 CHAPTER XIII. THE SEQUEL OF MY RESOLUTION For anything I know, I may have had some wild idea of running all the way to Dover when I gave up the pursuit of the young man with the donkey cart and started for Greenwich. My scattered senses were soon collected as to that point if I had, for I came to a stop in the Kent Road, at a terrace with a piece of water before it, and a great foolish image in the middle blowing a dry shell. Here I sat down on a doorstep, quite spent, and exhausted with the efforts I had already made and with hardly breath enough to cry for the loss of my box and half-guinea. It was by this time dark I heard the clock strike ten as I sat resting. But it was a summer night, fortunately, and fine weather. When I had recovered my breath and had got rid of a stifling sensation in my throat, I rose up and went on. In the midst of my distress I had no notion of going back. I doubt if I should have had any, though there had been a Swiss snowdrift in the Kent Road. But my standing possessed of only three half-pence in the world, and I am sure I wonder how they came to be left in my pocket on a Saturday night, troubled me nonetheless because I went on. I began to picture myself as a scrap of newspaper intelligence, my being found dead in a day or two under some hedge, and I trudged on miserably, though as fast as I could, until I happened to pass a little shop where it was written up that ladies and gentlemen's wardrobes were bought and that the best price was given for rags, bones, and kitchen stuff. The master of this shop was sitting at the door in his shirt sleeves smoking, and as there were a great many coats and pairs of trousers dangling from the low ceiling, and only two feeble candles burning inside to show what they were, I fancied that he looked like a man of a revengeful disposition who had hung all his enemies and was enjoying himself. My late experiences with Mr. and Mrs. Mycobber suggested to me that here might be a means of keeping off the wolf for a little while. I went up the next by street, took off my waistcoat, rolled it neatly under my arm, and came back to the shop door. If you please, sir, I said, I am to sell this for a fair price. Mr. Dollaby, Dollaby was the name over the shop door at least, took the waistcoat, stood his pipe on its head against the door post, went into the shop, followed by me, snuffed the two candles with his fingers, spread the waistcoat out on the counter, and looked at it there, held it up against the light, and looked at it there, and ultimately said, What do you call a price now for this here little waistcoat? Oh, you know best, sir, I returned modestly. I can't be a buyer and seller, too, said Mr. Dollaby, put a price on this here little waistcoat. Would 18 pence be? I hinted after some hesitation. Mr. Dollaby rolled it up again and gave it me back. I should rob my family, he said, if I was to offer nine pence for it. This was a disagreeable way of putting the business because it imposed upon me, a perfect stranger, the unpleasantness of asking Mr. Dollaby to rob his family on my account. My circumstances being so very oppressing, however, I said I would take nine pence for it if he pleased. Mr. Dollaby, not without some grumbling, gave nine pence. I wished him a good night and walked out of the shop the richer by that sum and the poorer by a waistcoat. But when I buttoned my jacket, that was not much. Indeed, I foresaw pretty clearly that my jacket would go next, and that I should have to make the best of my weighted over in a shirt and a pair of trousers, and might deem myself lucky if I got there even in that trim. But my mind did not run so much on this as might be supposed. Beyond a general impression of the distance before me and of the young man with the donkey cart having used me cruelly, I think I had no very urgent sense of my difficulties when I once again set off with my nine pence in my pocket. A plan had occurred to me for passing the night which I was going to carry into execution. This was to lie behind the wall at the back of my old school in a corner where there used to be a haystack. I imagined it would be a kind of company to have the boys and the bedroom where I used to tell the stories so near me, although the boys would know nothing of my being there and the bedroom would yield me no shelter. I had had a hard day's work and was pretty well jaded when I came climbing out at last upon the level of blackheath. It cost me some trouble to find out Salem House, but I found it. And I found a haystack in the corner and I lay down by it having first walked around the wall and looked up at the windows and seen that all was dark and silent within. Never shall I forget the lonely sensation of first lying down without a roof over my head. Sleep came upon me as it came upon many other outcasts against whom house doors were locked and house dogs barked that night. And I dreamed of lying on my old school bed talking to the boys in my room and found myself sitting upright with Steerforth's name upon my lips, looking wildly at the stars that were glistening and glimmering above me. When I remembered where I was at that untimely hour, a feeling stole upon me that made me get up afraid of I don't know what and walk about. But the fainter glimmering of the stars and the pale light in the sky where the day was coming reassured me and my eyes being very heavy, I lay down again and slept, though with the knowledge in my sleep that it was cold, until the warm beams of the sun and the ringing of the getting up bell at Salem House awoke me. If I could have hoped that Steerforth was there, I would have lurked about until he came out alone, but I knew he must have left long since. Traddles still remained perhaps, but it was very doubtful, and I had not sufficient confidence in his discretion or good luck. However strong my reliance was on his good nature, to wish to trust him with my situation. So I crept away from the wall as Mr. Creekel's boys were getting up, and struck into the long dusty track which I had first known to be the Dover Road when I was one of them, and when I little expected that any eyes would ever see me the Wayfarer I was now upon it. What a different Sunday morning from the old Sunday morning at Yarmouth. In due time I heard the church bells ringing as I plotted on, and I met people who were going to church, and I passed a church or two where the congregation were inside, and the sound of singing came out into the sunshine, while the beetle sat and cooled himself in the shade of the porch, or stood beneath the yew tree with his hand to his forehead, glowering at me going by. But the peace and rest of the old Sunday morning were on everything except me. That was the difference. I felt quite wicked in my dirt and dust with my tangled hair. But for the quiet picture I had conjured up of my mother and her youth and beauty weeping by the fire, and my aunt relenting to her, I hardly think I should have had the courage to go on until next day. But it always went before me, and I followed. I got that Sunday through three and twenty miles on the straight road, though not very easily, for I was new to that kind of toil. I see myself as the evening closes in, coming over the bridge at Rochester, foot sore and tired, and eating bread that I had bought for supper. One or two little houses with the notice lodgings for travelers hanging out had tempted me, but I was afraid of spending the few pence I had, and was even more afraid of the vicious looks of the trampers I had met or overtaken. I sought no shelter, therefore, but the sky, and toiling into Chatham, which in that night's aspect is a mere dream of chalk and draw bridges, and massless ships in a muddy river, roofed like Noah's arcs, crept at last upon a sort of grass-grown battery overhanging a lane where a sentry was walking to and fro. Here I lay down near a cannon, and happy in the society of the sentry's footsteps, though he knew no more of my being above him than the boys at Salem House had known of my lying by the wall, slept soundly until morning. Very stiff and sore of foot I was in the morning, and quite dazed by the beating of drums and marching of troops, which seemed to hem me in on every side when I went down towards the long, narrow street. Feeling I could go but a very little way that day if I were to reserve any strength for getting to my journey's end, I resolved to make the sale of my jacket its principal business. Accordingly, I took the jacket off that I might learn to do without it, and carrying it under my arm began a tour of inspection of the various slop shops. It was a likely place to sell a jacket in, for the dealers in secondhand clothes were numerous, and were, generally speaking, on the lookout for customers at their shop doors. But as most of them had, hanging up by their stock and officer's coat or two, epaulets and all, I was rendered timid by the costly nature of their dealings, and walked about for a long time without offering my merchandise to anyone. This modesty of mine directed my attention to the marine store shops, and set shops as Mr. Dallowby's in preference to the regular dealers. At last I found one that I thought looked promising, at the corner of the dirty lane, ending in an enclosure full of stinging nettles against the palings of which some secondhand sailors' clothes that seemed to have overflowed the shop were fluttering among some cots and rusty guns and oil skin hats, and certain trays full of so many rusty keys of so many sizes that they seemed various enough to open all the doors in the world. Into this shop, which was low and small, and which was darkened rather than lighted by a little window, overhung with clothes, and was descended into by some steps, I went with a palpitating heart, which was not relieved when an ugly old man with the lower part of his face all covered with a stubbly gray beard rushed out of a dirty den behind it and seized me by the hair of my head. He was a dreadful old man to look at in a filthy flannel waistcoat and smelling terribly of rum. His bedstead, covered with a tumbled and ragged piece of patchwork, was in the den he had come from, where another little window showed a prospect of more stinging nettles and a lame donkey. Oh, what do you want? Grinned this old man in a fierce monotonous whine. Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want? Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, guru, guru! I was so much dismayed by these words, and particularly by the repetition of the last unknown one, which was a kind of rattle in his throat, that I could make no answer. Hereupon, the old man, still holding me by the hair, repeated, Oh, what do you want? Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want? Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, guru! Which he screwed out of himself with an energy that made in its eyes start in his head. I wanted to know, I said trembling, if you would buy a jacket. Oh, let's see the jacket, cried the old man. Oh, my heart on fire, show the jacket to us. Oh, my eyes and limbs, bring the jacket out. With that, he took his trembling hands, which were like the claws of a great bird out of my hair, and put on a pair of spectacles, not at all ornamental to his inflamed eyes. Oh, how much for the jacket, cried the old man after examining it. Oh, guru! How much for the jacket? Half a crown, I answered recovering myself. Oh, my lungs and liver, cried the old man. No, oh, my eyes, no, oh, my limbs, no, 18 pence, guru! Every time he uttered this ejaculation, his eyes seemed to be in danger of starting out, and every sentence he spoke, he delivered in a sort of tune, always exactly the same, and more like a gust of wind, which begins low, mounts up high, and falls again, than any other comparison I can find for it. Well, I said, glad to have the matter closed. I'll take 18 pence. Oh, my liver, cried the old man, throwing the jacket on a shelf. Get out of the shop! Oh, my lungs, get out of the shop! Oh, my limbs, guru! Don't ask for money, make it in exchange! I never was so frightened in my life before or since, but I told him humbly that I wanted money, and that nothing else was of any use to me, but that I would wait for it as he desired outside, and had no wish to hurry him. So I went outside, and sat down in the shade in a corner, and I sat there so many hours that the shade became sunlight, and the sunlight became shade again, and still I sat there waiting for the money. There never was such another drunken madman in that line of business, I hope, that he was well known in the neighborhood, and enjoyed the reputation of having sold himself to the devil. I soon understood from the visits he received from the boys, who continually came skirmishing about the shop, shouting that legend, and calling to him to bring out his gold. You ain't poor, you know, Charlie, as you pretend. Bring out your gold! Bring out some of that gold you sold yourself to the devil for. Come, it's in the lining of the mattress, Charlie. Rip it open and let's have some. This, and many offers to lend him a knife for the purpose, exasperated him to such a degree that the whole day was a succession of rushes on his part, and flights on the part of the boys. Sometimes in his rage he would take me for one of them, and come at me, mouthing as if he were going to tear me in pieces. Then, remembering me just in time, would dive into the shop, and lie upon his bed as I thought from the sound of his voice, yelling, in a frantic way, to his own windy tune, the death of Nelson, with an o before every line, and innumerable gurus interspersed. As if this were not bad enough for me, the boys, connecting me with the establishment on account of the patience and perseverance with which I sat outside, half dressed, pelted me and used me very ill all day. He made many attempts to induce me to consent to an exchange, at one time coming out with a fishing rod, at another with a fiddle, and another with a cocked hat, at another with a flute. But I resisted all these overtures, and sat there in desperation, each time asking him with tears in my eyes for my money or my jacket. At last he began to pay me in half-pence at a time, and was full two hours getting by easy stages to a shilling. Oh, my eyes and limbs! He then cried, peeping hideously out of the shop after a long pause. Will you go for two pints more? I can't, I said. I shall be starved. Oh, lungs and liver, will you go for three pints? I would go for nothing if I could, I said, but I want the money badly. Oh, grrrr! It is really impossible to express how he twisted this ejaculation out of himself as he peeped round the doorpost at me, showing nothing but his crafty old head. Will you go for four pints? I was so faint and weary that I closed with this offer, and taking the money out of his claw, not without trembling, went away more hungry and thirsty than I had ever been, a little before sunset. But at an expense of three pints, I soon refreshed myself completely, and being in better spirits then, limped seven miles upon my road. My bed at night was under another haystack, where I rested comfortably, after having washed my blistered feet in a stream and dressed them as well as I was able with some cool leaves. When I took the road again next morning, I found that it lay through a succession of hop-grounds and orchards. It was sufficiently late in the year for the orchards to be ready with ripe apples, and in a few places the hop pickers were already at work. I thought it all extremely beautiful, and made up my mind to sleep among the hops that night, imagining some cheerful companionship in the long perspectives of poles, with the graceful leaves twining round them. The trampers were worse than ever that day, and it inspired me with a dread that is quite yet fresh in my mind. Some of them were most ferocious-looking ruffians who stared at me as I went by, and stopped perhaps, and called after me to come back and speak to them, and when I took to my heels, stoned me. I recollect one young fellow, a tinker, I suppose, from his wallet and brazier, who had a woman with him, and who faced about and stared at me thus, and then roared to me in such a tremendous voice to come back that I halted and looked round. Come here when you're called, said the tinker, or I'll rip your young body open. I thought it best to go back. As I drew nearer to them, trying to propitiate the tinker by my looks, I noticed that the woman had a black eye. Where are you going? said the tinker, gripping the bosom of my shirt with his blackened hand. I'm going to dover, I said. Where do you come from? asked the tinker, giving his hand another turn in my shirt to hold me more securely. I come from London, I said. What lay are you upon? asked the tinker. Are you a prig? No, I said. Ain't you by God? If you make a brag of your honesty to me, said the tinker, I'll knock your brains out. With his disengaged hand, he made a menace of striking me, and then looked at me from head to foot. Have you got the price of a pint of beer about you? said the tinker. If you have, out with it, before I take it away. I should certainly have produced it, but that I met the woman's look, and saw her very slightly shake her head and form no with her lips. I'm very poor, I said, attempting to smile, and have got no money. Why, what do you mean? said the tinker, looking so sternly at me that I almost feared he saw the money in my pocket. Sir, I stammered. What do you mean? said the tinker, by wearing my brother's silk handkerchief. Give it over here! And he had mine off my neck in a moment, and tossed it to the woman. The woman burst into a fit of laughter, as if she thought this a joke, and tossed it back to me, knotted once as slightly as before, and made the word go with her lips. Before I could obey, however, the tinker seized the handkerchief out of my hand with a roughness that threw me away like a feather, and putting it loosely round his own neck, turned upon the woman with an oath and knocked her down. I never shall forget seeing her fall backwards on the hard road, and lie there with her bonnet tumbled off, and her hair all whitened in the dust. Nor, when I looked back from a distance, seeing her sitting on the pathway, which was a bank by the roadside, wiping the blood from her face with a corner of her shawl while he went on ahead. This adventure frightened me so that afterwards when I saw any of these people coming, I turned back until I could find a hiding place where I remained until they had gone out of sight, which happened so often that I was very seriously delayed. But under this difficulty, as under all the difficulties of my journey, I seemed to be sustained and led on by my fanciful picture of my mother and her youth before I came into the world. It always kept me company. It was there, among the hops, when I lay down to sleep. It was with me on my waking in the morning. It went before me all day. I have associated it ever since with the sunny street of Canterbury, dozing as it were in the hot light, and the sight of its old houses and gateways, and the stately gray cathedral with the rook sailing round the towers. When I came at last upon the bare wide downs near Dover, it relieved the solitary aspect of the scene with hope, and not until I reached that first great aim of my journey and actually set foot in the town itself on the sixth day of my flight did it desert me. But then, strange to say, when I stood with my ragged shoes and my dusty sun-burnt half-clothed figure in the place so long desired, it seemed to vanish like a dream and to leave me helpless and dispirited. I inquired about my aunt among the boatmen first and received various answers. One said she lived in the South Forland light and had sentenced her whiskers by doing so. Another, that she was made fast to the great buoy outside the harbor and could only be visited at half tide. A third, that she was locked up in Maidstone Jail for child-stealing. A fourth, that she was seen to mount a broom in the last high wind and make direct for Calais. The fly-drivers, among whom I inquired next, were equally jacuzzi and equally disrespectful, and the shopkeepers, not liking my appearance, generally replied without hearing what I had to say that they had got nothing for me. I felt more miserable and destitute than I had done at any period of my running away. My money was all gone. I had nothing left to dispose of. I was hungry, thirsty, and worn out and seemed as distant from my end as if I had remained in London. The morning had worn away in these inquiries and I was sitting on the step of an empty shop at a street corner near the market place deliberating upon wondering towards those other places which had been mentioned, when a fly-driver, coming by with his carriage, dropped a horse-cloth. Something good-natured in the man's face as I handed it up encouraged me to ask him if he could tell me where Miss Trotwood lived, though I had asked the question so often that it almost died upon my lips. Trotwood, said he, let me see, I know the name too, old lady. Yes, I said, rather. Pretty stiff in the back, said he, making himself upright. Yes, I said, I should think it very likely. Carries a bag, said he, bag with a good deal of room in it, is gruffish and comes down upon you sharp. My heart sank within me as I acknowledged the undoubted accuracy of this description. Why, then, I tell you what, said he, if you go up there, pointing with his whip towards the heights, and keep right on till you come to some houses facing the sea, I think you'll hear of her. My opinion is she won't stand anything, so here's a penny for you. I accepted the gift, thankfully, and bought a loaf with it. Dispatching this refreshment by the way, I went in the direction my friend had indicated, and walked on a good distance without coming to the houses he had mentioned. At length, I saw some before me, and approaching them went into a little shop. It was what we used to call a general shop at home, and inquired if they could have the goodness to tell me where Miss Trotwood lived. I addressed myself to a man behind the counter, who was weighing some rice for a young woman, but the latter, taking the inquiry to herself, turned round quickly. My mistress, she said, what do you want with her, boy? I want, I replied, to speak to her, if you please. To beg of her, you mean, retorted the damsel. No, I said, indeed. But suddenly remembering that in truth I came for no other purpose, I held my peace in confusion, and felt my face burn. My aunt's handmaid, as I supposed she was from what she had said, put her rice in a little basket, and walked out of the shop, telling me that I could follow her if I wanted to know where Miss Trotwood lived. I needed no second permission, though I was by this time in such a state of consternation and agitation that my legs shook under me. I followed the young woman, and we soon came to a very neat little cottage with cheerful bow windows. In front of it, a small square graveled court, or garden, full of flowers, carefully tended and smelling deliciously. This is Miss Trotwood, said the young woman. Now you know, and that is all I've got to say. With which words she hurried into the house as if to shake off the responsibility of my appearance, and left me standing at the garden gate, looking disconsolately over the top of it towards the parlor window, where a muslin curtain partly undrawn in the middle, a large round green screener fan fastened onto the windowsill, a small table, and a great chair, suggested to me that my aunt might be at that moment seated in awful state. My shoes were by this time in a woeful condition. The soles had shed themselves bit by bit, and the upper leathers had broken and burst until the very shape and form of shoes had departed from them. My hat, which had served me for a nightcap, too, was so crushed and bent that no old battered handleless saucepan on a dung hill need to have been ashamed to vie with it. My shirt and trousers stained with dew, heat, grass, and the kentish soil on which I had slept, and torn besides might have frightened the birds from my aunt's garden as I stood at the gate. My hair had known no comb or brush since I left London. My face, neck, and hands from unaccustomed exposure to the air and sun were burnt to a berry brown. From head to foot I was powdered almost as white with chalk and dust as if I had come out of a lime kiln. In this plight, and with a strong consciousness of it, I waited to introduce myself to, and make