Great Expectations
became a hollower and hollower form, and, being on one occasion at
breakfast-time threatened (by letter) with legal proceedings, “not
unwholly unconnected,” as my local paper might put it, “with jewelery,”
I went so far as to seize the Avenger by his blue collar and shake him
off his feet,—so that he was actually in the air, like a booted
Cupid,—for presuming to suppose that we wanted a roll.
At certain times—meaning at uncertain times, for they depended on our
humour—I would say to Herbert, as if it were a remarkable discovery,—
“My dear Herbert, we are getting on badly.”
“My dear Handel,” Herbert would say to me, in all sincerity, “if you
will believe me, those very words were on my lips, by a strange
coincidence.”
“Then, Herbert,” I would respond, “let us look into our affairs.”
We always derived profound satisfaction from making an appointment for
this purpose. I always thought this was business, this was the way to
confront the thing, this was the way to take the foe by the throat. And
I know Herbert thought so too.
We ordered something rather special for dinner, with a bottle of
something similarly out of the common way, in order that our minds
might be fortified for the occasion, and we might come well up to the
mark. Dinner over, we produced a bundle of pens, a copious supply of
ink, and a goodly show of writing and blotting paper. For there was
something very comfortable in having plenty of stationery.
I would then take a sheet of paper, and write across the top of it, in
a neat hand, the heading, “Memorandum of Pip’s debts”; with Barnard’s
Inn and the date very carefully added. Herbert would also take a sheet
of paper, and write across it with similar formalities, “Memorandum of
Herbert’s debts.”
Each of us would then refer to a confused heap of papers at his side,
which had been thrown into drawers, worn into holes in pockets, half
burnt in lighting candles, stuck for weeks into the looking-glass, and
otherwise damaged. The sound of our pens going refreshed us
exceedingly, insomuch that I sometimes found it difficult to
distinguish between this edifying business proceeding and actually
paying the money. In point of meritorious character, the two things
seemed about equal.
When we had written a little while, I would ask Herbert how he got on?
Herbert probably would have been scratching his head in a most rueful
manner at the sight of his accumulating figures.
“They are mounting up, Handel,” Herbert would say; “upon my life, they
are mounting up.”
“Be firm, Herbert,” I would retort, plying my own pen with great
assiduity. “Look the thing in the face. Look into your affairs. Stare
them out of countenance.”
“So I would, Handel, only they are staring _me_ out of countenance.”
However, my determined manner would have its effect, and Herbert would
fall to work again. After a time he would give up once more, on the
plea that he had not got Cobbs’s bill, or Lobbs’s, or Nobbs’s, as the
case might be.
“Then, Herbert, estimate; estimate it in round numbers, and put it
down.”
“What a fellow of resource you are!” my friend would reply, with
admiration. “Really your business powers are very remarkable.”
I thought so too. I established with myself, on these occasions, the
reputation of a first-rate man of business,—prompt, decisive,
energetic, clear, cool-headed. When I had got all my responsibilities
down upon my list, I compared each with the bill, and ticked it off. My
self-approval when I ticked an entry was quite a luxurious sensation.
When I had no more ticks to make, I folded all my bills up uniformly,
docketed each on the back, and tied the whole into a symmetrical
bundle. Then I did the same for Herbert (who modestly said he had not
my administrative genius), and felt that I had brought his affairs into
a focus for him.
My business habits had one other bright feature, which I called
“leaving a Margin.” For example; supposing Herbert’s debts to be one
hundred and sixty-four pounds four-and-twopence, I would say, “Leave a
margin, and put them down at two hundred.” Or, supposing my own to be
four times as much, I would leave a margin, and put them down at seven
hundred. I had the highest opinion of the wisdom of this same Margin,
but I am bound to acknowledge that on looking back, I deem it to have
been an expensive device. For, we always ran into new debt immediately,
to the full extent of the margin, and sometimes, in the sense of
freedom and solvency it imparted, got pretty far on into another
margin.
But there was a calm, a rest, a virtuous hush, consequent on these
examinations of our affairs that gave me, for the time, an admirable
opinion of myself. Soothed by my exertions, my method, and Herbert’s
compliments, I would sit with his symmetrical bundle and my own on the
table before me among the stationery, and feel like a Bank of some
sort, rather than a private individual.
We shut our outer door on these solemn occasions, in order that we
might not be interrupted. I had fallen into my serene state one
evening, when we heard a letter dropped through the slit in the said
door, and fall on the ground. “It’s for you, Handel,” said Herbert,
going out and coming back with it, “and I hope there is nothing the
matter.” This was in allusion to its heavy black seal and border.
The letter was signed Trabb & Co., and its contents were simply, that I
was an honoured sir, and that they begged to inform me that Mrs. J.
Gargery had departed this life on Monday last at twenty minutes past
six in the evening, and that my attendance was requested at the
interment on Monday next at three o’clock in the afternoon.
Chapter XXXV.
