
washed ashore - asked me if we had seen a four-oared galley going up with 
the tide? When I told him No, he said she must have gone down then, and yet 
she 'took up too,' when she left there.
'They must ha' thought better on't for some reason or another,' said the 
Jack, 'and gone down.'
'A four-oared galley, did you say?' said I.
'A four,' said the Jack, 'and two sitters.'
'Did they come ashore here?'
'They put in with a stone two-gallon jar, for some beer. I'd ha' been glad 
to pison the beer myself,' said the Jack, 'or put some rattling physic in 
it.'
'Why?'
'I know why,' said the Jack. He spoke in a slushy voice, as if much mud had 
washed into his throat.
'He thinks,' said the landlord: a weakly meditative man with a pale eye, 
who seemed to rely greatly on his Jack: 'he thinks they was, what they 
wasn't.'
'I knows what I thinks,' observed the Jack.
'You thinks Custum 'Us, Jack?' said the landlord.
'I do,' said the Jack.
'Then you're wrong, Jack.'
'Am I!'
In the infinite meaning of his reply and his boundless confidence in his 
views, the Jack took one of his bloated shoes off, looked into it, knocked 
a few stones out of it on the kitchen floor, and put it on again. He did 
this with the air of a Jack who was so right that he could afford to do 
anything.
'Why, what do you make out that they done with their buttons then, Jack?' 
asked the landlord, vacillating weakly.
'Done with their buttons?' returned the Jack. 'Chucked 'em overboard. 
Swallered 'em. Sowed 'em, to come up small salad. Done with their buttons!'
'Don't be cheeky, Jack,' remonstrated the landlord, in a melancholy and 
pathetic way.
'A Custum 'Us officer knows what to do with his Buttons,' said the Jack, 
repeating the obnoxious word with the greatest contempt, 'when they comes 
betwixt him and his own light. A Four and two sitters don't go hanging and 
hovering, up with one tide and down with another, and both with and against 
another, without there being Custum 'Us at the bottom of it.' Saying which 
he went out in disdain; and the landlord, having no one to reply upon, 
found it impracticable to pursue the subject.
This dialogue made us all uneasy, and me very uneasy. The dismal wind was 
muttering round the house, the tide was flapping at the shore, and I had a 
feeling that we were caged and threatened. A four-oared galley hovering 
about in so unusual a way as to attract this notice, was an ugly 
circumstance that I could not get rid of. When I had induced Provis to go 
up to bed, I went outside with my two companions (Startop by this time knew 
the state of the case), and held another council. Whether we should remain 
at the house until near the steamer's time, which would be about one in the 
afternoon; or whether we should put off early in the morning; was the 
question we discussed. On the whole we deemed it the better course to lie 
where we were, until within an hour or so of the steamer's time, and then 
to get out in her track, and drift easily with the tide. Having settled to 
do this, we returned into the house and went to bed.
I lay down with the greater part of my clothes on, and slept well for a few 
hours. When I awoke, the wind had risen, and the sign of the house (the 
Ship) was creaking and banging about, with noises that startled me. Rising 
softly, for my charge lay fast asleep, I looked out of the window. It 
commanded the causeway where we had hauled up our boat, and, as my eyes 
adapted themselves to the light of the clouded moon, I saw two men looking 
into her. They passed by under the window, looking at nothing else, and 
they did not go down to the landing-place which I could discern to be 
empty, but struck across the marsh in the direction of the Nore.
My first impulse was to call up Herbert, and show him the two men going 
away. But, reflecting before I got into his room, which was at the back of 
the house and adjoined mine, that he and Startop had had a harder day than 
I, and were fatigued, I forbore. Going back to my window, I could see the 
two men moving over the marsh. In that light, however, I soon lost them, 
and feeling very cold, lay down to think of the matter, and fell asleep 
again.
We were up early. As we walked to and fro, all four together, before 
breakfast, I deemed it right to recount what I had seen. Again our charge 
was the least anxious of the party. It was very likely that the men 
belonged to the Custom House, he said quietly, and that they had no thought 
of us. I tried to persuade myself that it was so - as, indeed, it might 
easily be. However, I proposed that he and I should walk away together to a 
distant point we could see, and that the boat should take us aboard there, 
or as near there as might prove feasible, at about noon. This being 
considered a good precaution, soon after breakfast he and I set forth, 
without saying anything at the tavern.
He smoked his pipe as we went along, and sometimes stopped to clap me on 
the shoulder. One would have supposed that it was I who was in danger, not 
he, and that he was reassuring me. We spoke very little. As we approached 
the point, I begged him to remain in a sheltered place, while I went on to 
reconnoitre; for, it was towards it that the men had passed in the night. 
He complied, and I went on alone. There was no boat off the point, nor any 
boat drawn up anywhere near it, nor were there any signs of the men having 
embarked there. But, to be sure the tide was high, and there might have 
been some footprints under water.
When he looked out from his shelter in the distance, and saw that I waved 
my hat to him to come up, he rejoined me, and there we waited; sometimes 
lying on the bank wrapped in our coats, and sometimes moving about to warm 
ourselves: until we saw our boat coming round. We got aboard easily, and 
rowed out into the track of the steamer. By that time it wanted but ten 
minutes of one o'clock, and we began to look out for her smoke.
But, it was half-past one before we saw her smoke, and soon afterwards we 
saw behind it the smoke of another steamer. As they were coming on at full 
speed, we got the two bags ready, and took that opportunity of saying good-
bye to Herbert and Startop. We had all shaken hands cordially, and neither 
Herbert's eyes nor mine were quite dry, when I saw a four-oared galley 
shoot out from under the bank but a little way ahead of us, and row out 
into the same track.
A stretch of shore had been as yet between us and the steamer's smoke, by 
reason of the bend and wind of the river; but now she was visible, coming 
head on. I called to Herbert and Startop to keep before the tide, that she 
might see us lying by for her, and I adjured Provis to sit quite still, 
wrapped in his cloak. He answered cheerily, 'Trust to me, dear boy,' and 
sat like a statue. Meantime the galley, which was very skilfully handled, 
had crossed us, let us come up with her, and fallen alongside. Leaving just 
room enough for the play of the oars, she kept alongside, drifting when we 
drifted, and pulling a stroke or two when we pulled. Of the two sitters one 
held the rudder lines, and looked at us attentively - as did all the 
rowers; the other sitter was wrapped up, much as Provis was, and seemed to 
shrink, and whisper some instruction to the steerer as he looked at us. Not 
a word was spoken in either boat.
Startop could make out, after a few minutes, which steamer was first, and 
gave me the word 'Hamburg,' in a low voice as we sat face to face. She was 
nearing us very fast, and the beating of her peddles grew louder and 
louder. I felt as if her shadow were absolutely upon us, when the galley 
hailed us. I answered.
'You have a returned Transport there,' said the man who held the lines. 
'That's the man, wrapped in the cloak. His name is Abel Magwitch, otherwise 
Provis. I apprehend that man, and call upon him to surrender, and you to 
assist.'
At the same moment, without giving any audible direction to his crew, he 
ran the galley abroad of us. They had pulled one sudden stroke ahead, had 
got their oars in, had run athwart us, and were holding on to our gunwale, 
before we knew what they were doing. This caused great confusion on board 
the steamer, and I heard them calling to us, and heard the order given to 
stop the paddles, and heard them stop, but felt her driving down upon us 
irresistibly. In the same moment, I saw the steersman of the galley lay his 
hand on his prisoner's shoulder, and saw that both boats were swinging 
round with the force of the tide, and saw that all hands on board the 
steamer were running forward quite frantically. Still in the same moment, I 
saw the prisoner start up, lean across his captor, and pull the cloak from 
the neck of the shrinking sitter in the galley. Still in the same moment, I 
saw that the face disclosed, was the face of the other convict of long ago. 
Still in the same moment, I saw the face tilt backward with a white terror 
on it that I shall never forget, and heard a great cry on board the steamer 
and a loud splash in the water, and felt the boat sink from under me.
It was but for an instant that I seemed to struggle with a thousand mill-
weirs and a thousand flashes of light; that instant past, I was taken on 
board the galley. Herbert was there, and Startop was there; but our boat 
was gone, and the two convicts were gone.
What with the cries abroad the steamer, and the furious blowing off of her 
steam, and her driving on, and our driving on, I could not at first 
distinguish sky from water or shore from shore; but, the crew of the galley 
righted her with great speed, and, pulling certain swift strong strokes 
ahead, lay upon their oars, every man looking silently and eagerly at the 
water astern. Presently a dark object was seen in it, bearing towards us on 
the tide. No man spoke, but the steersman held up his hand, and all softly 
backed water, and kept the boat straight and true before it. As it came 
nearer, I saw it to be Magwitch, swimming, but not swimming freely. He was 
taken on board, and instantly manacled at the wrists and ankles.
The galley was kept steady, and the silent eager look-out at the water was 
resumed. But, the Rotterdam steamer now came up, and apparently not 
understanding what had happened, came on at speed. By the time she had been 
hailed and stopped, both steamers were drifting away from us, and we were 
rising and falling in a troubled wake of water. The look-out was kept, long 
after all was still again and the two steamers were gone; but, everybody 
knew that it was hopeless now.
At length we gave it up, and pulled under the shore towards the tavern we 
had lately left, where we were received with no little surprise. Here, I 
was able to get some comforts for Magwitch - Provis no longer - who had 
received some very severe injury in the chest and a deep cut in the head.
He told me that he believed himself to have gone under the keel of the 
steamer, and to have been struck on the head in rising. The injury to his 
chest (which rendered his breathing extremely painful) he thought he had 
received against the side of the galley. He added that he did not pretend 
to say what he might or might not have done to Compeyson, but, that in the 
moment of his laying his hand on his cloak to identify him, that villain 
had staggered up and staggered back, and they had both gone overboard 
together; when the sudden wrenching of him (Magwitch) out of our boat, and 
the endeavour of his captor to keep him in it, had capsized us. He told me 
in a whisper that they had gone down, fiercely locked in each other's arms, 
and that there had been a struggle under water, and that he had disengaged 
himself, struck out, and swum away.
I never had any reason to doubt the exact truth of what he thus told me. 
The officer who steered the galley gave the same account of their going 
overboard.
When I asked this officer's permission to change the prisoner's wet clothes 
by purchasing any spare garments I could get at the public-house, he gave 
it readily: merely observing that he must take charge of everything his 
prisoner had about him. So the pocketbook which had once been in my hands, 
passed into the officer's. He further gave me leave to accompany the 
prisoner to London; but, declined to accord that grace to my two friends.
The Jack at the Ship was instructed where the drowned man had gone down, 
and undertook to search for the body in the places where it was likeliest 
to come ashore. His interest in its recovery seemed to me to be much 
heightened when he heard that it had stockings on. Probably, it took about 
a dozen drowned men to fit him out completely; and that may have been the 
reason why the different articles of his dress were in various stages of 
decay.
We remained at the public-house until the tide turned, and then Magwitch 
was carried down to the galley and put on board. Herbert and Startop were 
to get to London by land, as soon as they could. We had a doleful parting, 
and when I took my place by Magwitch's side, I felt that that was my place 
henceforth while he lived.
For now, my repugnance to him had all melted away, and in the hunted 
wounded shackled creature who held my hand in his, I only saw a man who had 
meant to be my benefactor, and who had felt affectionately, gratefully, and 
generously, towards me with great constancy through a series of years. I 
only saw in him a much better man than I had been to Joe.
His breathing became more difficult and painful as the night drew on, and 
often he could not repress a groan. I tried to rest him on the arm I could 
use, in any easy position; but, it was dreadful to think that I could not 
be sorry at heart for his being badly hurt, since it was unquestionably 
best that he should die. That there were, still living, people enough who 
were able and willing to identify him, I could not doubt. That he would be 
leniently treated, I could not hope. He who had been presented in the worst 
light at his trial, who had since broken prison and had been tried again, 
who had returned from transportation under a life sentence, and who had 
occasioned the death of the man who was the cause of his arrest.
As we returned towards the setting sun we had yesterday left behind us, and 
as the stream of our hopes seemed all running back, I told him how grieved 
I was to think that he had come home for my sake.
'Dear boy,' he answered, 'I'm quite content to take my chance. I've seen my 
boy, and he can be a gentleman without me.'
No. I had thought about that, while we had been there side by side. No. 
Apart from any inclinations of my own, I understood Wemmick's hint now. I 
foresaw that, being convicted, his possessions would be forfeited to the 
Crown.
'Lookee here, dear boy,' said he 'It's best as a gentleman should not be 
knowed to belong to me now. Only come to see me as if you come by chance 
alonger Wemmick. Sit where I can see you when I am swore to, for the last 
o' many times, and I don't ask no more.'
'I will never stir from your side,' said I, 'when I am suffered to be near 
you. Please God, I will be as true to you, as you have been to me!'
I felt his hand tremble as it held mine, and he turned his face away as he 
lay in the bottom of the boat, and I heard that old sound in his throat - 
softened now, like all the rest of him. It was a good thing that he had 
touched this point, for it put into my mind what I might not otherwise have 
thought of until too late: That he need never know how his hopes of 
enriching me had perished.