my first impression on, my formidable aunt. The unbroken stillness of the parlor window leading me to infer after a while that she was not there, I lifted up my eyes to the window above it, where I saw a florid, pleasant-looking gentleman with a gray head, who shut up one eye in a grotesque manner, nodded his head at me several times, shook it at me as often, laughed, and went away. I had been discomposed enough before, but I was so much the more discomposed by this unexpected behavior that I was on the point of slinking off to think how I had best proceed, when there came out of the house a lady with her handkerchief tied over her cap, and a pair of gardening gloves on her hands, wearing a gardening pocket like a Toleman's apron, and carrying a great knife. I knew her immediately to be Miss Betsy, for she came stocking out of the house exactly as my poor mother had so often described her stocking up our garden at Blunderstone Rookery. Go away, said Miss Betsy, shaking her head and making a distant chop in the air with her knife. Go along, no boys here! I watched her with my heart at my lips as she marched to a corner of her garden and stooped to dig up some little root there. Then, without a scrap of courage, but with a great deal of desperation, I went softly in and stood beside her, touching her with my finger. If you please, ma'am, I began. She started and looked up. If you please, aunt. Eh? exclaimed Miss Betsy in a tone of amazement I have never heard approached. If you please, aunt, I am your nephew. O Lord! said my aunt, and sat flat down in the garden path. I am David Copperfield of Blunderstone and Suffolk, where you came on the night when I was born and saw my dear mama. I have been very unhappy since she died. I have been slighted and taught nothing and thrown upon myself and put to work not fit for me. It made me run away to you. I was robbed at first setting out and have walked all the way and have never slept in a bed since I began the journey. Here my self-support gave way all at once and with a movement of my hands, intending to show her my ragged state and call it to witness that I had suffered something, I broke into a passion of crying, which I suppose had been pent up with me all the week. My aunt, with every sort of expression but wonder just charged from her countenance, sat on the gravel, staring at me until I began to cry. When she got up in a hurry, collared me and took me into the parlor. Her first proceeding there was to unlock a tall press, bring out several bottles, and pour some of the contents of each into my mouth. I think they must have been taken out at random, for I am sure I tasted aniseed water and chovy sauce and salad dressing. When she had administered these restoratives, as I was still quite hysterical and unable to control my sobs, she put me on the sofa with a shawl under my head and a handkerchief from her own head under my feet, lest I should sully the cover, and then sitting herself down behind the green fan or screen I have already mentioned, so that I could not see her face ejaculated at intervals mercy upon us, letting those exclamations off like minute guns. After a time she rang the bell. Janet, said my aunt when her servant came in, go upstairs give my compliments to Mr. Dick and say I wish to speak to him. Janet looked a little surprised to see me lying stiffly on the sofa. I was afraid to move, lest it should be displeasing to my aunt, but went on her errand. My aunt, with her hands behind her, walked up and down the room until the gentleman who had squinted at me from the upper window came in laughing. Mr. Dick, said my aunt, don't be a fool, because nobody can be more discreet than you can when you choose. We all know that, so don't be a fool, whatever you are. The gentleman was serious immediately and looked at me, I thought, as if he would entreat me to say nothing about the window. Mr. Dick, said my aunt, you have heard me mention David Copperfield, and don't pretend not to have a memory because you and I know better. David Copperfield, said Mr. Dick, who did not appear to me to remember much about it. David Copperfield. Oh yes, to be sure. David, certainly. Well, said my aunt, this is his boy, his son. He would be as like his father as it's possible to be if he was not so like his mother too. His son, said Mr. Dick, David's son, indeed. Yes, pursued my aunt, and he has done a pretty piece of business. He has run away. His sister Betsy Trotwood never would have run away. My aunt shook her head firmly, confident in the character and behavior of the girl who never was born. Oh, you think she wouldn't have run away, said Mr. Dick. Bless and save the man, exclaimed my aunt sharply, how he talks. Don't I know she wouldn't? She would have lived with her godmother, and we should have been devoted to one another. Where, in the name of wonder, should his sister Betsy Trotwood have run from or to? Nowhere, said Mr. Dick. Well then, returned my aunt, softened by the reply, how could you pretend to be well-gathering Dick when you are as sharp as a surgeon's lancet? Now, here you see young David Copperfield, and the question I put to you is, what shall I do with him? What shall you do with him? said Mr. Dick, feebly scratching his head. Oh, do with him? Yes, said my aunt with a grave look, and her forefinger held up. Come, I want some very sound advice. Why, if I was you, said Mr. Dick, considering and looking vacantly at me, I should... The contemplation of me seemed to inspire him with a sudden idea, and he added briskly, I should wash him. Janet, said my aunt, turning around with a quiet triumph, which I did not then understand. Mr. Dick sets us all right. Heat the bath! Although I was deeply interested in this dialogue, I could not help observing my aunt, Mr. Dick, and Janet while it was in progress, and completing a survey I had already been engaged in making of the room. My aunt was a tall, hard-featured lady, but by no means ill-looking. There was an inflexibility in her face, in her voice, in her gait and carriage, amply sufficient to account for the effect she had made upon a gentle creature like my mother, but her features were rather handsome than otherwise, though unbending and austere. I particularly noticed that she had a very quick, bright eye. Her hair, which was gray, was arranged in two plain divisions, under what I believe would be called a mob cap. I mean a cap much more common then than now, with side pieces fastening under the chin. Her dress was of a lavender color and perfectly neat but scantily made, as if she desired to be as little encumbered as possible. I remember that I thought it, in form, more like a riding habit with a superfluous skirt cut off, than anything else. She wore at her side a gentleman's gold watch, if I might judge from its size and make, with an appropriate chain and seals. She had some linen of her throat, not unlike a shirt collar, and things at her wrists like little shirt wristbands. Mr. Dick, as I have already said, was gray-headed and florid. I should have said all about him in saying so, had not his head been curiously bowed, not by age. It reminded me of one of Mr. Creekel's boy's heads after a beating. And his gray eyes, prominent and large, with the strange kind of watery brightness in them that made me, in combination with his vacant manner, his submission to my aunt, and his childish delight when she praised him, suspect him of being a little mad. Though, if he were mad, how he came to be there puzzled me extremely. He was dressed like any other ordinary gentleman in a loose gray morning coat and waistcoat, and white trousers, and had his watch in his fob, and his money in his pockets, which he rattled as if he were very proud of it. Janet was a pretty blooming girl of about 19 or 20, and a perfect picture of neatness. Though I made no further observation of her at the moment, I may mention here what I did not discover until afterwards, namely that she was one of a series of protégés whom my aunt had taken into her service expressly to educate in a renouncement of mankind, and who had generally completed their abjuration by marrying the baker. The room was as neat as Janet, or my aunt. As I laid down my pen a moment since to think of it, the air from the sea came blowing in again, mixed with the perfume of the flowers, and I saw the old-fashioned furniture brightly rubbed and polished, my aunt's inviolable chair and table by the round green fan in the bow window. The drug it covered carpet, the cat, the kettle holder, the two canaries, the old china, the punch bowl full of dried rose leaves, the tall press guarding all sorts of bottles and pots, and wonderfully out of keeping with the rest, my dusty self upon the sofa taking note of everything. Janet had gone away to get the bath ready when my aunt, to my great alarm, became in one moment rigid with indignation and had hardly a voice to cry out, Jitz! Upon which Janet came running up the stairs as if the house were in flames, darted out on a little piece of green in front and warned off two saddle donkeys, lady ridden, that had presumed to set hoof upon it, while my aunt, rushing out of the house, seized the bridle of a third animal laden with a bestriding child, turned him, led him forth from those sacred precincts, and boxed the ears of the unlucky urchin in attendance who had dared to profane that hallowed ground. To this hour, I don't know whether my aunt had any lawful right of way over that patch of green, but she had settled it in her own mind that she had, and it was all the same to her. The one great outrage of her life, demanding to be constantly avenged, was the passage of a donkey over that immaculate spot. In whatever occupation she was engaged, however interesting to her the conversation in which she was taking part, a donkey turned the current of her ideas in a moment as she was upon him straight. Jugs of water and watering pots were kept in secret places, ready to be discharged on the offending boys. Sticks were laid in ambush behind the door, sallies were made at all hours, and incessant war prevailed. Perhaps this was an agreeable excitement to the donkey boys, or perhaps the more sagacious of the donkeys, understanding how the case stood, delighted with constitutional obstinacy in coming that way. I only know that there were three alarms before the bath was ready, and that on the occasion of the last and last night, the last and most desperate of all, I saw my aunt engage single-handed, with a sandy-headed lad of fifteen, and bump his sandy head against her own gait before he seemed to comprehend what was the matter. These interruptions were of the more ridiculous to me, because she was giving me broth out of a tablespoon at the time, having profoundly persuaded herself that I was actually starving, and must receive nourishment at first in very small quantities. And while my mouth was yet open to receive the spoon, she would put it back into the base and cry, CHIT! TOOKYS! and go out to the assault. The bath was a great comfort, for I began to be sensible of acute pains in my limbs from lying out on the fields, and was now so tired and low that I could hardly keep myself awake for five minutes together. When I had bathed, they, I mean my aunt and Janet, enrobed me in a shirt and a pair of trousers belonging to Mr. Dick, and tied me up in two or three great shawls. What sort of bundle I looked like, I don't know, but I felt a very hot one. Feeling also very faint and drowsy, I soon lay down on the sofa again and fell asleep. It might have been a dream originating in the fancy which had occupied my mind so long, but I awoke with the impression that my aunt had come and bent over me, and had put my hair away from my face, and laid my head more comfortably, and had then stood looking at me. The words pretty fellow, or poor fellow, seemed to be in my years too, but certainly there was nothing else when I awoke to lead me to believe that they had been uttered by my aunt, who sat in the bow window gazing at the sea from behind the green fan, which was mounted on a kind of swivel and turned anyway. We dined soon after I awoke, off a roast fowl and a pudding, I sitting at table, not unlike a trust bird myself, and moving my arms with considerable difficulty. But as