Chapter VII: Part 7

"Frederick," said he, "you and Fanny sup at your lodgings to-night, I know. What have you done with Fanny, Frederick?"

"She is walking with Tip."

"Tip--as you may know--is my son, Mr. Clennam. He has been a little wild, and difficult to settle, but his introduction to the world was rather"--he shrugged his shoulders with a faint sigh, and looked round the room--"a little adverse. Your first visit here, sir?"

"My first."

"You could hardly have been here since your boyhood without my knowledge. It very seldom happens that anybody--of any pretensions--any pretensions--comes here without being presented to me."

"As many as forty or fifty in a day have been introduced to my brother," said Frederick, faintly lighting up with a ray of pride.

"Yes!" the Father of the Marshalsea assented. "We have even exceeded that number. On a fine Sunday in term time, it is quite a reception!"

Thus the old man prattled on, proud of his queer distinction, and yet showing traces of the fine gentleman he once was. And while he listened, Arthur felt his heart throb with sympathy for the brave girl, sitting silent across the table, who had so long borne the burdens of this ruined family upon her frail shoulders.

He could not say anything to her, here, but when he rose to take his leave, he asked her by a look to come with him to the gate. He felt he must make some explanation for thus intruding and learning her secret.

"Pray forgive me," he said, when they paused alone at the gate. "I followed you to-night from my mother's. I should not have done so, but, believe me, it was only in the hope of doing you some service. What I have seen here, in this short time, has increased ten-fold my heartfelt wish to be a friend to you."

She seemed to take courage while he spoke to her.

"You are very good, sir. You speak very earnestly to me. But I--but I wish you had not watched me."

He understood the emotion with which she said it to arise in her father's behalf; and he respected it, and was silent.

"Mrs. Clennam has been of great service to me. I don't know what we should have done without the employment she has given me. I am afraid it may not be a good return to become secret with her. I can say no more to-night, sir. I am sure you mean to be kind to us. Thank you, thank you."

She was so agitated, and he was so moved by compassion for her, and by deep interest in her story as it dawned upon him, that he could scarcely tear himself away. But the stoppage of the bell, and the quiet in the prison, were a warning to depart; and with a few hurried words of kindness he left her gliding back to her father.

The next day, Arthur missed Little Dorrit at his home, and wondered if she might be ill. The weather was stormy, but she was not usually hindered by that. So he walked out toward the prison to look for her; and was presently rewarded by seeing her hurrying along in the face of the gale.

She had just reached the iron bridge, some distance from the gates, when his voice caused her to stop short. The wind blew roughly, the wet squalls came rattling past them, skimming the pools on the road and pavement, and raining them down into the river. The clouds raced on furiously in the lead-colored sky, the smoke and mist raced after them, the dark tide ran fierce and strong in the same direction. Little Dorrit seemed the least, the quietest, and weakest of Heaven's creatures.

"Let me put you in a coach," said Arthur Clennam, very nearly adding, "my poor child."

She hurriedly declined, thanking him, and saying that wet or dry made little difference to her; she was used to go about in all weathers. He knew it to be so, and was touched with more pity, thinking of the slight figure at his side, making its nightly way through the damp, dark, boisterous streets, to such a place of rest.

"But I am glad to have seen you, sir," she added shyly. "I did not want you to think that we were ungrateful for your interest and kindness, last night. And, besides, I had something else to say--"

She paused as if unable to go on.

"To say to me--" he prompted.

"That I hope you will not misunderstand my father. Don't judge him, sir, as you would judge others outside the gates. He has been there so long! I never saw him outside, but I can understand that he must have grown different in some things since."

"My thoughts will never be unjust or harsh towards him, believe me."

"Not," she said, with a prouder air, as the misgiving evidently crept upon her that she might seem to be abandoning him, "not that he has anything to be ashamed of for himself, or that I have anything to be ashamed of for him. He only requires to be understood. I only ask for him that his life may be fairly remembered. All that he said was quite true. He is very much respected. Everybody who comes in is glad to know him. He is more courted than any one else. He is far more thought of than the Marshal is." If ever pride were innocent, it was innocent in Little Dorrit when she grew boastful of her father.

"It is often said that his manners are a true gentleman's, and quite a study. He is not to be blamed for being in need, poor love. Who could be in prison a quarter of a century, and be prosperous!"

What affection in her words, what compassion in her repressed tears, what a great soul of fidelity within her, how true the light that shed false brightness round him!

"If I have found it best to conceal where my home is, it is not because I am ashamed of him. God forbid! Nor am I so much ashamed of the place itself as might be supposed. People are not bad because they come there. I have known many good friends there, and have spent many happy hours."

She had relieved the faithful fulness of her heart, and modestly said, raising her eyes appealingly to her new friend's, "I did not mean to say so much, nor have I ever but once spoken about this before. But it seems to set it more right than it was last night. I said I wished you had not followed me, sir. I don't wish it so much now, unless you should think--indeed I don't wish it at all, unless I should have spoken so confusedly, that--that you can scarcely understand me, which I am afraid may be the case."

He told her with perfect truth that it was not the case; and putting himself between her and the sharp wind and rain, sheltered her as well as he could.

