Speaker 1: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, chapter fifty one. What purpose
Speaker 1: I had in view when I was hot on tracing
Speaker 1: out improving Estella's parentage, I cannot say. It will presently
Speaker 1: be seen that the question was not before me in
Speaker 1: a distinct shape until it was put before me by
Speaker 1: a wiser head than my own. But when Herbert and
Speaker 1: I had held our momentous conversation, I was seized with
Speaker 1: a feverish conviction that I ought to hunt the matter down,
Speaker 1: that I ought not to let it rest, but that
Speaker 1: I ought to see mister Jaggers and come at the
Speaker 1: bare truth. I really do not know whether I felt
Speaker 1: that I did this for Estella's sake, or whether I
Speaker 1: was glad to transfer to the man in whose preservation
Speaker 1: I was so much concerned some rays of the romantic
Speaker 1: interest that had so long surrounded me. Perhaps the latter
Speaker 1: possibility may be the nearer to the truth. Anyway, I
Speaker 1: could scarcely be withheld from going out to Gerard Street
Speaker 1: that night Herbert's representations that if I did, I should
Speaker 1: probably be laid up and stricken useless, when our fugitive
Speaker 1: safety would depend upon me alone. Restrained by impatience, on
Speaker 1: the understanding again and again reiterated that come what would
Speaker 1: I was to go to mister Jaggers tomorrow? I at
Speaker 1: length submitted to keep quiet and to have my hurts
Speaker 1: looked after, and to stay at home. Early next morning
Speaker 1: we went out together, and at the corner of Guiltspur
Speaker 1: Street by Smithfield, I left Herbert to go his way
Speaker 1: into the city and took my way to Little Britain.
Speaker 1: There were periodical occasions when mister Jaggers and Wemmick went
Speaker 1: over the office accounts and checked off the vouchers and
Speaker 1: put all things straight. On these occasions, Wemmick took his
Speaker 1: books and papers into mister Jaggers's room, and one of
Speaker 1: the upstairs clerks came down into the outer office, finding
Speaker 1: such clerk on Wemmick's post. That morning, I knew what
Speaker 1: was going on, but I was not sorry to have
Speaker 1: mister Jaggers and Wemmick together, as Wemmick would then hear
Speaker 1: for himself that I said nothing to compromise him. My appearance,
Speaker 1: with my arm bandaged in my coat loose over my
Speaker 1: shoulders favored my object. Although I had sent mister Jaggers
Speaker 1: a brief account of the accident as soon as I
Speaker 1: had arrived in town. Yet I had to give him
Speaker 1: all the details now, and the specialty of the occasion
Speaker 1: caused our talk to be less dry and hard, and
Speaker 1: less strictly regulated by the rules of evidence than it
Speaker 1: had been before. When I described the disaster, Mister Jaggers
Speaker 1: stood according to his wont before the fire. Wemmick leaned
Speaker 1: back in his chair, staring at me with his hands
Speaker 1: in the pockets of his trousers and his pen put
Speaker 1: horizontally into the post. The two brutal casts, always inseparable
Speaker 1: in my mind from the official proceedings, seemed to be
Speaker 1: congestively considering whether they didn't smell fire At the present moment.
Speaker 1: My narrative finished and their questions exhausted, I then produced
Speaker 1: Miss Havisham's authority to receive the nine hundred pounds for Herbert.
Speaker 1: Mister Jaggers's eyes retired a little deeper into his head
Speaker 1: when I handed him the tablets, but he presently handed
Speaker 1: them over to Wemmick with instructions to draw the check
Speaker 1: for his signature. While that was in course of being done,
Speaker 1: I looked on at Wemmick as he wrote, and mister Jaggers,
Speaker 1: poising and swaying himself on his well polished boots, looked
Speaker 1: on at me. I am sorry, Pip, said he, as
Speaker 1: I put the check in my pocket when he had
Speaker 1: signed it, that we do nothing for you. Miss Havisham
Speaker 1: was good enough to ask me. I returned whether she
Speaker 1: could do nothing for me? And I told her no.
Speaker 1: Everybody should know he his own business, said mister Jaggers.
Speaker 1: And I saw Wemmick's lips form the words portable property.
Speaker 1: I should not have told her no if I had
Speaker 1: been you, said mister Jaggers. But every man ought to
Speaker 1: know his own business. Best. Every man's business, said Wemmick.