my aunt had swathed me up, I made no complaint of being inconvenienced. All this time I was deeply anxious to know what she was going to do with me. But she took her dinner in profound silence, except when she occasionally fixed her eyes on me sitting opposite and said, Mercy upon us! Which did not, by any means, relieve my anxiety. The cloth being drawn, and some sherry put upon the table, of which I had a glass, my aunt sent up for Mr. Dick again, who joined us, and looked as wise as he could when she requested him to attend to my story, which she elicited from me gradually by a course of questions. During my recital she kept her eyes on Mr. Dick, who I thought would have gone to sleep but for that, and who, when soever he lapsed into a smile, was checked by a frown from my aunt. Whatever possessed that poor unfortunate baby that she must go and be married again, said my aunt when I had finished, I can't conceive. Perhaps she fell in love with her second husband, Mr. Dick suggested. Fell in love, repeated my aunt. What do you mean? What business had she to do it? Perhaps, Mr. Dick simpered after thinking a little, she did it for pleasure. Pleasure indeed, replied my aunt, a mighty pleasure for the poor baby to fix her simple faith upon any dog of a fellow, certain to ill use her in some way or other. What did she propose to herself I should like to know? She had had one husband. She had seen David Copperfield out of the world, who was always running after wax dolls from his cradle. She had got a baby. Oh, there were a pair of babies when she gave birth to this child sitting here that Friday night. And what more did she want? Mr. Dick secretly shook his head in me, as if he thought there were no getting over this. She couldn't even have a baby like anybody else, said my aunt. Where was this child's sister, Betsy Trotwood? Not forthcoming, don't tell me. Mr. Dick seemed quite frightened. That little man of a doctor with his head on one side, said my aunt, Jellips or whatever his name was, what was he about? All he could do was to say to me, like a robin-red breast as he is, It's a boy! A boy! Yeah! The old imbecility of the whole set of them. The hardiness of the ejaculation startled Mr. Dick exceedingly, and me too, if I am to tell the truth. And then, as if this was not enough, and she had not stood sufficiently in the light of this child's sister, Betsy Trotwood, said my aunt, she marries a second time, goes and marries a murderer, or a man with a name like it, and stands in this child's light. And the natural consequence is, as anybody but a baby might have foreseen, that he prowls and wanders. He's as like Cain before he was grown up as he can be. Mr. Dick looked hard at me, as if to identify me in this character. And then there's that woman with a pagan name, said my aunt, that pegady she goes and gets married next. Because she has not seen enough of the evil attending such things, she goes and gets married next as the child relates. I only hope, said my aunt, shaking her head, that her husband is one of those poker husbands who abound in the newspapers, and will beat her well with one. I could not bear to hear my old nurse so decried, and made the subject of such a wish. I told my aunt that indeed she was mistaken, that pegady was the best, the truest, the most faithful, most devoted, and most self-denying friend and servant in the world, who had ever loved me dearly, who had ever loved my mother dearly, who had held my mother's dying head upon her arm, on whose face my mother had imprinted her last grateful kiss. And my remembrance of them both choking me, I broke down as I was trying to say that her home was my home, and that all she had was mine, and that I would have gone to her for shelter, but for her humble station, which made me fear that I might bring some trouble upon her. I broke down, as I say, as I was trying to say so, and laid my face and my hands upon the table. Well, well, said my aunt, the child is right to stand by those who have stood by him. Shit! Duckies! I thoroughly believe that, but for those unfortunate donkeys, we should have come to a good understanding, for my aunt had laid her hand upon my shoulder, and the impulse was upon me, thus emboldened, to embrace her and beseech her protection. But the interruption and the disorder she was thrown into by the struggle outside put an end to all softer ideas for the present, and kept my aunt indignantly declaiming to Mr. Dick about her determination to appeal for redress to the laws of her country, and to bring actions for trespass against the whole donkey proprietorship of Dover until tea time. After tea we sat at the window, on the lookout, as I imagined, for my aunt's sharp expression of face for more invaders, until dusk when Janet set candles and a bat-gammon board on the table, and pulled down the blinds. Now, Mr. Dick, said my aunt with her grave look, and her forefinger up as before, I am going to ask you another question. Look at this child. David's son? Said Mr. Dick with an attentive, puzzled face. Exactly so, returned my aunt. What would you do with him now? Do with David's son? Said Mr. Dick. I replied my aunt with David's son. Oh, said Mr. Dick. Yes, do with... I should put him to bed. Janet cried my aunt with the same complacent triumph that I had remarked before. Mr. Dick sets us all right. If the bed is ready, we'll take him up to it. Janet reporting it to be quite ready, I was taken up to it. Kindly, but in some sort, like a prisoner, my aunt going in front and Janet bringing up the rear. The only circumstance which gave me any new hope was my aunt stopping on the stairs to inquire about a smell of fire that was prevalent there, and Janet's replying that she had been making tinder down in the kitchen of my old shirt. But there were no other clothes in my room than the odd heap of things I wore, and when I was left there with a little taper which my aunt forewarned me would burn exactly five minutes, I heard them lock my door on the outside. Turning these things over in my mind, I deemed it possible that my aunt, who could know nothing of me, might suspect that I had a habit of running away and took precautions on that account to have me in safekeeping. The room was a pleasant one at the top of the house overlooking the sea on which the moon was shining brilliantly. After I had said my prayers and the candle had burnt out, I remember how I still sat looking at the moonlight on the water as if I could hope to read my fortune in it as in a bright book, or to see my mother with her child coming from heaven along that shining path to look upon me as she had looked when I last saw her sweet face. I remember how the solemn feeling with which I at length turned my eyes away yielded to the sensation of gratitude and rest which the sight of the white curtain bed and how much more the lying softly down upon it nestling in the snow white sheets inspired. I remember how I thought of all the solitary places under the night sky where I had slept and how I prayed that I never might be houseless anymore and never might forget the houseless. I remember how I seemed to float then down the melancholy glory of that track upon the sea away into the world of dreams. End of Chapter 13 Recording by Lorelle Anderson Sanford, Florida Chapter 14 of David Copperfield This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Lorelle Anderson David Copperfield by Charles Dickens Chapter 14 My Aunt Makes Up Her Mind About Me On going down in the morning I found my aunt musing so profoundly over the breakfast table with her elbow on the tray that the contents of the urn had overflowed the teapot and were laying the whole tablecloth under water when my entrance put her meditations to flight. I felt sure that I had been the subject of her reflections and was more than ever anxious to know her intentions toward me. Yet I dared not express my anxiety lest it should give her offense. My eyes, however, not being so much under control as my tongue, were attracted towards my aunt very often during breakfast. I never could look at her for a few moments together, but I found her looking at me in an odd thoughtful manner as if I were an immense way off instead of being on the other side of the small round table. When she had finished her breakfast, my aunt very deliberately leaned back in her chair, knitted her brows, folded her arms, and contemplated me at her leisure with such a fixedness of attention that I was quite overpowered by embarrassment. Not having as yet finished my own breakfast, I attempted to hide my confusion by proceeding with it, but my knife tumbled over my fork, my fork tripped up my knife, I chipped bits of bacon, a surprising hide-in to the air, instead of cutting them for my own eating, and choked myself with my tea, which persisted in going the wrong way instead of the right one, until I gave in altogether and sat blushing under my aunt's close scrutiny. Hello, said my aunt after a long time. I looked up and met her sharp, bright glance respectfully. I have written to him, said my aunt. To your father-in-law, said my aunt. I have sent him a letter that I'll trouble him to attend to, or he and I will fall out, I can tell him. Does he know where I am, aunt? I inquired, alarmed. I have told him, said my aunt, with a nod. Shall I be given up to him? I faltered. I don't know, said my aunt. We shall see. Oh, I can't think what I shall do, I exclaimed, if I have to go back to Mr. Murdstone. I don't know anything about it, said my aunt, shaking her head. I can't say I'm sure. We shall see. My spirit sank under these words, and I became very downcast and heavy of heart. My aunt, without appearing to take much heed of me, put on a coarse apron with a bib, which she took out of the press, washed up the tea-cups with her own hands, and when everything was washed and set in the tray again, and the cloth folded and put on top of the hole, rang for Janet to remove it. She next swept up the crumbs of the little broom, putting on a pair of gloves first, until there did not appear to be one microscopic speck left on the carpet. Next dusted and arranged the room, which was dusted and arranged to a hair's breadth already. When all these tasks were performed to her satisfaction, she took off the gloves and apron, folded them up, put them in the particular corner of the press from which they had been taken, brought out her workbox to her own table in the open window, and sat down, with the green fan between her and the light, to work. I wish she'd go upstairs, said my aunt, as she threaded her needle, and give my compliments to Mr. Dick, and I'll be glad to know how he gets on with his memorial. I rose with all alacrity to acquit myself of this commission. I suppose, said my aunt, eyeing me as narrowly as she had eyed the needle in threading it, you think Mr. Dick a short name, eh? I thought it was rather a short name yesterday, I confessed. You are not to suppose that he hasn't got a longer name if he chose to use it, said my aunt, with a loftier air. Bably, Mr. Richard Bably, that's the gentleman's true name. I was going to suggest, with a modest sense of my youth, and the familiarity I had already been guilty of, that I had better give him the full benefit of that name, when my aunt went on to say, But don't you call him by it, whatever you do. He can't bear his name, that's a peculiarity of his, though I don't know that it's much of a peculiarity either, for he has been ill-used enough, by some that bear it to have a mortal antipathy for it, heaven knows. Mr. Dick is his name here, and everywhere else now, if he ever went anywhere else, which he don't. So take care, child, you don't call him anything but Mr. Dick. I promised to obey, and went upstairs with my message, thinking as I went, that if Mr. Dick had been working at his memorial long, at the same rates I had seen him working at it, through the open door when I came down, he was probably getting on very well indeed. I found him still driving at it with a long pen, and his head almost laid upon the paper. He was so intent upon it that I had ample leisure to observe the large paper kite in a corner, the confusion of bundles of manuscripts, the number of pens, and above all, the quantity of ink, which he seemed to have