"I feel permitted now," he said, "to ask you a little more concerning your father. Has he many creditors?"

"Oh! a great number."

"I mean detaining creditors who keep him where he is?"

"Oh, yes! a great number."

"Can you tell me--I can get the information, no doubt, elsewhere, if you cannot--who is the most influential of them?"

Little Dorrit was not sure of any names, but she had heard her father mention several people with whom he said he once had dealings. She told him these names, and Clennam made a careful note of them.

"It can do no harm," he thought, "to see some of these people."

The thought did not come so quietly but that she quickly guessed it.

"Ah," said Little Dorrit, shaking her head with the mild despair of a lifetime. "Many people used to think once of getting my poor father out, but you don't know how hopeless it is."

She forgot to be shy at the moment, in honestly warning him away from the sunken wreck he had a dream of raising; and looked at him with eyes which assuredly, in association with her patient face, her fragile figure, her spare dress, and the wind and rain, did not turn him from his purpose of helping her.

But presently an incident happened which showed him a new side to her life--still of helpfulness and service.

They were come into the High Street, where the prison stood, when a voice cried, "Little mother, little mother!"

Little Dorrit stopped, looking back, when an excited figure of a strange kind bounced against them, fell down, and scattered the contents of a large basket, filled with potatoes, in the mud.

"Oh, Maggy," said Little Dorrit, "what a clumsy child you are!"

Maggy was not hurt, but picked herself up immediately, and began to pick up the potatoes, in which both the others helped. Maggy picked up very few potatoes, and a great quantity of mud. She was a curious, overgrown creature of about eight-and-twenty, with a vacant smiling face and a tattered shawl. She seemed twice as large as the child to whom she evidently looked for protection and called "little mother."

Arthur Clennam looked with the expression of one saying, "May I ask who this is?" Little Dorrit, whose hand Maggy had begun to fondle, answered in words. They were under a gateway into which the majority of the potatoes had rolled.

"This is Maggy, sir."

"Maggy, sir," echoed the personage presented. "Little mother!"

"She is the granddaughter--"

"Granddaughter," echoed Maggy.

"Of my old nurse, who has been dead a long time. Maggy, how old are you?"

"Ten, mother," said Maggy.

"You can't think how good she is, sir," said Little Dorrit, with infinite tenderness.

"Good _she_ is," echoed Maggy, transferring the pronoun in a most expressive way from herself to her little mother.

"Or how clever," said Little Dorrit. "She goes on errands as well as any one." Maggy laughed. "And is as trustworthy as the Bank of England." Maggy laughed. "She earns her own living entirely. Entirely, sir!" in a lower and triumphant tone. "Really does!"

"What is her history!" asked Clennam.

"Think of that, Maggy!" said Little Dorrit, taking Maggy's two large hands and clapping them together. "A gentleman from thousands of miles away, wanting to know your history!"

"_My_ history?" cried Maggy. "Little mother."

"She means me," said Little Dorrit, rather confused; "she is very much attached to me. Her old grandmother was not so kind to her as she should have been; was she, Maggy? When Maggy was ten years old," she continued, "she had a bad fever, sir, and has never grown any older since."

"Ten years old," said Maggy, nodding her head. "But what a nice hospital! So comfortable, wasn't it? Oh, so nice it was. Such a Ev'nly place!"

"She had never been at peace before, sir," continued the young girl, turning towards Arthur for an instant and speaking low, "and she always runs off upon that."

"Such beds there is there!" cried Maggy. "Such lemonades! Such oranges! Such d'licious broth and wine! Such Chicking! Oh, _ain't_ it a delightful place to go and stop at!"

"So Maggy stopped there as long as she could," said Little Dorrit, in her former tone of telling a child's story, the tone designed for Maggy's ear; "and at last, when she could stop there no longer, she came out. Then, because she was never to be more than ten years old, however long she lived--"

"However long she lived," echoed Maggy.

"And because she was very weak--indeed, was so weak that when she began to laugh she couldn't stop herself--which was a great pity--"

Maggy grew mighty grave of a sudden.

"Her grandmother did not know what to do with her, and for some years was very unkind to her indeed. At length, in course of time, Maggy began to take pains to improve herself, and to be very attentive and very industrious; and by degrees was allowed to come in and out as often as she liked, and got enough to do to support herself, and does support herself. And that," said Little Dorrit, clapping the two great hands together again, "is Maggy's history, as Maggy knows!"

Ah! that was all the history, as Little Dorrit told it. But Arthur, reading between the lines, saw in Maggy's absolute love and devotion the weeks and months of toil and care on the part of a pitying faithful child whose own burden seemed great enough without carrying others. The dirty gateway with the wind and rain whistling through it, and the basket of muddy potatoes waiting to be spilt again or taken up, never seemed the common hole it really was, when he looked back to it by these lights. Never, never!

Thereafter, Arthur Clennam, who was a man of some means, devoted a great part of his time to tracing out the Dorrit records. He went from one government office to another--a long, weary round of them--before he could get any light on the matter. He employed an agent whose specialty was to search out lost estates. And at last, after several months, their combined efforts were rewarded.