Chapter 55

He was taken to the Police Court next day, and would have been immediately 
committed for trial, but that it was necessary to send down for an old 
officer of the prison-ship from which he had once escaped, to speak to his 
identity. Nobody doubted it; but, Compeyson, who had meant to depose to it, 
was tumbling on the tides, dead, and it happened that there was not at that 
time any prison officer in London who could give the required evidence. I 
had gone direct to Mr Jaggers at his private house, on my arrival over 
night, to retain his assistance, and Mr Jaggers on the prisoner's behalf 
would admit nothing. It was the sole resource, for he told me that the case 
must be over in five minutes when the witness was there, and that no power 
on earth could prevent its going against us.
I imparted to Mr Jaggers my design of keeping him in ignorance of the fate 
of his wealth. Mr Jaggers was querulous and angry with me for having 'let 
it slip through my fingers,' and said we must memorialise by-and-by, and 
try at all events for some of it. But, he did not conceal from me that 
although there might be many cases in which the forfeiture would not be 
exacted, there were no circumstances in this case to make it one of them. I 
understood that, very well. I was not related to the outlaw, or connected 
with him by any recognisable tie; he had put his hand to no writing or 
settlement in my favour before his apprehension, and to do so now would be 
idle. I had no claim, and I finally resolved, and ever afterwards abided by 
the resolution, that my heart should never be sickened with the hopeless 
task of attempting to establish one.
There appeared to be reason for supposing that the drowned informer had 
hoped for a reward out of this forfeiture, and had obtained some accurate 
knowledge of Magwitch's affairs. When his body was found, many miles from 
the scene of his death, and so horribly disfigured that he was only 
recognisable by the contents of his pockets, notes were still legible, 
folded in a case he carried. Among these, were the name of a banking-house 
in New South Wales where a sum of money was, and the designation of certain 
lands of considerable value. Both these heads of information were in a list 
that Magwitch, while in prison, gave to Mr Jaggers, of the possessions he 
supposed I should inherit. His ignorance, poor fellow, at last served him; 
he never mistrusted but that my inheritance was quite safe, with Mr 
Jaggers's aid.
After three days' delay, during which the crown prosecution stood over for 
the production of the witness from the prison-ship, the witness came, and 
completed the easy case. He was committed to take his trial at the next 
Sessions, which would come on in a month.
It was at this dark time of my life that Herbert returned home one evening, 
a good deal cast down, and said:
'My dear Handel, I fear I shall soon have to leave you.'
His partner having prepared me for that, I was less surprised than he 
thought.
'We shall lose a fine opportunity if I put off going to Cairo, and I am 
very much afraid I must go, Handel, when you most need me.'
'Herbert, I shall always need you, because I shall always love you; but my 
need is no greater now, than at another time.'
'You will be so lonely.'
'I have not leisure to think of that,' said I. 'You know that I am always 
with him to the full extent of the time allowed, and that I should be with 
him all day long, if I could. And when I come away from him, you know that 
my thoughts are with him.'
The dreadful condition to which he was brought, was so appalling to both of 
us, that we could not refer to it in plainer words.
'My dear fellow,' said Herbert, 'let the near prospect of our separation - 
for, it is very near - be my justification for troubling you about 
yourself. Have you thought of your future?'
'No, for I have been afraid to think of any future.'
'But yours cannot be dismissed; indeed, my dear, dear Handel, it must not 
be dismissed. I wish you would enter on it now, as far as a few friendly 
words go, with me.'
'I will,' said I.
'In this branch house of ours, Handel, we must have a - '
I saw that his delicacy was avoiding the right word, so I said, 'A clerk.'
'A clerk. And I hope it is not at all unlikely that he may expand (as a 
clerk of your acquaintance has expanded) into a partner. Now, Handel - in 
short, my dear boy, will you come to me?'
There was something charmingly cordial and engaging in the manner in which 
after saying 'Now, Handel,' as if it were the grave beginning of a 
portentous business exordium, he had suddenly given up that tone, stretched 
out his honest hand, and spoken like a schoolboy.
'Clara and I have talked about it again and again,' Herbert pursued, 'and 
the dear little thing begged me only this evening, with tears in her eyes, 
to say to you that if you will live with us when we come together, she will 
do her best to make you happy, and to convince her husband's friend that he 
is her friend too. We should get on so well, Handel!'
I thanked her heartily, and I thanked him heartily, but said I could not 
yet make sure of joining him as he so kindly offered. Firstly, my mind was 
too preoccupied to be able to take in the subject clearly. Secondly - Yes! 
Secondly, there was a vague something lingering in my thoughts that will 
come out very near the end of this slight narrative.
'But if you thought, Herbert, that you could, without doing any injury to 
your business, leave the questions open for a little while - '
'For any while,' cried Herbert. 'Six months, a year!'
'Not so long as that,' said I. 'Two or three months at most.'
Herbert was highly delighted when we shook hands on this arrangement, and 
said he could now take courage to tell me that he believed he must go away 
at the end of the week.
'And Clara?' said I.
'The dear little thing,' returned Herbert, 'holds dutifully to her father 
as long as he lasts; but he won't last long. Mrs Whimple confides to me 
that the is certainly going.'
'Not to say an unfeeling thing,' said I, 'he cannot do better than go.'
'I am afraid that must be admitted,' said Herbert: 'and then I shall come 
back for the dear little thing, and the dear little thing and I will walk 
quietly into the nearest church. Remember! The blessed darling comes of no 
family, my dear Handel, and never looked into the red book, and hasn't a 
notion about her grandpapa. What a fortune for the son of my mother!'
On the Saturday in that same week, I took my leave of Herbert - full of 
bright hope, but sad and sorry to leave me - as he sat on one of the 
seaport mail coaches. I went into a coffee-house to write a little note a 
Clara, telling her he had gone off, sending his love to her over and over 
again, and then went to my lonely home - if it deserved the name, for it 
was now no home to me, and I had no home anywhere.
On the stairs I encountered Wemmick, who was coming down, after an 
unsuccessful application of his knuckles to my door. I had not seen him 
alone, since the disastrous issue of the attempted flight; and he had come, 
in his private and personal capacity, to say a few words of explanation in 
reference to that failure.
'The late Compeyson,' said Wemmick, 'had by little and little got at the 
bottom of half of the regular business now transacted, and it was from the 
talk of some of his people in trouble (some of his people being always in 
trouble) that I heard what I did. I kept my ears open, seeming to have them 
shut, until I heard that he was absent, and I thought that would be the 
best time for making the attempt. I can only suppose now, that it was a 
part of his policy, as a very clever man, habitually to deceive his own 
instruments. You don't blame me, I hope, Mr Pip? I am sure I tried to serve 
you, with all my heart.'
'I am as sure of that, Wemmick, as you can be, and I thank you most 
earnestly for all your interest and friendship.'
'Thank you, thank you very much. It's a bad job,' said Wemmick, scratching 
his head, 'and I assure you I haven't been so cut up for a long time. What 
I look at, is the sacrifice of so much portable property. Dear me!'
'What I think of, Wemmick, is the poor owner of the property.'
'Yes, to be sure,' said Wemmick. 'Of course there can be no objection to 
your being sorry for him, and I'd put down a five-pound note myself to get 
him out of it. But what I look at, is this. The late Compeyson having been 
beforehand with him in intelligence of his return, and being so determined 
to bring him to book, I do not think he could have been saved. Whereas, the 
portable property certainly could have been saved. That's the difference 
between the property and the owner, don't you see?'
I invited Wemmick to come upstairs, and refresh himself with a glass of 
grog before walking to Walworth. He accepted the invitation. While he was 
drinking his moderate allowance, he said, with nothing to lead up to it, 
and after having appeared rather fidgety:
'What do you think of my meaning to take a holiday on Monday, Mr Pip?'
'Why, I suppose you have not done such a thing these twelve months.'
'These twelve years, more likely,' said Wemmick. 'Yes. I'm going to take a 
holiday. More than that; I'm going to take a walk. More than that; I'm 
going to ask you to take a walk with me.'
I was about to excuse myself, as being but a bad companion just than, when 
Wemmick anticipated me.
'I know your engagements,' said he, 'and I know you are out of sorts, Mr 
Pip. But if you could oblige me, I should take it as a kindness. It ain't a 
long walk, and it's an early one. Say it might occupy you (including 
breakfast on the walk) from eight to twelve. Couldn't you stretch a point 
and manage it?'
He had done so much for me at various times, that this was very little to 
do for him. I said I could manage it - would manage it - and he was so very 
much pleased by my acquiescence, that I was pleased too. At his particular 
request, I appointed to call for him at the Castle at half-past eight on 
Monday morning, and so we parted for the time.
Punctual to my appointment, I rang at the Castle gate on the Monday 
morning, and was received by Wemmick himself: who struck me as looking 
tighter than usual, and having a sleeker hat on. Within, there were two 
glasses of rum-and-milk prepared, and two biscuits. The Aged must have been 
stirring with the lark, for, glancing into the perspective of his bedroom, 
I observed that his bed was empty.
When we had fortified ourselves with the rum-and-milk and biscuits, and 
were going out for the walk with that training preparation on us, I was 
considerably surprised to see Wemmick take up a fishing-rod, and put it 
over his shoulder. 'Why, we are not going fishing!' said I. 'No,' returned 
Wemmick, 'but I like to walk with one.'
I thought this odd; however, I said nothing, and we set off. We went 
towards Camberwell Green, and when we were thereabouts, Wemmick said 
suddenly:
'Halloa! Here's a church!'
There was nothing very surprising in that; but a gain, I was rather 
surprised, when he said, as if he were animated by a brilliant idea:
'Let's go in!'
We went in, Wemmick leaving his fishing-rod in the porch, and looked all 
round. In the mean time, Wemmick was diving into his coat-pockets, and 
getting something out of paper there.
'Halloa!' said he. 'Here's a couple of pair of gloves! Let's put 'em on!'
As the gloves were white kid gloves, and as the post-office was widened to 
its utmost extent, I now began to have my strong suspicions. They were 
strengthened into certainty when I beheld the Aged enter at a side door, 
escorting a lady.
'Halloa!' said Wemmick. 'Here's Miss Skiffins! Let's have a wedding.'
That discreet damsel was attired as usual, except that she was now engaged 
in substituting for her green kid gloves, a pair of white. The Aged was 
likewise occupied in preparing a similar sacrifice for the altar of Hymen. 
The old gentleman, however, experienced so much difficulty in getting his 
gloves on, that Wemmick found it necessary to put him with his back against 
a pillar, and then to get behind the pillar himself and pull away at them, 
while I for my part held the old gentleman round the waist, that he might 
present and equal and safe resistance. By dint of this ingenious Scheme, 
his gloves were got on to perfection.
The clerk and clergyman then appearing, we were ranged in order at those 
fatal rails. True to his notion of seeming to do it all without 
preparation, I heard Wemmick say to himself as he took something out of his 
waistcoat-pocket before the service began, 'Halloa! Here's a ring!'
I acted in the capacity of backer, or best-man, to the bridegroom; while a 
little limp pew opener in a soft bonnet like a baby's, made a feint of 
being the bosom friend of Miss Skiffins. The responsibility of giving the 
lady away, devolved upon the Aged, which led to the clergyman's being 
unintentionally scandalised, and it happened thus. When he said, 'Who 
giveth this woman to be married to this man?' the old gentlemen, not in the 
least knowing what point of the ceremony we had arrived at, stood most 
amiably beaming at the ten commandments. Upon which, the clergyman said 
again, 'WHO giveth this woman to be married to this man?' The old gentleman 
being still in a state of most estimable unconsciousness, the bridegroom 
cried out in his accustomed voice, 'Now Aged P. you know; who giveth?' To 
which the Aged replied with great briskness, before saying that he gave, 
'All right, John, all right, my boy!' And the clergyman came to so gloomy a 
pause upon it, that I had doubts for the moment whether we should get 
completely married that day.
It was completely done, however, and when we were going out of church, 
Wemmick took the cover off the font, and put his white gloves in it, and 
put the cover on again. Mrs Wemmick, more heedful of the future, put her 
white gloves in her pocket and assumed her green. 'Now, Mr Pip,' said 
Wemmick, triumphantly shouldering the fishing-rod as we came out, 'let me 
ask you whether anybody would suppose this to be a wedding-party!'
Breakfast had been ordered at a pleasant little tavern, a mile or so away 
upon the rising ground beyond the Green, and there was a bagatelle board in 
the room, in case we should desire to unbend our minds after the solemnity. 
It was pleasant to observe that Mrs Wemmick no longer unwound Wemmick's arm 
when it adapted itself to her figure, but sat in a high-backed chair 
against the wall, like a violoncello in its case, and submitted to be 
embraced as that melodious instrument might have done.
We had an excellent breakfast, and when any one declined anything on table, 
Wemmick said, 'Provided by contract, you know; don't be afraid of it!' I 
drank to the new couple, drank to the Aged, drank to the Castle, saluted 
the bride at parting, and made myself as agreeable as I could.
Wemmick came down to the door with me, and I again shook hands with him, 
and wished him joy.
'Thank'ee!' said Wemmick, rubbing his hands. 'She's such a manager of 
fowls, you have no idea. You shall have some eggs, and judge for yourself. 
I say, Mr Pip!' calling me back, and speaking low. 'This is altogether a 
Walworth sentiment, please.'
'I understand. Not to be mentioned in Little Britain,' said I.
Wemmick nodded. 'After what you let out the other day, Mr Jaggers may as 
well not know of it. He might think my brain was softening, or something of 
the kind.'