in, in half-gallon jars by the dozen, before he observed my being present. Ah, Phoebus! said Mr. Dick, laying down his pen. How does the world go? I'll tell you what, he added in a lower tone. I shouldn't wish it to be mentioned, but it's a— here he beckoned to me, and put his lips close to my ear. It's a mad world! Mad as bedlam, boy! said Mr. Dick, taking snuff from a round box on the table, and laughing heartily. Without presuming to give my opinion on this question, I delivered my message. Well, said Mr. Dick, in answer, my compliments to her, and I— I believe I have made a start. I think I have made a start, said Mr. Dick, passing his hand among his gray hair, and casting anything but a confident look in his manuscript. You have been to school? Yes, sir, I answered, for a short time. Do you recollect the date, said Mr. Dick, looking earnestly at me, and taking up his pen to note it down, when King Charles I had his head cut off? I said I believe it had happened in the year 1649. Well, returned Mr. Dick, scratching his ear with his pen, and looking dubiously at me. So the books say, but I don't see how that can be, because if it was so long ago, how could the people about him have made that mistake of putting some of the trouble out of his head after it was taken off into mine? I was very much surprised by the inquiry, but could give no information on this point. It's very strange, said Mr. Dick, with a despondent look upon his papers, and with his hand among his hair again, that I never can get that quite right. I never can make that perfectly clear. But no matter, no matter, he said cheerfully, and rousing himself, there's time enough. My compliments to Miss Trotwood I am getting on very well indeed. I was going away when he directed my attention to the kite. What do you think of that for a kite, he said? I answered that it was a beautiful one. I should think it must have been as much as seven feet high. I made it. We'll go and fly it, you and I, said Mr. Dick. Do you see this? He showed me that it was covered with manuscript, very closely and laboriously written, but so plainly, that as I looked along the lines, I thought I saw some allusion to King Charles I's head again in one or two places. There's plenty of string, said Mr. Dick, and when it flies high it takes the facts a long way. That's my manner of defusing them. I don't know where they may come down. It's according to circumstances in the wind and so forth, but I take my chance of that. His face was so very mild and pleasant, and had something so reverent in it, though it was hail and hearty, that I was not sure but that he was having a good humor just with me. So I laughed, and he laughed, and we parted the best friends possible. Well, child, said my aunt when I went downstairs, and what of Mr. Dick this morning? I informed her that he sent his compliments, and was getting on very well indeed. What do you think of him, said my aunt? I had some shadowy idea of endeavoring to evade the question by replying that I thought him a very nice gentleman, but my aunt was not to be so put off, for she laid her work down in her lap, and said, folding her hands upon it, Come, your sister Betsy Trotwood would have told me what she thought of anyone directly. Be as like your sister as you can, and speak out. Is he—is—Mr. Dick? I ask because I don't know, aunt. Is he at all out of his mind then? I stammered, for I felt I was on dangerous ground. Not a morsel, said my aunt. Oh, indeed, I observe faintly. If there is anything in this world, said my aunt, with great decision and force of manner, that Mr. Dick is not, it's that. I had nothing better to offer than another timid. Oh, indeed. He has been called mad, said my aunt. I have a selfish pleasure in saying he has been called mad, or I should not have had the benefit of his society and advice for these last ten years and upwards. In fact, ever since your sister Betsy Trotwood disappointed me. So long as that, I said. And nice people they were, who had the audacity to call him mad, pursued my aunt. Mr. Dick is a sort of distant connection of mine. It doesn't matter how. I needn't enter into that. If it hadn't been for me, his own brother would have shut him up for life. That's all. I am afraid it was hypocritical in me. But seeing that my aunt felt strongly on the subject, I tried to look as if I felt strongly too. A proud fool, said my aunt, because his brother was a little eccentric, though he is not half so eccentric as a good many people, he didn't like to have him visible about his house, and sent him away to some private asylum place, though he had been left to his particular care by their deceased father, who thought him almost a natural, and a wise man he must have been to think so, mad himself, no doubt. Again, as my aunt looked quite convinced, I endeavored to look quite convinced also. So I stepped in, said my aunt, and made him an offer. I said, your brother's sane. A great deal more sane than you are, or ever will be it is hoped. Let him have his little income, and come and live with me. I am not afraid of him. I am not proud. I am ready to take care of him, and shall not ill treat him as some people, besides the asylum folks, have done. After a good deal of squabbling, said my aunt, I got him, and he has been here ever since. He is the most friendly and amenable creature in existence, and as for advice, but nobody knows what that man's mind is except myself. My aunt smoothed her dress and shook her head, as if she smoothed defiance of the whole world out of the one, and shook it out of the other. He had a favorite sister, said my aunt, a good creature, and very kind to him, but she did what they all do, took a husband, and he did what they all do, made her wretched. It had such an effect upon the mind of Mr. Dick, that's not madness, I hope, that, combined with the fear of his brother and his sense of his unkindness, it threw him into a fever. That was before he came to me, but the recollection of it is oppressive to him even now. Did he say anything to you about King Charles the first child? Yes, aunt. Ah, said my aunt, rubbing her nose as if she were a little vexed. That's his allegorical way of expressing it. He connects his illness with great disturbance and agitation, naturally, and that's the figure, or the simile, or whatever it's called, which he chooses to use. And why shouldn't he, if he thinks proper? I said, certainly, aunt. It's not a business-like way of speaking, said my aunt, nor a worldly way. I am aware of that, and that's the reason why I insist upon it, that there shan't be a word about it in his memorial. Is it a memorial about his own history that he is writing on? Yes, child, said my aunt, rubbing her nose again. He is memorializing the Lord Chancellor or the Lord somebody or other, one of those people at all events who are paid to be memorialized, about his affairs. I suppose it will go in one of these days. He hasn't been able to draw it up yet without introducing that motive expressing himself. But it don't signify, it keeps him employed. In fact, I found out afterwards that Mr. Dick had been for upwards of ten years endeavoring to keep King Charles I out of the memorial, but he had been constantly getting into it and was there now. I say again, said my aunt, nobody knows what that man's mind is except myself, and he's the most amenable and friendly creature in existence. If he likes to fly a kite sometimes, what of that? Franklin used to fly a kite. He was a Quaker or something of that sort, if I am not mistaken, and a Quaker flying a kite is a much more ridiculous object than anybody else. If I could have supposed that my aunt had recounted these particulars from my special behoof, and as a piece of confidence in me, I should have felt very much distinguished and should have augured favorably from such a mark of her good opinion. But I could hardly help observing that she had launched into them chiefly because the question was raised in her own mind and with very little reference to me, though she had addressed herself to me in the absence of anybody else. At the same time, I must say that the generosity of her championship of poor, harmless Mr. Dick not only inspired my young breast with some selfish hope for myself, but warmed it unselfishly towards her. I believe that I began to know that there was something about my aunt, notwithstanding her many eccentricities and odd humors to be honored and trusted in, though she was just as sharp that day as on the day before, and was in and out about the donkeys just as often, and was thrown into a tremendous state of indignation when a young man going by augulled Janet at a window, which was one of the gravest misdemeanors that could be committed against my aunt's dignity. She seemed to me to command more of my respect, if not less of my fear. The anxiety I underwent in the interval which necessarily elapsed before a reply could be received to her letter to Mr. Mergedon was extreme, but I made an endeavor to suppress it and to be as agreeable as I could in a quiet way, both to my aunt and Mr. Dick. The latter and I would have gone out to fly the great kite, but that I still had no other clothes than the anything but ornamental garments with which I had been decorated on the first day, and which confined me to the house, except for an hour after dark when my aunt, for my health's sake, paraded me up and down on the cliff outside before going to bed. At length the reply for Mr. Mergedon came, and my aunt informed me, to my infinite terror, that he was coming to speak to her herself on the next day. On the next day, still bundled up in my curious habit limits, I sat counting the time flushed and heated by the conflict of sinking hopes and rising fears within me, and waiting to be startled by the sight of the gloomy face whose non-arrival startled me every minute. My aunt was a little more imperious and stern than usual, but I observed no other token of her preparing herself to receive the visitor so much dreaded by me. She sat at work in the window, and I sat by, with my thoughts running astray, on all possible and impossible results of Mr. Mergedon's visit, until pretty late in the afternoon. Our dinner had been indefinitely postponed, but it was growing so late that my aunt had ordered it to be got ready, when she gave a sudden alarm of donkeys, and to my consternation and amazement, I beheld Miss Mergedon on a side saddle, ride deliberately over the sacred piece of green, and stop in front of the house looking about her. Go along with you! cried my aunt, shaking her head and her fist at the window. You have no business there! How dare you trespass! Go along! Oh, you bold-faced thing! My aunt was so exasperated by the coolness with which Miss Mergedon looked about her, that I really believed she was motionless and unable for the moment to dart out according to custom. I ceased the opportunity to inform her who it was, and that the gentleman now coming near the offender, for the way up was very steep and he had dropped behind, was Mr. Mergedon himself. I don't care who it is! cried my aunt, still shaking her head and gesticulating anything but welcome from the bow window. I won't be trespassed upon! I won't allow it! Go away! Janet, turn him round! Lead him off! And I saw from behind my aunt a sort of hurried battle-piece, in which the donkey stood resisting everybody with all his four legs planted different ways, while Janet tried to pull him round by the bridle, Mr. Mergedon tried to lead him on, Miss Mergedon struck at Janet with a parasol, and several boys who had come to see the engagement shouted vigorously. But my aunt, suddenly describing among them the young malefactor, who was the donkey's guardian, and who was one of the most inveterate offenders against her, though hardly in his teens, rushed out to the scene of action, pounced upon him, captured him, dragged him with his jacket over his head and his heels grinding the ground into the garden, and called upon Janet to fetch the constables and justices that he might be taken, tried, and executed on the spot, held him at bay there. This part of the business, however, did not last long, for the young rascal, being expert at a variety of faints and dodges of which my aunt had no conception, soon