Mr. Dorrit was found to be heir-at-law to a large estate that had long lain unknown, unclaimed, and growing greater. His right to it was cleared up by this skilful agent; so that all Mr. Dorrit had to do, now, would be to discharge his debts, and he would be a free man.

When Arthur was convinced of this surprising fortune, he hastened first to Little Dorrit, whom he wished to see alone. But before he could say a word, his face told her that something unusual was afoot.

Hastily dropping her sewing, she cried, "Mr. Clennam! What's the matter?"

"Nothing, nothing! That is--nothing bad. I have come to tell you good news."

"Good fortune?"

"Wonderful fortune!"

Her lips seemed to repeat the words, but no sound came.

"Dear Little Dorrit," he said, "your father--"

The ice of the pale face broke at the word, and little lights of expression passed all over it. They were all expressions of pain. Her breath was faint and hurried. Her heart beat fast, but he saw that the eyes appealed to him to go on.

"Your father can be free within this week. He does not know it; we must go to him from here, to tell him of it. Your father will be free within a few days. Remember we must go to him, from here, to tell him of it!"

That brought her back. Her eyes were closing, but they opened again.

"This is not all the good fortune. This is not all the wonderful good fortune, Little Dorrit. Shall I tell you more?"

Her lips shaped "Yes."

"He will be a rich man: A great sum of money is waiting to be paid over to him as his inheritance; you are all henceforth very wealthy. Bravest and best of children, I thank Heaven that you are rewarded!"

She turned her head towards his shoulder, and raised her arm towards his neck; then cried out, "Father! Father! Father!" and swooned away.

The housekeeper came running in at this, and Little Dorrit was soon revived, smiling bravely at her own weakness. But the news had been too much for her. It was the dream of her lifetime--come true!

"Come!" she exclaimed, "we must not lose a moment, but must hasten to my father!"

When the turnkey, who was on duty, admitted them into the lodge, he saw something in their faces which filled him with astonishment. He stood looking after them, when they hurried into the prison, as though he perceived that they had come back accompanied by a ghost apiece. Two or three debtors whom they passed, looked after them too, and presently joining the turnkey, formed a little group on the lodge steps, in the midst of which there originated a whisper that the Father was going to get his discharge. Within a few minutes it was heard in the remotest room in the prison.

Little Dorrit opened the door from without, and they both entered. Her father was sitting in his old gray gown, and his old black cap, in the sunlight by the window, reading his newspaper. His glasses were in his hand, and he had just looked round; surprised at first, no doubt, by her step upon the stairs, not expecting her until night; surprised again, by seeing Arthur Clennam in her company. As they came in, the same unwonted look in both of them, which had already caught attention in the yard below, struck him. He did not rise or speak, but laid down his glasses and his newspaper on the table beside him, and looked at them with his mouth a little open, and his lips trembling. When Arthur put out his hand, he touched it, but not with his usual state; and then he turned to his daughter, who had sat down close beside him with her hands upon his shoulder, and looked attentively in her face.

"Father! I have been made so happy this morning!"

"You have been made so happy, my dear?"

"By Mr. Clennam, father. He brought me such joyful and wonderful intelligence about you!"

Her agitation was great, and the tears rolled down her face. He put his hand suddenly to his heart, and looked at Clennam.

"Compose yourself, sir," said Clennam, "and take a little time to think. To think of the brightest and most fortunate accidents of life. We have all heard of great surprises of joy. They are not at an end."

"Mr. Clennam? Not at an end? Not at an end for--" He touched himself upon the breast, instead of saying "me."

"No," returned Clennam.

He looked at Clennam, and, so looking at him, seemed to change into a very old haggard man. The sun was bright upon the wall beyond the window, and on the spikes at the top. He slowly stretched out the hand that had been upon his heart, and pointed at the wall.

"It is down," said Clennam. "Gone!"

He remained in the same attitude, looking steadfastly at him.

"And in its place," said Clennam, slowly and distinctly, "are the means to possess and enjoy the utmost that they have so long shut out. Mr. Dorrit, there is not the smallest doubt that within a few days you will be free, and highly prosperous. I congratulate you with all my soul on this change of fortune, and on the happy future into which you are soon to carry the treasure you have been blessed with here--the best of all the riches you can have elsewhere--the treasure in the dear child at your side."

With those words, he pressed Mr. Dorrit's hand and released it; and his daughter, laying her face against his, encircled him in the hour of his prosperity with her arms, as she had in the long years of his adversity encircled him with her love and toil and truth; and poured out her full heart in gratitude, hope, joy, blissful ecstasy, and all for him.

"I shall see him, as I never saw him yet. I shall see my dear father, with the dark cloud cleared away. I shall see him, as my poor mother saw him long ago. Oh, my dear, my dear! Oh, father, father! Oh, thank God, thank God!"

Mr. Dorrit came slowly out of the daze into which he had seemed to fall. To divert his mind, Arthur told him how the good fortune had been found through the skill of an agent.

"He shall be rewarded!" he exclaimed, starting up. "Every one shall be--ha!--handsomely rewarded! Every cent I owe shall be paid. Oh! can this be true? A freeman, and all my debts paid! Give me my purse, Amy!"

