David Copperfield
We doen’t say so, but so ‘twill be, and better so. The last you see on
him--the very last--will you give him the lovingest duty and thanks of
the orphan, as he was ever more than a father to?’
This I also promised, faithfully.
‘I thankee agen, sir,’ he said, heartily shaking hands. ‘I know wheer
you’re a-going. Good-bye!’
With a slight wave of his hand, as though to explain to me that he could
not enter the old place, he turned away. As I looked after his figure,
crossing the waste in the moonlight, I saw him turn his face towards a
strip of silvery light upon the sea, and pass on, looking at it, until
he was a shadow in the distance.
The door of the boat-house stood open when I approached; and, on
entering, I found it emptied of all its furniture, saving one of the old
lockers, on which Mrs. Gummidge, with a basket on her knee, was seated,
looking at Mr. Peggotty. He leaned his elbow on the rough chimney-piece,
and gazed upon a few expiring embers in the grate; but he raised his
head, hopefully, on my coming in, and spoke in a cheery manner.
‘Come, according to promise, to bid farewell to ‘t, eh, Mas’r Davy?’
he said, taking up the candle. ‘Bare enough, now, an’t it?’ ‘Indeed you
have made good use of the time,’ said I.
‘Why, we have not been idle, sir. Missis Gummidge has worked like a--I
doen’t know what Missis Gummidge an’t worked like,’ said Mr. Peggotty,
looking at her, at a loss for a sufficiently approving simile.
Mrs. Gummidge, leaning on her basket, made no observation.
‘Theer’s the very locker that you used to sit on, ‘long with Em’ly!’
said Mr. Peggotty, in a whisper. ‘I’m a-going to carry it away with me,
last of all. And heer’s your old little bedroom, see, Mas’r Davy! A’most
as bleak tonight, as ‘art could wish!’
In truth, the wind, though it was low, had a solemn sound, and crept
around the deserted house with a whispered wailing that was very
mournful. Everything was gone, down to the little mirror with the
oyster-shell frame. I thought of myself, lying here, when that first
great change was being wrought at home. I thought of the blue-eyed child
who had enchanted me. I thought of Steerforth: and a foolish, fearful
fancy came upon me of his being near at hand, and liable to be met at
any turn.
‘’Tis like to be long,’ said Mr. Peggotty, in a low voice, ‘afore
the boat finds new tenants. They look upon ‘t, down heer, as being
unfortunate now!’
‘Does it belong to anybody in the neighbourhood?’ I asked.
‘To a mast-maker up town,’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘I’m a-going to give the
key to him tonight.’
We looked into the other little room, and came back to Mrs. Gummidge,
sitting on the locker, whom Mr. Peggotty, putting the light on the
chimney-piece, requested to rise, that he might carry it outside the
door before extinguishing the candle.
‘Dan’l,’ said Mrs. Gummidge, suddenly deserting her basket, and clinging
to his arm ‘my dear Dan’l, the parting words I speak in this house is, I
mustn’t be left behind. Doen’t ye think of leaving me behind, Dan’l! Oh,
doen’t ye ever do it!’
Mr. Peggotty, taken aback, looked from Mrs. Gummidge to me, and from me
to Mrs. Gummidge, as if he had been awakened from a sleep.
‘Doen’t ye, dearest Dan’l, doen’t ye!’ cried Mrs. Gummidge, fervently.
‘Take me ‘long with you, Dan’l, take me ‘long with you and Em’ly! I’ll
be your servant, constant and trew. If there’s slaves in them parts
where you’re a-going, I’ll be bound to you for one, and happy, but
doen’t ye leave me behind, Dan’l, that’s a deary dear!’
‘My good soul,’ said Mr. Peggotty, shaking his head, ‘you doen’t know
what a long voyage, and what a hard life ‘tis!’ ‘Yes, I do, Dan’l! I can
guess!’ cried Mrs. Gummidge. ‘But my parting words under this roof is,
I shall go into the house and die, if I am not took. I can dig, Dan’l.
I can work. I can live hard. I can be loving and patient now--more than
you think, Dan’l, if you’ll on’y try me. I wouldn’t touch the ‘lowance,
not if I was dying of want, Dan’l Peggotty; but I’ll go with you and
Em’ly, if you’ll on’y let me, to the world’s end! I know how ‘tis; I
know you think that I am lone and lorn; but, deary love, ‘tan’t so no
more! I ain’t sat here, so long, a-watching, and a-thinking of your
trials, without some good being done me. Mas’r Davy, speak to him for
me! I knows his ways, and Em’ly’s, and I knows their sorrows, and can be
a comfort to ‘em, some odd times, and labour for ‘em allus! Dan’l, deary
Dan’l, let me go ‘long with you!’
And Mrs. Gummidge took his hand, and kissed it with a homely pathos and
affection, in a homely rapture of devotion and gratitude, that he well
deserved.
We brought the locker out, extinguished the candle, fastened the door
on the outside, and left the old boat close shut up, a dark speck in
the cloudy night. Next day, when we were returning to London outside the
coach, Mrs. Gummidge and her basket were on the seat behind, and Mrs.
Gummidge was happy.
CHAPTER 52. I ASSIST AT AN EXPLOSION
When the time Mr. Micawber had appointed so mysteriously, was within
four-and-twenty hours of being come, my aunt and I consulted how we
should proceed; for my aunt was very unwilling to leave Dora. Ah! how
easily I carried Dora up and down stairs, now!
We were disposed, notwithstanding Mr. Micawber’s stipulation for my
aunt’s attendance, to arrange that she should stay at home, and be
represented by Mr. Dick and me. In short, we had resolved to take this
course, when Dora again unsettled us by declaring that she never
would forgive herself, and never would forgive her bad boy, if my aunt
remained behind, on any pretence.
