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force nothing upon himself but a cup of tea.

'Try a little something green,' said Young John, handing him the basket.

He took a sprig or so of water-cress, and tried again; but the bread

turned to a heavier sand than before, and the ham (though it was good

enough of itself) seemed to blow a faint simoom of ham through the whole

Marshalsea.

'Try a little more something green, sir,' said Young John; and again

handed the basket.

It was so like handing green meat into the cage of a dull imprisoned

bird, and John had so evidently brought the little basket as a handful

of fresh relief from the stale hot paving-stones and bricks of the jail,

that Clennam said, with a smile, 'It was very kind of you to think of

putting this between the wires; but I cannot even get this down to-day.'

As if the difficulty were contagious, Young John soon pushed away his

own plate, and fell to folding the cabbage-leaf that had contained the

ham. When he had folded it into a number of layers, one over another,

so that it was small in the palm of his hand, he began to flatten it

between both his hands, and to eye Clennam attentively. 'I wonder,' he

at length said, compressing his green packet with some force, 'that if

it's not worth your while to take care of yourself for your own sake,

it's not worth doing for some one else's.'

'Truly,' returned Arthur, with a sigh and a smile, 'I don't know for

whose.'

'Mr Clennam,' said John, warmly, 'I am surprised that a gentleman who

is capable of the straightforwardness that you are capable of, should be

capable of the mean action of making me such an answer. Mr Clennam, I am

surprised that a gentleman who is capable of having a heart of his own,

should be capable of the heartlessness of treating mine in that way. I

am astonished at it, sir. Really and truly I am astonished!'

Having got upon his feet to emphasise his concluding words, Young John

sat down again, and fell to rolling his green packet on his right leg;

never taking his eyes off Clennam, but surveying him with a fixed look

of indignant reproach.

'I had got over it, sir,' said John. 'I had conquered it, knowing that

it must be conquered, and had come to the resolution to think no more

about it. I shouldn't have given my mind to it again, I hope, if to this

prison you had not been brought, and in an hour unfortunate for me,

this day!' (In his agitation Young John adopted his mother's powerful

construction of sentences.) 'When you first came upon me, sir, in the

Lodge, this day, more as if a Upas tree had been made a capture of than

a private defendant, such mingled streams of feelings broke loose again

within me, that everything was for the first few minutes swept away

before them, and I was going round and round in a vortex. I got out of

it. I struggled, and got out of it. If it was the last word I had to

speak, against that vortex with my utmost powers I strove, and out of it

I came. I argued that if I had been rude, apologies was due, and those

apologies without a question of demeaning, I did make. And now, when

I've been so wishful to show that one thought is next to being a holy

one with me and goes before all others--now, after all, you dodge me

when I ever so gently hint at it, and throw me back upon myself. For, do

not, sir,' said Young John, 'do not be so base as to deny that dodge you

do, and thrown me back upon myself you have!'

All amazement, Arthur gazed at him like one lost, only saying, 'What is

it? What do you mean, John?' But, John, being in that state of mind in

which nothing would seem to be more impossible to a certain class of

people than the giving of an answer, went ahead blindly.

'I hadn't,' John declared, 'no, I hadn't, and I never had the

audaciousness to think, I am sure, that all was anything but lost. I

hadn't, no, why should I say I hadn't if I ever had, any hope that it

was possible to be so blest, not after the words that passed, not even

if barriers insurmountable had not been raised! But is that a reason why

I am to have no memory, why I am to have no thoughts, why I am to have

no sacred spots, nor anything?'

'What can you mean?' cried Arthur.

'It's all very well to trample on it, sir,' John went on, scouring a

very prairie of wild words, 'if a person can make up his mind to be

guilty of the action. It's all very well to trample on it, but it's

there. It may be that it couldn't be trampled upon if it wasn't there.