He clutched it as if it were already overflowing with gold, and paced rapidly up and down the room. Just then a great cheering arose in the prison yard.

"The news has spread already," said Clennam, looking down from the window. "Will you show yourself to them, Mr. Dorrit? They are very earnest, and evidently wish it."

"I--hum--ha--I confess I could have desired, Amy, my dear," he said, jogging about in a more feverish flutter than before, "to have made some change in my dress first, and to have bought a--hum--a watch and chain. But if it must be done as it is, it---ha--it must be done. Fasten the collar of my shirt, my dear. Mr. Clennam, would you oblige me--hum--with a blue neckcloth you will find in that drawer at your elbow. Button my coat across at the chest, my love. It looks--ha--it looks broader, buttoned."

With his trembling hand he pushed his gray hair up, and then, taking Clennam and his daughter for supporters, appeared at the window leaning on an arm of each. The inmates cheered him very heartily, and he kissed his hand to them with great urbanity and protection. When he withdrew into the room again, he said "Poor creatures!" in a tone of much pity for their miserable condition.

Presently he said, unexpectedly:

"Mr. Clennam, I beg your pardon. Am I to understand, my dear sir, that I could--ha--could pass through the lodge at this moment, and--hum--take a walk?"

"I think not, Mr. Dorrit," was the unwilling reply. "There are certain forms to be completed; and although your detention here is now in itself a form, I fear it has to be observed for a few hours longer."

"A few hours, sir," he returned in a sudden passion. "You talk very easily of hours, sir! How long do you suppose, sir, that an hour is to a man who is choking for want of air?"

It was the cry of a man who had been imprisoned for nearly a quarter of a century.

Little Dorrit had been thinking too. After softly putting his gray hair aside, and touching his forehead with her lips, she looked towards Arthur, who came nearer to her, and pursued in a low whisper the subject of her thoughts.

"Mr. Clennam, will he pay all his debts before he leaves here?"

"No doubt. All."

"All the debts for which he has been imprisoned here, all my life and longer?"

"No doubt."

There was something of uncertainty and remonstrance in her look; something that was not all satisfaction. He wondered to detect it, and said:

"Are you not glad?"

"It seems to me hard," said Little Dorrit, "that he should have lost so many years and suffered so much, and at last pay all the debts as well. It seems to me hard that he should pay in life and money both."

"My dear child--" Clennam was beginning.

"Yes, I know I am wrong," she pleaded timidly, "don't think any worse of me; it has grown up with me here."

The prison, which could spoil so many things, had tainted Little Dorrit's mind no more than this. It was the first speck Clennam had ever seen, it was the last speck Clennam ever saw, of the prison atmosphere upon her.

He thought this, and forebore to say another word. With the thought, her purity and goodness came before him in their brightest light. The little spot made them the more beautiful.

*THE PERSONAL HISTORY OF DAVID COPPERFIELD*

*I. MY EARLIEST RECOLLECTIONS*

The first things that I seem to remember are the figure of my mother with her pretty hair and youthful face, and Peggotty, our faithful servant, large of figure, black of eye, and with cheeks and arms so hard and red that I wondered the birds didn't peck them in preference to apples. I believe I can remember these two at a little distance apart, dwarfed to my sight by stooping down or kneeling on the floor, and I going unsteadily from the one to the other. My father I never saw, for he died before I was born.

What else do I remember? Let me see. There comes to me a vision of our quaint cosy little home, the "Rookery." On the ground floor is Peggotty's kitchen, opening into a back yard; with a pigeon-house on a pole, in the centre, without any pigeons in it; a great dog-kennel in a corner, without any dog; and a quantity of fowls that look terribly tall to me, walking about, in a ferocious manner. There is one cock who gets upon a post to crow, and seems to take particular notice of me as I look at him through the kitchen window, who makes me shiver, he is so fierce. Of the geese outside the gate who come waddling after me with their long necks stretched out when I go that way, I dream fearfully at night.

Here is a long passage leading from Peggotty's kitchen to the front door. A dark storeroom opens out of it, and that is a place to be run past at night; for I don't know what may be among those tubs and jars and old tea-chests, in which there is the smell of soap, pickles, pepper, candles, and coffee, all at one whiff. Then there are the two parlors: the parlor in which we sit of an evening, my mother and I and Peggotty--for Peggotty is quite our companion, when her work is done and we are alone--and the best parlor where we sit on a Sunday; grandly but not so comfortably.

And now I see the outside of our house, with the latticed bedroom windows standing open to let in the sweet-smelling air, and the ragged old rooks'-nests still dangling in the elm trees at the bottom of the front garden. Now I am in the garden at the back, beyond the yard where the empty pigeon-house and dog-kennel are--a very preserve of butterflies, as I remember it, with a high fence, and a gate and padlock; where the fruit clusters on the trees, riper and richer than fruit has ever been since, in any other garden, and where my mother gathers some in a basket, while I stand by, bolting gooseberries slyly, and trying to look unmoved.

A great wind rises, and the summer is gone in a moment. We are playing in the winter twilight, dancing about the parlor. When my mother is out of breath and rests herself in an elbow-chair, I watch her winding her bright curls round her fingers and straightening her waist, and nobody knows better than I do that she likes to look so well, and is proud of being so pretty.

