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Charles Dickens
Chapter 13
Charles Dickens
 
 
1       For anything I know, I may have had some wild idea of running all
2  the way to Dover, when I gave up the pursuit of the young man with
3  the donkey-cart, and started for Greenwich. My scattered senses
4  were soon collected as to that point, if I had; for I came to a
5  stop in the Kent Road, at a terrace with a piece of water before
6  it, and a great foolish image in the middle, blowing a dry shell.
7  Here I sat down on a doorstep, quite spent and exhausted with the
8  efforts I had already made, and with hardly breath enough to cry
9  for the loss of my box and half-guinea.

10       It was by this time dark; I heard the clocks strike ten, as I sat
11  resting. But it was a summer night, fortunately, and fine weather.
12  When I had recovered my breath, and had got rid of a stifling
13  sensation in my throat, I rose up and went on. In the midst of my
14  distress, I had no notion of going back. I doubt if I should have
15  had any, though there had been a Swiss snow-drift in the Kent Road.

16       But my standing possessed of only three-halfpence in the world (and
17  I am sure I wonder how they came to be left in my pocket on a
18  Saturday night!) troubled me none the less because I went on. I
19  began to picture to myself, as a scrap of newspaper intelligence,
20  my being found dead in a day or two, under some hedge; and I
21  trudged on miserably, though as fast as I could, until I happened
22  to pass a little shop, where it was written up that ladies' and
23  gentlemen's wardrobes were bought, and that the best price was
24  given for rags, bones, and kitchen-stuff. The master of this shop
25  was sitting at the door in his shirt-sleeves, smoking; and as there
26  were a great many coats and pairs of trousers dangling from the low
27  ceiling, and only two feeble candles burning inside to show what
28  they were, I fancied that he looked like a man of a revengeful
29  disposition, who had hung all his enemies, and was enjoying
30  himself.

31       My late experiences with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber suggested to me that
32  here might be a means of keeping off the wolf for a little while.
33  I went up the next by-street, took off my waistcoat, rolled it
34  neatly under my arm, and came back to the shop door.

35       'If you please, sir,' I said, 'I am to sell this for a fair price.'

36       Mr. Dolloby - Dolloby was the name over the shop door, at least -
37  took the waistcoat, stood his pipe on its head, against the
38  door-post, went into the shop, followed by me, snuffed the two
39  candles with his fingers, spread the waistcoat on the counter, and
40  looked at it there, held it up against the light, and looked at it
41  there, and ultimately said:

42       'What do you call a price, now, for this here little weskit?'

43       'Oh! you know best, sir,' I returned modestly.

44       'I can't be buyer and seller too,' said Mr. Dolloby. 'Put a price
45  on this here little weskit.'

46       'Would eighteenpence be?'- I hinted, after some hesitation.

47       Mr. Dolloby rolled it up again, and gave it me back. 'I should rob
48  my family,' he said, 'if I was to offer ninepence for it.'

49       This was a disagreeable way of putting the business; because it
50  imposed upon me, a perfect stranger, the unpleasantness of asking
51  Mr. Dolloby to rob his family on my account. My circumstances
52  being so very pressing, however, I said I would take ninepence for
53  it, if he pleased. Mr. Dolloby, not without some grumbling, gave
54  ninepence. I wished him good night, and walked out of the shop the
55  richer by that sum, and the poorer by a waistcoat. But when I
56  buttoned my jacket, that was not much.
57  Indeed, I foresaw pretty clearly that my jacket would go next, and
58  that I should have to make the best of my way to Dover in a shirt
59  and a pair of trousers, and might deem myself lucky if I got there
60  even in that trim. But my mind did not run so much on this as
61  might be supposed. Beyond a general impression of the distance
62  before me, and of the young man with the donkey-cart having used me
63  cruelly, I think I had no very urgent sense of my difficulties when
64  I once again set off with my ninepence in my pocket.

65       A plan had occurred to me for passing the night, which I was going
66  to carry into execution. This was, to lie behind the wall at the
67  back of my old school, in a corner where there used to be a
68  haystack. I imagined it would be a kind of company to have the
69  boys, and the bedroom where I used to tell the stories, so near me:
70  although the boys would know nothing of my being there, and the
71  bedroom would yield me no shelter.

72       I had had a hard day's work, and was pretty well jaded when I came
73  climbing out, at last, upon the level of Blackheath. It cost me
74  some trouble to find out Salem House; but I found it, and I found
75  a haystack in the corner, and I lay down by it; having first walked
76  round the wall, and looked up at the windows, and seen that all was
77  dark and silent within. Never shall I forget the lonely sensation
78  of first lying down, without a roof above my head!

79       Sleep came upon me as it came on many other outcasts, against whom
80  house-doors were locked, and house-dogs barked, that night - and I
81  dreamed of lying on my old school-bed, talking to the boys in my
82  room; and found myself sitting upright, with Steerforth's name upon
83  my lips, looking wildly at the stars that were glistening and
84  glimmering above me. When I remembered where I was at that
85  untimely hour, a feeling stole upon me that made me get up, afraid
86  of I don't know what, and walk about. But the fainter glimmering
87  of the stars, and the pale light in the sky where the day was
88  coming, reassured me: and my eyes being very heavy, I lay down
89  again and slept - though with a knowledge in my sleep that it was
90  cold - until the warm beams of the sun, and the ringing of the
91  getting-up bell at Salem House, awoke me. If I could have hoped
92  that Steerforth was there, I would have lurked about until he came
93  out alone; but I knew he must have left long since. Traddles still
94  remained, perhaps, but it was very doubtful; and I had not
95  sufficient confidence in his discretion or good luck, however
96  strong my reliance was on his good nature, to wish to trust him
97  with my situation. So I crept away from the wall as Mr. Creakle's
98  boys were getting up, and struck into the long dusty track which I
99  had first known to be the Dover Road when I was one of them, and
100  when I little expected that any eyes would ever see me the wayfarer
101  I was now, upon it.