went whooping away, leaving some deep impressions of his nailed boots in the flower beds, and taking his donkey in triumph with him. Miss Mergedon, during the latter portion of the contest, had dismounted, and was now waiting with her brother at the bottom of the steps, until my aunt should be at leisure to receive them. My aunt, a little ruffled by the combat, marched past them into the house with great dignity, and took no notice of their presence until they were announced by Janet. Shall I go away, aunt? I asked, trembling. No, sir, said my aunt, certainly not, with which she pushed me into a corner near her, and fenced me in with a chair, as if it were a prison or a bar of justice. This position I continued to occupy during the whole interview, and from it I now saw Mr. and Miss Mergedon enter the room. Oh, said my aunt, I was not aware at first to whom I had the pleasure of objecting, but I don't allow anybody to ride over that turf. I make no exceptions. I don't allow anybody to do it. Your regulation is rather awkward to strangers, said Miss Mergedon. Is it, said my aunt? Mr. Mergedon seemed afraid of a renewal of hostilities, and interposing began Miss Trotwood. I beg your pardon, observed my aunt with a keen look. You are the Mr. Mergedon who married the widow of my late nephew David Copperfield of Blunderstone Rookery, though why Rookery I don't know. I am, said Mr. Mergedon. You'll excuse my saying, sir, returned my aunt, that I think it would have been a much better and happier thing if you had left that poor child alone. I so far agree with what Miss Trotwood has remarked, observed Miss Mergedon bridling, that I consider our lamented Clara to have been, in all essential respect, a mere child. It is a comfort to you and me, ma'am, said my aunt, who are getting on in life and are not likely to be made unhappy by our personal attractions, that nobody can say the same of us. No doubt, returned Miss Mergedon, though I thought not with a very ready or gracious assent. And it certainly might have been, as you say, a better and happier thing for my brother if he had never entered into such a marriage. I have always been of that opinion. I have no doubt you have, said my aunt. Janet, ringing the bell, my compliments to Mr. Dick, and beg him to come down. Until he came, my aunt sat perfectly upright and stiff, frowning at the wall. When he came, my aunt performed the ceremony of introduction. Mr. Dick, an old and intimate friend, on whose judgment, said my aunt, with emphasis as an admonition to Mr. Dick, who was biting his forefinger and looking rather foolish, I RELY! Mr. Dick took his finger out of his mouth on this hint, and stood among the group, with a grave and attentive expression of face. My aunt inclined her head to Mr. Mergedon, who went on. Miss Trotwood, on the receipt of your letter, I considered it an act of greater justice to myself, and perhaps of more respect to you. Thank you! said my aunt, still eyeing him keenly. You needn't mind me. To answer it in person, however inconvenient the journey pursued Mr. Mergedon, rather than by letter. This unhappy boy, who was run away from his friends and his occupation, and whose appearance, interposed his sister directing general attention to me in my indefinable costume, is perfectly scandalous and disgraceful. Jane Mergedon, said her brother, have the goodness not to interrupt me. This unhappy boy, Miss Trotwood, has been the occasion of much domestic trouble and uneasiness, both during the lifetime of my late dear wife and since. He has a sullen, rebellious spirit, a violent temper, and an untoward, intractable disposition. Both my sister and myself have endeavored to correct his vices, but ineffectually. And I have felt, we both have felt, I may say, my sister being fully in my confidence, that it is right you should receive this grave and dispassionate assurance from our lips. It can hardly be necessary for me to confirm anything stated by my brother, said Miss Mergedon, but I beg to observe that, of all the boys in the world, I believe this is the worst boy. Strong, said my aunt shortly, but not at all too strong for the facts, returned Miss Mergedon. Ha! said my aunt. Well, sir. I have my own opinions, resumed Mr. Mergedon, whose face darkened more and more, the more he and my aunt observed each other, which they did very narrowly, as to the best mode of bringing him up. They are founded, in part, on my knowledge of him, and in part, on my knowledge of my own means and resources. I am responsible for them to myself. I act upon them, and I say no more about them. It is enough that I place this boy under the eye of a friend of my own, and a respectable business, that it does not please him, that he runs away from it, makes himself a common vagabond about the country, and comes here in rags to appeal to you, Miss Trotwood. I wish to set before you honorably the exact consequences, so far as they are within my knowledge, of your abetting him in this appeal. But about the respectable business, first, said my aunt. If he had been your own boy, you would have put him to it just the same, I suppose. If he had been my brother's own boy, returned Miss Murdstone, striking in, his character, I trust, would have been altogether different. Or if the poor child his mother had been alive, he would still have gone into the respectable business, would he? said my aunt. I believe, said Mr. Murdstone, with an inclination of his head, that Clara would have disputed nothing with myself and my sister Jane Murdstone were agreed was for the best. Miss Murdstone confirmed this with an audible murmur. Ha! said my aunt. Unfortunate baby! Mr. Dick, who had been rattling his money all this time, was rattling it so loudly now that my aunt felt it necessary to check him with a look, before saying, the poor child's annuity died with her? Died with her, replied Mr. Murdstone. And there was no settlement of the little property, the house and garden, the what's-its-name ruckery without any rucks in it, upon her boy? It had been left to her unconditionally by her first husband. Mr. Murdstone began, when my aunt caught him up with the greatest irascibility and impatience. Good Lord, man, there's no occasion to say that. Left to her unconditionally? I think I see David Copperfield looking forward to any condition of any sort or any kind, though it stared him point-blank in the face. Of course it was left to her unconditionally. But when she married again, which he took that most disastrous step of marrying you in short, said my aunt to be plain, did no one put in a word for the boy at that time? My late wife loved her second husband, ma'am, said Mr. Murdstone, and trusted implicitly in him. Your late wife, sir, was a most unworldly, most unhappy, most unfortunate baby, returned my aunt, shaking her head at him. That's what she was. And now what have you got to say next? Merely this, Miss Trotwood, he returned, I am here to take David back, to take him back unconditionally, to dispose of him as I think proper, and to deal with him as I think right. I am not here to make any promise or give any pledge to anybody. You may possibly have some idea, Miss Trotwood, of abetting him in his running away, and in his complaints to you. Your manner, which I must say does not seem intended to propitiate, induces me to think it possible. Now I must caution you that if you abet him once, you abet him for good and all. If you step in between him and me now, you must step in, Miss Trotwood, for ever. I cannot trifle or be trifled with. I am here for the first and last time to take him away. Is he ready to go? If he is not, and you tell me he is not, on any pretense it is indifferent to me what. My doors are shut against him henceforth, and yours, I take it for granted, are open to him. To this address my aunt had listened with the closest attention, sitting perfectly upright, with her hands folded on one knee, and looking grimly at the speaker. When he had finished she turned her eyes so as to command Miss Murdstone, without otherwise disturbing her attitude, and said, Well, ma'am, have you got anything to remark? Indeed, Miss Trotwood, said Miss Murdstone, All that I could say has been so well said by my brother, and all that I know to be the fact has been so plainly stated by him, that I have nothing to add except my thanks for your politeness. For your very great politeness I am sure, said Miss Murdstone, with an irony which no more affected my aunt, than it discomposed the canon I had slept by at Chatham. And what does the boy say, said my aunt, Are you ready to go, David? I answered no, and entreated her not to let me go. I said that neither Mr. Nor Miss Murdstone had ever liked me, or had ever been kind to me, that they had made my mama, who had always loved me dearly, unhappy about me, and that I knew it well, and that Pagedy knew it. I said that I had been more miserable than I thought anybody could believe, who only knew how young I was. And I begged and prayed my aunt, I forget in what terms now, but I remember that they affected me very much then, to be friend and protect me for my father's sake. Mr. Dick, said my aunt, What shall I do with this child? Mr. Dick considered, hesitated, brightened, and rejoined, have him measured for a suit of clothes directly. Mr. Dick, said my aunt triumphantly, Give me your hand, for your common sense is invaluable. Having shaken it with great cordiality, she pulled me toward her, and said to Mr. Murdstone, You can go when you like, I'll take my chance with the boy. If he's all you say he is, at least I can do as much for him then as you have done. But I don't believe a word of it. Miss Trotwood rejoined Mr. Murdstone, shrugging his shoulders as he rose, If you were a gentleman, Pah! Stephen Nonsense, said my aunt, Don't talk to me! How exquisitely polite, exclaimed Miss Murdstone, rising, overpowering really. Do you think I don't know? said my aunt, turning a deaf ear to the sister, and continuing to address the brother, and to shake her head at him with infinite expression. What kind of a life you must have led that poor, unhappy, misdirected baby? Do you think I don't know what a woeful day it was for the soft little creature when you first came in her way, smirking and making great eyes at her all be bound, as if you couldn't say boo to a goose? I never heard anything so elegant, said Miss Murdstone. Do you think I can't understand you as well as if I had seen you, pursued my aunt, now that I do see you and hear you, which I tell you candidly is anything but a pleasure to me? Oh yes, bless us! Who so smooth and silky as Mr. Murdstone at first! The poor, benighted, innocent had never seen such a man. He was made of sweetness, he worshipped her, he doted on her boy, tenderly doted on him. He was to be another father to him, and they were all to live together in a garden of roses, weren't they? Get along with you, do, said my aunt. I never heard anything like this person in my life, exclaimed Miss Murdstone. And when you had made sure of the poor little fool, said my aunt, God forgive me that I should call her so, and she gone where you won't go in a hurry, because you had not done wrong enough to her and hers, you must begin to train her must you, begin to break her like a poor caged bird, and wear her deluded life away in teaching her to sing your notes. This is either insanity or intoxication, said Miss Murdstone in a perfect agony at not being able to turn the current of my aunt's address toward herself, and my suspicion is that it's intoxication. Miss Betsy, without taking the least notice of the interruption, continued to address herself to Mr. Murdstone as if there had been no such thing. Mr. Murdstone, she said, shaking her finger at him, you were a tyrant to the simple baby, and you broke her heart. She was a loving baby. I know that, I knew it, years before you ever saw her, and through the best part of her weakness you gave her the wounds she died of. There is the truth for your comfort, however you like it, and you and your instruments may make the most of it. Allow me to inquire, Miss Trotwood, interposed Miss Murdstone, whom you are pleased to call, in a choice of words in which I am not experienced, my brother's instruments. It was clear enough, as I