That is among my very earliest impressions,--that, and a sense that we were both a little afraid of Peggotty, and submit ourselves in most things to her direction.

Peggotty and I were sitting one night by the parlor fire, alone. I had been reading to Peggotty about crocodiles. I must not have read very clearly, for I remember she had a cloudy impression that they were a sort of vegetable. I was tired of reading, and sleepy; but having leave, as a high treat, to sit up until my mother came home from spending the evening at a neighbor's, I would rather have died upon my post than have gone to bed.

We had exhausted the crocodiles, and begun with alligators, when the bell rang. We went out to the door; and there was my mother looking unusually pretty, I thought, and with her a gentleman with beautiful black hair and whiskers, who had walked home with us from church last Sunday.

As my mother stooped down on the threshold to take me in her arms and kiss me, the gentleman said I was a more highly privileged little fellow than a monarch--or something like that.

"What does that mean?" I asked him, over her shoulder.

He patted me on the head; but somehow, I didn't like him or his deep voice, and I was jealous that his hand should touch my mother's in touching me--which it did. I put it away as well as I could. My mother gently chid me for being rude; and, keeping me close to her shawl, turned to thank the gentleman for bringing her home.

From the moment that I first saw the gentleman with the black whiskers, I held a deep instinctive dislike to him. And I am sure Peggotty agreed with me, from some remarks I chanced to hear her utter to my mother. But Mr. Murdstone--that was his name--began coming often to the Rookery, and exerted himself always to be agreeable to me, calling me a fine boy and patting me on the head; so I tried to think myself very ungrateful. But still I could not make myself like him. The sight of him made me fear that something was going to happen--I didn't know what.

Not long after that, when Peggotty and I were sitting alone, she darning and I reading farther in the crocodile book,--for my mother was out, as she often was, with Mr. Murdstone,--she bit off a thread and asked:

"Master Davy, how should you like to go along with me and spend a fortnight at my brother's at Yarmouth? Wouldn't that be a treat?"

"Is your brother an agreeable man, Peggotty?" I inquired doubtfully.

"Oh, what an agreeable man he is!" cried Peggotty, holding up her hands. "Then there's the sea; and the boats and ships; and the fishermen; and the beach; and 'Am to play with--"

Peggotty meant her nephew Ham, but she spoke of him as a morsel of English Grammar.

I was flushed by her summary of delights, and replied that it would indeed be a treat, but what would my mother say?

"Why, then, I'll as good as bet a guinea," said Peggotty, intent upon my face, "that she'll let us go. I'll ask her, if you like, as soon as ever she comes home. There now!"

"But what's she to do while we're away?" said I, putting my small elbows on the table to argue the point. "She can't live by herself."

If Peggotty were looking for a hole, all of a sudden, in the heel of that stocking, it must have been a very little one indeed, and not worth darning.

"I say! Peggotty! She can't live by herself, you know."

"Oh, bless you!" said Peggotty, looking at me again at last. "Don't you know? She's going to stay for a fortnight with Mrs. Grayper. Mrs. Grayper's going to have a lot of company."

Oh! If that was it, I was quite ready to go. I waited, in the utmost impatience, until my mother came home from Mrs. Grayper's (for it was that identical neighbor), to ascertain if we could get leave to carry out this great idea. Without being nearly so much surprised as I had expected, my mother entered into it readily; and it was all arranged that night, and my board and lodging during the visit were to be paid for.

The day soon came for our going. It was such an early day that it came soon, even to me, who was in a fever of expectation, and half afraid that an earthquake or a fiery mountain, or some other accident might stop the expedition. We were to go in a carrier's cart, which departed in the morning after breakfast. I would have given any money to have been allowed to wrap myself up over-night, and sleep in my hat and boots.

It touches me nearly now, although I tell it lightly, to recollect how eager I was to leave my happy home; to think how little I suspected what I did leave for ever.

I am glad to recollect that when the carrier began to move, my mother ran out at the gate, and called to him to stop, that she might kiss me once more. I am glad to dwell upon the earnestness and love with which she lifted up her face to mine.

As we left her standing in the road, Mr. Murdstone came up to where she was, and chided her for being so moved. I was looking back round the awning of the cart, and wondered what business it was of his. Peggotty, who was also looking back on the other side, seemed anything but satisfied, as the face she brought back into the cart denoted.

The carrier's horse was the laziest horse in the world, I thought, as he shuffled along with his head down. But Peggotty had brought along a basket of refreshments which would have lasted us handsomely for a journey three times as long. And at last we drove up to the Yarmouth tavern, where we found Ham awaiting us. He was a huge, strong fellow, about six feet high, with a simple, good-natured face.

He put me upon his shoulder, and my box under his arm, and trudged away easily down a lane littered with shipbuilders' odds and ends, past forges, yards and gas works, till we came out upon an open waste of sand, with the sea pounding upon it and eating away at it. Then Ham said,

"Yon's our house, Mas'r Davy!"

