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

'Yes,' added Mr. Smangle; 'and if he'd the power of raising him again, he would, in two months and three days from this time, to renew the bill!'

  'Those are very remarkable traits,' said Mr. Pickwick; 'but I'm afraid that while we are talking here, my friends may be in a state of great perplexity at not finding me.'

  'I'll show 'em the way,' said Smangle, making for the door. 'Good-day. I won't disturb you while they're here, you know. By the bye--'

  As Smangle pronounced the last three words, he stopped suddenly, reclosed the door which he had opened, and, walking softly back to Mr. Pickwick, stepped close up to him on tiptoe, and said, in a very soft whisper--

  'You couldn't make it convenient to lend me half-a-crown till the latter end of next week, could you?'

  Mr. Pickwick could scarcely forbear smiling, but managing to preserve his gravity, he drew forth the coin, and placed it in Mr. Smangle's palm; upon which, that gentleman, with many nods and winks, implying profound mystery, disappeared in quest of the three strangers, with whom he presently returned; and having coughed thrice, and nodded as many times, as an assurance to Mr. Pickwick that he would not forget to pay, he shook hands all round, in an engaging manner, and at length took himself off.

  'My dear friends,' said Mr. Pickwick, shaking hands alternately with Mr. Tupman, Mr. Winkle, and Mr. Snodgrass, who were the three visitors in question, 'I am delighted to see you.'

  The triumvirate were much affected. Mr. Tupman shook his head deploringly, Mr. Snodgrass drew forth his handkerchief, with undisguised emotion; and Mr. Winkle retired to the window, and sniffed aloud.

  'Mornin', gen'l'm'n,' said Sam, entering at the moment with the shoes and gaiters. 'Avay vith melincholly, as the little boy said ven his schoolmissus died. Velcome to the college, gen'l'm'n.' 'This foolish fellow,' said Mr. Pickwick, tapping Sam on the head as he knelt down to button up his master's gaiters--'this foolish fellow has got himself arrested, in order to be near me.' 'What!' exclaimed the three friends.

  'Yes, gen'l'm'n,' said Sam, 'I'm a--stand steady, sir, if you please--I'm a prisoner, gen'l'm'n. Con-fined, as the lady said.' 'A prisoner!' exclaimed Mr. Winkle, with unaccountable vehemence.

  'Hollo, sir!' responded Sam, looking up. 'Wot's the matter, Sir?'

  'I had hoped, Sam, that-- Nothing, nothing,' said Mr. Winkle precipitately.

  There was something so very abrupt and unsettled in Mr. Winkle's manner, that Mr. Pickwick involuntarily looked at his two friends for an explanation.

  'We don't know,' said Mr. Tupman, answering this mute appeal aloud. 'He has been much excited for two days past, and his whole demeanour very unlike what it usually is. We feared there must be something the matter, but he resolutely denies it.'

  'No, no,' said Mr. Winkle, colouring beneath Mr. Pickwick's gaze; 'there is really nothing. I assure you there is nothing, my dear sir. It will be necessary for me to leave town, for a short time, on private business, and I had hoped to have prevailed upon you to allow Sam to accompany me.'

  Mr. Pickwick looked more astonished than before.

  'I think,' faltered Mr. Winkle, 'that Sam would have had no objection to do so; but, of course, his being a prisoner here, renders it impossible. So I must go alone.'

  As Mr. Winkle said these words, Mr. Pickwick felt, with some astonishment, that Sam's fingers were trembling at the gaiters, as if he were rather surprised or startled. Sam looked up at Mr. Winkle, too, when he had finished speaking; and though the glance they exchanged was instantaneous, they seemed to understand each other.

  'Do you know anything of this, Sam?' said Mr. Pickwick sharply.

  'No, I don't, sir,' replied Mr. Weller, beginning to button with extraordinary assiduity.

  'Are you sure, Sam?' said Mr. Pickwick.

  'Wy, sir,' responded Mr. Weller; 'I'm sure so far, that I've never heerd anythin' on the subject afore this moment. If I makes any guess about it,' added Sam, looking at Mr. Winkle, 'I haven't got any right to say what 'It is, fear it should be a wrong 'un.'

  'I have no right to make any further inquiry into the private affairs of a friend, however intimate a friend,' said Mr. Pickwick, after a short silence; 'at present let me merely say, that I do not understand this at all. There. We have had quite enough of the subject.'