102       What a different Sunday morning from the old Sunday morning at
103  Yarmouth! In due time I heard the church-bells ringing, as I
104  plodded on; and I met people who were going to church; and I passed
105  a church or two where the congregation were inside, and the sound
106  of singing came out into the sunshine, while the beadle sat and
107  cooled himself in the shade of the porch, or stood beneath the
108  yew-tree, with his hand to his forehead, glowering at me going by.
109  But the peace and rest of the old Sunday morning were on
110  everything, except me. That was the difference. I felt quite
111  wicked in my dirt and dust, with my tangled hair. But for the
112  quiet picture I had conjured up, of my mother in her youth and
113  beauty, weeping by the fire, and my aunt relenting to her, I hardly
114  think I should have had the courage to go on until next day. But
115  it always went before me, and I followed.

116       I got, that Sunday, through three-and-twenty miles on the straight
117  road, though not very easily, for I was new to that kind of toil.
118  I see myself, as evening closes in, coming over the bridge at
119  Rochester, footsore and tired, and eating bread that I had bought
120  for supper. One or two little houses, with the notice, 'Lodgings
121  for Travellers', hanging out, had tempted me; but I was afraid of
122  spending the few pence I had, and was even more afraid of the
123  vicious looks of the trampers I had met or overtaken. I sought no
124  shelter, therefore, but the sky; and toiling into Chatham, - which,
125  in that night's aspect, is a mere dream of chalk, and drawbridges,
126  and mastless ships in a muddy river, roofed like Noah's arks, -
127  crept, at last, upon a sort of grass-grown battery overhanging a
128  lane, where a sentry was walking to and fro. Here I lay down, near
129  a cannon; and, happy in the society of the sentry's footsteps,
130  though he knew no more of my being above him than the boys at Salem
131  House had known of my lying by the wall, slept soundly until
132  morning.

133       Very stiff and sore of foot I was in the morning, and quite dazed
134  by the beating of drums and marching of troops, which seemed to hem
135  me in on every side when I went down towards the long narrow
136  street. Feeling that I could go but a very little way that day, if
137  I were to reserve any strength for getting to my journey's end, I
138  resolved to make the sale of my jacket its principal business.
139  Accordingly, I took the jacket off, that I might learn to do
140  without it; and carrying it under my arm, began a tour of
141  inspection of the various slop-shops.

142       It was a likely place to sell a jacket in; for the dealers in
143  second-hand clothes were numerous, and were, generally speaking, on
144  the look-out for customers at their shop doors. But as most of
145  them had, hanging up among their stock, an officer's coat or two,
146  epaulettes and all, I was rendered timid by the costly nature of
147  their dealings, and walked about for a long time without offering
148  my merchandise to anyone.

149       This modesty of mine directed my attention to the marine-store
150  shops, and such shops as Mr. Dolloby's, in preference to the
151  regular dealers. At last I found one that I thought looked
152  promising, at the corner of a dirty lane, ending in an enclosure
153  full of stinging-nettles, against the palings of which some
154  second-hand sailors' clothes, that seemed to have overflowed the
155  shop, were fluttering among some cots, and rusty guns, and oilskin
156  hats, and certain trays full of so many old rusty keys of so many
157  sizes that they seemed various enough to open all the doors in the
158  world.

159       Into this shop, which was low and small, and which was darkened
160  rather than lighted by a little window, overhung with clothes, and
161  was descended into by some steps, I went with a palpitating heart;
162  which was not relieved when an ugly old man, with the lower part of
163  his face all covered with a stubbly grey beard, rushed out of a
164  dirty den behind it, and seized me by the hair of my head. He was
165  a dreadful old man to look at, in a filthy flannel waistcoat, and
166  smelling terribly of rum. His bedstead, covered with a tumbled and
167  ragged piece of patchwork, was in the den he had come from, where
168  another little window showed a prospect of more stinging-nettles,
169  and a lame donkey.

170       'Oh, what do you want?' grinned this old man, in a fierce,
171  monotonous whine. 'Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want? Oh,
172  my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goroo, goroo!'

173       I was so much dismayed by these words, and particularly by the
174  repetition of the last unknown one, which was a kind of rattle in
175  his throat, that I could make no answer; hereupon the old man,
176  still holding me by the hair, repeated:

177       'Oh, what do you want? Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want?
178  Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goroo!' - which he
179  screwed out of himself, with an energy that made his eyes start in
180  his head.

181       'I wanted to know,' I said, trembling, 'if you would buy a jacket.'

182       'Oh, let's see the jacket!' cried the old man. 'Oh, my heart on
183  fire, show the jacket to us! Oh, my eyes and limbs, bring the
184  jacket out!'

185       With that he took his trembling hands, which were like the claws of
186  a great bird, out of my hair; and put on a pair of spectacles, not
187  at all ornamental to his inflamed eyes.

188       'Oh, how much for the jacket?' cried the old man, after examining
189  it. 'Oh - goroo! - how much for the jacket?'