Speaker 1: Rather reproachfully towards me. Is portable property. As I thought,
Speaker 1: the time was now come for pursuing the theme I
Speaker 1: had at heart, I said, turning on mister Jaggers. I
Speaker 1: did ask something of miss Havisham, however, Sir, I asked
Speaker 1: her to give me some information relative to her adopted daughter,
Speaker 1: and she gave me all she possessed, did she said
Speaker 1: mister Jaggers, bending forward to look at his boots and
Speaker 1: then straightening himself. Ah, I don't think I should have
Speaker 1: done so if I had been Miss Havisham, but she
Speaker 1: ought to know her own business best. I know more
Speaker 1: of the history of Miss Havisham's adopted child than Miss
Speaker 1: Havisham herself does, Sir. I know her mother. Mister Jaggers
Speaker 1: looked at me inquiringly and repeated, mother, I have seen
Speaker 1: her mother within these three days, yes, said mister Jaggers.
Speaker 1: And so have you, sir. And you have seen her
Speaker 1: still more recently, yes, said mister Jaggers. Perhaps I know
Speaker 1: more of Estella's history than even you do, said I.
Speaker 1: I know her father too. A certain stop that mister
Speaker 1: Jaggers came to in his manner. He was too self
Speaker 1: possessed to change his manner, but he could not help
Speaker 1: its being brought to an indefinably attentive stop, assured me
Speaker 1: that he did not know who her father was. This
Speaker 1: I had strongly suspected from Probus's account, as Herbert had
Speaker 1: repeated it of his having kept himself dark, which I
Speaker 1: pieced on to the fact that he himself was not
Speaker 1: mister Jagger's client until some four years later, and when
Speaker 1: he could have no reason for claiming his identity. But
Speaker 1: I could not be sure of this unconsciousness on mister
Speaker 1: Jaggers's part before, though I was quite sure of it now.
Speaker 1: So you know the young lady's father, Pip, said mister Jaggers, Yes,
Speaker 1: I replied, and his name is Provis from New South Wales.
Speaker 1: Even mister Jaggers started when I said those words. It
Speaker 1: was the slightest start that could escape a man, the
Speaker 1: most carefully repressed, and the sooner checked. But he did start,
Speaker 1: though he made it a part of the action of
Speaker 1: taking out his pocket handkerchief. How Wemmick received the announcement,
Speaker 1: I am unable to say, for I was afraid to
Speaker 1: look at him just then, lest mister Jagger's sharpness should
Speaker 1: detect that there had been some communication known to him
Speaker 1: between us. And on what evidence, Pip asked mister Jaggers,
Speaker 1: very coolly, as he paused with his handkerchief halfway to
Speaker 1: his nose. Does Provis make this claim? He does not
Speaker 1: make it, said I, and has never made it, and
Speaker 1: has no knowledge or belief that his daughter is in existence.
Speaker 1: For once the powerful pocket handkerchief failed, my reply was
Speaker 1: so unexpected that mister Jaggers put the handkerchief back into
Speaker 1: his pocket. Without completing the usual performance, folded his arms
Speaker 1: and looked with stern attention at me, though with then
Speaker 1: immovable face. Then I told him all I knew and
Speaker 1: how I knew it, with the one reservation that I
Speaker 1: left him to infer that I knew from Miss Havisham
Speaker 1: what I in fact knew from Wemmick. I was very careful,
Speaker 1: indeed as to that, Nor did I look towards Wemmick
Speaker 1: until I had finished all I had to tell, and
Speaker 1: had been for some time silently meeting mister Jaggers's look.
Speaker 1: When I did at last turned my eyes in Wemmick's direction,
Speaker 1: I found that he had unposted his pen and was
Speaker 1: intent upon the table before him. Ha, said mister Jaggers
Speaker 1: at last, as he moved towards the papers on the table.
Speaker 1: What item was it? You were at Wemmick when mister
Speaker 1: Pip came in. But I could not submit to be
Speaker 1: thrown off in that way, and I made a passionate,
Speaker 1: almost an indignant, appeal to him to be more frank
Speaker 1: and manly with me. I reminded him of the false
Speaker 1: hopes into which I had lapsed the length of time
Speaker 1: they had lasted and the discovery I had made, and
Speaker 1: I hinted at the danger that weighed upon my spirits.