I looked in all directions, as far as I could, and away at the sea, but no house could _I_ make out. There was a black barge, or some other kind of boat, not far off, high and dry on the ground, with an iron funnel sticking out of it for a chimney and smoking very cosily; but nothing else in the way of a house that was visible to me.

"That's not it?" said I. "That ship-looking thing?"

"That's it, Mas'r Davy," returned Ham.

If it had been Aladdin's palace, roc's egg and all, I suppose I could not have been more charmed with the idea of living in it. There was a delightful door cut in the side, and it was roofed in, and there were little windows in it; but the charm of it was that it was a _real boat_ which had no doubt been upon the water hundreds of times, and which had never been intended to be lived in on dry land.

It was beautifully clean inside, and as tidy as possible. There was a table, and a Dutch clock, and a chest of drawers, and a tea-tray with a painting on it. The tray was kept from tumbling down by a Bible; and the tray, if it had tumbled down, would have smashed a quantity of cups and saucers and a tea-pot around the book. On the walls there were some colored pictures, framed and glazed, of scripture subjects. There were some hooks in the beams of the ceiling whose use I did not know; and some lockers and boxes scattered around, which served for seats.

One thing I particularly noticed in this delightful house was the smell of fish, which was so searching that when I took out my pocket-handkerchief to wipe my nose, I found it smelt exactly as if it had wrapped up a lobster. On my whispering this to Peggotty, she informed me that her brother dealt in lobsters, crabs, and crawfish; and I afterwards found that a heap of these creatures, in a state of wonderful confusion with one another, and never leaving off pinching whatever they laid hold of, were usually to be found in a little wooden lean-to where the pots and kettles were kept.

We were welcomed by a very civil woman in a white apron, whom I had seen courtesying at the door when I was on Ham's back, about a quarter of a mile off; likewise by a most beautiful little girl with a necklace of blue beads, who wouldn't let me kiss her when I offered to, but ran away and hid herself.

By and by, when we had dined in a sumptuous manner off boiled fish, melted butter, and potatoes, with a chop for me, a hairy man with a very good-natured face came home. As he called Peggotty "Lass," and gave her a hearty smack on the cheek, I had no doubt that he was her brother; and so he turned out--being presently introduced to me as Mr. Peggotty, the master of the house.

"Glad to see you, sir," said Mr. Peggotty. "You'll find us rough, sir, but you'll find us ready."

I thanked him and replied that I was sure I should be happy in such a delightful place.

The civil woman with the white apron was Mrs. Gummidge, an old widowed lady who kept the boat-house in fine order. The little girl was Emily, a niece of Mr. Peggotty's. She had never seen her father, just as I had never seen mine--which was our first bond of sympathy. She had lost her mother, too; and as we played together happily in the sand, I told her all about my mother and how we had only each other and I was going to grow up right away to take care of her.

Of course I was quite in love with little Emily. I am sure I loved her quite as truly as one could possibly love. And I made her confess that she loved me. So when the golden days flew by and the time of parting drew near, our agony of mind was intense. The farewells were very tearful; and if ever in my life I had a void in my heart, I had one that day.

I am ashamed to confess that the delightful fortnight by the sea had driven out all thoughts of home. But no sooner were we on the return journey, than the home longing came crowding in upon me tenfold. I grew so excited to see my mother, that it seemed as if I couldn't wait for that blundering old cart. But Peggotty, instead of sharing in these transports, tried to check them, though very kindly, and looked confused and out of sorts.

The Rookery would come, however, in spite of her, when the carrier's horse pleased--and did. How well I recollect it, on a cold, gray afternoon, with a dull sky threatening rain!

The door opened, and I sprang in, half laughing and half crying as I looked for my mother. It was not she who met me, but a strange servant.

"Why, Peggotty!" I said, ruefully, "isn't she come home?"

"Yes, yes, Master Davy," said Peggotty. "She's come home. Wait a bit, Master Davy, and I'll--I'll tell you something."

"Peggotty!" said I, quite frightened. "What's the matter?"

"Nothing's the matter, bless you, Master Davy dear!" she answered, with an air of cheerfulness.

"Something's the matter, I'm sure. Where's mamma?"

"Master Davy," said Peggotty, untying her bonnet with a shaking hand, and speaking in a breathless sort of way; "what do you think? You have got a Pa!"

I trembled, and turned white. Something--I don't know what, or how--connected with my father's grave in the churchyard, and the raising of the dead, seemed to strike me like an unwholesome wind.

"A new one," said Peggotty.

"A new one?" I repeated.

Peggotty gave a gasp, as if she were swallowing something that was very hard, and, putting out her hand, said,

"Come and see him."

"I don't want to see him."

"And your mamma," said Peggotty.

I ceased to draw back, and we went straight to the best parlor, where she left me. On one side of the fire, sat my mother; on the other, Mr. Murdstone. My mother dropped her work, and arose hurriedly but timidly, I thought. "Now, Clara, my dear," said Mr. Murdstone, "recollect! control yourself. Davy boy, how do you do?"

I gave him my hand. Then I went and kissed my mother; she kissed me, patted me gently on the shoulder, and sat down again to her work. I could not look at her, I could not look at him. I knew quite well that he was looking at us both; and I turned to the window and looked out there, at some shrubs that were drooping their heads in the cold.