190       'Half-a-crown,' I answered, recovering myself.

191       'Oh, my lungs and liver,' cried the old man, 'no! Oh, my eyes, no!
192  Oh, my limbs, no! Eighteenpence. Goroo!'

193       Every time he uttered this ejaculation, his eyes seemed to be in
194  danger of starting out; and every sentence he spoke, he delivered
195  in a sort of tune, always exactly the same, and more like a gust of
196  wind, which begins low, mounts up high, and falls again, than any
197  other comparison I can find for it.

198       'Well,' said I, glad to have closed the bargain, 'I'll take
199  eighteenpence.'

200       'Oh, my liver!' cried the old man, throwing the jacket on a shelf.
201  'Get out of the shop! Oh, my lungs, get out of the shop! Oh, my
202  eyes and limbs - goroo! - don't ask for money; make it an
203  exchange.' I never was so frightened in my life, before or since;
204  but I told him humbly that I wanted money, and that nothing else
205  was of any use to me, but that I would wait for it, as he desired,
206  outside, and had no wish to hurry him. So I went outside, and sat
207  down in the shade in a corner. And I sat there so many hours, that
208  the shade became sunlight, and the sunlight became shade again, and
209  still I sat there waiting for the money.

210       There never was such another drunken madman in that line of
211  business, I hope. That he was well known in the neighbourhood, and
212  enjoyed the reputation of having sold himself to the devil, I soon
213  understood from the visits he received from the boys, who
214  continually came skirmishing about the shop, shouting that legend,
215  and calling to him to bring out his gold. 'You ain't poor, you
216  know, Charley, as you pretend. Bring out your gold. Bring out
217  some of the gold you sold yourself to the devil for. Come! It's
218  in the lining of the mattress, Charley. Rip it open and let's have
219  some!' This, and many offers to lend him a knife for the purpose,
220  exasperated him to such a degree, that the whole day was a
221  succession of rushes on his part, and flights on the part of the
222  boys. Sometimes in his rage he would take me for one of them, and
223  come at me, mouthing as if he were going to tear me in pieces;
224  then, remembering me, just in time, would dive into the shop, and
225  lie upon his bed, as I thought from the sound of his voice, yelling
226  in a frantic way, to his own windy tune, the 'Death of Nelson';
227  with an Oh! before every line, and innumerable Goroos interspersed.
228  As if this were not bad enough for me, the boys, connecting me with
229  the establishment, on account of the patience and perseverance with
230  which I sat outside, half-dressed, pelted me, and used me very ill
231  all day.

232       He made many attempts to induce me to consent to an exchange; at
233  one time coming out with a fishing-rod, at another with a fiddle,
234  at another with a cocked hat, at another with a flute. But I
235  resisted all these overtures, and sat there in desperation; each
236  time asking him, with tears in my eyes, for my money or my jacket.
237  At last he began to pay me in halfpence at a time; and was full two
238  hours getting by easy stages to a shilling.

239       'Oh, my eyes and limbs!' he then cried, peeping hideously out of
240  the shop, after a long pause, 'will you go for twopence more?'

241       'I can't,' I said; 'I shall be starved.'

242       'Oh, my lungs and liver, will you go for threepence?'

243       'I would go for nothing, if I could,' I said, 'but I want the money
244  badly.'

245       'Oh, go-roo!' (it is really impossible to express how he twisted
246  this ejaculation out of himself, as he peeped round the door-post
247  at me, showing nothing but his crafty old head); 'will you go for
248  fourpence?'

249       I was so faint and weary that I closed with this offer; and taking
250  the money out of his claw, not without trembling, went away more
251  hungry and thirsty than I had ever been, a little before sunset.
252  But at an expense of threepence I soon refreshed myself completely;
253  and, being in better spirits then, limped seven miles upon my road.

254       My bed at night was under another haystack, where I rested
255  comfortably, after having washed my blistered feet in a stream, and
256  dressed them as well as I was able, with some cool leaves. When I
257  took the road again next morning, I found that it lay through a
258  succession of hop-grounds and orchards. It was sufficiently late
259  in the year for the orchards to be ruddy with ripe apples; and in
260  a few places the hop-pickers were already at work. I thought it
261  all extremely beautiful, and made up my mind to sleep among the
262  hops that night: imagining some cheerful companionship in the long
263  perspectives of poles, with the graceful leaves twining round them.

264       The trampers were worse than ever that day, and inspired me with a
265  dread that is yet quite fresh in my mind. Some of them were most
266  ferocious-looking ruffians, who stared at me as I went by; and
267  stopped, perhaps, and called after me to come back and speak to
268  them, and when I took to my heels, stoned me. I recollect one
269  young fellow - a tinker, I suppose, from his wallet and brazier -
270  who had a woman with him, and who faced about and stared at me
271  thus; and then roared to me in such a tremendous voice to come
272  back, that I halted and looked round.

273       'Come here, when you're called,' said the tinker, 'or I'll rip your
274  young body open.'

275       I thought it best to go back. As I drew nearer to them, trying to
276  propitiate the tinker by my looks, I observed that the woman had a
277  black eye.

278       'Where are you going?' said the tinker, gripping the bosom of my
279  shirt with his blackened hand.

280       'I am going to Dover,' I said.

281       'Where do you come from?' asked the tinker, giving his hand another
282  turn in my shirt, to hold me more securely.

283       'I come from London,' I said.

284       'What lay are you upon?' asked the tinker. 'Are you a prig?'