Chapter 56

He lay in prison very ill, during the whole interval between his committal 
for trial, and the coming round of the Sessions. He had broken two ribs, 
they had wounded one of his lungs, and he breathed with great pain and 
difficulty, which increased daily. It was a consequence of his hurt, that 
he spoke so low as to be scarcely audible; therefore, he spoke very little. 
But, he was ever ready to listen to me, and it became the first duty of my 
life to say to him, and read to him, what I knew he ought to hear.
Being far too ill to remain in the common prison, he was removed, after the 
first day or so, into the infirmary. This gave me opportunities of being 
with him that I could not otherwise have had. And but for his illness he 
would have been put in irons, for he was regarded as a determined prison-
breaker, and I know not what else.
Although I saw him every day, it was for only a short time; hence, the 
regularly recurring spaces of our separation were long enough to record on 
his face any slight changes that occurred in his physical state. I do not 
recollect that I once saw any change in it for the better; he wasted, and 
became slowly weaker and worse, day by day, from the day when the prison 
door closed upon him.
The kind of submission or resignation that he showed, was that of a man who 
was tired out. I sometimes derived an impression, from his manner or from a 
whispered word or two which escaped him, that he pondered over the question 
whether he might have been a better man under better circumstances. But, he 
never justified himself by a hint tending that way, or tried to bend the 
past out of its eternal shape.
It happened or two or three occasions in my presence, that his desperate 
reputation was alluded to by one or other of the people in attendance on 
him. A smile crossed his face then, and he turned his eyes on me with a 
trustful look, as if he were confident that I had see some small redeeming 
touch in him, even so long ago as when I was a little child. As to all the 
rest, he was humble and contrite, and I never knew him complain.
When the Sessions came round, Mr Jaggers caused an application to be made 
for the postponement of his trial until the following Sessions. It was 
obviously made with the assurance that he could not live so long, and was 
refused. The trial came on at once, and, when he was put to the bar, he was 
seated in a chair. No objection was made to my getting close to the dock, 
on the outside of it, and holding the hand that he stretched forth to me.
The trial was very short and very clear. Such things as could be said for 
him, were said - how he had taken to industrious habits, and had thriven 
lawfully and reputably. But, nothing could unsay the fact that he had 
returned, and was there in presence of the Judge and Jury. It was 
impossible to try him for that, and do otherwise than find him guilty.
At that time, it was the custom (as I learnt from my terrible experience of 
that Sessions) to devote a concluding day to the passing of Sentences, and 
to make a finishing effect with the Sentence of Death. But for the 
indelible picture that my remembrance now holds before me, I could scarcely 
believe, even as I write these words, that I saw two-and-thirty men and 
women put before the Judge to receive that sentence together. Foremost 
among the two-and-thirty, was he; seated, that he might get breath enough 
to keep life in him.
The whole scene starts out again in the vivid colours of the moment, down 
to the drops of April rain on the windows of the court, glittering in the 
rays of April sun. Penned in the dock, as I again stood outside it at the 
corner with his hand in mine, were the two-and-thirty men and women; some 
defiant, some stricken with terror, some sobbing and weeping, some covering 
their faces, some staring gloomily about. There had been shrieks from among 
the women convicts, but they had been stilled, a hush had succeeded. The 
sheriffs with their great chains and nosegays, other civic gewgaws and 
monsters, criers, ushers, a great gallery full of people - a large 
theatrical audience - looked on, as the two-and-thirty and the Judge were 
solemnly confronted. Then, the Judge addressed them. Among the wretched 
creatures before him whom he must single out for special address, was one 
who almost from his infancy had been an offender against the laws; who, 
after repeated imprisonments and punishments, had been at length sentenced 
to exile for a term of years; and who, under circumstances of great 
violence and daring had made his escape and been re-sentenced to exile for 
life. That miserable man would seem for a time to have become convinced of 
his errors, when far removed from the scenes of his old offences, and to 
have lived a peaceable and honest life. But in a fatal moment, yielding to 
those propensities and passions, the indulgence of which had so long 
rendered him a scourge to society, he had quitted his haven of rest and 
repentance, and had come back to the country where he was proscribed. Being 
here presently denounced, he had for a time succeeded in evading the 
officers of Justice, but being at length seized while in the act of flight, 
he had resisted them, and had - he best knew whether by express design, or 
in the blindness of his hardihood - caused the death of his denouncer, to 
whom his whole career was known. The appointed punishment for his return to 
the land that had cast him out, being Death, and his case being this 
aggravated case, he must prepare himself to Die.
The sun was striking in at the great windows of the court, through the 
glittering drops of rain upon the glass, and it made a broad shaft of light 
between the two-and-thirty and the Judge, linking both together, and 
perhaps reminding some among the audience, how both were passing on, with 
absolute equality, to the greater Judgment that knoweth all things and 
cannot err. Rising for a moment, a distinct speck of face in this way of 
light, the prisoner said, 'My Lord, I have received my sentence of Death 
from the Almighty, but I bow to yours,' and sat down again. There was some 
hushing, and the Judge went on with what he had to say to the rest. Then, 
they were all formally doomed, and some of them were supported out, and 
some of them sauntered out with a haggard look of bravery, and a few nodded 
to the gallery, and two or three shook hands, and others went out chewing 
the fragments of herb they had taken from the sweet herbs lying about. He 
went last of all, because of having to be helped from his chair and to go 
very slowly; and he held my hand while all the others were removed, and 
while the audience got up (putting their dresses right, as they might at 
church or elsewhere) and pointed down at this criminal or at that, and most 
of all at him and me.
I earnestly hoped and prayed that he might die before the Recorder's Report 
was made, but, in the dread of his lingering on, I began that night to 
write out a petition to the Home Secretary of State, setting forth my 
knowledge of him, and how it was that he had come back for my sake. I wrote 
it as fervently and pathetically as I could, and when I had finished it and 
sent it in, I wrote out other petitions to such men in authority as I hoped 
were the most merciful, and drew up one to the Crown itself. For several 
days and nights after he was sentenced I took no rest except when I fell 
asleep in my chair, but was wholly absorbed in these appeals. And after I 
had sent them in, I could not keep away from the places where they were, 
but felt as if they were more hopeful and less desperate when I was near 
them. In this unreasonable restlessness and pain of mind, I would roam the 
streets of an evening, wandering by those offices and houses where I had 
left the petitions. To the present hour, the weary western streets of 
London on a cold dusty spring night, with their ranges of stern shut-up 
mansions and their long rows of lamps, are melancholy to me from this 
association.
The daily visits I could make him were shortened now, and he was more 
strictly kept. Seeing, or fancying, that I was suspected of an intention of 
carrying poison to him, I asked to be searched before I sat down at his 
bedside, and told the officer who was always there, that I was willing to 
do anything that would assure him of the singleness of my designs. Nobody 
was hard with him, or with me. There was duty to be done, and it was done, 
but not harshly. The officer always gave me the assurance that he was 
worse, and some other sick prisoners in the room, and some other prisoners 
who attended on them as sick nurses (malefactors, but not incapable of 
kindness, God be thanked!), always joined in the same report.
As the days went on, I noticed more and more that he would lie placidly 
looking at the white ceiling, with an absence of light in his face, until 
some word of mine brightened it for an instant, and then it would subside 
again. Sometimes he was almost, or quite, unable to speak; then, he would 
answer me with slight pressures on my hand, and I grew to understand his 
meaning very well.
The number of the days had risen to ten, when I saw a greater change in him 
than I had seen yet. His eyes were turned towards the door, and lighted up 
as I entered.
'Dear boy,' he said, as I sat down by his bed: 'I thought you was late. But 
I knowed you couldn't be that.'
'It is just the time,' said I. 'I waited for it at the gate.'
'You always waits at the gate; don't you, dear boy?'
'Yes. Not to lose a moment of the time.'
'Thank'ee dear boy, thank'ee. God bless you! You've never deserted me, dear 
boy.'
I pressed his hand in silence, for I could not forget that I had once meant 
to desert him.
'And what's the best of all,' he said, 'you've been more comfortable 
alonger me, since I was under a dark cloud, than when the sun shone. That's 
best of all.'
He lay on his back, breathing with great difficulty. Do what he would, and 
love me though he did, the light left his face ever and again, and a film 
came over the placid look at the white ceiling.
'Are you in much pain today?'
'I don't complain of none, dear boy.'
'You never do complain.'
He had spoken his last words. He smiled, and I understood his touch to mean 
that he wished to lift my hand, and lay it on his breast. I laid it there, 
and he smiled again, and put both his hands upon it.
The allotted time ran out, while we were thus; but, looking round, I found 
the governor of the prison standing near me, and he whispered, 'You needn't 
go yet.' I thanked him gratefully, and asked, 'Might I speak to him, if he 
can hear me?'
The governor stepped aside, and beckoned the officer away. The change, 
though it was made without noise, drew back the film from the placid look 
at the white ceiling, and he looked most affectionately at me.
'Dear Magwitch, I must tell you, now at last. You understand what I say?'
A gentle pressure on my hand.
'You had a child once, whom you loved and lost.'
A stronger pressure on my hand.
'She lived and found powerful friends. She is living now. She is a lady and 
very beautiful. And I love her!'
With a last faint effort, which would have been powerless but for my 
yielding to it and assisting it, he raised my hand to his lips. Then, he 
gently let it sink upon his breast again, with his own hands lying on it. 
The placid look at the white ceiling came back, and passed away, and his 
head dropped quietly on his breast.
Mindful, then, of what we had read together, I thought of the two men who 
went up into the Temple to pray, and I knew there were no better words that 
I could say beside his bed, than 'O Lord, be merciful to him, a sinner!'


