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Charles Dickens 13 page

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 cov-

ering 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.

Great Expectations

‘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

table-cloth, exclaiming, ‘Lord bless my soul!’

‘I am going up to my guardian in London,’ said I, casu-

ally 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 cor-

ners and obstacles, to express (as I understood it) equality

with any blacksmith, alive or dead.

‘Hold that noise,’ said Mr. Trabb, with the greatest stern-

ness, ‘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 coun-

ter, preparatory to getting his hand under it to show the

gloss, ‘is a very sweet article. I can recommend it for your

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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 un-

til 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 ar-



ticle for summer wear, an article much in vogue among

the nobility and gentry, an article that it would ever be an

honour to him to reflect upon a distinguished fellow-towns-

man’s (if he might claim me for a fellow-townsman) having

worn. ‘Are you bringing numbers five and eight, you vaga-

bond,’ 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 circum-

stances, 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 pos-

Great Expectations

sibly remunerate him for his pains. When he had at last

done and had appointed to send the articles to Mr. Pum-

blechook’s on the Thursday evening, he said, with his hand

upon the parlour lock, ‘I know, sir, that London gentlemen

cannot be expected to patronize 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 expe-

rience 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 bootmaker’s, and the hosier’s, and felt rather like Moth-

er 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 in the chaise-cart, and had called at the forge

and heard the news. He had prepared a collation for me in

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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 de-

served!’

This was coming to the point, and I thought it a sensible

way of expressing himself.

‘To think,’ said Mr. Pumblechook, after snorting admi-

ration at me for some moments, ‘that I should have been

the humble instrument of leading up to this, is a proud re-

ward.’

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

Great Expectations

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. Pum-

blechook, 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 Thor-

oughfares of Pork now), and took, comparatively speaking,

no care of himself at all. ‘Ah! poultry, poultry! You little

thought,’ said Mr. Pumblechook, apostrophizing 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,

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‘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 under-

standing 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 nobleminded, 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 com-

mon 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 get-

ting 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 de-

siring 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

Great Expectations

apprentice, and, in effect, how he had ever been my favou-

rite 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 amal-

gamation 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 want-

ing 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 opin-

ion. ‘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.

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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 in-

dignation. 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,

Great Expectations

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. Pum-

blechook’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. Prob-

ably every new and eagerly expected garment ever put on

since clothes came in, fell a trifle short of the wearer’s ex-

pectation. But after I had had my new suit on, some half

an hour, and had gone through an immensity of postur-

ing with Mr. Pumblechook’s very limited dressing-glass, in

the futile endeavour to see my legs, it seemed to fit me bet-

ter. 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 af-

ter 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.

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‘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, to-morrow,’ 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 to-morrow?’

‘Yes, Miss Havisham.’

‘And you are adopted by a rich person?’

‘Yes, Miss Havisham.’

‘Not named?’

 

Great Expectations

‘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 instruc-

tions.’ 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 dim-

ly 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 col-

lected 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

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- much more at my ease too, though I had the bundle to car-

ry.And now, those six days which were to have run out so

slowly, had run out fast and were gone, and to-morrow

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 oc-

casion, 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, carry-

ing 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 to-

gether. 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 hors-

es. Fantastic failures of journeys occupied me until the day

dawned and the birds were singing. Then, I got up and part-

ly dressed, and sat at the window to take a last look out, and

 

Great Expectations

in taking it fell asleep.

Biddy was astir so early to get my breakfast, that, al-

though 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 un-

strapping 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 port-

manteau 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 an-

other old shoe. I stopped then, to wave my hat, and dear old

Joe waved his strong right arm above his head, crying hus-

kily ‘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 af-

ter 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

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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 de-

liberations, 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.

 

Great Expectations

Chapter 20

The journey from our town to the metropolis, was a jour-

ney of about five hours. It was a little past mid-day when

the fourhorse stage-coach 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 immen-

sity 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 great-coat 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.

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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 gen-

tleman with one eye, in a velveteen suit and knee-breeches,

 

Great Expectations

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


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