But that doesn't make it gentlemanly, that doesn't make it honourable,

that doesn't justify throwing a person back upon himself after he has

struggled and strived out of himself like a butterfly. The world may

sneer at a turnkey, but he's a man--when he isn't a woman, which among

female criminals he's expected to be.'

Ridiculous as the incoherence of his talk was, there was yet a

truthfulness in Young john's simple, sentimental character, and a sense

of being wounded in some very tender respect, expressed in his burning

face and in the agitation of his voice and manner, which Arthur must

have been cruel to disregard. He turned his thoughts back to the

starting-point of this unknown injury; and in the meantime Young John,

having rolled his green packet pretty round, cut it carefully into three

pieces, and laid it on a plate as if it were some particular delicacy.

'It seems to me just possible,' said Arthur, when he had retraced the

conversation to the water-cresses and back again, 'that you have made

some reference to Miss Dorrit.'

'It is just possible, sir,' returned John Chivery.

'I don't understand it. I hope I may not be so unlucky as to make you

think I mean to offend you again, for I never have meant to offend you

yet, when I say I don't understand it.'

'Sir,' said Young John, 'will you have the perfidy to deny that you know

and long have known that I felt towards Miss Dorrit, call it not the

presumption of love, but adoration and sacrifice?'

'Indeed, John, I will not have any perfidy if I know it; why you should

suspect me of it I am at a loss to think. Did you ever hear from Mrs

Chivery, your mother, that I went to see her once?'

'No, sir,' returned John, shortly. 'Never heard of such a thing.'

'But I did. Can you imagine why?'

'No, sir,' returned John, shortly. 'I can't imagine why.'

'I will tell you. I was solicitous to promote Miss Dorrit's happiness;

and if I could have supposed that Miss Dorrit returned your affection--'

Poor John Chivery turned crimson to the tips of his ears. 'Miss Dorrit

never did, sir. I wish to be honourable and true, so far as in my humble

way I can, and I would scorn to pretend for a moment that she ever did,

or that she ever led me to believe she did; no, nor even that it was

ever to be expected in any cool reason that she would or could. She was

far above me in all respects at all times. As likewise,' added John,

'similarly was her gen-teel family.' His chivalrous feeling towards all

that belonged to her made him so very respectable, in spite of his

small stature and his rather weak legs, and his very weak hair, and

his poetical temperament, that a Goliath might have sat in his place

demanding less consideration at Arthur's hands.

'You speak, john,' he said, with cordial admiration, 'like a Man.'

'Well, sir,' returned John, brushing his hand across his eyes, 'then I

wish you'd do the same.'

He was quick with this unexpected retort, and it again made Arthur

regard him with a wondering expression of face.

'Leastways,' said John, stretching his hand across the tea-tray, 'if too

strong a remark, withdrawn! But, why not, why not? When I say to you,

Mr Clennam, take care of yourself for some one else's sake, why not be

open, though a turnkey? Why did I get you the room which I knew you'd

like best? Why did I carry up your things?

Not that I found 'em heavy; I don't mention 'em on that accounts; far

from it. Why have I cultivated you in the manner I have done since the

morning? On the ground of your own merits? No. They're very great, I've

no doubt at all; but not on the ground of them. Another's merits have

had their weight, and have had far more weight with Me. Then why not

speak free?'

'Unaffectedly, John,' said Clennam, 'you are so good a fellow and I have

so true a respect for your character, that if I have appeared to be less

sensible than I really am of the fact that the kind services you have

rendered me to-day are attributable to my having been trusted by

Miss Dorrit as her friend--I confess it to be a fault, and I ask your

forgiveness.'

'Oh! why not,' John repeated with returning scorn, 'why not speak free!'

'I declare to you,' returned Arthur, 'that I do not understand you.

Look at me. Consider the trouble I have been in. Is it likely that I

would wilfully add to my other self-reproaches, that of being ungrateful

or treacherous to you. I do not understand you.'