have told you, years before you ever saw her, and why in the mysterious dispensations of providence you ever did see her is more than humanity can comprehend. It was clear enough that the poor soft little thing would marry somebody at some time or another, but I did hope it wouldn't have been as bad as it has turned out. That was the time, Mr. Murdstone, when she gave birth to her boy here, said my aunt. To the poor child you sometimes tormented her through afterwards, which is a disagreeable remembrance and makes the sight of him odious now. I, I, you needn't win, said my aunt. I know it's true without that. He had stood by the door all this while, observant of her with a smile upon his face, though his black eyebrows were heavily contracted. I remarked now that though the smile was on his face still, his color had gone in a moment, and he seemed to breathe as if he had been running. Good day, sir, said my aunt, and good-bye. Good day to you, too, ma'am, said my aunt, turning suddenly upon his sister. Let me see you ride a donkey over my green again, and as sure as you have a head upon your shoulders, I'll knock your bonnet off and tread on it. It would require a painter, and no common painter, too, to depict my aunt's face as she delivered herself of this very unexpected sentiment, and Miss Murdstone's face as she heard it. But the manner of the speech, no less than the matter, was so fiery that Miss Murdstone, without a word and answer, discreetly put her arm through her brothers, and walked hodlily out of the cottage. My aunt remaining in the window looking after them, prepared, I have no doubt, in case of the donkey's reappearance, to carry her threat into instant execution. No attempt at defiance being made, however, her face gradually relaxed, and became so pleasant that I was emboldened to kiss and thank her, which I did with great hardiness, and with both my arms clasped around her neck. I then shook hands with Mr. Dick, who shook hands with me a great many times, and hailed this happy close of the proceedings with repeated bursts of laughter. You'll consider yourself guardian, jointly with me, of this child, Mr. Dick, said my aunt. I shall be delighted, said Mr. Dick, to be the guardian of David's son. Very good, returned my aunt, that's settled. I have been thinking, do you know Mr. Dick that I might call him Trotwood? Certainly, certainly, call him Trotwood, certainly, said Mr. Dick, David's son Trotwood. Trotwood Copperfield, you mean, returned my aunt. Yes, to be sure, yes, Trotwood Copperfield, said Mr. Dick, a little abashed. My aunt took so kindly to the notion that some ready-made clothes, which were purchased for me that afternoon, were marked Trotwood Copperfield in her own handwriting, and in indelible marking ink before I put them on. And it was settled that all the other clothes which were ordered to be made for me, a complete outfit was bespoke that afternoon, should be marked in the same way. Thus I began my new life in a new name and with everything new about me. Now that the state of doubt was over, I felt for many days like one in a dream. I never thought that I had a curious couple of guardians in my aunt and Mr. Dick. I never thought of anything about myself distinctly. The two things clearest in my mind were that a remoteness had come upon the old Blunderstone life, which seemed to lie in the haze of an immeasurable distance, and that a curtain had forever fallen on my life at Murdstone and Grimby's. No one has ever raised that curtain since. I have lifted it for a moment, even in this narrative, with a reluctant hand, and dropped it gladly. The remembrance of that life is fraught with so much pain to me, with so much mental suffering and want of hope, that I have never had the courage even to examine how long I was doomed to lead it. Whether it lasted for a year or more or less, I do not know. I only know that it was, and cease to be, and that I have written, and there I leave it. End of Chapter 14. Recording by Lorelle Anderson, Sanford, Florida Mr. Dick and I soon became the best of friends, and very often, when his day's work was done, went out together to fly the great kite. Every day of his life he had a long sitting at the memorial, which never made the least progress however hard he labored. For King Charles I always strayed into it sooner or later, and then it was thrown aside and another one begun. The patience and hope with which he bore these perpetual disappointments, the mild perception he had that there was something wrong about King Charles I, the feeble efforts he made to keep him out, and the certainty with which he came in, and tumbled the memorial out of all shape, made a deep impression on me. What Mr. Dick supposed would come of the memorial, if it were completed, where he thought it was to go, or what he thought it was to do, he knew no more than anybody else, I believe. Nor was it at all necessary that he should trouble himself with such questions. For if anything were certain under the sun, it was certain that the memorial never would be finished. It was quite an affecting sight, I used to think, to see him with the kite when it was up a great height in the air. What he had told me in his room about his belief in its disseminating the statements pasted on it, which were nothing but old leaves of abortive memorials, might have been a fancy with him sometimes. But not when he was out, looking up at the kite in the sky, and feeling it pulled and tugged his hand. He never looked so serene as he did then. I used to fancy as I sat by him of an evening on a green slope, and saw him watch the kite high in the quiet air, that it lifted his mind out of its confusion and bore it, such was my boyish thought, into the skies. As he wound the string in, and it came lower and lower down out of the beautiful light, until it fluttered to the ground and lay there like a dead thing, he seemed to wait gradually out of a dream, and I remembered to have seen him take it up and look about him in a lost way, as if they had both come down together, so that I pitted him with all my heart. While I advanced in friendship and intimacy with Mr. Dick, I did not go backward in the favor of his staunch friend, my aunt. She took so kindly to me, that in the course of a few weeks she shortened my adopted name of Trotwood into Trot, and even encouraged me to hope that if I went on as I had begun, I might take equal rank in her affections with my sister Betsy Trotwood. Trot, said my aunt one evening when the backgammon board was placed as usual for herself and Mr. Dick, we must not forget your education. This was my only subject of anxiety, and I felt quite delighted by her referring to it. Should you like to go to school at Canterbury? said my aunt. I replied that I should like it very much, as it was so near her. Good, said my aunt, should you like to go tomorrow? Being already no stranger to the general rapidity of my aunt's evolutions, I was not surprised by the suddenness of the proposal, and said yes. Good, said my aunt again. Janet, hire the gray pony and chase tomorrow morning at 10 o'clock and pack up Master Trotwood's clothes tonight. I was greatly elated by these orders, but my heart smoked me for my selfishness when I witnessed their effect on Mr. Dick, who was so low-spirited at the prospect of our separation, and played so ill in consequence that my aunt, after giving him several admonitory wraps on the knuckles with her dice box, shut up the board and declined to play with him any more. But, on hearing from my aunt that I should sometimes come over on a Saturday, and that he could sometimes come and see me on a Wednesday, he revived, and vowed to make another kite for those occasions of proportions greatly surpassing the present one. In the morning he was downhearted again, and would have sustained himself by giving me all the money he had in his possession, gold and silver too if my aunt had not interposed, and limited the gift to five shillings, which, at his earnest petition, were afterwards increased to ten. We parted at the garden gate in a most affectionate manner, and Mr. Dick did not go into the house until my aunt had driven me out of sight of it. My aunt, who was perfectly indifferent to public opinion, drove the gray pony through Dover in a masterly manner, sitting high and stiff like a state coachman, keeping a steady eye upon him wherever he went, and making a point of not letting him have his own way in any respect. When we came into the country road she permitted him to relax a little, however, and, looking at me, down in a valley of cushion by her side, asked me whether I was happy. Very happy indeed, thank you, aunt, I said. She was much gratified, and both her hands being occupied pattered me on the head with her whip. Is it a large school, aunt, I asked? Why, I don't know, said my aunt. We are going to Mr. Wickfield's first. Does he keep a school, I asked? No, trot, said my aunt. He keeps an office. I asked for no more information about Mr. Wickfield, as she offered none, and we conversed on other subjects until we came to Canterbury, where, as it was market day, my aunt had a great opportunity of insinuating the gray pony among carts, baskets, vegetables, and hucksters goods. The hair-breadth turns and twists we made drew down upon us a variety of speeches from the people standing about, which were not always complementary. But my aunt drove on with perfect indifference, and I daresay would have taken her own way with as much coolness through an enemy's country. At length we stopped before a very old house bulging out over the road, a house with long, low, lattice windows bulging out still farther, and beams with carved heads on the ends bulging out too, so that I fancied the whole house was leaning forward, trying to see who was passing on the narrow pavement below. It was quite spotless in its cleanliness. The old-fashioned brass knocker on the low arched door ornamented with carved garlands of fruit and flowers twinkled like a star. The two stone steps descending to the door were as white as if they had been covered with fair linen, and all the angles and corners and carvings and moldings and quaint little panes of glass and quaint little windows, though as old as the hills were as pure as any snow that ever fell upon the hills. When the pony chase stopped at the door and my eyes were intent upon the house, I saw a cadaverous face appear at a small window on the ground floor in a little round tower that formed one side of the house, and quickly disappear. The low arched door then opened and the face came out. It was quite as cadaverous as it had looked in the window, though in the grain of it there was that tinge of red which is sometimes to be observed in the skins of red-haired people. It belonged to a red-haired person, a youth of fifteen as I take it now, but looking much older, whose hair was cropped as close as the closest stubble, who had hardly any eyebrows and no eyelashes and eyes of a red-brown so unsheltered and unshaded that I remember wondering how he went to sleep. He was high-shouldered and bony, dressed in decent black with a white wisp of a neck cloth buttoned up to the throat, and had a long-length skeleton hand which particularly attracted my attention as he stood at the pony's head rubbing his chin with it and looking up at us in the chaise. Is Mr. Wickfield at home, Uriah Heep? said my aunt. Mr. Wickfield's at home, ma'am, said Uriah Heep, if you'll please to walk in there, pointing with his long hand to the room he meant. We got out and leaving him to hold the pony went into a long low parlor looking towards the street from the window of which I caught a glimpse as I went in of Uriah Heep breathing into the pony's nostrils and immediately covering them with his hand as if he were putting some spell upon him. Opposite to the tall old chimneypiece were two portraits, one of a gentleman with gray hair though not by any means an old man, and black eyebrows who was looking over some papers tied together with red tape, the other of a lady with a very placid and sweet expression of face who was looking at me. I believe I was turning about in search of Uriah's picture when a door at the farther end of the room opening a gentleman entered at sight of whom I