285       'N-no,' I said.

286       'Ain't you, by G--? If you make a brag of your honesty to me,'
287  said the tinker, 'I'll knock your brains out.'

288       With his disengaged hand he made a menace of striking me, and then
289  looked at me from head to foot.

290       'Have you got the price of a pint of beer about you?' said the
291  tinker. 'If you have, out with it, afore I take it away!'

292       I should certainly have produced it, but that I met the woman's
293  look, and saw her very slightly shake her head, and form 'No!' with
294  her lips.

295       'I am very poor,' I said, attempting to smile, 'and have got no
296  money.'

297       'Why, what do you mean?' said the tinker, looking so sternly at me,
298  that I almost feared he saw the money in my pocket.

299       'Sir!' I stammered.

300       'What do you mean,' said the tinker, 'by wearing my brother's silk
301  handkerchief! Give it over here!' And he had mine off my neck in
302  a moment, and tossed it to the woman.

303       The woman burst into a fit of laughter, as if she thought this a
304  joke, and tossed it back to me, nodded once, as slightly as before,
305  and made the word 'Go!' with her lips. Before I could obey,
306  however, the tinker seized the handkerchief out of my hand with a
307  roughness that threw me away like a feather, and putting it loosely
308  round his own neck, turned upon the woman with an oath, and knocked
309  her down. I never shall forget seeing her fall backward on the
310  hard road, and lie there with her bonnet tumbled off, and her hair
311  all whitened in the dust; nor, when I looked back from a distance,
312  seeing her sitting on the pathway, which was a bank by the
313  roadside, wiping the blood from her face with a corner of her
314  shawl, while he went on ahead.

315       This adventure frightened me so, that, afterwards, when I saw any
316  of these people coming, I turned back until I could find a
317  hiding-place, where I remained until they had gone out of sight;
318  which happened so often, that I was very seriously delayed. But
319  under this difficulty, as under all the other difficulties of my
320  journey, I seemed to be sustained and led on by my fanciful picture
321  of my mother in her youth, before I came into the world. It always
322  kept me company. It was there, among the hops, when I lay down to
323  sleep; it was with me on my waking in the morning; it went before
324  me all day. I have associated it, ever since, with the sunny
325  street of Canterbury, dozing as it were in the hot light; and with
326  the sight of its old houses and gateways, and the stately, grey
327  Cathedral, with the rooks sailing round the towers. When I came,
328  at last, upon the bare, wide downs near Dover, it relieved the
329  solitary aspect of the scene with hope; and not until I reached
330  that first great aim of my journey, and actually set foot in the
331  town itself, on the sixth day of my flight, did it desert me. But
332  then, strange to say, when I stood with my ragged shoes, and my
333  dusty, sunburnt, half-clothed figure, in the place so long desired,
334  it seemed to vanish like a dream, and to leave me helpless and
335  dispirited.

336       I inquired about my aunt among the boatmen first, and received
337  various answers. One said she lived in the South Foreland Light,
338  and had singed her whiskers by doing so; another, that she was made
339  fast to the great buoy outside the harbour, and could only be
340  visited at half-tide; a third, that she was locked up in Maidstone
341  jail for child-stealing; a fourth, that she was seen to mount a
342  broom in the last high wind, and make direct for Calais. The
343  fly-drivers, among whom I inquired next, were equally jocose and
344  equally disrespectful; and the shopkeepers, not liking my
345  appearance, generally replied, without hearing what I had to say,
346  that they had got nothing for me. I felt more miserable and
347  destitute than I had done at any period of my running away. My
348  money was all gone, I had nothing left to dispose of; I was hungry,
349  thirsty, and worn out; and seemed as distant from my end as if I
350  had remained in London.

351       The morning had worn away in these inquiries, and I was sitting on
352  the step of an empty shop at a street corner, near the
353  market-place, deliberating upon wandering towards those other
354  places which had been mentioned, when a fly-driver, coming by with
355  his carriage, dropped a horsecloth. Something good-natured in the
356  man's face, as I handed it up, encouraged me to ask him if he could
357  tell me where Miss Trotwood lived; though I had asked the question
358  so often, that it almost died upon my lips.

359       'Trotwood,' said he. 'Let me see. I know the name, too. Old
360  lady?'

361       'Yes,' I said, 'rather.'

362       'Pretty stiff in the back?' said he, making himself upright.

363       'Yes,' I said. 'I should think it very likely.'

364       'Carries a bag?' said he - 'bag with a good deal of room in it - is
365  gruffish, and comes down upon you, sharp?'

366       My heart sank within me as I acknowledged the undoubted accuracy of
367  this description.

368       'Why then, I tell you what,' said he. 'If you go up there,'
369  pointing with his whip towards the heights, 'and keep right on till
370  you come to some houses facing the sea, I think you'll hear of her.
371  My opinion is she won't stand anything, so here's a penny for you.'

372       I accepted the gift thankfully, and bought a loaf with it.
373  Dispatching this refreshment by the way, I went in the direction my
374  friend had indicated, and walked on a good distance without coming
375  to the houses he had mentioned. At length I saw some before me;
376  and approaching them, went into a little shop (it was what we used
377  to call a general shop, at home), and inquired if they could have
378  the goodness to tell me where Miss Trotwood lived. I addressed
379  myself to a man behind the counter, who was weighing some rice for
380  a young woman; but the latter, taking the inquiry to herself,
381  turned round quickly.

