Works of Charles Dickens (200+ Works) The Adventures of Oliver Twist, Great Expectations, A Christmas Carol, A Tale of Two Cities, Bleak House, David Copperfield & more (mobi)

by Charles Dickens

  'I am much relieved to hear it,' said Bella. 'I have far other views in life, and why should you waste your own?'

  'Mine!' said the Secretary. 'My life!'

  His curious tone caused Bella to glance at the curious smile with which he said it. It was gone as he glanced back. 'Pardon me, Miss Wilfer,' he proceeded, when their eyes met; 'you have used some hard words, for which I do not doubt you have a justification in your mind, that I do not understand. Ungenerous and dishonourable. In what?'

  'I would rather not be asked,' said Bella, haughtily looking down.

  'I would rather not ask, but the question is imposed upon me. Kindly explain; or if not kindly, justly.'

  'Oh, sir!' said Bella, raising her eyes to his, after a little struggle to forbear, 'is it generous and honourable to use the power here which your favour with Mr and Mrs Boffin and your ability in your place give you, against me?'

  'Against you?'

  'Is it generous and honourable to form a plan for gradually bringing their influence to bear upon a suit which I have shown you that I do not like, and which I tell you that I utterly reject?'

  The late John Harmon could have borne a good deal, but he would have been cut to the heart by such a suspicion as this.

  'Would it be generous and honourable to step into your place--if you did so, for I don't know that you did, and I hope you did not--anticipating, or knowing beforehand, that I should come here, and designing to take me at this disadvantage?'

  'This mean and cruel disadvantage,' said the Secretary.

  'Yes,' assented Bella.

  The Secretary kept silence for a little while; then merely said, 'You are wholly mistaken, Miss Wilfer; wonderfully mistaken. I cannot say, however, that it is your fault. If I deserve better things of you, you do not know it.'

  'At least, sir,' retorted Bella, with her old indignation rising, 'you know the history of my being here at all. I have heard Mr Boffin say that you are master of every line and word of that will, as you are master of all his affairs. And was it not enough that I should have been willed away, like a horse, or a dog, or a bird; but must you too begin to dispose of me in your mind, and speculate in me, as soon as I had ceased to be the talk and the laugh of the town? Am I for ever to be made the property of strangers?'

  'Believe me,' returned the Secretary, 'you are wonderfully mistaken.'

  'I should be glad to know it,' answered Bella.

  'I doubt if you ever will. Good-night. Of course I shall be careful to conceal any traces of this interview from Mr and Mrs Boffin, as long as I remain here. Trust me, what you have complained of is at an end for ever.'

  'I am glad I have spoken, then, Mr Rokesmith. It has been painful and difficult, but it is done. If I have hurt you, I hope you will forgive me. I am inexperienced and impetuous, and I have been a little spoilt; but I really am not so bad as I dare say I appear, or as you think me.'

  He quitted the room when Bella had said this, relenting in her wilful inconsistent way. Left alone, she threw herself back on her ottoman, and said, 'I didn't know the lovely woman was such a Dragon!' Then, she got up and looked in the glass, and said to her image, 'You have been positively swelling your features, you little fool!' Then, she took an impatient walk to the other end of the room and back, and said, 'I wish Pa was here to have a talk about an avaricious marriage; but he is better away, poor dear, for I know I should pull his hair if he WAS here.' And then she threw her work away, and threw her book after it, and sat down and hummed a tune, and hummed it out of tune, and quarrelled with it.

  And John Rokesmith, what did he?

  He went down to his room, and buried John Harmon many additional fathoms deep. He took his hat, and walked out, and, as he went to Holloway or anywhere else--not at all minding where--heaped mounds upon mounds of earth over John Harmon's grave. His walking did not bring him home until the dawn of day. And so busy had he been all night, piling and piling weights upon weights of earth above John Harmon's grave, that by that time John Harmon lay buried under a whole Alpine range; and still the Sexton Rokesmith accumulated mountains over him, lightening his labour with the dirge, 'Cover him, crush him, keep him down!'

  Chapter 14

  STRONG OF PURPOSE

  The sexton-task of piling earth above John Harmon all night long, was not conducive to sound sleep; but Rokesmith had some broken morning rest, and rose strengthened in his purpose. It was all over now. No ghost should trouble Mr and Mrs Boffin's peace; invisible and voiceless, the ghost should look on for a little while longer at the state of existence out of which it had departed, and then should for ever cease to haunt the scenes in which it had no place.