Speaker 1: I represented myself as being surely worthy of some little
Speaker 1: confidence from him in return for the confidence I had
Speaker 1: just now imparted. I said that I did not blame him,
Speaker 1: or suspect him, or mistrust him, but I wanted assurance
Speaker 1: of the truth from him. And if he asked me
Speaker 1: why I wanted it, and why I thought I had
Speaker 1: any right to it, I would tell him little, as
Speaker 1: he cared for such poor dreams, that I had loved
Speaker 1: Distella dearly and long, and that although I had lost
Speaker 1: her and must live a bereaved life, whatever concerned her
Speaker 1: was still nearer and dearer to me than anything else
Speaker 1: in the world. And seeing that mister Jaggers stood quite
Speaker 1: still and silent, and apparently quite obdurate under this appeal,
Speaker 1: I turned to Wemmick and said, Wemmick, I know you
Speaker 1: to be a man with a gentle heart. I have
Speaker 1: seen your pleasant home, and your old father, and all
Speaker 1: the innocent, cheerful, playful ways with which you refresh your
Speaker 1: business life. And I entreat you to say a word
Speaker 1: for me to mister Jaggers. And to represent to him
Speaker 1: that all circumstances considered, he ought to be more open
Speaker 1: and with me. I have never seen two men look
Speaker 1: more oddly at one another than mister Jaggers and Wemmick
Speaker 1: did after this apostrophe. At first a misgiving crossed me
Speaker 1: that Wemmick would be instantly dismissed from his employment. But
Speaker 1: it melted as I saw mister Jaggers relax into something
Speaker 1: like a smile, and Wemmick became bolder. What's all this,
Speaker 1: said mister Jaggers, You with an old father on you,
Speaker 1: with pleasant and playful ways, well, returned Wemmick. If I
Speaker 1: don't bring him here, what does it matter, pip, said
Speaker 1: mister Jaggers, laying his hand upon my arm and smiling openly.
Speaker 1: This man must be the most cunning impostor in all London.
Speaker 1: Not a bit of it, returned Wemmick, growing bolder and bolder.
Speaker 1: I think you're another again. They exchanged their former odd looks,
Speaker 1: each apparently still distrustful that the other was taking him in.
Speaker 1: You with a pleasant home, said mister Jaggers. Since you
Speaker 1: don't interfere with business, returned Wemmick. Let it be so.
Speaker 1: Now I look at you, sir, I shouldn't wonder if
Speaker 1: you might be planning and contriving to have a pleasant
Speaker 1: home of your own one of these days when you're
Speaker 1: tired of all this work. Mister Jaggers nodded his head
Speaker 1: retrospectively two or three times and actually drew a sigh.
Speaker 1: Pip said he we won't talk about poor dreams, and
Speaker 1: you know more about such things than I, having much
Speaker 1: pressure experience of that kind. But now about this other matter,
Speaker 1: I'll put a case to you. Mind, I admit nothing.
Speaker 1: He waited for me to declare that. I quite understood that.
Speaker 1: He expressly said that he admitted nothing. Now, Pip said,
Speaker 1: mister Jaggers, put this case. Put the case that a woman,
Speaker 1: under such circumstances as you have mentioned, held her child concealed,
Speaker 1: and was obliged to communicate the fact to her legal
Speaker 1: adviser on his representing to her that he must know
Speaker 1: with an eye to the latitude of his defense, how
Speaker 1: the fact stood about that child. Put the case that,
Speaker 1: at the same time he held a trust to find
Speaker 1: a child for an eccentric, rich lady to adopt and
Speaker 1: bring up. I follow you, sir, put the case that
Speaker 1: he lived in an atmosphere of evil, and that all
Speaker 1: he saw of children was their being generated in great
Speaker 1: numbers for certain destruction. Put the case that he often
Speaker 1: saw children solemnly tried at a criminal bar, where they
Speaker 1: were held up to be seen. Put the case that
Speaker 1: he habitually knew of their being imprisoned, whipped, transported, neglected, cast,
Speaker 1: doubt qualified in all ways for the hangman, and growing
Speaker 1: up to be hanged. Put the case that pretty nigh
Speaker 1: all the children he saw in his daily business life
Speaker 1: he had reason to look upon as so much spawn
Speaker 1: to develop into the fish that were to come to
Speaker 1: his net, to be prosecuted, defended, forsworn, made orphans be
Speaker 1: deviled somehow, I follow you, sir. Put the case, Pip,
Speaker 1: that here was one pretty little child out of the
Speaker 1: heap who could be saved, whom the father believed dead
Speaker 1: and dared make no stir about as to whom over
Speaker 1: the mother the legal adviser had this power. I know
Speaker 1: what you did and how you did it. You came so,
Speaker 1: and so you did such and such things to divert suspicion.
Speaker 1: I have tracked you through it all, and I tell
Speaker 1: it you all part with the child unless it should
Speaker 1: be necessary to produce it to clear you, and then
Speaker 1: it shall be produced. Give the child into my hands,
Speaker 1: and I will do my best to bring you off.
Speaker 1: If you are saved, your child is saved too. If
Speaker 1: you are lost, your child is still saved. Put the
Speaker 1: case that this was done, and that the woman was cleared.
Speaker 1: I understand you perfectly, but that I make no admissions,
Speaker 1: that you make no admissions, and Wemmick repeated no admissions.