Chapter 57

Now that I was left wholly to myself, I gave notice of my intention to quit 
the chambers in the Temple as soon as my tenancy could legally determine, 
and in the meanwhile to underlet them. At once I put bills up in the 
windows; for, I was in debt, and had scarcely any money, and began to be 
seriously alarmed by the state of my affairs. I ought rather to write that 
I should have been alarmed if I had energy and concentration enough to help 
me to the clear perception of any truth beyond the fact that I was falling 
very ill. The late stress upon me had enabled me to put off illness, but 
not to put it away; I knew that it was coming on me now, and I knew very 
little else, and was even careless as to that.
For a day or two, I lay on the sofa, or on the floor - anywhere, according 
as I happened to sink down - with a heavy head and aching limbs, and no 
purpose, and no power. Then there came one night which appeared of great 
duration, and which teemed with anxiety and horror; and when in the morning 
I tried to sit up in my bed and think of it, I found I could not do so.
Whether I really had been down in Garden-court in the dead of the night, 
groping about for the boat that I supposed to be there; whether I had two 
or three times come to myself on the staircase with great terror, not 
knowing how I had got out of bed; whether I had found myself lighting the 
lamp, possessed by the idea that he was coming up the stairs, and that the 
lights were blown out; whether I had been inexpressibly harassed by the 
distracted talking, laughing, and groaning, of some one, and had half 
suspected those sounds to be of my own making; whether there had been a 
closed iron furnace in a dark corner of the room, and a voice had called 
out over and over again that Miss Havisham was consuming within it; these 
were things that I tried to settle with myself and get into some order, as 
I lay that morning on my bed. But, the vapour of a lime-kiln would come 
between me and them, disordering them all, and it was through the vapour at 
last that I saw two men looking at me.
'What do you want?' I asked, starting; 'I don't know you.'
'Well, sir,' returned one of them, bending down and touching me on the 
shoulder, 'this is a matter that you'll soon arrange, I dare say, but 
you're arrested.'
'What is the debt?'
'Hundred and twenty-three pound, fifteen, six. Jeweller's account, I 
think.'
'What is to be done?'
'You had better come to my house,' said the man. 'I keep a very nice 
house.'
I made some attempt to get up and dress myself. When I next attended to 
them, they were standing a little off from the bed, looking at me. I still 
lay there.
'You see my state,' said I. 'I would come with you if I could; but indeed I 
am quite unable. If you take me from here, I think I shall die by the way.'
Perhaps they replied, or argued the point, or tried to encourage me to 
believe that I was better than I thought. Forasmuch as they hang in my 
memory by only this one slender thread, I don't know what they did, except 
that they forbore to remove me.
That I had a fever and was avoided, that I suffered greatly, that I often 
lost my reason, that the time seemed interminable, that I confounded 
impossible existences with my own identity; that I was a brick in the house 
wall, and yet entreating to be released from the giddy place where the 
builders had set me; that I was a steel beam of a vast engine, clashing and 
whirling over a gulf, and yet that I implored in my own person to have the 
engine stopped, and my part in it hammered off; that I passed through these 
phases of disease, I know of my own remembrance, and did in some sort know 
at the time. That I sometimes struggled with real people, in the belief 
that they were murderers, and that I would all at once comprehend that they 
meant to do me good, and would then sink exhausted in their arms, and 
suffer them to lay me down, I also knew at the time. But, above all, I knew 
that there was constant tendency in all these people - who, when I was very 
ill, would present all kinds of extraordinary transformations of the human 
face, and would be much dilated in size - above all, I say, I knew that 
there was an extraordinary tendency in all these people, sooner or later to 
settle down into the likeness of Joe.
After I had turned the worst point of my illness, I began to notice that 
while all its other features changed, this one consistent feature did not 
change. Whoever came about me, still settled down into Joe. I opened my 
eyes in the night, and I saw in the great chair at the bedside, Joe. I 
opened my eyes in the day, and, sitting on the window-seat, smoking his 
pipe in the shaded open window, still I saw Joe. I asked for cooling drink, 
and the dear hand that gave it me was Joe's. I sank back on my pillow after 
drinking, and the face that looked so hopefully and tenderly upon me was 
the face of Joe.
At last, one day, I took courage, and said, 'Is it Joe?'
And the dear old home-voice answered, 'Which it air, old chap.'
'O Joe, you break my heart! Look angry at me, Joe. Strike me, Joe. Tell me 
of my ingratitude. Don't be so good to me!'
For, Joe had actually laid his head down on the pillow at my side and put 
his arm round my neck, in his joy that I knew him.
'Which dear old Pip, old chap,' said Joe, 'you and me was ever friends. And 
when you're well enough to go out for a ride - what larks!'
After which, Joe withdrew to the window, and stood with his back towards 
me, wiping his eyes. And as my extreme weakness prevented me from getting 
up and going to him, I lay there, penitently whispering, 'O God bless him! 
O God bless this gentle Christian man!'
Joe's eyes were red when I next found him beside me; but, I was holding his 
hand, and we both felt happy.
'How long, dear Joe?'
'Which you meantersay, Pip, how long have your illness lasted, dear old 
chap?'
'Yes, Joe.'
'It's the end of May, Pip. Tomorrow is the first of June.'
'And have you been here all the time, dear Joe?'
'Pretty nigh, old chap. For, as I says to Biddy when the news of your being 
ill were brought by letter, which it were brought by the post and being 
formerly single he is now married though underpaid for a deal of walking 
and shoe-leather, but wealth were not a object on his part, and marriage 
were the great wish of his hart - '
'It is so delightful to hear you, Joe! But I interrupt you in what you said 
to Biddy.'
'Which it were,' said Joe, 'that how you might be amongst strangers, and 
that how you and me having been ever friends, a wisit at such a moment 
might not prove unacceptabobble. And Biddy, her word were, "Go to him, 
without loss of time." That,' said Joe, summing up with his judicial air, 
'were the word of Biddy. "Go to him," Biddy say, "without loss of time." In 
short, I shouldn't greatly deceive you,' Joe added, after a little grave 
reflection, 'if I represented to you that the word of that young woman 
were, "without a minute's loss of time."'
There Joe cut himself short, and informed me that I was to be talked to in 
great moderation, and that I was to take a little nourishment at stated 
frequent times, whether I felt inclined for it or not, and that I was to 
submit myself to all his orders. So, I kissed his hand, and lay quiet, 
while he proceeded to indite a note to Biddy, with my love in it.
Evidently, Biddy had taught Joe to write. As I lay in bed looking at him, 
it made me, in my weak state, cry again with pleasure to see the pride with 
which he set about his letter. My bedstead, divested of its curtains, had 
been removed, with me upon it, into the sitting-room, as the airiest and 
largest, and the carpet had been taken away, and the room kept always fresh 
and wholesome night and day. At my own writing-table, pushed into a corner 
and cumbered with little bottles, Joe now sat down to his great work, first 
choosing a pen from the pen-tray as if it were a chest of large tools, and 
tucking up his sleeves as if he were going to wield a crowbar or 
sledgehammer. It was necessary for Joe to hold on heavily to the table with 
his left elbow, and to get his right leg well out behind him, before he 
could begin, and when he did begin, he made every downstroke so slowly that 
it might have been six feet long, while at every upstroke I could hear his 
pen spluttering extensively. He had a curious idea that the inkstand was on 
the side of him where it was not, and constantly dipped his pen into space, 
and seemed quite satisfied with the result. Occasionally, he was tripped up 
by some orthographical stumbling-block, but on the whole he got on very 
well indeed, and when he had signed his name, and had removed a finishing 
blot from the paper to the crown of his head with his two forefingers, he 
got up and hovered about the table, trying the effect of his performance 
from various points of view as it lay there, with unbounded satisfaction.
Not to make Joe uneasy by talking too much, even if I had been able to talk 
much, I deferred asking him about Miss Havisham until next day. He shook 
his head when I then asked him if she had recovered.
'Is she dead, Joe?'
'Why you see, old chap,' said Joe, in a tone of remonstrance, and by way of 
getting at it by degrees, 'I wouldn't go so far as to say that, for that's 
a deal to say; but she ain't - '
'Living, Joe?'
'That's nigher where it is,' said Joe; 'she ain't living.'
'Did she linger long, Joe?'
'Arter you was took ill, pretty much about what you might call (if you was 
put to it) a week,' said Joe; still determined, on my account, to come at 
everything by degrees.
'Dear Joe, have you heard what becomes of her property?'
'Well, old chap,' said Joe, 'it do appear that she had settled the most of 
it, which I meantersay tied it up, on Miss Estella. But she had wrote out a 
little coddleshell in her own hand a day or two afore the accident, leaving 
a cool four thousand to Mr Matthew Pocket. And why, do you suppose, above 
all things, Pip, she left that cool four thousand unto him? "Because of 
Pip's account of him the said Matthew." I am told by Biddy, that air the 
writing,' said Joe, repeating the legal turn as if it did him infinite 
good, '"account of him the said Matthew." And a cool four thousand, Pip!'
I never discovered from whom Joe derived the conventional temperature of 
the four thousand pounds, but it appeared to make the sum of money more to 
him, and he had a manifest relish in insisting on its being cool.
This account gave me great joy, as it perfected the only good thing I had 
done. I asked Joe whether he had heard if any of the other relations had 
any legacies?
'Miss Sarah,' said Joe, 'she have twenty-five pound perannium fur to buy 
pills, on account of being bilious. Miss Georgiana, she have twenty pound 
down. Mrs - what's the name of them wild beasts with humps, old chap?'
'Camels?' said I, wondering why he could possibly want to know.
Joe nodded. 'Mrs Camels,' by which I presently understood he meant Camilla, 
'she have five pound fur to buy rushlights to put her in spirits when she 
wake up in the night.'
The accuracy of these recitals was sufficiently obvious to me, to give me 
great confidence in Joe's information. 'And now,' said Joe, 'you ain't that 
strong yet, old chap, that you can take in more nor one additional shovel-
full today. Old Orlick he's been a bustin' open a dwelling-'ouse.'
'Whose?' said I.
'Not, I grant, you, but what his manners is given to blusterous,' said Joe, 
apologetically; 'still, a Englishman's ouse is his Castle, and castles must 
not be busted 'cept when done in war time. And wotsume'er the failings on 
