第 44 页

help it, I think we had better take a little breathing-time. In the

meanwhile, you must try to look at it from a new point of view, and not

as a schoolboy.’

‘I will, aunt.’

‘It has occurred to me,’ pursued my aunt, ‘that a little change, and a

glimpse of life out of doors, may be useful in helping you to know your

own mind, and form a cooler judgement. Suppose you were to go down into

the old part of the country again, for instance, and see that--that

out-of-the-way woman with the savagest of names,’ said my aunt, rubbing

her nose, for she could never thoroughly forgive Peggotty for being so

called.

‘Of all things in the world, aunt, I should like it best!’

‘Well,’ said my aunt, ‘that’s lucky, for I should like it too. But

it’s natural and rational that you should like it. And I am very

well persuaded that whatever you do, Trot, will always be natural and

rational.’

‘I hope so, aunt.’

‘Your sister, Betsey Trotwood,’ said my aunt, ‘would have been as

natural and rational a girl as ever breathed. You’ll be worthy of her,

won’t you?’

‘I hope I shall be worthy of YOU, aunt. That will be enough for me.’

‘It’s a mercy that poor dear baby of a mother of yours didn’t live,’

said my aunt, looking at me approvingly, ‘or she’d have been so vain

of her boy by this time, that her soft little head would have been

completely turned, if there was anything of it left to turn.’ (My aunt

always excused any weakness of her own in my behalf, by transferring it

in this way to my poor mother.) ‘Bless me, Trotwood, how you do remind

me of her!’

‘Pleasantly, I hope, aunt?’ said I.

‘He’s as like her, Dick,’ said my aunt, emphatically, ‘he’s as like her,

as she was that afternoon before she began to fret--bless my heart, he’s

as like her, as he can look at me out of his two eyes!’

‘Is he indeed?’ said Mr. Dick.

‘And he’s like David, too,’ said my aunt, decisively.

‘He is very like David!’ said Mr. Dick.

‘But what I want you to be, Trot,’ resumed my aunt, ‘--I don’t mean

physically, but morally; you are very well physically--is, a firm

fellow. A fine firm fellow, with a will of your own. With resolution,’

said my aunt, shaking her cap at me, and clenching her hand. ‘With

determination. With character, Trot--with strength of character that is

not to be influenced, except on good reason, by anybody, or by anything.

That’s what I want you to be. That’s what your father and mother might

both have been, Heaven knows, and been the better for it.’

I intimated that I hoped I should be what she described.

‘That you may begin, in a small way, to have a reliance upon yourself,

and to act for yourself,’ said my aunt, ‘I shall send you upon your

trip, alone. I did think, once, of Mr. Dick’s going with you; but, on

second thoughts, I shall keep him to take care of me.’

Mr. Dick, for a moment, looked a little disappointed; until the honour

and dignity of having to take care of the most wonderful woman in the

world, restored the sunshine to his face.

‘Besides,’ said my aunt, ‘there’s the Memorial--’

‘Oh, certainly,’ said Mr. Dick, in a hurry, ‘I intend, Trotwood, to get

that done immediately--it really must be done immediately! And then it

will go in, you know--and then--’ said Mr. Dick, after checking himself,

and pausing a long time, ‘there’ll be a pretty kettle of fish!’

In pursuance of my aunt’s kind scheme, I was shortly afterwards fitted

out with a handsome purse of money, and a portmanteau, and tenderly

dismissed upon my expedition. At parting, my aunt gave me some good

advice, and a good many kisses; and said that as her object was that I

should look about me, and should think a little, she would recommend me

to stay a few days in London, if I liked it, either on my way down into

Suffolk, or in coming back. In a word, I was at liberty to do what I

would, for three weeks or a month; and no other conditions were imposed

upon my freedom than the before-mentioned thinking and looking about me,

and a pledge to write three times a week and faithfully report myself.

I went to Canterbury first, that I might take leave of Agnes and Mr.

Wickfield (my old room in whose house I had not yet relinquished), and

also of the good Doctor. Agnes was very glad to see me, and told me that

the house had not been like itself since I had left it.

‘I am sure I am not like myself when I am away,’ said I. ‘I seem to

want my right hand, when I miss you. Though that’s not saying much; for

there’s no head in my right hand, and no heart. Everyone who knows you,

consults with you, and is guided by you, Agnes.’

‘Everyone who knows me, spoils me, I believe,’ she answered, smiling.