As soon as I could, I crept upstairs. My old dear bedroom was changed, and I was to lie a long way off. I rambled downstairs to find anything that was like itself, so altered it all seemed; and roamed into the yard. I very soon started back from there, for the empty dog-kennel was filled up with a great dog--deep-mouthed and black-haired like Him--and he was very angry at the sight of me, and sprang out to get at me.

*II. I FALL INTO DISGRACE*

That first lonely evening when I crept off alone, feeling that no one wanted me, was the most miserable of my life. I rolled up in a corner of my bed and cried myself to sleep.

Presently I was awakened by somebody saying, "Here he is!" and uncovering my hot head. My mother and Peggotty had come to look for me, and it was one of them who had done it.

"Davy," said my mother, "what's the matter?"

I thought it very strange that she should ask me, and answered, "Nothing." I turned over on my face, I recollect, to hide my trembling lip, which answered her with greater truth.

"Davy," said my mother. "Davy, my child!"

I dare say, no words she could have uttered would have affected me so much, then, as her calling me her child. I hid my tears in the bedclothes, and pressed her from me with my hand, when she would have raised me up.

Then I felt the touch of a hand that I knew was neither hers nor Peggotty's, and slipped to my feet at the bedside. It was Mr. Murdstone's hand, and he kept it on my arm as he said:

"What's this? Clara, my love, have you forgotten? Firmness, my dear!"

"I am very sorry, Edward," said my mother. "I meant to be very good."

"Go below, my dear," he answered. "David and I will come down together."

When we two were left alone, he shut the door, and sitting on a chair, and holding me standing before him, looked steadily into my eyes.

"David," he said, making his lips thin, by pressing them together, "if I have an obstinate horse or dog to deal with, what do you think I do?"

"I don't know."

"I beat him. I make him wince and smart. I say to myself, 'I'll conquer that fellow'; and if it were to cost him all the blood he had, I should do it. What is that upon your face?"

"Dirt," I said.

He knew it was the mark of tears as well as I. But if he had asked the question twenty times, each time with twenty blows, I believe my baby heart would have burst before I would have told him so.

"You have a good deal of intelligence for a little fellow," he said, with a grave smile that belonged to him, "and you understood me very well, I see. Wash that face, sir, and come down with me."

"Clara, my dear," he said, when I had done his bidding, and he walked me into the parlor, with his hand still on my arm; "you will not be made uncomfortable any more, I hope. We shall soon improve our youthful humors."

What a little thing will change the current of our lives! I might have been made another creature perhaps by a kind word just then. A word of welcome home, of assurance that it _was_ home, might have made me respect my new father instead of hate him. But the word was not spoken, and the time for it was gone.

From that time my life was a lonely one. My mother petted me in secret, but plainly stood in awe of Mr. Murdstone; and even the dauntless Peggotty must needs keep her peace. His word alone was law.

After a time his sister, Miss Murdstone, came to live with us. And from the second day of her arrival she took charge of the household keys, and managed things with a firmness second only to her brother himself.

There had been some talk of my going to boarding-school. Mr. and Miss Murdstone had originated it, and my mother had of course agreed with them. Nothing, however, was concluded on the subject yet, and in the meantime I learned my lessons at home.

Shall I ever forget those lessons! They were presided over nominally by my mother, but really by Mr. Murdstone and his sister, who were always present, and found them a favorable occasion for giving my mother lessons in that miscalled firmness which was the bane of both our lives. I believe I was kept at home for that purpose. I had been apt enough to learn, and willing enough, when my mother and I had lived alone together. I can faintly remember learning the alphabet at her knee. To this day, when I look upon the fat black letters in the primer, the puzzling novelty of their shapes and the easy good-nature of O and Q and S seem to present themselves again before me as they used to do. But they recall no feeling of disgust or reluctance. On the contrary, I seem to have walked along a path of flowers as far as the crocodile-book, and to have been cheered by the gentleness of my mother's voice and manner all the way.

But these solemn lessons which succeeded I remember as the death-blow to my peace, and a grievous daily drudgery and misery. They were very long, very numerous, very hard,--and I was generally as much bewildered by them as I believe my poor mother was herself.

Let me remember how it used to be, and bring one morning back again.

I come into the second-best parlor after breakfast with my books and an exercise-book and a slate. My mother is ready for me at her writing-desk, but not half so ready as Mr. Murdstone in his easy-chair by the window, though he pretends to be reading a book, or as Miss Murdstone, sitting near my mother, stringing steel beads. The very sight of these two has such an influence over me that I begin to feel the words I have been at infinite pains to get into my head all sliding away and going I don't know where. I wonder where they do go, by the bye?

I hand the first book to my mother. Perhaps it is a grammar, perhaps a history or geography. I take a last drowning look at the page as I give it into her hand, and start off aloud at a racing pace while I have got it fresh. I trip over a word. Mr. Murdstone looks up. I trip over another word. Miss Murdstone looks up. I redden, tumble over half-a-dozen words, and stop. I think my mother would show me the book if she dared, but she does not dare, and she says softly:

"Oh, Davy! Davy!"