his part, he were a corn and seedsman in his hart.'
'Is it Pumblechook's house that has been broken into, then?'
'That's it, Pip,' said Joe; 'and they took his till, and they took his cash-
box, and they drinked his wine, and they partook of his wittles, and they 
slapped his face, and they pulled his nose, and they tied him up to his 
bedpust, and they giv' him a dozen, and they stuffed his mouth full of 
flowering annuals to prewent his crying out. But he knowed Orlick, and 
Orlick's in the country jail.'
By these approaches we arrived at unrestricted conversation. I was slow to 
gain strength, but I did slowly and surely become less weak, and Joe stayed 
with me, and I fancied I was little Pip again.
For, the tenderness of Joe was so beautifully proportioned to my need, that 
I was like a child in his hands. He would sit and talk to me in the old 
confidence, and with the old simplicity, and in the old unassertive 
protecting way, so that I would half believe that all my life since the 
days of the old kitchen was one of the mental troubles of the fever that 
was gone. He did everything for me except the household work, for which he 
had engaged a very decent woman, after paying off the laundress on his 
first arrival. 'Which I do assure you, Pip,' he would often say, in 
explanation of that liberty; 'I found her a tapping the spare bed, like a 
cask of beer, and drawing off the feathers in a bucket, for sale. Which she 
would have tapped yourn next, and draw'd it off with you a laying on it, 
and was then a carrying away the coals gradiwally in the soup-tureen and 
wegetable-dishes, and the wine and spirits in your Wellington boots.'
We looked forward to the day when I should go out for a ride, as we had 
once looked forward to the day of my apprenticeship. And when the day came, 
and an open carriage was got into the Lane, Joe wrapped me up, took me in 
his arms, carried me down to it, and put me in, as if I were still the 
small helpless creature to whom he had so abundantly given of the wealth of 
his great nature.
And Joe got in bedside me, and we drove away together into the country, 
where the rich summer growth was already on the trees and on the grass, and 
sweet summer scents filled all the air. The day happened to be Sunday, and 
when I looked on the loveliness around me, and thought how it had grown and 
changed, and how the little wild flowers had been forming, and the voices 
of the birds had been strengthening, by day and by night, under the sun and 
under the stars, while poor I lay burning and tossing on my bed, the mere 
remembrance of having burned and tossed there, came like a check upon my 
peace. But, when I heard the Sunday bells, and looked around a little more 
upon the outspread beauty, I felt that I was not nearly thankful enough - 
that I was too weak yet, to be even that - and I laid my head on Joe's 
shoulder, as I had laid it long ago when he had taken me to the Fair or 
where not, and it was too much for my young senses.
More composure came to me after a while, and we talked as we used to talk, 
lying on the grass at the old Battery. There was no change whatever in Joe. 
Exactly what he had been in my eyes then, he was in my eyes still; just as 
simply faithful, and as simply right.
When we got back again and he lifted me out, and carried me - so easily - 
across the court and up the stairs, I thought of that eventful Christmas 
Day when he had carried me over the marshes. We had not yet made any 
allusion to my change of fortune, nor did I know how much of my late 
history he was acquainted with. I was so doubtful of myself now, and put so 
much trust in him, that I could not satisfy myself whether I ought to refer 
to it when he did not.
'Have you heard, Joe,' I asked him that evening, upon further 
consideration, as he smoked his pipe at the window, 'who my patron was?'
'I heerd,' returned Joe, 'as it were not Miss Havisham, old chap.'
'Did you hear who it was, Joe?'
'Well! I heerd as it were a person what sent the person what giv' you the 
banknotes at the Jolly Bargemen, Pip.'
'So it was.'
'Astonishing!' said Joe, in the placidest way.
'Did you hear that he was dead, Joe?' I presently asked, with increasing 
diffidence.
'Which? Him as sent the banknotes, Pip?'
'Yes.'
'I think,' said Joe, after meditating a long time, and looking rather 
evasively at the window-seat, 'as I did hear tell that how he were 
something or another in a general way in that direction.'
'Did you hear anything of his circumstances, Joe?'
'Not partickler, Pip.'
'If you would like to hear, Joe -' I was beginning, when Joe got up and 
came to my sofa.
'Lookee here, old chap,' said Joe, bending over me. 'Ever the best of 
friends; ain't us, Pip?'
I was ashamed to answer him.
'Wery good, then,' said Joe, as if I had answered; 'that's all right, 
that's agreed upon. Then why go into subjects, old chap, which as betwixt 
two sech must be for ever onnecessary? There's subjects enough as betwixt 
two sech, without onnecessary ones. Lord! To think of your poor sister and 
her Rampages! And don't you remember Tickler?'
'I do indeed, Joe.'
'Lookee here, old chap,' said Joe. 'I done what I could to keep you and 
Tickler in sunders, but my power were not always fully equal to my 
inclinations. For when your poor sister had a mind to drop into you, it 
were not so much,' said Joe, in his favourite argumentative way, 'that she 
dropped into me too, if I put myself in opposition to her but that she 
dropped into you always heavier for it. I noticed that. It ain't a grab at 
a man's whisker, not yet a shake or two of a man (to which your sister was 
quite welcome), that 'ud put a man off from getting a little child out of 
punishment. But when that little child is dropped into, heavier, for that 
grab of whisker or shaking, then that man naterally up and says to himself, 
"Where is the good as you are a doing? I grant you I see the 'arm," says 
the man, "but I don't see the good. I call upon you, sir, therefore, to 
pint out the good."'
'The man says?' I observed, as Joe waited for me to speak.
'The man says,' Joe assented. 'Is he right, that man?'
'Dear Joe, he is always right.'
'Well, old chap,' said Joe, 'then abide by your words. If he's always right 
(which in general he's more likely wrong), he's right when he says this: - 
Supposing ever you kep any little matter to yourself, when you was a little 
child, you kep it mostly because you know'd as J. Gargery's power to part 
you and Tickler in sunders, were not fully equal to his inclinations. 
Therefore, think no more of it as betwixt two sech, and do not let us pass 
remarks upon onnecessary subjects. Biddy giv' herself a deal o' trouble 
with me afore I left (for I am almost awful dull), as I should view it in 
this light, and, viewing it in this light, as I should so put it. Both of 
which,' said Joe, quite charmed with his logical arrangement, 'being done, 
now this to you a true friend, say. Namely. You mustn't go a over-doing on 
it, but you must have your supper and your wine-and-water, and you must be 
put betwixt the sheets.'
The delicacy with which Joe dismissed this theme, and the sweet tact and 
kindness with which Biddy - who with her woman's wit had found me out so 
soon - had prepared him for it, made a deep impression on my mind. But 
whether Joe knew how poor I was, and how my great expectations had all 
dissolved, like our own marsh mists before the sun, I could not understand.
Another thing in Joe that I could not understand when it first began to 
develop itself, but which I soon arrived at a sorrowful comprehension of, 
was this: As I became stronger and better, Joe became a little less easy 
with me. In my weakness and entire dependence on him, the dear fellow had 
fallen into the old tone, and called me by the old names, the dear 'old 
Pip, old chap,' that now were music in my ears. I too had fallen into the 
old ways, only happy and thankful that he let me. But, imperceptibly, 
though I held by them fast, Joe's hold upon them began to slacken; and 
whereas I wondered at this, at first, I soon began to understand that the 
cause of it was in me, and that the fault of it was all mine.
Ah! Had I given Joe no reason to doubt my constancy, and to think that in 
prosperity I should grow cold to him and cast him off? Had I given Joe's 
innocent heart no cause to feel instinctively that as I got stronger, his 
hold upon me would be weaker, and that he had better loosen it in time and 
let me go, before I plucked myself away?
It was on the third or fourth occasion of my going out walking in the 
Temple Gardens leaning on Joe's arm, that I saw this change in him very 
plainly. We had been sitting in the bright warm sunlight, looking at the 
river, and I chanced to say as we got up:
'See, Joe! I can walk quite strongly. Now, you shall see me walk back by 
myself.'
'Which do not over-do it, Pip,' said Joe; 'but I shall be happy fur to see 
you able, sir.'
The last word grated on me; but how could I remonstrate! I walked no 
further than the gate of the gardens, and then pretended to be weaker than 
I was, and asked Joe for his arm. Joe gave it me, but was thoughtful.
I, for my part, was thoughtful too; for, how best to check this growing 
change in Joe, was a great perplexity to my remorseful thoughts. That I was 
ashamed to tell him exactly how I was placed, and what I had come down to, 
I do not seek to conceal; but, I hope my reluctance was not quite an 
unworthy one. He would want to help me out of his little savings, I knew, 
and I knew that he ought not to help me, and that I must not suffer him to 
do it.
It was a thoughtful evening with both of us. But, before we went to bed, I 
had resolved that I would wait over tomorrow, tomorrow being Sunday, and 
would begin my new course with the new week. On Monday morning I would 
speak to Joe about this change, I would lay aside this last vestige of 
reverse, I would tell him what I had in my thoughts (that Secondly, not yet 
arrived at), and why I had not decided to go out to Herbert, and then the 
change would be conquered for ever. As I cleared, Joe cleared, and it 
seemed as though he had sympathetically arrived at a resolution too.
We had a quite day on the Sunday, and we rode out into the country, and 
then walked in the fields.
'I feel thankful that I have been ill, Joe,' I said.
'Dear old Pip, old chap, you're a'most come round, sir.'
'It has been a memorable time for me, Joe.'
'Likeways for myself, sir,' Joe returned.
'We have had a time together, Joe, that I can never forget. There were days 
once, I know, that I did for a while forget; but I never shall forget 
these.'
'Pip,' said Joe, appearing a little hurried and troubled, 'there has been 
larks, And, dear sir, what have been betwixt us - have been.'
At night, when I had gone to bed, Joe came into my room, as he had done all 
through my recovery. He asked me if I felt sure that I was as well as in 
the morning?
'Yes, dear Joe, quite.'
'And are always a getting stronger, old chap?'
'Yes, dear Joe, steadily.'
Joe patted the coverlet on my shoulder with his great good hand, and said, 
in what I thought a husky voice, 'Good night!'
When I got up in the morning, refreshed and stronger yet, I was full of my 
resolution to tell Joe all, without delay. I would tell him before 
breakfast. I would dress at once and go to his room and surprise him; for, 
it was the first day I had been up early. I went to his room, and he was 
not there. Not only was he not there, but his box was gone.
I hurried then to the breakfast-table, and on it found a letter. These were 
its brief contents.