‘No. It’s because you are like no one else. You are so good, and so

sweet-tempered. You have such a gentle nature, and you are always

right.’

‘You talk,’ said Agnes, breaking into a pleasant laugh, as she sat at

work, ‘as if I were the late Miss Larkins.’

‘Come! It’s not fair to abuse my confidence,’ I answered, reddening at

the recollection of my blue enslaver. ‘But I shall confide in you, just

the same, Agnes. I can never grow out of that. Whenever I fall into

trouble, or fall in love, I shall always tell you, if you’ll let

me--even when I come to fall in love in earnest.’

‘Why, you have always been in earnest!’ said Agnes, laughing again.

‘Oh! that was as a child, or a schoolboy,’ said I, laughing in my turn,

not without being a little shame-faced. ‘Times are altering now, and I

suppose I shall be in a terrible state of earnestness one day or other.

My wonder is, that you are not in earnest yourself, by this time,

Agnes.’

Agnes laughed again, and shook her head.

‘Oh, I know you are not!’ said I, ‘because if you had been you would

have told me. Or at least’--for I saw a faint blush in her face, ‘you

would have let me find it out for myself. But there is no one that I

know of, who deserves to love you, Agnes. Someone of a nobler character,

and more worthy altogether than anyone I have ever seen here, must rise

up, before I give my consent. In the time to come, I shall have a wary

eye on all admirers; and shall exact a great deal from the successful

one, I assure you.’

We had gone on, so far, in a mixture of confidential jest and earnest,

that had long grown naturally out of our familiar relations, begun as

mere children. But Agnes, now suddenly lifting up her eyes to mine, and

speaking in a different manner, said:

‘Trotwood, there is something that I want to ask you, and that I may not

have another opportunity of asking for a long time, perhaps--something

I would ask, I think, of no one else. Have you observed any gradual

alteration in Papa?’

I had observed it, and had often wondered whether she had too. I must

have shown as much, now, in my face; for her eyes were in a moment cast

down, and I saw tears in them.

‘Tell me what it is,’ she said, in a low voice.

‘I think--shall I be quite plain, Agnes, liking him so much?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘I think he does himself no good by the habit that has increased upon

him since I first came here. He is often very nervous--or I fancy so.’

‘It is not fancy,’ said Agnes, shaking her head.

‘His hand trembles, his speech is not plain, and his eyes look wild. I

have remarked that at those times, and when he is least like himself, he

is most certain to be wanted on some business.’

‘By Uriah,’ said Agnes.

‘Yes; and the sense of being unfit for it, or of not having understood

it, or of having shown his condition in spite of himself, seems to make

him so uneasy, that next day he is worse, and next day worse, and so he

becomes jaded and haggard. Do not be alarmed by what I say, Agnes, but

in this state I saw him, only the other evening, lay down his head upon

his desk, and shed tears like a child.’

Her hand passed softly before my lips while I was yet speaking, and in

a moment she had met her father at the door of the room, and was hanging

on his shoulder. The expression of her face, as they both looked towards

me, I felt to be very touching. There was such deep fondness for him,

and gratitude to him for all his love and care, in her beautiful look;

and there was such a fervent appeal to me to deal tenderly by him, even

in my inmost thoughts, and to let no harsh construction find any place

against him; she was, at once, so proud of him and devoted to him, yet

so compassionate and sorry, and so reliant upon me to be so, too; that

nothing she could have said would have expressed more to me, or moved me

more.

We were to drink tea at the Doctor’s. We went there at the usual hour;

and round the study fireside found the Doctor, and his young wife, and

her mother. The Doctor, who made as much of my going away as if I were

going to China, received me as an honoured guest; and called for a log

of wood to be thrown on the fire, that he might see the face of his old

pupil reddening in the blaze.

‘I shall not see many more new faces in Trotwood’s stead, Wickfield,’

said the Doctor, warming his hands; ‘I am getting lazy, and want ease.

I shall relinquish all my young people in another six months, and lead a

quieter life.’

‘You have said so, any time these ten years, Doctor,’ Mr. Wickfield

answered.

‘But now I mean to do it,’ returned the Doctor. ‘My first master will

succeed me--I am in earnest at last--so you’ll soon have to arrange our

contracts, and to bind us firmly to them, like a couple of knaves.’

‘And to take care,’ said Mr. Wickfield, ‘that you’re not imposed on, eh?

As you certainly would be, in any contract you should make for yourself.

Well! I am ready. There are worse tasks than that, in my calling.’