382       'My mistress?' she said. 'What do you want with her, boy?'

383       'I want,' I replied, 'to speak to her, if you please.'

384       'To beg of her, you mean,' retorted the damsel.

385       'No,' I said, 'indeed.' But suddenly remembering that in truth I
386  came for no other purpose, I held my peace in confusion, and felt
387  my face burn.

388       MY aunt's handmaid, as I supposed she was from what she had said,
389  put her rice in a little basket and walked out of the shop; telling
390  me that I could follow her, if I wanted to know where Miss Trotwood
391  lived. I needed no second permission; though I was by this time in
392  such a state of consternation and agitation, that my legs shook
393  under me. I followed the young woman, and we soon came to a very
394  neat little cottage with cheerful bow-windows: in front of it, a
395  small square gravelled court or garden full of flowers, carefully
396  tended, and smelling deliciously.

397       'This is Miss Trotwood's,' said the young woman. 'Now you know;
398  and that's all I have got to say.' With which words she hurried
399  into the house, as if to shake off the responsibility of my
400  appearance; and left me standing at the garden-gate, looking
401  disconsolately over the top of it towards the parlour window, where
402  a muslin curtain partly undrawn in the middle, a large round green
403  screen or fan fastened on to the windowsill, a small table, and a
404  great chair, suggested to me that my aunt might be at that moment
405  seated in awful state.

406       My shoes were by this time in a woeful condition. The soles had
407  shed themselves bit by bit, and the upper leathers had broken and
408  burst until the very shape and form of shoes had departed from
409  them. My hat (which had served me for a night-cap, too) was so
410  crushed and bent, that no old battered handleless saucepan on a
411  dunghill need have been ashamed to vie with it. My shirt and
412  trousers, stained with heat, dew, grass, and the Kentish soil on
413  which I had slept - and torn besides - might have frightened the
414  birds from my aunt's garden, as I stood at the gate. My hair had
415  known no comb or brush since I left London. My face, neck, and
416  hands, from unaccustomed exposure to the air and sun, were burnt to
417  a berry-brown. From head to foot I was powdered almost as white
418  with chalk and dust, as if I had come out of a lime-kiln. In this
419  plight, and with a strong consciousness of it, I waited to
420  introduce myself to, and make my first impression on, my formidable
421  aunt.

422       The unbroken stillness of the parlour window leading me to infer,
423  after a while, that she was not there, I lifted up my eyes to the
424  window above it, where I saw a florid, pleasant-looking gentleman,
425  with a grey head, who shut up one eye in a grotesque manner, nodded
426  his head at me several times, shook it at me as often, laughed, and
427  went away.

428       I had been discomposed enough before; but I was so much the more
429  discomposed by this unexpected behaviour, that I was on the point
430  of slinking off, to think how I had best proceed, when there came
431  out of the house a lady with her handkerchief tied over her cap,
432  and a pair of gardening gloves on her hands, wearing a gardening
433  pocket like a toll-man's apron, and carrying a great knife. I knew
434  her immediately to be Miss Betsey, for she came stalking out of the
435  house exactly as my poor mother had so often described her stalking
436  up our garden at Blunderstone Rookery.

437       'Go away!' said Miss Betsey, shaking her head, and making a distant
438  chop in the air with her knife. 'Go along! No boys here!'

439       I watched her, with my heart at my lips, as she marched to a corner
440  of her garden, and stooped to dig up some little root there. Then,
441  without a scrap of courage, but with a great deal of desperation,
442  I went softly in and stood beside her, touching her with my finger.

443       'If you please, ma'am,' I began.

444       She started and looked up.

445       'If you please, aunt.'

446       'EH?' exclaimed Miss Betsey, in a tone of amazement I have never
447  heard approached.

448       'If you please, aunt, I am your nephew.'

449       'Oh, Lord!' said my aunt. And sat flat down in the garden-path.

450       'I am David Copperfield, of Blunderstone, in Suffolk - where you
451  came, on the night when I was born, and saw my dear mama. I have
452  been very unhappy since she died. I have been slighted, and taught
453  nothing, and thrown upon myself, and put to work not fit for me.
454  It made me run away to you. I was robbed at first setting out, and
455  have walked all the way, and have never slept in a bed since I
456  began the journey.' Here my self-support gave way all at once; and
457  with a movement of my hands, intended to show her my ragged state,
458  and call it to witness that I had suffered something, I broke into
459  a passion of crying, which I suppose had been pent up within me all
460  the week.

461       My aunt, with every sort of expression but wonder discharged from
462  her countenance, sat on the gravel, staring at me, until I began to
463  cry; when she got up in a great hurry, collared me, and took me
464  into the parlour. Her first proceeding there was to unlock a tall
465  press, bring out several bottles, and pour some of the contents of
466  each into my mouth. I think they must have been taken out at
467  random, for I am sure I tasted aniseed water, anchovy sauce, and
468  salad dressing. When she had administered these restoratives, as
469  I was still quite hysterical, and unable to control my sobs, she
470  put me on the sofa, with a shawl under my head, and the
471  handkerchief from her own head under my feet, lest I should sully
472  the cover; and then, sitting herself down behind the green fan or
473  screen I have already mentioned, so that I could not see her face,
474  ejaculated at intervals, 'Mercy on us!' letting those exclamations
475  off like minute guns.

476       After a time she rang the bell. 'Janet,' said my aunt, when her
477  servant came in. 'Go upstairs, give my compliments to Mr. Dick,
478  and say I wish to speak to him.'