'Not wishful to intrude I have departed fur you are well again dear Pip and 
will do better without
'JO.

'P.S. Ever the best of friends.'

Enclosed in the letter, was a receipt for the debt and costs on which I had 
been arrested. Down to that moment I had vainly supposed that my creditor 
had withdrawn or suspended proceedings until I should be quite recovered. I 
had never dreamed of Joe's having paid the money; but, Joe had paid it, and 
the receipt was in his name.
What remained for me now, but to follow him to the dear old forge, and 
there to have out my disclosure to him, and my penitent remonstrance with 
him, and there to relieve my mind and heart of that reserved Secondly, 
which had begun as a vague something lingering in my thoughts, and had 
formed into a settled purpose?
The purpose was, that I would go to Biddy, that I would show her how 
humbled and repentant I came back, that I would tell her how I had lost all 
I once hoped for, that I would remind her of our old confidences in my 
first unhappy time. Then, I would say to her, 'Biddy, I think you once 
liked me very well, when my errant heart, even while it strayed away from 
you, was quieter and better with you than it ever has been since. If you 
can like me only half as well once more, if you can take me with all my 
faults and disappointments on my head, if you can receive me like a 
forgiven child (and indeed I am as sorry, Biddy, and have as much need of a 
hushing voice and a soothing hand), I hope I am a little worthier of you 
that I was - not much, but a little. And, Biddy, it shall rest with you to 
say whether I shall work at the forge with Joe, or whether I shall try for 
any different occupation down in this country, or whether we shall go away 
to a distant place where an opportunity awaits me, which I set aside when 
it was offered, until I knew your answer. And now, dear Biddy, if you can 
tell me that you will go through the world with me, you will surely make it 
a better world for me, and me a better man for it, and I will try hard to 
make it a better world for you.'
Such was my purpose. After three days more of recovery, I went down to the 
old place, to put it in execution; and how I sped in it, is all I have left 
to tell.