‘I shall have nothing to think of then,’ said the Doctor, with a smile,

‘but my Dictionary; and this other contract-bargain--Annie.’

As Mr. Wickfield glanced towards her, sitting at the tea table by Agnes,

she seemed to me to avoid his look with such unwonted hesitation and

timidity, that his attention became fixed upon her, as if something were

suggested to his thoughts.

‘There is a post come in from India, I observe,’ he said, after a short

silence.

‘By the by! and letters from Mr. Jack Maldon!’ said the Doctor.

‘Indeed!’ ‘Poor dear Jack!’ said Mrs. Markleham, shaking her head. ‘That

trying climate!--like living, they tell me, on a sand-heap, underneath

a burning-glass! He looked strong, but he wasn’t. My dear Doctor, it was

his spirit, not his constitution, that he ventured on so boldly. Annie,

my dear, I am sure you must perfectly recollect that your cousin

never was strong--not what can be called ROBUST, you know,’ said Mrs.

Markleham, with emphasis, and looking round upon us generally, ‘--from

the time when my daughter and himself were children together, and

walking about, arm-in-arm, the livelong day.’

Annie, thus addressed, made no reply.

‘Do I gather from what you say, ma’am, that Mr. Maldon is ill?’ asked

Mr. Wickfield.

‘Ill!’ replied the Old Soldier. ‘My dear sir, he’s all sorts of things.’

‘Except well?’ said Mr. Wickfield.

‘Except well, indeed!’ said the Old Soldier. ‘He has had dreadful

strokes of the sun, no doubt, and jungle fevers and agues, and every

kind of thing you can mention. As to his liver,’ said the Old Soldier

resignedly, ‘that, of course, he gave up altogether, when he first went

out!’

‘Does he say all this?’ asked Mr. Wickfield.

‘Say? My dear sir,’ returned Mrs. Markleham, shaking her head and her

fan, ‘you little know my poor Jack Maldon when you ask that question.

Say? Not he. You might drag him at the heels of four wild horses first.’

‘Mama!’ said Mrs. Strong.

‘Annie, my dear,’ returned her mother, ‘once for all, I must really beg

that you will not interfere with me, unless it is to confirm what I say.

You know as well as I do that your cousin Maldon would be dragged at the

heels of any number of wild horses--why should I confine myself to four!

I WON’T confine myself to four--eight, sixteen, two-and-thirty, rather

than say anything calculated to overturn the Doctor’s plans.’

‘Wickfield’s plans,’ said the Doctor, stroking his face, and looking

penitently at his adviser. ‘That is to say, our joint plans for him. I

said myself, abroad or at home.’

‘And I said’ added Mr. Wickfield gravely, ‘abroad. I was the means of

sending him abroad. It’s my responsibility.’

‘Oh! Responsibility!’ said the Old Soldier. ‘Everything was done for

the best, my dear Mr. Wickfield; everything was done for the kindest and

best, we know. But if the dear fellow can’t live there, he can’t live

there. And if he can’t live there, he’ll die there, sooner than he’ll

overturn the Doctor’s plans. I know him,’ said the Old Soldier, fanning

herself, in a sort of calm prophetic agony, ‘and I know he’ll die there,

sooner than he’ll overturn the Doctor’s plans.’

‘Well, well, ma’am,’ said the Doctor cheerfully, ‘I am not bigoted to

my plans, and I can overturn them myself. I can substitute some other

plans. If Mr. Jack Maldon comes home on account of ill health, he must

not be allowed to go back, and we must endeavour to make some more

suitable and fortunate provision for him in this country.’

Mrs. Markleham was so overcome by this generous speech--which, I need

not say, she had not at all expected or led up to--that she could only

tell the Doctor it was like himself, and go several times through that

operation of kissing the sticks of her fan, and then tapping his hand

with it. After which she gently chid her daughter Annie, for not being

more demonstrative when such kindnesses were showered, for her sake, on

her old playfellow; and entertained us with some particulars concerning

other deserving members of her family, whom it was desirable to set on

their deserving legs.

All this time, her daughter Annie never once spoke, or lifted up her

eyes. All this time, Mr. Wickfield had his glance upon her as she sat

by his own daughter’s side. It appeared to me that he never thought of

being observed by anyone; but was so intent upon her, and upon his own

thoughts in connexion with her, as to be quite absorbed. He now asked

what Mr. Jack Maldon had actually written in reference to himself, and

to whom he had written?