  He went over it all again. He had lapsed into the condition in which he found himself, as many a man lapses into many a condition, without perceiving the accumulative power of its separate circumstances. When in the distrust engendered by his wretched childhood and the action for evil--never yet for good within his knowledge then--of his father and his father's wealth on all within their influence, he conceived the idea of his first deception, it was meant to be harmless, it was to last but a few hours or days, it was to involve in it only the girl so capriciously forced upon him and upon whom he was so capriciously forced, and it was honestly meant well towards her. For, if he had found her unhappy in the prospect of that marriage (through her heart inclining to another man or for any other cause), he would seriously have said: 'This is another of the old perverted uses of the misery-making money. I will let it go to my and my sister's only protectors and friends.' When the snare into which he fell so outstripped his first intention as that he found himself placarded by the police authorities upon the London walls for dead, he confusedly accepted the aid that fell upon him, without considering how firmly it must seem to fix the Boffins in their accession to the fortune. When he saw them, and knew them, and even from his vantage-ground of inspection could find no flaw in them, he asked himself, 'And shall I come to life to dispossess such people as these?' There was no good to set against the putting of them to that hard proof. He had heard from Bella's own lips when he stood tapping at the door on that night of his taking the lodgings, that the marriage would have been on her part thoroughly mercenary. He had since tried her, in his own unknown person and supposed station, and she not only rejected his advances but resented them. Was it for him to have the shame of buying her, or the meanness of punishing her? Yet, by coming to life and accepting the condition of the inheritance, he must do the former; and by coming to life and rejecting it, he must do the latter.

  Another consequence that he had never foreshadowed, was the implication of an innocent man in his supposed murder. He would obtain complete retraction from the accuser, and set the wrong right; but clearly the wrong could never have been done if he had never planned a deception. Then, whatever inconvenience or distress of mind the deception cost him, it was manful repentantly to accept as among its consequences, and make no complaint.

  Thus John Rokesmith in the morning, and it buried John Harmon still many fathoms deeper than he had been buried in the night.

  Going out earlier than he was accustomed to do, he encountered the cherub at the door. The cherub's way was for a certain space his way, and they walked together.

  It was impossible not to notice the change in the cherub's appearance. The cherub felt very conscious of it, and modestly remarked:

  'A present from my daughter Bella, Mr Rokesmith.'

  The words gave the Secretary a stroke of pleasure, for he remembered the fifty pounds, and he still loved the girl. No doubt it was very weak--it always IS very weak, some authorities hold--but he loved the girl.

  'I don't know whether you happen to have read many books of African Travel, Mr Rokesmith?' said R. W.

  'I have read several.'

  'Well, you know, there's usually a King George, or a King Boy, or a King Sambo, or a King Bill, or Bull, or Rum, or Junk, or whatever name the sailors may have happened to give him.'

  'Where?' asked Rokesmith.


  'Anywhere. Anywhere in Africa, I mean. Pretty well everywhere, I may say; for black kings are cheap--and I think'--said R. W., with an apologetic air, 'nasty'.

  'I am much of your opinion, Mr Wilfer. You were going to say--?'

  'I was going to say, the king is generally dressed in a London hat only, or a Manchester pair of braces, or one epaulette, or an uniform coat with his legs in the sleeves, or something of that kind.'

  'Just so,' said the Secretary.

  'In confidence, I assure you, Mr Rokesmith,' observed the cheerful cherub, 'that when more of my family were at home and to be provided for, I used to remind myself immensely of that king. You have no idea, as a single man, of the difficulty I have had in wearing more than one good article at a time.'

  'I can easily believe it, Mr Wilfer.'

  'I only mention it,' said R. W. in the warmth of his heart, 'as a proof of the amiable, delicate, and considerate affection of my daughter Bella. If she had been a little spoilt, I couldn't have thought so very much of it, under the circumstances. But no, not a bit. And she is so very pretty! I hope you agree with me in finding her very pretty, Mr Rokesmith?'

  'Certainly I do. Every one must.'

