第 117 页

‘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

hands with him again, and laughed rather childishly.

‘Dick,’ said my aunt, ‘attention!’

Mr. Dick recovered himself, with a blush.

‘Now, sir,’ said my aunt to Mr. Micawber, as she put on her gloves, ‘we

are ready for Mount Vesuvius, or anything else, as soon as YOU please.’

‘Madam,’ returned Mr. Micawber, ‘I trust you will shortly witness an

eruption. Mr. Traddles, I have your permission, I believe, to mention

here that we have been in communication together?’

‘It is undoubtedly the fact, Copperfield,’ said Traddles, to whom I

looked in surprise. ‘Mr. Micawber has consulted me in reference to

what he has in contemplation; and I have advised him to the best of my

judgement.’

‘Unless I deceive myself, Mr. Traddles,’ pursued Mr. Micawber, ‘what I

contemplate is a disclosure of an important nature.’

‘Highly so,’ said Traddles.

‘Perhaps, under such circumstances, madam and gentlemen,’ said Mr.

Micawber, ‘you will do me the favour to submit yourselves, for the

moment, to the direction of one who, however unworthy to be regarded in

any other light but as a Waif and Stray upon the shore of human nature,

is still your fellow-man, though crushed out of his original form

by individual errors, and the accumulative force of a combination of

circumstances?’

‘We have perfect confidence in you, Mr. Micawber,’ said I, ‘and will do

what you please.’

‘Mr. Copperfield,’ returned Mr. Micawber, ‘your confidence is not, at

the existing juncture, ill-bestowed. I would beg to be allowed a start

of five minutes by the clock; and then to receive the present company,

inquiring for Miss Wickfield, at the office of Wickfield and Heep, whose

Stipendiary I am.’

My aunt and I looked at Traddles, who nodded his approval.

‘I have no more,’ observed Mr. Micawber, ‘to say at present.’

With which, to my infinite surprise, he included us all in a

comprehensive bow, and disappeared; his manner being extremely distant,

and his face extremely pale.

Traddles only smiled, and shook his head (with his hair standing upright

on the top of it), when I looked to him for an explanation; so I took

out my watch, and, as a last resource, counted off the five minutes. My

aunt, with her own watch in her hand, did the like. When the time was

expired, Traddles gave her his arm; and we all went out together to the

old house, without saying one word on the way.

We found Mr. Micawber at his desk, in the turret office on the

ground floor, either writing, or pretending to write, hard. The large

office-ruler was stuck into his waistcoat, and was not so well concealed

but that a foot or more of that instrument protruded from his bosom,

like a new kind of shirt-frill.

As it appeared to me that I was expected to speak, I said aloud:

‘How do you do, Mr. Micawber?’

‘Mr. Copperfield,’ said Mr. Micawber, gravely, ‘I hope I see you well?’

‘Is Miss Wickfield at home?’ said I.

‘Mr. Wickfield is unwell in bed, sir, of a rheumatic fever,’ he

returned; ‘but Miss Wickfield, I have no doubt, will be happy to see old

friends. Will you walk in, sir?’

He preceded us to the dining-room--the first room I had entered in that

house--and flinging open the door of Mr. Wickfield’s former office,

said, in a sonorous voice:

‘Miss Trotwood, Mr. David Copperfield, Mr. Thomas Traddles, and Mr.

Dixon!’

I had not seen Uriah Heep since the time of the blow. Our visit

astonished him, evidently; not the less, I dare say, because it

astonished ourselves. He did not gather his eyebrows together, for he

had none worth mentioning; but he frowned to that degree that he almost

closed his small eyes, while the hurried raising of his grisly hand to

his chin betrayed some trepidation or surprise. This was only when we

were in the act of entering his room, and when I caught a glance at him

over my aunt’s shoulder. A moment afterwards, he was as fawning and as

humble as ever.