It was the first time that a grave had opened in my road of life, and
the gap it made in the smooth ground was wonderful. The figure of my
sister in her chair by the kitchen fire, haunted me night and day. That
the place could possibly be, without her, was something my mind seemed
unable to compass; and whereas she had seldom or never been in my
thoughts of late, I had now the strangest ideas that she was coming
towards me in the street, or that she would presently knock at the
door. In my rooms too, with which she had never been at all associated,
there was at once the blankness of death and a perpetual suggestion of
the sound of her voice or the turn of her face or figure, as if she
were still alive and had been often there.
Whatever my fortunes might have been, I could scarcely have recalled my
sister with much tenderness. But I suppose there is a shock of regret
which may exist without much tenderness. Under its influence (and
perhaps to make up for the want of the softer feeling) I was seized
with a violent indignation against the assailant from whom she had
suffered so much; and I felt that on sufficient proof I could have
revengefully pursued Orlick, or any one else, to the last extremity.
Having written to Joe, to offer him consolation, and to assure him that
I would come to the funeral, I passed the intermediate days in the
curious state of mind I have glanced at. I went down early in the
morning, and alighted at the Blue Boar in good time to walk over to the
forge.
It was fine summer weather again, and, as I walked along, the times
when I was a little helpless creature, and my sister did not spare me,
vividly returned. But they returned with a gentle tone upon them that
softened even the edge of Tickler. For now, the very breath of the
beans and clover whispered to my heart that the day must come when it
would be well for my memory that others walking in the sunshine should
be softened as they thought of me.
At last I came within sight of the house, and saw that Trabb and Co.
had put in a funereal execution and taken possession. Two dismally
absurd persons, each ostentatiously exhibiting a crutch done up in a
black bandage,—as if that instrument could possibly communicate any
comfort to anybody,—were posted at the front door; and in one of them I
recognised a postboy discharged from the Boar for turning a young
couple into a sawpit on their bridal morning, in consequence of
intoxication rendering it necessary for him to ride his horse clasped
round the neck with both arms. All the children of the village, and
most of the women, were admiring these sable warders and the closed
windows of the house and forge; and as I came up, one of the two
warders (the postboy) knocked at the door,—implying that I was far too
much exhausted by grief to have strength remaining to knock for myself.
Another sable warder (a carpenter, who had once eaten two geese for a
wager) opened the door, and showed me into the best parlour. Here, Mr.
Trabb had taken unto himself the best table, and had got all the leaves
up, and was holding a kind of black Bazaar, with the aid of a quantity
of black pins. At the moment of my arrival, he had just finished
putting somebody’s hat into black long-clothes, like an African baby;
so he held out his hand for mine. But I, misled by the action, and
confused by the occasion, shook hands with him with every testimony of
warm affection.
Poor dear Joe, entangled in a little black cloak tied in a large bow
under his chin, was seated apart at the upper end of the room; where,
as chief mourner, he had evidently been stationed by Trabb. When I bent
down and said to him, “Dear Joe, how are you?” he said, “Pip, old chap,
you knowed her when she were a fine figure of a—” and clasped my hand
and said no more.
Biddy, looking very neat and modest in her black dress, went quietly
here and there, and was very helpful. When I had spoken to Biddy, as I
thought it not a time for talking I went and sat down near Joe, and
there began to wonder in what part of the house it—she—my sister—was.
The air of the parlour being faint with the smell of sweet-cake, I
looked about for the table of refreshments; it was scarcely visible
until one had got accustomed to the gloom, but there was a cut-up plum
cake upon it, and there were cut-up oranges, and sandwiches, and
biscuits, and two decanters that I knew very well as ornaments, but had
never seen used in all my life; one full of port, and one of sherry.
Standing at this table, I became conscious of the servile Pumblechook
in a black cloak and several yards of hatband, who was alternately
stuffing himself, and making obsequious movements to catch my
attention. The moment he succeeded, he came over to me (breathing
sherry and crumbs), and said in a subdued voice, “May I, dear sir?” and
did. I then descried Mr. and Mrs. Hubble; the last-named in a decent
speechless paroxysm in a corner. We were all going to “follow,” and
were all in course of being tied up separately (by Trabb) into
ridiculous bundles.
“Which I meantersay, Pip,” Joe whispered me, as we were being what Mr.
Trabb called “formed” in the parlour, two and two,—and it was
dreadfully like a preparation for some grim kind of dance; “which I
meantersay, sir, as I would in preference have carried her to the
church myself, along with three or four friendly ones wot come to it
with willing harts and arms, but it were considered wot the neighbours
would look down on such and would be of opinions as it were wanting in
respect.”
“Pocket-handkerchiefs out, all!” cried Mr. Trabb at this point, in a
depressed business-like voice. “Pocket-handkerchiefs out! We are
ready!”
So we all put our pocket-handkerchiefs to our faces, as if our noses
were bleeding, and filed out two and two; Joe and I; Biddy and
Pumblechook; Mr. and Mrs. Hubble. The remains of my poor sister had
been brought round by the kitchen door, and, it being a point of
Undertaking ceremony that the six bearers must be stifled and blinded
under a horrible black velvet housing with a white border, the whole