  'I hope so,' said the cherub. 'Indeed, I have no doubt of it. This is a great advancement for her in life, Mr Rokesmith. A great opening of her prospects?'

  'Miss Wilfer could have no better friends than Mr and Mrs Boffin.'

  'Impossible!' said the gratified cherub. 'Really I begin to think things are very well as they are. If Mr John Harmon had lived--'

  'He is better dead,' said the Secretary.

  'No, I won't go so far as to say that,' urged the cherub, a little remonstrant against the very decisive and unpitying tone; 'but he mightn't have suited Bella, or Bella mightn't have suited him, or fifty things, whereas now I hope she can choose for herself.'

  'Has she--as you place the confidence in me of speaking on the subject, you will excuse my asking--has she--perhaps--chosen?' faltered the Secretary.

  'Oh dear no!' returned R. W.

  'Young ladies sometimes,' Rokesmith hinted, 'choose without mentioning their choice to their fathers.'

  'Not in this case, Mr Rokesmith. Between my daughter Bella and me there is a regular league and covenant of confidence. It was ratified only the other day. The ratification dates from--these,' said the cherub, giving a little pull at the lappels of his coat and the pockets of his trousers. 'Oh no, she has not chosen. To be sure, young George Sampson, in the days when Mr John Harmon--'

  'Who I wish had never been born!' said the Secretary, with a gloomy brow.

  R. W. looked at him with surprise, as thinking he had contracted an unaccountable spite against the poor deceased, and continued: 'In the days when Mr John Harmon was being sought out, young George Sampson certainly was hovering about Bella, and Bella let him hover. But it never was seriously thought of, and it's still less than ever to be thought of now. For Bella is ambitious, Mr Rokesmith, and I think I may predict will marry fortune. This time, you see, she will have the person and the property before her together, and will be able to make her choice with her eyes open. This is my road. I am very sorry to part company so soon. Good morning, sir!'

  The Secretary pursued his way, not very much elevated in spirits by this conversation, and, arriving at the Boffin mansion, found Betty Higden waiting for him.

  'I should thank you kindly, sir,' said Betty, 'if I might make so bold as have a word or two wi' you.'

  She should have as many words as she liked, he told her; and took her into his room, and made her sit down.

  ''Tis concerning Sloppy, sir,' said Betty. 'And that's how I come here by myself. Not wishing him to know what I'm a-going to say to you, I got the start of him early and walked up.'

  'You have wonderful energy,' returned Rokesmith. 'You are as young as I am.'

  Betty Higden gravely shook her head. 'I am strong for my time of life, sir, but not young, thank the Lord!'

  'Are you thankful for not being young?'

  'Yes, sir. If I was young, it would all have to be gone through again, and the end would be a weary way off, don't you see? But never mind me; 'tis concerning Sloppy.'

  'And what about him, Betty?'

  ''Tis just this, sir. It can't be reasoned out of his head by any powers of mine but what that he can do right by your kind lady and gentleman and do his work for me, both together. Now he can't. To give himself up to being put in the way of arning a good living and getting on, he must give me up. Well; he won't.'

  'I respect him for it,' said Rokesmith.

  'DO ye, sir? I don't know but what I do myself. Still that don't make it right to let him have his way. So as he won't give me up, I'm a-going to give him up.'

  'How, Betty?'

  'I'm a-going to run away from him.'

  With an astonished look at the indomitable old face and the bright eyes, the Secretary repeated, 'Run away from him?'

  'Yes, sir,' said Betty, with one nod. And in the nod and in the firm set of her mouth, there was a vigour of purpose not to be doubted.

  'Come, come!' said the Secretary. 'We must talk about this. Let us take our time over it, and try to get at the true sense of the case and the true course, by degrees.'

