Martin Chuzzlewit
overhearing fragments of the conversation, he must have rejoiced in
every word of it.
‘I am glad he’s gone,’ said Martin, drawing a long breath when Tom had
left the room.
‘It IS a relief,’ assented Mr Pecksniff. ‘It is a great relief. But
having discharged--I hope with tolerable firmness--the duty which I owed
to society, I will now, my dear sir, if you will give me leave, retire
to shed a few tears in the back garden, as an humble individual.’
Tom went upstairs; cleared his shelf of books; packed them up with his
music and an old fiddle in his trunk; got out his clothes (they were not
so many that they made his head ache); put them on the top of his books;
and went into the workroom for his case of instruments. There was a
ragged stool there, with the horsehair all sticking out of the top like
a wig: a very Beast of a stool in itself; on which he had taken up his
daily seat, year after year, during the whole period of his service.
They had grown older and shabbier in company. Pupils had served their
time; seasons had come and gone. Tom and the worn-out stool had held
together through it all. That part of the room was traditionally called
‘Tom’s Corner.’ It had been assigned to him at first because of its
being situated in a strong draught, and a great way from the fire; and
he had occupied it ever since. There were portraits of him on the walls,
with all his weak points monstrously portrayed. Diabolical sentiments,
foreign to his character, were represented as issuing from his mouth in
fat balloons. Every pupil had added something, even unto fancy portraits
of his father with one eye, and of his mother with a disproportionate
nose, and especially of his sister; who always being presented as
extremely beautiful, made full amends to Tom for any other jokes. Under
less uncommon circumstances, it would have cut Tom to the heart to leave
these things and think that he saw them for the last time; but it didn’t
now. There was no Pecksniff; there never had been a Pecksniff; and all
his other griefs were swallowed up in that.
So, when he returned into the bedroom, and, having fastened his box and
a carpet-bag, put on his walking gaiters, and his great-coat, and his
hat, and taken his stick in his hand, looked round it for the last time.
Early on summer mornings, and by the light of private candle-ends on
winter nights, he had read himself half blind in this same room. He had
tried in this same room to learn the fiddle under the bedclothes, but
yielding to objections from the other pupils, had reluctantly abandoned
the design. At any other time he would have parted from it with a pang,
thinking of all he had learned there, of the many hours he had passed
there; for the love of his very dreams. But there was no Pecksniff;
there never had been a Pecksniff, and the unreality of Pecksniff
extended itself to the chamber, in which, sitting on one particular
bed, the thing supposed to be that Great Abstraction had often preached
morality with such effect that Tom had felt a moisture in his eyes,
while hanging breathless on the words.
The man engaged to bear his box--Tom knew him well: a Dragon man--came
stamping up the stairs, and made a roughish bow to Tom (to whom in
common times he would have nodded with a grin) as though he were aware
of what had happened, and wished him to perceive it made no difference
to HIM. It was clumsily done; he was a mere waterer of horses; but Tom
liked the man for it, and felt it more than going away.
Tom would have helped him with the box, but he made no more of it,
though it was a heavy one, than an elephant would have made of a
castle; just swinging it on his back and bowling downstairs as if, being
naturally a heavy sort of fellow, he could carry a box infinitely better
than he could go alone. Tom took the carpet-bag, and went downstairs
along with him. At the outer door stood Jane, crying with all her might;
and on the steps was Mrs Lupin, sobbing bitterly, and putting out her
hand for Tom to shake.
‘You’re coming to the Dragon, Mr Pinch?’
‘No,’ said Tom, ‘no. I shall walk to Salisbury to-night. I couldn’t stay
here. For goodness’ sake, don’t make me so unhappy, Mrs Lupin.’
‘But you’ll come to the Dragon, Mr Pinch. If it’s only for tonight. To
see me, you know; not as a traveller.’
‘God bless my soul!’ said Tom, wiping his eyes. ‘The kindness of people
is enough to break one’s heart! I mean to go to Salisbury to-night, my
dear good creature. If you’ll take care of my box for me till I write
for it, I shall consider it the greatest kindness you can do me.’
‘I wish,’ cried Mrs Lupin, ‘there were twenty boxes, Mr Pinch, that I
might have ‘em all.’
‘Thank’ee,’ said Tom. ‘It’s like you. Good-bye. Good-bye.’
There were several people, young and old, standing about the door, some
of whom cried with Mrs Lupin; while others tried to keep up a stout
heart, as Tom did; and others were absorbed in admiration of Mr
Pecksniff--a man who could build a church, as one may say, by squinting
at a sheet of paper; and others were divided between that feeling and
sympathy with Tom. Mr Pecksniff had appeared on the top of the steps,
simultaneously with his old pupil, and while Tom was talking with Mrs
Lupin kept his hand stretched out, as though he said ‘Go forth!’ When
Tom went forth, and had turned the corner Mr Pecksniff shook his head,
shut his eyes, and heaving a deep sigh, shut the door. On which, the
best of Tom’s supporters said he must have done some dreadful deed, or
such a man as Mr Pecksniff never could have felt like that. If it had
been a common quarrel (they observed), he would have said something, but
when he didn’t, Mr Pinch must have shocked him dreadfully.