  Thus expressing himself, Mr. Pickwick led the conversation to different topics, and Mr. Winkle gradually appeared more at ease, though still very far from being completely so. They had all so much to converse about, that the morning very quickly passed away; and when, at three o'clock, Mr. Weller produced upon the little dining-table, a roast leg of mutton and an enormous meat- pie, with sundry dishes of vegetables, and pots of porter, which stood upon the chairs or the sofa bedstead, or where they could, everybody felt disposed to do justice to the meal, notwithstanding that the meat had been purchased, and dressed, and the pie made, and baked, at the prison cookery hard by.

  To these succeeded a bottle or two of very good wine, for which a messenger was despatched by Mr. Pickwick to the Horn Coffee-house, in Doctors' Commons. The bottle or two, indeed, might be more properly described as a bottle or six, for by the time it was drunk, and tea over, the bell began to ring for strangers to withdraw.

  But, if Mr. Winkle's behaviour had been unaccountable in the morning, it became perfectly unearthly and solemn when, under the influence of his feelings, and his share of the bottle or six, he prepared to take leave of his friend. He lingered behind, until Mr. Tupman and Mr. Snodgrass had disappeared, and then fervently clenched Mr. Pickwick's hand, with an expression of face in which deep and mighty resolve was fearfully blended with the very concentrated essence of gloom.

  'Good-night, my dear Sir!' said Mr. Winkle between his set teeth.

  'Bless you, my dear fellow!' replied the warm-hearted Mr. Pickwick, as he returned the pressure of his young friend's hand.

  'Now then!' cried Mr. Tupman from the gallery.

  'Yes, yes, directly,' replied Mr. Winkle. 'Good-night!'

  'Good-night,' said Mr. Pickwick.

  There was another good-night, and another, and half a dozen more after that, and still Mr. Winkle had fast hold of his friend's hand, and was looking into his face with the same strange expression.

  'Is anything the matter?' said Mr. Pickwick at last, when his arm was quite sore with shaking. 'Nothing,' said Mr. Winkle.

  'Well then, good-night,' said Mr. Pickwick, attempting to disengage his hand.

  'My friend, my benefactor, my honoured companion,' murmured Mr. Winkle, catching at his wrist. 'Do not judge me harshly; do not, when you hear that, driven to extremity by hopeless obstacles, I--'

  'Now then,' said Mr. Tupman, reappearing at the door. 'Are you coming, or are we to be locked in?'

  'Yes, yes, I am ready,' replied Mr. Winkle. And with a violent effort he tore himself away.

  As Mr. Pickwick was gazing down the passage after them in silent astonishment, Sam Weller appeared at the stair-head, and whispered for one moment in Mr. Winkle's ear.

  'Oh, certainly, depend upon me,' said that gentleman aloud.

  'Thank'ee, sir. You won't forget, sir?' said Sam. 'Of course not,' replied Mr. Winkle.

  'Wish you luck, Sir,' said Sam, touching his hat. 'I should very much liked to ha' joined you, Sir; but the gov'nor, o' course, is paramount.'

  'It is very much to your credit that you remain here,' said Mr. Winkle. With these words they disappeared down the stairs.

  ,Very extraordinary,' said Mr. Pickwick, going back into his room, and seating himself at the table in a musing attitude. 'What can that young man be going to do?'

  He had sat ruminating about the matter for some time, when the voice of Roker, the turnkey, demanded whether he might come in.

  'By all means,' said Mr. Pickwick.

  'I've brought you a softer pillow, Sir,' said Mr. Roker, 'instead of the temporary one you had last night.'

  'Thank you,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'Will you take a glass of wine?'

  'You're wery good, Sir,' replied Mr. Roker, accepting
the proffered glass. 'Yours, sir.'

  'Thank you,' said Mr. Pickwick.

  'I'm sorry to say that your landlord's wery bad to-night, Sir,' said Roker, setting down the glass, and inspecting the lining of his hat preparatory to putting it on again.

  'What! The Chancery prisoner!' exclaimed Mr. Pickwick.

  'He won't be a Chancery prisoner wery long, Sir,' replied Roker, turning his hat round, so as to get the maker's name right side upwards, as he looked into it.

  'You make my blood run cold,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'What do you mean?'

  'He's been consumptive for a long time past,' said Mr. Roker, 'and he's taken wery bad in the breath to-night. The doctor said, six months ago, that nothing but change of air could save him.'

  'Great Heaven!' exclaimed Mr. Pickwick; 'has this man been slowly murdered by the law for six months?'

  'I don't know about that,' replied Roker, weighing the hat by the brim in both hands. 'I suppose he'd have been took the same, wherever he was. He went into the infirmary, this morning; the doctor says his strength is to be kept up as much as possible; and the warden's sent him wine and broth and that, from his own house. It's not the warden's fault, you know, sir.'