turned to the first mentioned portrait again to make it quite sure that it had not come out of its frame. But it was stationary and as the gentleman advanced into the light I saw that he was some years older than when he had had his picture painted. Miss Betsy Trotwood said the gentleman pray walk in. I was engaged for a moment but you'll excuse my being busy you know my motive I have but one in life. Miss Betsy thanked him and we went into his room which was furnished as an office with books, papers, tin boxes and so forth. It looked into a garden and had an iron safe led into the wall so immediately over the mantel shelf that I wondered as I sat down how the sweeps got round it when they swept the chimney. Well, Miss Trotwood said Mr. Wickfield for I soon found that it was he and that he was a lawyer and steward of the estates of a rich gentleman of the county. What wind blows you here not an ill wind I hope. No replied my aunt I have not come for any law. That's right ma'am said Mr. Wickfield you had better come for anything else. His hair was quite white now though his eyebrows were still black. He had a very agreeable face and I thought was handsome. There was a certain richness in his complexion which I had been long accustomed under Pegaty's tuition to connect with port wine and I fancied it was in his voice too and referred his growing corpulency to the same cause. He was very cleanly dressed in a blue coat striped waistcoat and nankine trousers and his fine frilled shirt and cambrick neck cloth looked unusually soft and white reminding my strolling fancy I call to mind of the plumage on the breast of a swan. This is my nephew said my aunt wasn't aware you had one Miss Trotwood said Mr. Wickfield my grand nephew that is to say observed my aunt wasn't aware you had a grand nephew I give you my word said Mr. Wickfield I have adopted him said my aunt with a wave of her hand importing that his knowledge and his ignorance were all one to her and I have brought him here to put to a school where he may be thoroughly well taught and well treated now tell me where that school is and what it is and all about it before I can advise you properly said Mr. Wickfield the old question you know what's your motive in this do take the man exclaimed my aunt always fishing for motives when they're on the surface or to make the child happy and useful it must be a mixed motive I think said Mr. Wickfield shaking his head and smiling incredulously a mixed fiddle stick returned my aunt you claim to have one plain motive in all you do yourself you don't suppose I hope that you are the only plain dealer in the world hey but I have only one motive in life Miss Trotwood he rejoined smiling other people have dozens scores hundreds I have only one there is the difference however that's beside the question the best school whatever the motive you want the best my aunt not at a scent at the best we have said Mr. Wickfield considering your nephew couldn't board just now but he could board somewhere else I suppose suggested my aunt Mr. Wickfield thought I could after a little discussion he proposed to take my aunt to the school that she might see it and judge for herself also to take her with the same object to two or three houses where he thought I could be boarded my aunt embracing the proposal we were all three going out together when he stopped and said our little friend here might have some motive perhaps for objecting to the arrangements I think we had better leave him behind my aunt seemed disposed to contest the point but to facilitate matters I said I would gladly remain behind if they pleased and returned into Mr. Wickfield's office where I sat down again in the chair I had first occupied to await their return it so happened that this chair was opposite a narrow passage which ended in the little circular room where I had seen your eye heaps pale face looking out of the window Uriah having taken the pony to a neighboring stable was at work at a desk in this room which had a brass frame on the top to hang paper upon and on which the writing he was making a copy of was then hanging though his face was towards me I thought for some time the writing being between us that he could not see me but looking that way more attentively it made me uncomfortable to observe but every now and then his sleepless eyes would come below the writing like two red suns and stealthily stare at me for I daresay a whole minute at a time during which his pen went or pretended to go as cleverly as ever I made several attempts to get out of their way such as standing on a chair to look at a map on the other side of the room and pouring over the columns of a Kentish newspaper but they always attracted me back again and whenever I looked towards those two red suns I was sure to find them either just rising or just setting at length much to my relief my aunt and mr. Whitfield came back after a pretty long absence they were not so successful as I could have wished for though the advantages of the school were undeniable my aunt had not approved of any of the boarding houses proposed for me it's very unfortunate said my aunt I don't know what to do trot it does happen unfortunately said mr. Whitfield but I'll tell you what you can do mr. Trotwood what's that inquired my aunt leave your nephew here for the present he's a quiet fellow he won't disturb me at all it's a capital house for study as quiet as a monastery and almost as roomy leave him here my aunt evidently liked the offer though she was delicate of accepting it so did I come mr. Trotwood said mr. Whitfield this is the way out of the difficulty it's only a temporary arrangement you know if it don't act well or don't quite accord with our mutual convenience we can easily go to the right about there will be time to find some better place for him in the meanwhile you had better determined to leave him here for the present I'm very much obliged to you said my aunt and so is he I see but come I know what you mean cried mr. Whitfield you shall not be oppressed by the receipt of favors mr. Trotwood you may pay for him if you like we won't be hard about terms but you shall pay if you will on that understanding said my aunt though it doesn't lessen the real obligation I shall be very glad to leave him and come and see my little housekeeper said mr. Whitfield we accordingly went up a wonderful old staircase with a ballastrade so broad that we might have gone up that almost as easily and into a shady old drawing room lighted by some three or four of the quaint windows I had looked up at from the street which had old oak seats in them that seem to have come of the same trees as the shining oak floor and the great beams in the ceiling it was a prettily furnished room with a piano and some lively furniture and red and green and some flowers it seemed to be all old nooks and corners and in every nook and corner there was some queer little table or cupboard or bookcase or seat or something or other that made me think there was not such another good corner in the room until I looked at the next one and found it equal to it if not better on everything there was the same air of retirement and cleanliness that marks the house outside mr. Whitfield tapped at a door in a corner of the paneled wall and a girl of about my own age came quickly out and kissed him on her face I saw immediately the placid and sweet expression of the lady whose picture had looked at me downstairs it seemed to my imagination as if the portrait had grown womanly and the original remained a child although her face was quite bright and happy there was a tranquility about it and about her a quiet good calm spirit that I never have forgotten that I shall never forget this was his little housekeeper his daughter agnes mr. Whitfield said when I heard how he said it and saw how he held her hand I guessed what the one motive of his life was she had a little basket trifle hanging at her side with keys in it and she looked as stayed in his discreet a housekeeper as the old house could have she listened to her father as he told her about me with a pleasant face and when he had concluded proposed to my aunt that we should go upstairs and see my room we all went together she before us and a glorious old room it was with more oak beams and diamond panes and the broad balustrade going all the way up to it I cannot call to mind where or when in my childhood I had seen a stained glass window in a church nor do I recollect its subject but I know that when I saw her turn round in the grave light of the old staircase and wait for us above I thought of that window and I associated something of its tranquil brightness with agnes Whitfield ever afterwards my aunt was as happy as I was in the arrangement made for me and we went down to the drawing room again well pleased and gratified as she would not hear of staying to dinner lest she should by any chance fail to arrive at home with a gray pony before dark and as I apprehend mr. Whitfield knew her too well to argue any point with her some lunch was provided for her there and agnes went back to her governess and mr. Whitfield to his office so we were left to take leave of one another without any restraint she told me that everything would be arranged for me by mr. Whitfield and that I should want for nothing and gave me the kindest words and the best advice trot said my aunt in conclusion be a credit to yourself to me and mr. Dick and heaven be with you I was greatly overcome and could only thank her again and again and send my love to mr. Dick never said my aunt be mean in anything never be false never be cruel avoid those three vices trot and I can always be hopeful of you I promised as well as I could that I would not abuse her kindness or forget her admonition the ponies at the door said my aunt and I am off stay here with these words she embraced me hastily and went out of the room shutting the door after her at first I was startled by so abrupt a departure and almost feared I had displeased her but when I looked into the street and saw how dejectedly she got into the chaise and drove away without looking up I understood her better and did not do her that injustice by five o'clock which was mr. Whitfield's dinner hour I had mustered up my spirits again and was ready for my knife and fork the cloth was only laid for us too but Agnes was waiting in the drawing room before dinner went down with her father and sat opposite to him at table I doubted whether he could have dined without her we did not stay there after dinner but came upstairs into the drawing room again in one snug corner of which Agnes set glasses for her father and a decanter of port wine I thought he would have missed its usual flavor if it had been put there for him by any other hands there he sat taking his wine and taking a good deal of it for two hours while Agnes played on the piano worked and talked to him and me he was for the most part gay and cheerful with us but sometimes his eyes rested on her and he fell into a brooding state and was silent she always observed this quickly I thought and always roused him with a question or caress then he came out of his meditation and drank more wine Agnes made the tea and presided over it and the time passed away after it as after dinner until she went to bed when her father took her in his arms and kissed her and she being gone ordered candles in his office then I went to bed too but in the course of the evening I had rambled down to the door and a little way along the street that I might have another peep at the old houses in the great cathedral and might think of my coming through that old city on my journey and of my passing the very house I lived in without knowing it as I came back I saw Uriah Heap shutting up the office and feeling friendly towards everybody went in and spoke to him and at parting gave him my hand but oh what a clammy hand his was as ghostly to the touch as to the sight I rubbed mine afterwards to warm it and to rub his off it was such an uncomfortable hand that when I went to my room it was still cold and wet upon my memory leaning out of the window and seeing one of the faces on the beam ends looking at me sideways I fancied it was Uriah Heap got up there somehow and shut him out in a hurry end of chapter 15