Chapter 58

The tidings of my high fortunes having had a heavy fall, had got down to my 
native place and its neighbourhood, before I got there. I found the Blue 
Boar in possession of the intelligence, and I found that it made a great 
change in the Boar's demeanour. Whereas the Boar had cultivated my good 
opinion with warm assiduity when I was coming into property, the Boar was 
exceedingly cool on the subject now that I was going out of property.
It was evening when I arrived, much fatigued by the journey I had so often 
made so easily. The Boar could not put me into my usual bedroom, which was 
engaged (probably by some one who had expectations), and could only assign 
me a very indifferent chamber among the pigeons and post-chaises up the 
yard. But, I had as sound a sleep in that lodging as in the most superior 
accommodation the Boar could have given me, and the quality of my dreams 
was about the same as in the best bedroom.
Early in the morning while my breakfast was getting ready, I strolled round 
by Satis House. There were printed bills on the gate, and on bits of carpet 
hanging out of the windows, announcing a sale by auction of the Household 
Furniture and Effects, next week. The House itself was to be sold as old 
building materials and pulled down. Lot 1 was marked in whitewashed knock-
knee letters on the brew house; Lot 2 on that part of the main building 
which had been so long shut up. Other lots were marked off on other parts 
of the structure, and the ivy had been torn down to make room for the 
inscriptions, and much of it trailed low in the dust and was withered 
already. Stepping in for a moment at the open gate and looking around me 
with the uncomfortable air of a stranger who had no business there, I saw 
the auctioneer's clerk walking on the casks and telling them off for the 
information of a catalogue compiler, pen in hand, who made a temporary desk 
of the wheeled chair I had so often pushed along to the tune of Old Clem.
When I got back to my breakfast in the Boar's coffee-room, I found Mr 
Pumblechook conversing with the landlord. Mr Pumblechook (not improved in 
appearance by his late nocturnal adventure) was waiting for me, and 
addressed me in the following terms.
'Young man, I am sorry to see you brought low. But what else could be 
expected! What else could be expected!'
As he extended his hand with a magnificently forgiving air, and as I was 
broken by illness and unfit to quarrel, I took it.
'William,' said Mr Pumblechook to the waiter, 'put a muffin on table. And 
has it come to this! Has it come to this!'
I frowningly sat down t my breakfast. Mr Pumblechook stood over me and 
poured out my tea - before I could touch the teapot - with the air of a 
benefactor who was resolved to be true to the last.
'William,' said Mr Pumblechook, mournfully, 'put the salt on. In happier 
times,' addressing me, 'I think you too sugar. And did you take milk? You 
did. Sugar and milk. William, bring a watercress.'
'Thank you,' said I, shortly, 'but I don't eat watercresses.'
'You don't eat 'em,' returned Mr Pumblechook, sighing and nodding his head 
several times, as if he might have expected that, and as if abstinence from 
watercresses were consistent with my downfall. 'True. The simple fruits of 
the earth. No. You needn't bring any, William.'
I went on with my breakfast, and Mr Pumblechook continued to stand over me, 
staring fishily and breathing noisily, as he always did.
'Little more than skin and bone!' mused Mr Pumblechook, aloud. 'And yet 
when he went from here (I may say with my blessing), and I spread afore him 
my humble store, like the Bee, he was as plump as a Peach!'
This reminded me of the wonderful difference between the servile manner in 
which he had offered his hand in my new prosperity, saying, 'May I?' and 
the ostentatious clemency with which he had just now exhibited the same fat 
five fingers.
'Hah!' he went on, handing me the bread-and-butter. 'And air you a going to 
Joseph?'
'In heaven's name,' said I, firing in spite of myself, 'what does it matter 
to you where I am going? Leave that teapot alone.'
It was the worst course I could have taken, because it gave Pumblechook the 
opportunity he wanted.
'Yes, young man,' said he, releasing the handle of the article in question, 
retiring a step or two from my table, and speaking for the behoof of the 
landlord and waiter at the door, 'I will leave that teapot alone. You are 
right, young man. For once, you are right. I forgit myself when I take such 
an interest in your breakfast, as to wish your frame, exhausted by the 
debilitating effects of prodigygality, to be stimulated by the 'olesome 
nourishment of your forefathers. And yet,' said Pumblechook, turning to the 
landlord and waiter, and pointing me out at arm's length, 'this is him as I 
ever sported with in his days of happy infancy! Tell me not it cannot be; I 
tell you this is him!'
A low murmur from the two replied. The waiter appeared to be particularly 
affected.
'This is him,' said Pumblechook, 'as I have rode in my shay-cart. This is 
him as I have seen brought up by hand. This is him untoe the sister of 
which I was uncle by marriage, as her name was Georgiana M'ria from her own 
mother, let him deny it if he can!'
The waiter seemed convinced that I could not deny it, and that it gave the 
case a black look.
'Young man,' said Pumblechook, screwing his head at me in the old fashion, 
'you air a going to Joseph. What does it matter to me, you ask me, where 
you air going? I say to you, Sir, you air a going to Joseph.'
The waiter coughed, as if he modestly invited to get over that.
'Now,' said Pumblechook, and all this with a most exasperating air of 
saying in the cause of virtue what was perfectly convincing and conclusive, 
'I will tell you what to say to Joseph. Here is Squires of the Boar 
present, known and respected in this town, and here is William, which his 
father's name was Potkins if I do not deceive myself.'
'You do not, sir,' said William.
'In their presence,' pursued Pumblechook, 'I will tell you, young man, what 
to say to Joseph. Says you, "Joseph, I have this day seen my earliest 
benefactor and the founder of my fortun's. I will name no names, Joseph, 
but so they are pleased to call him up-town, and I have seen that man."
'I swear I don't see him here,' said I.
'Say that likewise,' retorted Pumblechook. 'Say you said that, and even 
Joseph will probably betray surprise.'
'There you quite mistake him,' said I. 'I know better.'
'Says you,' Pumblechook went on, '"Joseph, I have seen that man, and that 
man bears you no malice and bears me no malice. He knows your character, 
Joseph, and is well acquainted with your pig-headedness and ignorance; and 
he knows my character, Joseph, and he knows my want of gratitude. Yes, 
Joseph," says you,' here Pumblechook shook his head and hand at me, '"he 
knows my total deficiency of common human gratitude. He knows it, Joseph, 
as none can. You do not know it, Joseph, having no call to know it, but 
that man do."'
Windy donkey as he was, it really amazed me that he could have the face to 
talk thus to mine.
'Says you, "Joseph, he gave me a little message, which I will now repeat. 
It was, that in my being brought low, he saw the finger of Providence. He 
knowed that finger when he saw it, Joseph, and he saw it plain. It pinted 
out this writing, Joseph. Reward of ingratitoode to his earliest 
benefactor, and founder of fortun's. But that man said he did not repent of 
what he had done, Joseph. Not at all. It was right to do it, it was kind to 
do it, it was benevolent to do it, and he would do it again."'
'It's pity,' said I, scornfully, as I finished my interrupted breakfast, 
'that the man did not say what he had done and would do again.'
'Squires of the Boar!' Pumblechook was now addressing the landlord, 'and 
William! I have no objections to your mentioning, either up-town or down-
town, if such should be your wishes, that it was right to do it, kind to do 
it, benevolent to do it, and that I would do it again.'
With those words the Impostor shook them both by the hand, with an air, and 
left the house; leaving me much more astonished than delighted by the 
virtues of that same indefinite 'it.' I was not long after him in leaving 
the house too, and when I went down the High-street I saw him holding forth 
(no doubt to the same effect) at his shop door to a select group, who 
honoured me with very unfavourable glances as I passed on the opposite side 
of the way.
But, it was only the pleasanter to turn to Biddy and to Joe, whose great 
forbearance shone more brightly than before, if that could be, contrasted 
with this brazen pretender. I went towards them slowly, for my limbs were 
weak, but with a sense of increasing relief as I drew nearer to them, and a 
sense of leaving arrogance and untruthfulness further and further behind.
The June weather was delicious. The sky was blue, the larks were soaring 
high over the green corn, I thought all that countryside more beautiful and 
peaceful by far than I had ever known it to be yet. Many pleasant pictures 
of the life that I would lead there, and of the change for the better that 
would come over my character when I had a guiding spirit at my side whose 
simple faith and clear home-wisdom I had proved, beguiled my way. They 
awakened a tender emotion in me; for, my heart was softened by my return, 
and such a change had come to pass, that I felt like one who was toiling 
home barefoot from distant travel, and whose wanderings had lasted many 
years.
The schoolhouse where Biddy was mistress, I had never seen; but, the little 
roundabout lane by which I entered the village for quietness' sake, took me 
past it. I was disappointed to find that the day was a holiday; no children 
were there, and Biddy's house was closed. Some hopeful notion of seeing her 
busily engaged in her daily duties, before she saw me, had been in my mind 
and was defeated.
But, the forge was a very short distance off, and I went towards it under 
the sweet green limes, listening for the clink of Joe's hammer. Long after 
I ought to have heard it, and long after I had fancied I heard it and found 
it but a fancy, all was still. The limes were there, and the white thorns 
were there, and the chestnut-trees were there, and their leaves rustled 
harmoniously when I stopped to listen; but, the clink of Joe's hammer was 
not in the midsummer wind.
Almost fearing, without knowing why, to come in view of the forge, I saw it 
at last, and saw that it was closed. No gleam of fire, no glittering shower 
of sparks, no roar of bellows; all shut up, and still.
But, the house was not deserted, and the best parlour seemed to be in use, 
for there were white curtains fluttering in its window, and the window was 
open and gay with flowers. I went softly towards it, meaning to peep over 
the flowers, when Joe and Biddy stood before me, arm in arm.
At first Biddy gave a cry, as if she thought it was my apparition, but in 
another moment she was in my embrace. I wept to see her, and she wept to 
see me; I, because she looked so fresh and pleasant; she, because I looked 
so worn and white.
'But dear Biddy, how smart you are!'
'Yes, dear Pip.'
'And Joe, how smart you are!'
'Yes, dear old Pip, old chap.'
I looked at both of them, from one to the other, and then -
'It's my wedding-day,' cried Biddy, in a burst of happiness, 'and I am 
married to Joe!'