  'Now, lookee here, by dear,' returned old Betty--'asking your excuse for being so familiar, but being of a time of life a'most to be your grandmother twice over. Now, lookee, here. 'Tis a poor living and a hard as is to be got out of this work that I'm a doing now, and but for Sloppy I don't know as I should have held to it this long. But it did just keep us on, the two together. Now that I'm alone--with even Johnny gone--I'd far sooner be upon my feet and tiring of myself out, than a sitting folding and folding by the fire. And I'll tell you why. There's a deadness steals over me at times, that the kind of life favours and I don't like. Now, I seem to have Johnny in my arms--now, his mother--now, his mother's mother--now, I seem to be a child myself, a lying once again in the arms of my own mother--then I get numbed, thought and sense, till I start out of my seat, afeerd that I'm a growing like the poor old people that they brick up in the Unions, as you may sometimes see when they let 'em out of the four walls to have a warm in the sun, crawling quite scared about the streets. I was a nimble girl, and have always been a active body, as I told your lady, first time ever I see her good face. I can still walk twenty mile if I am put to it. I'd far better be a walking than a getting numbed and dreary. I'm a good fair knitter, and can make many little things to sell. The loan from your lady and gentleman of twenty shillings to fit out a basket with, would be a fortune for me. Trudging round the country and tiring of myself out, I shall keep the deadness off, and get my own bread by my own labour. And what more can I want?'

  'And this is your plan,' said the Secretary, 'for running away?'

  'Show me a better! My deary, show me a better! Why, I know very well,' said old Betty Higden, 'and you know very well, that your lady and gentleman would set me up like a queen for the rest of my life, if so be that we could make it right among us to have it so. But we can't make it right among us to have it so. I've never took charity yet, nor yet has any one belonging to me. And it would be forsaking of myself indeed, and forsaking of my children dead and gone, and forsaking of their children dead and gone, to set up a contradiction now at last.'

  'It might come to be justifiable and unavoidable at last,' the Secretary gently hinted, with a slight stress on the word.

  'I hope it never will! It ain't that I mean to give offence by being anyways proud,' said the old creature simply, 'but that I want to be of a piece like, and helpful of myself right through to my death.'

  'And to be sure,' added the Secretary, as a comfort for her, 'Sloppy will be eagerly looking forward to his opportunity of being to you what you have been to him.'

  'Trust him for that, sir!' said Betty, cheerfully. 'Though he had need to be something quick about it, for I'm a getting to be an old one. But I'm a strong one too, and travel and weather never hurt me yet!
Now, be so kind as speak for me to your lady and gentleman, and tell 'em what I ask of their good friendliness to let me do, and why I ask it.'

  The Secretary felt that there was no gainsaying what was urged by this brave old heroine, and he presently repaired to Mrs Boffin and recommended her to let Betty Higden have her way, at all events for the time. 'It would be far more satisfactory to your kind heart, I know,' he said, 'to provide for her, but it may be a duty to respect this independent spirit.' Mrs Boffin was not proof against the consideration set before her. She and her husband had worked too, and had brought their simple faith and honour clean out of dustheaps. If they owed a duty to Betty Higden, of a surety that duty must be done.

  'But, Betty,' said Mrs Boffin, when she accompanied John Rokesmith back to his room, and shone upon her with the light of her radiant face, 'granted all else, I think I wouldn't run away'.

  ''Twould come easier to Sloppy,' said Mrs Higden, shaking her head. ''Twould come easier to me too. But 'tis as you please.'

  'When would you go?'

  'Now,' was the bright and ready answer. 'To-day, my deary, to-morrow. Bless ye, I am used to it. I know many parts of the country well. When nothing else was to be done, I have worked in many a market-garden afore now, and in many a hop-garden too.'

  'If I give my consent to your going, Betty--which Mr Rokesmith thinks I ought to do--'

  Betty thanked him with a grateful curtsey.

  '--We must not lose sight of you. We must not let you pass out of our knowledge. We must know all about you.'

  'Yes, my deary, but not through letter-writing, because letter-writing--indeed, writing of most sorts hadn't much come up for such as me when I was young. But I shall be to and fro. No fear of my missing a chance of giving myself a sight of your reviving face. Besides,' said Betty, with logical good faith, 'I shall have a debt to pay off, by littles, and naturally that would bring me back, if nothing else would.'

  'MUST it be done?' asked Mrs Boffin, still reluctant, of the Secretary.

  'I think it must.'

  After more discussion it was agreed that it should be done, and Mrs Boffin summoned Bella to note down the little purchases that were necessary to set Betty up in trade. 'Don't ye be timorous for me, my dear,' said the stanch old heart, observant of Bella's face: when I take my seat with my work, clean and busy and fresh, in a country market-place, I shall turn a sixpence as sure as ever a farmer's wife there.'