479       Janet looked a little surprised to see me lying stiffly on the sofa
480  (I was afraid to move lest it should be displeasing to my aunt),
481  but went on her errand. My aunt, with her hands behind her, walked
482  up and down the room, until the gentleman who had squinted at me
483  from the upper window came in laughing.

484       'Mr. Dick,' said my aunt, 'don't be a fool, because nobody can be
485  more discreet than you can, when you choose. We all know that. So
486  don't be a fool, whatever you are.'

487       The gentleman was serious immediately, and looked at me, I thought,
488  as if he would entreat me to say nothing about the window.

489       'Mr. Dick,' said my aunt, 'you have heard me mention David
490  Copperfield? Now don't pretend not to have a memory, because you
491  and I know better.'

492       'David Copperfield?' said Mr. Dick, who did not appear to me to
493  remember much about it. 'David Copperfield? Oh yes, to be sure.
494  David, certainly.'

495       'Well,' said my aunt, 'this is his boy - his son. He would be as
496  like his father as it's possible to be, if he was not so like his
497  mother, too.'

498       'His son?' said Mr. Dick. 'David's son? Indeed!'

499       'Yes,' pursued my aunt, 'and he has done a pretty piece of
500  business. He has run away. Ah! His sister, Betsey Trotwood,
501  never would have run away.' My aunt shook her head firmly,
502  confident in the character and behaviour of the girl who never was
503  born.

504       'Oh! you think she wouldn't have run away?' said Mr. Dick.

505       'Bless and save the man,' exclaimed my aunt, sharply, 'how he
506  talks! Don't I know she wouldn't? She would have lived with her
507  god-mother, and we should have been devoted to one another. Where,
508  in the name of wonder, should his sister, Betsey Trotwood, have run
509  from, or to?'

510       'Nowhere,' said Mr. Dick.

511       'Well then,' returned my aunt, softened by the reply, 'how can you
512  pretend to be wool-gathering, Dick, when you are as sharp as a
513  surgeon's lancet? Now, here you see young David Copperfield, and
514  the question I put to you is, what shall I do with him?'

515       'What shall you do with him?' said Mr. Dick, feebly, scratching his
516  head. 'Oh! do with him?'

517       'Yes,' said my aunt, with a grave look, and her forefinger held up.
518  'Come! I want some very sound advice.'

519       'Why, if I was you,' said Mr. Dick, considering, and looking
520  vacantly at me, 'I should -' The contemplation of me seemed to
521  inspire him with a sudden idea, and he added, briskly, 'I should
522  wash him!'

523       'Janet,' said my aunt, turning round with a quiet triumph, which I
524  did not then understand, 'Mr. Dick sets us all right. Heat the
525  bath!'

526       Although I was deeply interested in this dialogue, I could not help
527  observing my aunt, Mr. Dick, and Janet, while it was in progress,
528  and completing a survey I had already been engaged in making of the
529  room.

530       MY aunt was a tall, hard-featured lady, but by no means
531  ill-looking. There was an inflexibility in her face, in her voice,
532  in her gait and carriage, amply sufficient to account for the
533  effect she had made upon a gentle creature like my mother; but her
534  features were rather handsome than otherwise, though unbending and
535  austere. I particularly noticed that she had a very quick, bright
536  eye. Her hair, which was grey, was arranged in two plain
537  divisions, under what I believe would be called a mob-cap; I mean
538  a cap, much more common then than now, with side-pieces fastening
539  under the chin. Her dress was of a lavender colour, and perfectly
540  neat; but scantily made, as if she desired to be as little
541  encumbered as possible. I remember that I thought it, in form,
542  more like a riding-habit with the superfluous skirt cut off, than
543  anything else. She wore at her side a gentleman's gold watch, if
544  I might judge from its size and make, with an appropriate chain and
545  seals; she had some linen at her throat not unlike a shirt-collar,
546  and things at her wrists like little shirt-wristbands.

547       Mr. Dick, as I have already said, was grey-headed, and florid: I
548  should have said all about him, in saying so, had not his head been
549  curiously bowed - not by age; it reminded me of one of Mr.
550  Creakle's boys' heads after a beating - and his grey eyes prominent
551  and large, with a strange kind of watery brightness in them that
552  made me, in combination with his vacant manner, his submission to
553  my aunt, and his childish delight when she praised him, suspect him
554  of being a little mad; though, if he were mad, how he came to be
555  there puzzled me extremely. He was dressed like any other ordinary
556  gentleman, in a loose grey morning coat and waistcoat, and white
557  trousers; and had his watch in his fob, and his money in his
558  pockets: which he rattled as if he were very proud of it.

559       Janet was a pretty blooming girl, of about nineteen or twenty, and
560  a perfect picture of neatness. Though I made no further
561  observation of her at the moment, I may mention here what I did not
562  discover until afterwards, namely, that she was one of a series of
563  protegees whom my aunt had taken into her service expressly to
564  educate in a renouncement of mankind, and who had generally
565  completed their abjuration by marrying the baker.

566       The room was as neat as Janet or my aunt. As I laid down my pen,
567  a moment since, to think of it, the air from the sea came blowing
568  in again, mixed with the perfume of the flowers; and I saw the
569  old-fashioned furniture brightly rubbed and polished, my aunt's
570  inviolable chair and table by the round green fan in the
571  bow-window, the drugget-covered carpet, the cat, the kettle-holder,
572  the two canaries, the old china, the punchbowl full of dried
573  rose-leaves, the tall press guarding all sorts of bottles and pots,
574  and, wonderfully out of keeping with the rest, my dusty self upon
575  the sofa, taking note of everything.