They had taken me into the kitchen, and I had laid my head down on the old 
deal table. Biddy held one of my hands to her lips, and Joe's restoring 
touch was on my shoulder. 'Which he warn't strong enough, my dear, fur to 
be surprised,' said Joe. And Biddy said, 'I ought to have thought of it, 
dear Joe, but I was too happy.' They were both so overjoyed to see me, so 
proud to see me, so touched by my coming to them, so delighted that I 
should have come by accident to make their day complete!
My first thought was one of great thankfulness that I had never breathed 
this last baffled hope to Joe. How often, while he was with me in my 
illness, had it risen to my lips. How irrevocable would have been his 
knowledge of it, if he had remained with me but another hour!
'Dear Biddy,' said I, 'you have the best husband in the whole world, and if 
you could have seen him by my bed you would have - But no, you couldn't 
love him better than you do.'
'No, I couldn't indeed,' said Biddy.
'And, dear Joe, you have the best wife in the whole world, and she will 
make you as happy as even you deserve to be, you dear, good, noble Joe!'
Joe looked at me with a quivering lip, and fairly put his sleeve before his 
eyes.
'And Joe and Biddy both, as you have been to church today, and are in 
charity and love with all mankind, receive my humble thanks for all you 
have done for me and all I have so ill repaid! And when I say that I am 
going away within the hour, for I am soon going abroad, and that I shall 
never rest until I have worked for the money with which you have kept me 
out of prison, and have sent it to you, don't think, dear Joe and Biddy, 
that if I could repay it a thousand times over, I suppose I could cancel a 
farthing of the debt I owe you, or that I would do so if I could!'
They were both melted by these words, and both entreated me to say no more.
'But I must say more. Dear Joe, I hope you will have children to love, and 
that some little fellow will sit in this chimney corner of a winter night, 
who may remind you of another little fellow gone out of it for ever. Don't 
tell him, Joe, that I was thankless; don't tell him, Biddy, that I was 
ungenerous and unjust; only tell him that I honoured you both, because you 
were both so good and true, and that, as your child, I said it would 
natural to him to grow up a much better man than I did.'
'I ain't a going,' said Joe, from behind his sleeve, 'to tell him nothink 
o' that natur, Pip. Nor Biddy ain't. Nor yet no one ain't.'
'And now, though I know you have already done it in your own kind hearts, 
pray tell me, both, that you forgive me! Pray let me hear you say the 
words, that I may carry the sound of them away with me, and then I shall be 
able to believe that you can trust me, and think better of me, in the time 
to come!'
'O dear old Pip, old chap,' said Joe. 'God knows as I forgive you, if I 
have anythink to forgive!'
'Amen! And God knows I do!' echoed Biddy.
Now let me go and look at my old little room, and rest there a few minutes 
by myself, and then when I have eaten and drunk with you, go with me as far 
as the finger-post, dear Joe and Biddy, before we say good-bye!'

I sold all I had, and put aside as much as I could, for a composition with 
my creditors - who gave me ample time to pay them in full - and I went out 
and joined Herbert. Within a month, I had quitted England, and within two 
months I was clerk to Clarriker and Co., and within four months I assumed 
my first undivided responsibility. For, the beam across the parlour ceiling 
at Mill Pond Bank, had then ceased to tremble under old Bill Barley's 
growls and was at peace, and Herbert had gone away to marry Clara, and I 
was left in sole charge of the Eastern Branch until he brought her back.
Many a year went round, before I was a partner in the House; but, lived 
happily with Herbert and his wife, and lived frugally, and paid my debts, 
and maintained a constant correspondence with Biddy and Joe. It was not 
until I become third in the Firm, that Clarriker betrayed me to Herbert; 
but, he then declared that the secret of Herbert's partnership had been 
long enough upon his conscience, and he must tell it. So, he told it, and 
Herbert was as much moved as amazed, and the dear fellow and I were not the 
worse friends for the long concealment. I must not leave it to be supposed 
that we were ever a great house, or that we made mints of money. We were 
not in a grand way of business, but we had a good name, and worked for our 
profits, and did very well. We owed so much to Herbert's ever cheerful 
industry and readiness, that I often wondered how I had conceived that old 
idea of his inaptitude, until I was one day enlightened by the reflection, 
that perhaps the inaptitude had never been in him at all, but had been in 
me.


Chapter 59

For eleven years, I had not seen Joe nor Biddy with my bodily eyes-though 
they had both been often before my fancy in the East-when, upon an evening 
in December, an hour or two after dark, I laid my hand softly on the latch 
of the old kitchen door. I touched it so softly that I was not heard, and 
looked in unseen. There, smoking his pipe in the old place by the kitchen 
firelight, as hale and as strong as ever though a little grey, sat Joe; and 
there, fenced into the corner with Joe's leg, and sitting on my own little 
stool looking at the fire, was - I again!
'We giv' him the name of Pip for your sake, dear old chap,' said Joe, 
delighted when I took another stool by the child's side (but I did not 
rumple his hair), 'and we hoped he might grow a little bit like you, and we 
think he do.'
I thought so too, and I took him out for a walk next morning, and we talked 
immensely, understanding one another to perfection. And I took him down to 
the churchyard, and set him on a certain tombstone there, and he showed me 
from that elevation which stone was sacred to the memory of Philip Pirrip, 
late of this Parish, and Also Georgiana, Wife of the Above.
'Biddy,' said I, when I talked with her after dinner, as her little girl 
lay sleeping in her lap, 'you must give Pip to me, one of these days; or 
lend him, at all events.'
'No, no,' said Biddy, gently. 'You must marry.'
'So Herbert and Clara say, but I don't think I shall, Biddy. I have so 
settled down in their home, that it's not at all likely. I am already quite 
an old bachelor.'
Biddy looked down at her child, and put its little hand to her lips, and 
then put the good matronly hand with which she had touched it, into mine. 
There was something in the action and in the light pressure of Biddy's 
wedding-ring, that had a very pretty eloquence in it.
'Dear Pip,' said Biddy, 'you are sure you don't fret for her?'
'O no-I think not, Biddy.'
'Tell me as an old, old friend. Have you quite forgotten her?
'My dear Biddy, I have forgotten nothing in my life that ever had a 
foremost place there, and little that ever had any place there. But that 
poor dream, as I once used to call it, has all gone by, Biddy, all gone 
by!'
Nevertheless, I knew while I said those words, that I secretly intended to 
revisit the site of the house that evening, alone, for her sake. Yes even 
so. For Estella's sake.
I had heard of her as leading a most unhappy life, and as being separated 
from her husband, who had used her with great cruelty, and who had become 
quite renowned as a compound of pride, avarice, brutality, and meanness. 
And I had heard of the death of her husband, from an accident consequent on 
his ill-treatment of a horse. This release had befallen her some two years 
before; for anything I knew, she was married again.
The early dinner-hour at Joe's, left me abundance of time, without hurrying 
my talk with Biddy, to walk over to the old spot before dark. But, what 
with loitering on the way, to look at old objects and to think of old 
times, the day had quite declined when I came to the place.
There was no house now, no brewery, no building whatever left, but the wall 
of the old garden. The cleared space had been enclosed with a rough fence, 
and, looking over it, I saw that some of the old ivy had struck root anew, 
and was growing green on low quiet mounds of ruin. A gate in the fence 
standing ajar, I pushed it open, and went in.
A cold silvery mist had veiled the afternoon, and the moon was not yet up 
to scatter it. But, the stars were shining beyond the mist, and the moon 
was coming, and the evening was not dark. I could trace out where every 
part of the old house had been, and where the brewery had been, and where 
the gates, and where the casks. I had done so, and was looking along the 
desolate garden-walk, when I beheld a solitary figure in it.
The figure showed itself aware of me, as I advanced. It had been moving 
towards me, but it stood still. As I drew nearer, I saw it to be the figure 
of a woman. As I drew nearer yet, it was about to turn away, when it 
stopped, and let me come up with it. Then, it faltered as if much 
surprised, and uttered my name, and I cried out:
'Estella!'
'I am greatly changed. I wonder you know me.'
The freshness of her beauty was indeed gone, but its indescribable majesty 
and its indescribable charm remained. Those attractions in it, I had seen 
before; what I had never seen before, was the saddened softened light of 
the once proud eyes; what I had never felt before, was the friendly touch 
of the once insensible hand.
We sat down on a bench that was near, and I said, 'After so many years, it 
is strange that we should thus meet again, Estella, here where our first 
meeting was! Do you often come back?'
'I have never been here since.'
'Nor I.'
The moon began to rise, and I thought of the placid look at the white 
ceiling, which had passed away. The moon began to rise, and I thought of 
the pressure on my hand when I had spoken the last words he had heard on 
earth.
Estella was the next to break the silence that ensued between us.
'I have very often hoped and intended to come back, but have been prevented 
by many circumstances. Poor, poor old place!'
The silvery mist was touched with the first rays of the moonlight, and the 
same rays touched the tears that dropped from her eyes. Not knowing that I 
saw them, and setting herself to get the better of them, she said quietly:
'Were you wondering, as you walked along, how it came to be left in this 
condition?'
'Yes, Estella.'
'The ground belongs to me. It is the only possession I have not 
relinquished. Everything else has gone from me, little by little, but I 
have kept this. It was the subject of the only determined resistance I made 
in all the wretched years.'
'Is it to be built on?'
'At last it is. I came here to take leave of it before its change. And 
you,' she said, in a voice of touching interest to a wanderer, 'you live 
abroad still?'
'Still.'
'And do well, I am sure?'
'I work pretty hard for a sufficient living, and therefore - Yes, I do 
well.'
'I have often thought of you,' said Estella.
'Have you?'
'Of late, very often. There was a long hard time when I kept far from me, 
the remembrance, of what I had thrown away when I was quite ignorant of its 
worth. But, since my duty has not been incompatible with the admission of 
that remembrance, I have given it a place in my heart.'
'You have always held your place in my heart,' I answered.
And we were silent again, until she spoke.
'I little thought,' said Estella, 'that I should take leave of you in 
taking leave of this spot. I am very glad to do so.'
'Glad to part again, Estella? To me, parting is a painful thing. To me, the 
remembrance of our last parting has been ever mournful and painful.'
'But you said to me,' returned Estella, very earnestly, '"God bless you, 
God forgive you!" And if you could say that to me then, you will not 
hesitate to say that to me now - now, when suffering has been stronger than 
all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to 
be. I have been bent and broken, but - I hope - into a better shape. Be as 
considerate and good to me as you were, and tell me we are friends.'
'We are friends,' said I, rising and bending over her, as she rose from the 
bench.
'And will continue friends apart,' said Estella.
I took her hand in mine, and we went out of the ruined place; and, as the 
morning mists had risen long ago when I first left the forge, so, the 
evening mists were rising now, and in all the broad expanse of tranquil 
light they showed to me, I saw no shadow of another parting from her.