‘Well, I am sure,’ he said. ‘This is indeed an unexpected pleasure! To

have, as I may say, all friends round St. Paul’s at once, is a treat

unlooked for! Mr. Copperfield, I hope I see you well, and--if I may

umbly express myself so--friendly towards them as is ever your friends,

whether or not. Mrs. Copperfield, sir, I hope she’s getting on. We have

been made quite uneasy by the poor accounts we have had of her state,

lately, I do assure you.’

I felt ashamed to let him take my hand, but I did not know yet what else

to do.

‘Things are changed in this office, Miss Trotwood, since I was an umble

clerk, and held your pony; ain’t they?’ said Uriah, with his sickliest

smile. ‘But I am not changed, Miss Trotwood.’

‘Well, sir,’ returned my aunt, ‘to tell you the truth, I think you are

pretty constant to the promise of your youth; if that’s any satisfaction

to you.’

‘Thank you, Miss Trotwood,’ said Uriah, writhing in his ungainly manner,

‘for your good opinion! Micawber, tell ‘em to let Miss Agnes know--and

mother. Mother will be quite in a state, when she sees the present

company!’ said Uriah, setting chairs.

‘You are not busy, Mr. Heep?’ said Traddles, whose eye the cunning red

eye accidentally caught, as it at once scrutinized and evaded us.

‘No, Mr. Traddles,’ replied Uriah, resuming his official seat, and

squeezing his bony hands, laid palm to palm between his bony knees. ‘Not

so much so as I could wish. But lawyers, sharks, and leeches, are not

easily satisfied, you know! Not but what myself and Micawber have our

hands pretty full, in general, on account of Mr. Wickfield’s being

hardly fit for any occupation, sir. But it’s a pleasure as well as a

duty, I am sure, to work for him. You’ve not been intimate with Mr.

Wickfield, I think, Mr. Traddles? I believe I’ve only had the honour of

seeing you once myself?’

‘No, I have not been intimate with Mr. Wickfield,’ returned Traddles;

‘or I might perhaps have waited on you long ago, Mr. Heep.’

There was something in the tone of this reply, which made Uriah look at

the speaker again, with a very sinister and suspicious expression. But,

seeing only Traddles, with his good-natured face, simple manner, and

hair on end, he dismissed it as he replied, with a jerk of his whole

body, but especially his throat:

‘I am sorry for that, Mr. Traddles. You would have admired him as much

as we all do. His little failings would only have endeared him to you

the more. But if you would like to hear my fellow-partner eloquently

spoken of, I should refer you to Copperfield. The family is a subject

he’s very strong upon, if you never heard him.’

I was prevented from disclaiming the compliment (if I should have

done so, in any case), by the entrance of Agnes, now ushered in by Mr.

Micawber. She was not quite so self-possessed as usual, I thought; and

had evidently undergone anxiety and fatigue. But her earnest cordiality,

and her quiet beauty, shone with the gentler lustre for it.

I saw Uriah watch her while she greeted us; and he reminded me of an

ugly and rebellious genie watching a good spirit. In the meanwhile,

some slight sign passed between Mr. Micawber and Traddles; and Traddles,

unobserved except by me, went out.

‘Don’t wait, Micawber,’ said Uriah.

Mr. Micawber, with his hand upon the ruler in his breast, stood erect

before the door, most unmistakably contemplating one of his fellow-men,

and that man his employer.

‘What are you waiting for?’ said Uriah. ‘Micawber! did you hear me tell

you not to wait?’

‘Yes!’ replied the immovable Mr. Micawber.

‘Then why DO you wait?’ said Uriah.

‘Because I--in short, choose,’ replied Mr. Micawber, with a burst.

Uriah’s cheeks lost colour, and an unwholesome paleness, still faintly

tinged by his pervading red, overspread them. He looked at Mr. Micawber

attentively, with his whole face breathing short and quick in every

feature.

‘You are a dissipated fellow, as all the world knows,’ he said, with an

effort at a smile, ‘and I am afraid you’ll oblige me to get rid of you.

Go along! I’ll talk to you presently.’

‘If there is a scoundrel on this earth,’ said Mr. Micawber, suddenly

breaking out again with the utmost vehemence, ‘with whom I have already

talked too much, that scoundrel’s name is--HEEP!’