  'Of course not,' replied Mr. Pickwick hastily.

  'I'm afraid, however,' said Roker, shaking his head, 'that it's all up with him. I offered Neddy two six-penn'orths to one upon it just now, but he wouldn't take it, and quite right. Thank'ee, Sir. Good-night, sir.'

  'Stay,' said Mr. Pickwick earnestly. 'Where is this infirmary?'

  'Just over where you slept, sir,' replied Roker. 'I'll show you, if you like to come.' Mr. Pickwick snatched up his hat without speaking, and followed at once.

  The turnkey led the way in silence; and gently raising the latch of the room door, motioned Mr. Pickwick to enter. It was a large, bare, desolate room, with a number of stump bedsteads made of iron, on one of which lay stretched the shadow of a man --wan, pale, and ghastly. His breathing was hard and thick, and he moaned painfully as it came and went. At the bedside sat a short old man in a cobbler's apron, who, by the aid of a pair of horn spectacles, was reading from the Bible aloud. It was the fortunate legatee.

  The sick man laid his hand upon his attendant's arm, and motioned him to stop. He closed the book, and laid it on the bed.

  'Open the window,' said the sick man.

  He did so. The noise of carriages and carts, the rattle of wheels, the cries of men and boys, all the busy sounds of a mighty multitude instinct with life and occupation, blended into one deep murmur, floated into the room. Above the hoarse loud hum, arose, from time to time, a boisterous laugh; or a scrap of some jingling song, shouted forth, by one of the giddy crowd, would strike upon the ear, for an instant, and then be lost amidst the roar of voices and the tramp of footsteps; the breaking of the billows of the restless sea of life, that rolled heavily on, without. These are melancholy sounds to a quiet listener at any time; but how melancholy to the watcher by the bed of death!

  'There is no air here,' said the man faintly. 'The place pollutes it. It was fresh round about, when I walked there, years ago; but it grows hot and heavy in passing these walls. I cannot breathe it.'

  'We have breathed it together, for a long time,' said the old man. 'Come, come.'

  There was a short silence, during which the two spectators approached the bed. The sick man drew a hand of his old fellow- prisoner towards him, and pressing it affectionately between both his own, retained it in his grasp.

  'I hope,' he gasped after a while, so faintly that they bent their ears close over the bed to catch the half-formed sounds his pale lips gave vent to--'I hope my merciful Judge will bear in mind my heavy punishment on earth. Twenty years, my friend, twenty years in this hideous grave! My heart broke when my child died, and I could not even kiss him in his little coffin. My loneliness since then, in all this noise and riot, has been very dreadful. May God forgive me! He has seen my solitary, lingering death.'

  He folded his hands, and murmuring something more they could not hear, fell into a sleep--only a sleep at first, for they saw him smile.

  They whispered together for a little time, and the turnkey, stooping over the pillow, drew hastily back. 'He has got his discharge, by G--!' said the man.

  He had. But he had grown so like death in life, that they knew not when he died.

  CHAPTER XLIV DESCRIPTIVE OF AN AFFECTING INTERVIEW BETWEEN Mr. SAMUEL WELLER AND A FAMILY PARTY. Mr. PICKWICK MAKES A TOUR OF THE DIMINUTIVE WORLD HE INHABITS, AND RESOLVES TO MIX WITH IT, IN FUTURE, AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE

  A few mornings after his incarceration, Mr. Samuel Weller, having arranged his master's room with all possible care, and seen him comfortably seated over his books and papers, withdrew to employ himself for an hour or two to come, as he best could. It was a fine morning, and it occurred to Sam that a pint of porter in the open air would lighten his next quarter of an hour or so, as well as any little amusement in which he could indulge.

  Having arrived at this conclusion, he betook himself to the tap. Having purchased the beer, and obtained, moreover, the day-but-one-before-yesterday's paper, he repaired to the skittle- ground, and seating himself on a bench, proceeded to enjoy himself in a very sedate and methodical manner.

  First of all, he took a refreshing draught of the beer, and then he looked up at a window, and bestowed a platonic wink on a young lady who was peeling potatoes thereat. Then he opened the paper, and folded it so as to get the police reports outwards; and this being a vexatious and difficult thing to do, when there is any wind stirring, he took another draught of the beer when he had accomplished it. Then, he read two lines of the paper, and stopped short to look at a couple of men who were finishing a game at rackets, which, being concluded, he cried out 'wery good,' in an approving manner, and looked round upon the spectators, to ascertain whether their sentiments coincided with his own. This involved the necessity of looking up at the windows also; and as the young lady was still there, it was an act of common politeness to wink again, and to drink to her good health in dumb show, in another draught of the beer, which Sam did; and having frowned hideously upon a small boy who had noted this latter proceeding with open eyes, he threw one leg over the other, and, holding the newspaper in both hands, began to read in real earnest.