576       Janet had gone away to get the bath ready, when my aunt, to my
577  great alarm, became in one moment rigid with indignation, and had
578  hardly voice to cry out, 'Janet! Donkeys!'

579       Upon which, Janet came running up the stairs as if the house were
580  in flames, darted out on a little piece of green in front, and
581  warned off two saddle-donkeys, lady-ridden, that had presumed to
582  set hoof upon it; while my aunt, rushing out of the house, seized
583  the bridle of a third animal laden with a bestriding child, turned
584  him, led him forth from those sacred precincts, and boxed the ears
585  of the unlucky urchin in attendance who had dared to profane that
586  hallowed ground.

587       To this hour I don't know whether my aunt had any lawful right of
588  way over that patch of green; but she had settled it in her own
589  mind that she had, and it was all the same to her. The one great
590  outrage of her life, demanding to be constantly avenged, was the
591  passage of a donkey over that immaculate spot. In whatever
592  occupation she was engaged, however interesting to her the
593  conversation in which she was taking part, a donkey turned the
594  current of her ideas in a moment, and she was upon him straight.
595  Jugs of water, and watering-pots, were kept in secret places ready
596  to be discharged on the offending boys; sticks were laid in ambush
597  behind the door; sallies were made at all hours; and incessant war
598  prevailed. Perhaps this was an agreeable excitement to the
599  donkey-boys; or perhaps the more sagacious of the donkeys,
600  understanding how the case stood, delighted with constitutional
601  obstinacy in coming that way. I only know that there were three
602  alarms before the bath was ready; and that on the occasion of the
603  last and most desperate of all, I saw my aunt engage,
604  single-handed, with a sandy-headed lad of fifteen, and bump his
605  sandy head against her own gate, before he seemed to comprehend
606  what was the matter. These interruptions were of the more
607  ridiculous to me, because she was giving me broth out of a
608  table-spoon at the time (having firmly persuaded herself that I was
609  actually starving, and must receive nourishment at first in very
610  small quantities), and, while my mouth was yet open to receive the
611  spoon, she would put it back into the basin, cry 'Janet! Donkeys!'
612  and go out to the assault.

613       The bath was a great comfort. For I began to be sensible of acute
614  pains in my limbs from lying out in the fields, and was now so
615  tired and low that I could hardly keep myself awake for five
616  minutes together. When I had bathed, they (I mean my aunt and
617  Janet) enrobed me in a shirt and a pair of trousers belonging to
618  Mr. Dick, and tied me up in two or three great shawls. What sort
619  of bundle I looked like, I don't know, but I felt a very hot one.
620  Feeling also very faint and drowsy, I soon lay down on the sofa
621  again and fell asleep.

622       It might have been a dream, originating in the fancy which had
623  occupied my mind so long, but I awoke with the impression that my
624  aunt had come and bent over me, and had put my hair away from my
625  face, and laid my head more comfortably, and had then stood looking
626  at me. The words, 'Pretty fellow,' or 'Poor fellow,' seemed to be
627  in my ears, too; but certainly there was nothing else, when I
628  awoke, to lead me to believe that they had been uttered by my aunt,
629  who sat in the bow-window gazing at the sea from behind the green
630  fan, which was mounted on a kind of swivel, and turned any way.

631       We dined soon after I awoke, off a roast fowl and a pudding; I
632  sitting at table, not unlike a trussed bird myself, and moving my
633  arms with considerable difficulty. But as my aunt had swathed me
634  up, I made no complaint of being inconvenienced. All this time I
635  was deeply anxious to know what she was going to do with me; but
636  she took her dinner in profound silence, except when she
637  occasionally fixed her eyes on me sitting opposite, and said,
638  'Mercy upon us!' which did not by any means relieve my anxiety.

639       The cloth being drawn, and some sherry put upon the table (of which
640  I had a glass), my aunt sent up for Mr. Dick again, who joined us,
641  and looked as wise as he could when she requested him to attend to
642  my story, which she elicited from me, gradually, by a course of
643  questions. During my recital, she kept her eyes on Mr. Dick, who
644  I thought would have gone to sleep but for that, and who,
645  whensoever he lapsed into a smile, was checked by a frown from my
646  aunt.

647       'Whatever possessed that poor unfortunate Baby, that she must go
648  and be married again,' said my aunt, when I had finished, 'I can't
649  conceive.'

650       'Perhaps she fell in love with her second husband,' Mr. Dick
651  suggested.

652       'Fell in love!' repeated my aunt. 'What do you mean? What
653  business had she to do it?'

654       'Perhaps,' Mr. Dick simpered, after thinking a little, 'she did it
655  for pleasure.'

656       'Pleasure, indeed!' replied my aunt. 'A mighty pleasure for the
657  poor Baby to fix her simple faith upon any dog of a fellow, certain
658  to ill-use her in some way or other. What did she propose to
659  herself, I should like to know! She had had one husband. She had
660  seen David Copperfield out of the world, who was always running
661  after wax dolls from his cradle. She had got a baby - oh, there
662  were a pair of babies when she gave birth to this child sitting
663  here, that Friday night! - and what more did she want?'

664       Mr. Dick secretly shook his head at me, as if he thought there was
665  no getting over this.

666       'She couldn't even have a baby like anybody else,' said my aunt.
667  'Where was this child's sister, Betsey Trotwood? Not forthcoming.
668  Don't tell me!'