Speaker 1: Put the case, Pip, that passion and the terror of
Speaker 1: death had a little shaken the woman's intellects, and that
Speaker 1: when she was set at liberty, she was scared out
Speaker 1: of the ways of the world and went to him
Speaker 1: to be sheltered. Put the case that he took her in,
Speaker 1: and that he kept down the old, wild, violent nature
Speaker 1: whenever he saw an inkling of its breaking out by
Speaker 1: asserting his power over her in the old way. Do
Speaker 1: you comprehend the imaginary case quite? Put the case that
Speaker 1: the child grew up and was married for money, That
Speaker 1: the mother was still living, that the father was still living,
Speaker 1: That the mother and father, unknown to one another, were
Speaker 1: dwelling within so many miles. Furlong's yards if you like
Speaker 1: of one another that the secret was still a secret
Speaker 1: except that you had got wind of it. Put that
Speaker 1: last case yourself very carefully. I do. I ask Wemmick
Speaker 1: to put it to himself very carefully, And Wemmick said,
Speaker 1: I do. For whose sake would you reveal the secret?
Speaker 1: For the father's I think he would not be much
Speaker 1: the better for the mother. For the mother's, I think
Speaker 1: if she had done such a deed, she would be
Speaker 1: safer where she was. For the daughters, I think it
Speaker 1: would hardly serve her to establish her parentage for the
Speaker 1: information of her husband, and to drag her back to
Speaker 1: disgrace after an escape of twenty years pretty secure to
Speaker 1: last for life. But add the case that you had
Speaker 1: loved her, Pip, and had made her the subject of
Speaker 1: those poor dreams, which have it one time or another,
Speaker 1: been in the heads of more men than you think likely.
Speaker 1: Then I tell you that you had better, and would
Speaker 1: much sooner when you would thought well of it. Chop
Speaker 1: off that bandage left hand of yours with your bandaged
Speaker 1: right hand, and then pass the chopper on to Wemmick
Speaker 1: here to cut that off too. I looked at Wemmick,
Speaker 1: whose face was very grave. He gravely touched his lips
Speaker 1: with his forefinger. I did the same. Mister Jaggers did
Speaker 1: the same. Now, Wemmick, said the latter, then re zsuming
Speaker 1: his usual manner. What item was it you were at?
Speaker 1: When mister Pip came in. Standing by for a little
Speaker 1: while they were at work, I observed that the odd
Speaker 1: looks they had cast at one another were repeated several
Speaker 1: times with this difference. Now that each of them seemed suspicious,
Speaker 1: not to say conscious of having shown himself in a
Speaker 1: weak and unprofessional light to the other. For this reason,
Speaker 1: I suppose they were now inflexible with one another, mister
Speaker 1: Jaggers being highly dictatorial, and Wemmick obstinately justifying himself whenever
Speaker 1: there was the smallest point in abeyance for a moment.
Speaker 1: I had never seen them on such ill terms, for
Speaker 1: generally they got on very well, indeed together. But they
Speaker 1: were both happily relieved by the opportune appearance of Mike,
Speaker 1: the client with the fur cap and the habit of
Speaker 1: wiping his nose on his sleeve, whom I had seen
Speaker 1: on the very first day of my appearance. Within these walls.
Speaker 1: This individual, who, either in his own person or in
Speaker 1: that of some member of his family, seemed to be
Speaker 1: always in trouble, which in that place meant Newgate called
Speaker 1: to announce that his eldest daughter was taken up on
Speaker 1: suspicion of shoplifting. As he imparted this melancholy circumstance to Wemmick,
Speaker 1: mister Jaggers, standing magisterially before the fire and taking no
Speaker 1: share in the proceedings, Mike's eye happened to twinkle with
Speaker 1: a tear. What are you about, demanded Wemmick, with the
Speaker 1: utmost indignation. What do you come sniveling here? For? I
Speaker 1: didn't go to do it, mister Wemmick, You did, said Wemmick.
Speaker 1: How dare you? You're not in a fit state to
Speaker 1: come here? If you can't come here without spluttering like
Speaker 1: a bad pen, what do you mean by it? A
Speaker 1: man can't help these feelings, mister Wemmick, pleaded Mike. He's what,
Speaker 1: demanded Wemmick, quite savagely. See that again. Now look here,
Speaker 1: my man, said mister Jaggers, advancing a step and pointing
Speaker 1: to the door. Get out of this office. I'll have
Speaker 1: no feelings here. Get out. It's Sergey right, said Wemmick.
Speaker 1: Get out. So the unfortunate Mike very humbly Withdrew and
Speaker 1: mister Jaggers and Wemmick appeared to have re established their
Speaker 1: good understanding and went to work again, with an air
Speaker 1: of refreshment upon them, as if they had just had lunch.
Speaker 1: End of chapter