  He had hardly composed himself into the needful state of abstraction, when he thought he heard his own name proclaimed in some distant passage. Nor was he mistaken, for it quickly passed from mouth to mouth, and in a few seconds the air teemed with shouts of 'Weller!' 'Here!' roared Sam, in a stentorian voice. 'Wot's the matter? Who wants him? Has an express come to say that his country house is afire?'

  'Somebody wants you in the hall,' said a man who was standing by.

  'Just mind that 'ere paper and the pot, old feller, will you?' said Sam. 'I'm a-comin'. Blessed, if they was a-callin' me to the bar, they couldn't make more noise about it!'

  Accompanying these words with a gentle rap on the head of the young gentleman before noticed, who, unconscious of his close vicinity to the person in request, was screaming 'Weller!' with all his might, Sam hastened across the ground, and ran up the steps into the hall. Here, the first object that met his eyes was his beloved father sitting on a bottom stair, with his hat in his hand, shouting out 'Weller!' in his very loudest tone, at half-minute intervals.

  'Wot are you a-roarin' at?' said Sam impetuously, when the old gentleman had discharged himself of another shout; 'making yourself so precious hot that you looks like a aggrawated glass- blower. Wot's the matter?'

  'Aha!' replied the old gentleman, 'I began to be afeerd that you'd gone for a walk round the Regency Park, Sammy.'

  'Come,' said Sam, 'none o' them taunts agin the wictim o' avarice, and come off that 'ere step. Wot arc you a-settin' down there for? I don't live there.'

  'I've got such a game for you, Sammy,' said the elder Mr. Weller, rising.

  'Stop a minit,' said Sam, 'you're all vite behind.'

  'That's right, Sammy, rub it
off,' said Mr. Weller, as his son dusted him. 'It might look personal here, if a man walked about with vitevash on his clothes, eh, Sammy?'

  As Mr. Weller exhibited in this place unequivocal symptoms of an approaching fit of chuckling, Sam interposed to stop it.

  'Keep quiet, do,' said Sam, 'there never vos such a old picter- card born. Wot are you bustin' vith, now?'

  'Sammy,' said Mr. Weller, wiping his forehead, 'I'm afeerd that vun o' these days I shall laugh myself into a appleplexy, my boy.'

  'Vell, then, wot do you do it for?' said Sam. 'Now, then, wot have you got to say?'

  'Who do you think's come here with me, Samivel?' said Mr. Weller, drawing back a pace or two, pursing up his mouth, and extending his eyebrows. 'Pell?' said Sam.

  Mr. Weller shook his head, and his red cheeks expanded with the laughter that was endeavouring to find a vent.

  'Mottled-faced man, p'raps?' asked Sam.

  Again Mr. Weller shook his head.

  'Who then?'asked Sam.

  'Your mother-in-law,' said Mr. Weller; and it was lucky he did say it, or his cheeks must inevitably have cracked, from their most unnatural distension.

  'Your mother--in--law, Sammy,' said Mr. Weller, 'and the red-nosed man, my boy; and the red-nosed man. Ho! ho! ho!'

  With this, Mr. Weller launched into convulsions of laughter, while Sam regarded him with a broad grin gradually over- spreading his whole countenance.

  'They've come to have a little serious talk with you, Samivel,' said Mr. Weller, wiping his eyes. 'Don't let out nothin' about the unnat'ral creditor, Sammy.'

  'Wot, don't they know who it is?' inquired Sam.

  'Not a bit on it,' replied his father.

  'Vere are they?' said Sam, reciprocating all the old gentleman's grins.

  'In the snuggery,' rejoined Mr. Weller. 'Catch the red-nosed man a-goin' anyvere but vere the liquors is; not he, Samivel, not he. Ve'd a wery pleasant ride along the road from the Markis this mornin', Sammy,' said Mr. Weller, when he felt himself equal to the task of speaking in an articulate manner. 'I drove the old piebald in that 'ere little shay-cart as belonged to your mother-in-law's first wenter, into vich a harm-cheer wos lifted for the shepherd; and I'm blessed,' said Mr. Weller, with a look of deep scorn--'I'm blessed if they didn't bring a portable flight o' steps out into the road a-front o' our door for him, to get up by.'