John's incredulous face slowly softened into a face of doubt. He rose,

backed into the garret-window of the room, beckoned Arthur to come

there, and stood looking at him thoughtfully. 'Mr Clennam, do you mean

to say that you don't know?'

'What, John?'

'Lord,' said Young John, appealing with a gasp to the spikes on the

wall. 'He says, What!'

Clennam looked at the spikes, and looked at John; and looked at the

spikes, and looked at John.

'He says What! And what is more,' exclaimed Young John, surveying him in

a doleful maze, 'he appears to mean it! Do you see this window, sir?'

'Of course I see this window.'

'See this room?'

'Why, of course I see this room.'

'That wall opposite, and that yard down below? They have all been

witnesses of it, from day to day, from night to night, from week to

week, from month to month. For how often have I seen Miss Dorrit here

when she has not seen me!'

'Witnesses of what?' said Clennam.

'Of Miss Dorrit's love.'

'For whom?'

'You,' said John. And touched him with the back of his hand upon the

breast, and backed to his chair, and sat down on it with a pale face,

holding the arms, and shaking his head at him.

If he had dealt Clennam a heavy blow, instead of laying that light touch

upon him, its effect could not have been to shake him more. He stood

amazed; his eyes looking at John; his lips parted, and seeming now and

then to form the word 'Me!' without uttering it; his hands dropped at

his sides; his whole appearance that of a man who has been awakened from

sleep, and stupefied by intelligence beyond his full comprehension.

'Me!' he at length said aloud.

'Ah!' groaned Young John. 'You!'

He did what he could to muster a smile, and returned, 'Your fancy. You

are completely mistaken.'

'I mistaken, sir!' said Young John. '_I_ completely mistaken on that

subject! No, Mr Clennam, don't tell me so. On any other, if you like,

for I don't set up to be a penetrating character, and am well aware of

my own deficiencies. But, _I_ mistaken on a point that has caused me

more smart in my breast than a flight of savages' arrows could have

done! _I_ mistaken on a point that almost sent me into my grave, as

I sometimes wished it would, if the grave could only have been made

compatible with the tobacco-business and father and mother's feelings! I

mistaken on a point that, even at the present moment, makes me take out

my pocket-handkercher like a great girl, as people say: though I am sure

I don't know why a great girl should be a term of reproach, for every

rightly constituted male mind loves 'em great and small. Don't tell me

so, don't tell me so!'

Still highly respectable at bottom, though absurd enough upon the

surface, Young John took out his pocket-handkerchief with a genuine

absence both of display and concealment, which is only to be seen in

a man with a great deal of good in him, when he takes out his

pocket-handkerchief for the purpose of wiping his eyes. Having dried

them, and indulged in the harmless luxury of a sob and a sniff, he put

it up again.

The touch was still in its influence so like a blow that Arthur could

not get many words together to close the subject with. He assured John

Chivery when he had returned his handkerchief to his pocket, that he

did all honour to his disinterestedness and to the fidelity of his

remembrance of Miss Dorrit. As to the impression on his mind, of which

he had just relieved it--here John interposed, and said, 'No impression!

Certainty!'--as to that, they might perhaps speak of it at another time,

but would say no more now. Feeling low-spirited and weary, he would go

back to his room, with john's leave, and come out no more that night.

John assented, and he crept back in the shadow of the wall to his own

lodging.

The feeling of the blow was still so strong upon him that, when the

dirty old woman was gone whom he found sitting on the stairs outside

his door, waiting to make his bed, and who gave him to understand while

doing it, that she had received her instructions from Mr Chivery, 'not

the old 'un but the young 'un,' he sat down in the faded arm-chair,

pressing his head between his hands, as if he had been stunned. Little

Dorrit love him! More bewildering to him than his misery, far.

Consider the improbability. He had been accustomed to call her his

child, and his dear child, and to invite her confidence by dwelling upon

the difference in their respective ages, and to speak of himself as one