Tom was out of hearing of their shrewd opinions, and plodded on as
steadily as he could go, until he came within sight of the turnpike
where the tollman’s family had cried out ‘Mr Pinch!’ that frosty
morning, when he went to meet young Martin. He had got through the
village, and this toll-bar was his last trial; but when the infant
toll-takers came screeching out, he had half a mind to run for it, and
make a bolt across the country.
‘Why, deary Mr Pinch! oh, deary sir!’ cried the tollman’s wife. ‘What an
unlikely time for you to be a-going this way with a bag!’
‘I am going to Salisbury,’ said Tom.
‘Why, goodness, where’s the gig, then?’ cried the tollman’s wife,
looking down the road, as if she thought Tom might have been upset
without observing it.
‘I haven’t got it,’ said Tom. ‘I--’ he couldn’t evade it; he felt she
would have him in the next question, if he got over this one. ‘I have
left Mr Pecksniff.’
The tollman--a crusty customer, always smoking solitary pipes in a
Windsor chair, inside, set artfully between two little windows that
looked up and down the road, so that when he saw anything coming up he
might hug himself on having toll to take, and when he saw it going down,
might hug himself on having taken it--the tollman was out in an instant.
‘Left Mr Pecksniff!’ cried the tollman.
‘Yes,’ said Tom, ‘left him.’
The tollman looked at his wife, uncertain whether to ask her if she had
anything to suggest, or to order her to mind the children. Astonishment
making him surly, he preferred the latter, and sent her into the
toll-house with a flea in her ear.
‘You left Mr Pecksniff!’ cried the tollman, folding his arms, and
spreading his legs. ‘I should as soon have thought of his head leaving
him.’
‘Aye!’ said Tom, ‘so should I, yesterday. Good night!’
If a heavy drove of oxen hadn’t come by immediately, the tollman would
have gone down to the village straight, to inquire into it. As
things turned out, he smoked another pipe, and took his wife into his
confidence. But their united sagacity could make nothing of it, and they
went to bed--metaphorically--in the dark. But several times that night,
when a waggon or other vehicle came through, and the driver asked
the tollkeeper ‘What news?’ he looked at the man by the light of his
lantern, to assure himself that he had an interest in the subject, and
then said, wrapping his watch-coat round his legs:
‘You’ve heerd of Mr Pecksniff down yonder?’
‘Ah! sure-ly!’
‘And of his young man Mr Pinch, p’raps?’
‘Ah!’
‘They’ve parted.’
After every one of these disclosures, the tollman plunged into his
house again, and was seen no more, while the other side went on in great
amazement.
But this was long after Tom was abed, and Tom was now with his face
towards Salisbury, doing his best to get there. The evening was
beautiful at first, but it became cloudy and dull at sunset, and the
rain fell heavily soon afterwards. For ten long miles he plodded on, wet
through, until at last the lights appeared, and he came into the welcome
precincts of the city.
He went to the inn where he had waited for Martin, and briefly answering
their inquiries after Mr Pecksniff, ordered a bed. He had no heart for
tea or supper, meat or drink of any kind, but sat by himself before
an empty table in the public room while the bed was getting ready,
revolving in his mind all that had happened that eventful day, and
wondering what he could or should do for the future. It was a great
relief when the chambermaid came in, and said the bed was ready.
It was a low four-poster, shelving downward in the centre like a trough,
and the room was crowded with impracticable tables and exploded chests
of drawers, full of damp linen. A graphic representation in oil of a
remarkably fat ox hung over the fireplace, and the portrait of some
former landlord (who might have been the ox’s brother, he was so like
him) stared roundly in, at the foot of the bed. A variety of queer
smells were partially quenched in the prevailing scent of very old
lavender; and the window had not been opened for such a long space of
time that it pleaded immemorial usage, and wouldn’t come open now.
These were trifles in themselves, but they added to the strangeness of
the place, and did not induce Tom to forget his new position. Pecksniff
had gone out of the world--had never been in it--and it was as much
as Tom could do to say his prayers without him. But he felt happier
afterwards, and went to sleep, and dreamed about him as he Never Was.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
TREATS OF TODGER’S AGAIN; AND OF ANOTHER BLIGHTED PLANT BESIDES THE
PLANTS UPON THE LEADS
Early on the day next after that on which she bade adieu to the halls
of her youth and the scenes of her childhood, Miss Pecksniff, arriving
safely at the coach-office in London, was there received, and conducted
to her peaceful home beneath the shadow of the Monument, by Mrs Todgers.
M. Todgers looked a little worn by cares of gravy and other such
solicitudes arising out of her establishment, but displayed her usual
earnestness and warmth of manner.
‘And how, my sweet Miss Pecksniff,’ said she, ‘how is your princely pa?’
Miss Pecksniff signified (in confidence) that he contemplated the
introduction of a princely ma; and repeated the sentiment that she
wasn’t blind, and wasn’t quite a fool, and wouldn’t bear it.
Mrs Todgers was more shocked by the intelligence than any one could have
expected. She was quite bitter. She said there was no truth in man and
that the warmer he expressed himself, as a general principle, the falser
and more treacherous he was. She foresaw with astonishing clearness that
the object of Mr Pecksniff’s attachment was designing, worthless, and
wicked; and receiving from Charity the fullest confirmation of these
views, protested with tears in her eyes that she loved Miss Pecksniff
like a sister, and felt her injuries as if they were her own.
‘Your real darling sister, I have not seen her more than once since her
marriage,’ said Mrs Todgers, ‘and then I thought her looking poorly. My