669       Mr. Dick seemed quite frightened.

670       'That little man of a doctor, with his head on one side,' said my
671  aunt, 'Jellips, or whatever his name was, what was he about? All
672  he could do, was to say to me, like a robin redbreast - as he is -
673  "It's a boy." A boy! Yah, the imbecility of the whole set of
674  'em!'

675       The heartiness of the ejaculation startled Mr. Dick exceedingly;
676  and me, too, if I am to tell the truth.

677       'And then, as if this was not enough, and she had not stood
678  sufficiently in the light of this child's sister, Betsey Trotwood,'
679  said my aunt, 'she marries a second time - goes and marries a
680  Murderer - or a man with a name like it - and stands in THIS
681  child's light! And the natural consequence is, as anybody but a
682  baby might have foreseen, that he prowls and wanders. He's as like
683  Cain before he was grown up, as he can be.'

684       Mr. Dick looked hard at me, as if to identify me in this character.

685       'And then there's that woman with the Pagan name,' said my aunt,
686  'that Peggotty, she goes and gets married next. Because she has
687  not seen enough of the evil attending such things, she goes and
688  gets married next, as the child relates. I only hope,' said my
689  aunt, shaking her head, 'that her husband is one of those Poker
690  husbands who abound in the newspapers, and will beat her well with
691  one.'

692       I could not bear to hear my old nurse so decried, and made the
693  subject of such a wish. I told my aunt that indeed she was
694  mistaken. That Peggotty was the best, the truest, the most
695  faithful, most devoted, and most self-denying friend and servant in
696  the world; who had ever loved me dearly, who had ever loved my
697  mother dearly; who had held my mother's dying head upon her arm, on
698  whose face my mother had imprinted her last grateful kiss. And my
699  remembrance of them both, choking me, I broke down as I was trying
700  to say that her home was my home, and that all she had was mine,
701  and that I would have gone to her for shelter, but for her humble
702  station, which made me fear that I might bring some trouble on her
703  - I broke down, I say, as I was trying to say so, and laid my face
704  in my hands upon the table.

705       'Well, well!' said my aunt, 'the child is right to stand by those
706  who have stood by him - Janet! Donkeys!'

707       I thoroughly believe that but for those unfortunate donkeys, we
708  should have come to a good understanding; for my aunt had laid her
709  hand on my shoulder, and the impulse was upon me, thus emboldened,
710  to embrace her and beseech her protection. But the interruption,
711  and the disorder she was thrown into by the struggle outside, put
712  an end to all softer ideas for the present, and kept my aunt
713  indignantly declaiming to Mr. Dick about her determination to
714  appeal for redress to the laws of her country, and to bring actions
715  for trespass against the whole donkey proprietorship of Dover,
716  until tea-time.

717       After tea, we sat at the window - on the look-out, as I imagined,
718  from my aunt's sharp expression of face, for more invaders - until
719  dusk, when Janet set candles, and a backgammon-board, on the table,
720  and pulled down the blinds.

721       'Now, Mr. Dick,' said my aunt, with her grave look, and her
722  forefinger up as before, 'I am going to ask you another question.
723  Look at this child.'

724       'David's son?' said Mr. Dick, with an attentive, puzzled face.

725       'Exactly so,' returned my aunt. 'What would you do with him, now?'

726       'Do with David's son?' said Mr. Dick.

727       'Ay,' replied my aunt, 'with David's son.'

728       'Oh!' said Mr. Dick. 'Yes. Do with - I should put him to bed.'

729       'Janet!' cried my aunt, with the same complacent triumph that I had
730  remarked before. 'Mr. Dick sets us all right. If the bed is
731  ready, we'll take him up to it.'

732       Janet reporting it to be quite ready, I was taken up to it; kindly,
733  but in some sort like a prisoner; my aunt going in front and Janet
734  bringing up the rear. The only circumstance which gave me any new
735  hope, was my aunt's stopping on the stairs to inquire about a smell
736  of fire that was prevalent there; and janet's replying that she had
737  been making tinder down in the kitchen, of my old shirt. But there
738  were no other clothes in my room than the odd heap of things I
739  wore; and when I was left there, with a little taper which my aunt
740  forewarned me would burn exactly five minutes, I heard them lock my
741  door on the outside. Turning these things over in my mind I deemed
742  it possible that my aunt, who could know nothing of me, might
743  suspect I had a habit of running away, and took precautions, on
744  that account, to have me in safe keeping.

745       The room was a pleasant one, at the top of the house, overlooking
746  the sea, on which the moon was shining brilliantly. After I had
747  said my prayers, and the candle had burnt out, I remember how I
748  still sat looking at the moonlight on the water, as if I could hope
749  to read my fortune in it, as in a bright book; or to see my mother
750  with her child, coming from Heaven, along that shining path, to
751  look upon me as she had looked when I last saw her sweet face. I
752  remember how the solemn feeling with which at length I turned my
753  eyes away, yielded to the sensation of gratitude and rest which the
754  sight of the white-curtained bed - and how much more the lying
755  softly down upon it, nestling in the snow-white sheets! - inspired.
756  I remember how I thought of all the solitary places under the night
757  sky where I had slept, and how I prayed that I never might be
758  houseless any more, and never might forget the houseless. I
759  remember how I seemed to float, then, down the melancholy glory of
760  that track upon the sea, away into the world of dreams.

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