‘I won’t speak to you,’ said Dora, shaking her curls at my aunt. ‘I’ll
be disagreeable! I’ll make Jip bark at you all day. I shall be sure that
you really are a cross old thing, if you don’t go!’
‘Tut, Blossom!’ laughed my aunt. ‘You know you can’t do without me!’
‘Yes, I can,’ said Dora. ‘You are no use to me at all. You never run up
and down stairs for me, all day long. You never sit and tell me stories
about Doady, when his shoes were worn out, and he was covered with
dust--oh, what a poor little mite of a fellow! You never do anything at
all to please me, do you, dear?’ Dora made haste to kiss my aunt, and
say, ‘Yes, you do! I’m only joking!’-lest my aunt should think she
really meant it.
‘But, aunt,’ said Dora, coaxingly, ‘now listen. You must go. I shall
tease you, ‘till you let me have my own way about it. I shall lead my
naughty boy such a life, if he don’t make you go. I shall make myself
so disagreeable--and so will Jip! You’ll wish you had gone, like a good
thing, for ever and ever so long, if you don’t go. Besides,’ said Dora,
putting back her hair, and looking wonderingly at my aunt and me, ‘why
shouldn’t you both go? I am not very ill indeed. Am I?’
‘Why, what a question!’ cried my aunt.
‘What a fancy!’ said I.
‘Yes! I know I am a silly little thing!’ said Dora, slowly looking from
one of us to the other, and then putting up her pretty lips to kiss us
as she lay upon her couch. ‘Well, then, you must both go, or I shall not
believe you; and then I shall cry!’
I saw, in my aunt’s face, that she began to give way now, and Dora
brightened again, as she saw it too.
‘You’ll come back with so much to tell me, that it’ll take at least
a week to make me understand!’ said Dora. ‘Because I know I shan’t
understand, for a length of time, if there’s any business in it. And
there’s sure to be some business in it! If there’s anything to add up,
besides, I don’t know when I shall make it out; and my bad boy will look
so miserable all the time. There! Now you’ll go, won’t you? You’ll only
be gone one night, and Jip will take care of me while you are gone.
Doady will carry me upstairs before you go, and I won’t come down again
till you come back; and you shall take Agnes a dreadfully scolding
letter from me, because she has never been to see us!’
We agreed, without any more consultation, that we would both go, and
that Dora was a little Impostor, who feigned to be rather unwell,
because she liked to be petted. She was greatly pleased, and very merry;
and we four, that is to say, my aunt, Mr. Dick, Traddles, and I, went
down to Canterbury by the Dover mail that night.
At the hotel where Mr. Micawber had requested us to await him, which
we got into, with some trouble, in the middle of the night, I found a
letter, importing that he would appear in the morning punctually at half
past nine. After which, we went shivering, at that uncomfortable hour,
to our respective beds, through various close passages; which smelt as
if they had been steeped, for ages, in a solution of soup and stables.
Early in the morning, I sauntered through the dear old tranquil streets,
and again mingled with the shadows of the venerable gateways and
churches. The rooks were sailing about the cathedral towers; and the
towers themselves, overlooking many a long unaltered mile of the rich
country and its pleasant streams, were cutting the bright morning air,
as if there were no such thing as change on earth. Yet the bells, when
they sounded, told me sorrowfully of change in everything; told me of
their own age, and my pretty Dora’s youth; and of the many, never old,
who had lived and loved and died, while the reverberations of the bells
had hummed through the rusty armour of the Black Prince hanging up
within, and, motes upon the deep of Time, had lost themselves in air, as
circles do in water.
I looked at the old house from the corner of the street, but did not go
nearer to it, lest, being observed, I might unwittingly do any harm to
the design I had come to aid. The early sun was striking edgewise on its
gables and lattice-windows, touching them with gold; and some beams of
its old peace seemed to touch my heart.
I strolled into the country for an hour or so, and then returned by
the main street, which in the interval had shaken off its last night’s
sleep. Among those who were stirring in the shops, I saw my ancient
enemy the butcher, now advanced to top-boots and a baby, and in business
for himself. He was nursing the baby, and appeared to be a benignant
member of society.
We all became very anxious and impatient, when we sat down to breakfast.
As it approached nearer and nearer to half past nine o’clock, our
restless expectation of Mr. Micawber increased. At last we made no more
pretence of attending to the meal, which, except with Mr. Dick, had been
a mere form from the first; but my aunt walked up and down the room.
Traddles sat upon the sofa affecting to read the paper with his eyes on
the ceiling; and I looked out of the window to give early notice of Mr.
Micawber’s coming. Nor had I long to watch, for, at the first chime of
the half hour, he appeared in the street.
‘Here he is,’ said I, ‘and not in his legal attire!’
My aunt tied the strings of her bonnet (she had come down to breakfast
in it), and put on her shawl, as if she were ready for anything that
was resolute and uncompromising. Traddles buttoned his coat with a
determined air. Mr. Dick, disturbed by these formidable appearances, but
feeling it necessary to imitate them, pulled his hat, with both hands,
as firmly over his ears as he possibly could; and instantly took it off
again, to welcome Mr. Micawber.
‘Gentlemen, and madam,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘good morning! My dear sir,’
to Mr. Dick, who shook hands with him violently, ‘you are extremely
good.’
‘Have you breakfasted?’ said Mr. Dick. ‘Have a chop!’
‘Not for the world, my good sir!’ cried Mr. Micawber, stopping him on
his way to the bell; ‘appetite and myself, Mr. Dixon, have long been
strangers.’
Mr. Dixon was so well pleased with his new name, and appeared to think
it so obliging in Mr. Micawber to confer it upon him, that he shook