"Now, Clara," says Mr. Murdstone, "be firm with the boy. Don't say 'Oh, Davy, Davy!' That's childish. He knows his lesson, or he does not know it."

"He does _not_ know it," Miss Murdstone interposes, awfully.

"I am really afraid he does not," says my mother.

"Then you see, Clara," returns Miss Murdstone, "you should just give him the book back and make him know it."

"Yes, certainly," says my mother; "that is what I intend to do, my dear Jane. Now, Davy, try once more, and don't be stupid."

The natural result of this treatment was to make me sullen, dull, and dogged; and my temper was not improved by the sense that I was daily shut out from my mother.

One morning, after about six months of these lessons, when I went into the parlor with my books, I found my mother looking anxious, Miss Murdstone looking firm, and Mr. Murdstone binding something round the bottom of a cane,--a lithe and limber cane, which he left off binding when I came in, and poised and switched in the air.

"Now, David," he said, "you must be far more careful to-day than usual." He gave the cane another poise and another switch, and laid it down beside him with an expressive look and took up his book.

This was a good freshener to my presence of mind as a beginning. I felt the words of my lessons slipping off, not one by one, or line by line, but by the entire page. I tried to lay hold of them; but they seemed, if I may so express it, to have put skates on and to skim away from me with a smoothness there was no checking.

We began badly, and went on worse. I had come in, with an idea that I was very well prepared, but it turned out to be quite a mistake. Book after book was added to the heap of failures, Miss Murdstone being firmly watchful of us all the time. And when we came to the last, my mother burst out crying.

"Clara!" said Miss Murdstone, in her warning voice.

Mr. Murdstone laid down his book and stood up, cane in hand.

"David, you and I will go upstairs," he said.

He walked me up to my room slowly and gravely, and when we got there, suddenly twisted my head under his arm.

"Mr. Murdstone! Sir!" I cried to him. "Don't! Pray don't beat me! I have tried to learn, sir, but I can't learn while you and Miss Murdstone are by. I can't indeed!"

"Can't you, indeed, David?" he said. "We'll try that."

He had my head as in a vice, but I twined round him somehow, and stopped him for a moment, entreating him not to beat me. It was only for a moment that I stopped him, for he cut me heavily an instant afterwards, and in the same instant I caught his hand in my mouth, and bit it through. It sets my teeth on edge to think of it!

He beat me then, as if he would have beaten me to death. Above all the noise we made, I heard them running up the stairs, and crying out--I heard my mother crying out--and Peggotty. Then he was gone; and the door was locked outside; and I was lying, torn and sore and raging, upon the floor.

How well I recollect, when I became quiet, what an unnatural stillness seemed to reign through the whole house! How well I remember, when my smart and passion began to cool, how wicked I began to feel!

I sat listening for a long while, but there was not a sound. I crawled up from the floor, and saw my face in the glass, so swollen, red, and ugly that it almost frightened me. My stripes were sore and stiff, and made me cry afresh, when I moved; but they were nothing to the guilt I felt. It lay like lead upon my breast.

For five days I was imprisoned thus within my room, seeing no one except Miss Murdstone, who came to bring me food. They live like years in my remembrance. On the fifth night I heard my name softly whispered through the keyhole.

I groped my way to the door, and, putting my own lips to the keyhole, whispered,

"Is that you, Peggotty, dear?"

"Yes, my own precious Davy," she replied. "Be as soft as a mouse, or the Cat'll hear us."

I understood this to mean Miss Murdstone, her room being close by.

"How's mamma, dear Peggotty? Is she very angry with me?"

I could hear Peggotty crying softly on her side of the keyhole, as I was doing on mine, before she answered, "No. Not very."

"What is going to be done with me, Peggotty, dear? Do you know?"

"School. Near London."

"When, Peggotty?"

"To-morrow."

"Sha'n't I see mamma?"

"Yes," said Peggotty. "Morning."

Then she stole away, fearful of surprises. In the morning Miss Murdstone appeared as usual, and told me I was going to school, which was not altogether such news to me as she supposed. She also informed me that when I was dressed, I was to come down stairs into the parlor, and have my breakfast. There I found my mother, very pale and with red eyes, into whose arms I ran, and begged her pardon from my suffering soul.

"Oh, Davy!" she said. "That you could hurt any one I love! Try to be better, pray to be better! I forgive you; but I am so grieved, Davy, that you should have such bad passions in your heart."

They had persuaded her that I was a wicked fellow, and she was more sorry for that than for my going away. I felt it sorely. I tried to eat my parting breakfast, but my tears dropped upon my bread and butter, and trickled into my tea. I saw my mother look at me sometimes, and then glance at the watchful Miss Murdstone, and then look down, or look away.

"Master Copperfield's box there?" said Miss Murdstone, when wheels were heard at the gate.

I looked for Peggotty, but it was not she; neither she nor Mr. Murdstone appeared. My former acquaintance, the carrier, was at the door; the box was taken out to his cart and lifted in.

"Clara!" said Miss Murdstone, in her warning note.

"Yes, my dear Jane," returned my mother. "Good-bye, Davy. You are going for your own good. Good-bye, my child. You will come home in the holidays, and be a better boy. God bless you!"