Speaker 1: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, chapter fifty two, From Little Britain.
Speaker 1: I went, with my check in my pocket to Miss
Speaker 1: Skiffin's brother, the accountant, and Miss Skiffins's brother the accountant,
Speaker 1: going straight to Clerker's and bringing Clerriker to me. I
Speaker 1: had the great satisfaction of concluding that arrangement. It was
Speaker 1: the only good thing I had done, and the only
Speaker 1: completed thing I had done since I was first apprized
Speaker 1: of my great expectations. Clerker informing me on that occasion
Speaker 1: that the affairs of the house were steadily progressing, that
Speaker 1: he would now be able to establish a small branch
Speaker 1: house in the east, which was much wanted for the
Speaker 1: extension of the business, and that Herbert, in his new
Speaker 1: partnership capacity, would go out and take charge of it.
Speaker 1: I found that I must have prepared for a separation
Speaker 1: from my friend, even though my own affairs had been
Speaker 1: more settled, and now indeed I felt as if my
Speaker 1: last anchor were loosening its hold, and I should soon
Speaker 1: be driving with the winds and waves. But there was
Speaker 1: recompense in the joy with which Herbert would come home
Speaker 1: of a night and tell me of these changes. Little
Speaker 1: imagining that he told me no news, and would sketch
Speaker 1: airy pictures of himself conducting Clara Barley to the land
Speaker 1: of the Arabian Nights, and of me going out to
Speaker 1: join them with a caravan of camels, i believe, and
Speaker 1: of our all going up the nile and seeing wonders.
Speaker 1: Without being sanguine as to my own part in these
Speaker 1: bright plans. I felt that Herbert's way was clearing fast,
Speaker 1: and that old Bill Barley had but to stick to
Speaker 1: his pepper and rum, and his daughter would soon be
Speaker 1: happily provided for. We had now got into the month
Speaker 1: of March. My left arm, though it presented no bad symptoms,
Speaker 1: took in the natural course so long to heal that
Speaker 1: I was still unable to get a coat on. My
Speaker 1: right arm was tolerably recved, disfigured, but fairly serviceable. On
Speaker 1: a Monday morning, when Herbert and I were at breakfast,
Speaker 1: I received the following letter from Wemmick by the post
Speaker 1: Whalworth Burn this as soon as read early in the week,
Speaker 1: or say Wednesday, you might do what you know of
Speaker 1: if you felt disposed to try it now Burn. When
Speaker 1: I had shown this to Herbert and had put it
Speaker 1: in the fire, but not before we had both got
Speaker 1: it by heart. We considered what to do, for of course,
Speaker 1: my being disabled could now be no longer kept out
Speaker 1: of you. I have thought it over again and again,
Speaker 1: said Herbert, and I think I know a better course
Speaker 1: than taking a Thames waterman. Take Startop, a good fellow,
Speaker 1: a skilled hand, fond of us and enthusiastic and honorable.
Speaker 1: I had thought of him more than once. But how
Speaker 1: much would you tell him, Herbert? It is necessary to
Speaker 1: tell him very little. Let him suppose it a mere freak,
Speaker 1: but a secret one until the morning comes. Then let
Speaker 1: him know that there is urgent reason for your getting
Speaker 1: provis aboard. In a way, you go with him, no
Speaker 1: doubt where it had seemed to me in the many
Speaker 1: anxious considerations, I had given the point almost indifferent what
Speaker 1: port we made for Hamburg, Rotterdam Antwerp. The place signified
Speaker 1: little so that he was out of England. Any foreign
Speaker 1: steamer that fell on our way and would take us
Speaker 1: up would do. I had always proposed myself to get
Speaker 1: him well down the river in the boat, certainly well
Speaker 1: beyond Gravesend, which was a critical place for search or inquiry.
Speaker 1: If suspicion were afoot, as foreign steamers would leave London
Speaker 1: at about the time of high water. Our plan would
Speaker 1: be to get down the river by a previous ebbtide
Speaker 1: and lie by in some quiet spot until we could
Speaker 1: pull off to one the time when one would be due.
Speaker 1: Where we lay wherever that might be, could be calculated
Speaker 1: pretty nearly if we made inquiries beforehand. Herbert assented to
Speaker 1: all this, and we went out immediately after breakfast to
Speaker 1: pursue our investigations. We found that a steamer for Hamburg
Speaker 1: was likely to suit our purpose best, and we directed
Speaker 1: our thoughts chiefly to that vessel. But we noted down
Speaker 1: what other foreign steamers would leave London with the same tide,
Speaker 1: and we satisfied ourselves that we knew the build and
Speaker 1: color of each. We then separated for a few hours.
Speaker 1: I to get at once such passports as were necessary,
Speaker 1: Herbert to seized Star Top at his lodgings. We both
Speaker 1: did what we had to do without any hindrance, and
Speaker 1: when we met again at one o'clock reported it done. I,
Speaker 1: for my part, was prepared with passports. Herbert had seen
Speaker 1: Star Top and he was more than ready to join
Speaker 1: those two should pull a pair of oars. We settled,
Speaker 1: and I would steer. Our charge would be sitter and
Speaker 1: keep quiet. As speed was not our object, we should
Speaker 1: make way enough. We arranged that Herbert should not come
Speaker 1: home to dinner before going to mill Pond Bank that evening,
Speaker 1: that he should not go there at all tomorrow evening Tuesday.
Speaker 1: That he should prepare provis to come down to some
Speaker 1: stairs hard by the house on Wednesday when he saw
Speaker 1: us approach, and not sooner. That all the arrangements with
Speaker 1: him should be concluded that Monday night, and he should
Speaker 1: be communicated with no more in any way until we
Speaker 1: took him on board. These precautions well understood by both
Speaker 1: of us. I went home. On opening the outer door
Speaker 1: of our chambers with my key, I found a letter
Speaker 1: in the box directed to me, A very dirty letter,
Speaker 1: though not ill written. It had been delivered by hand,
Speaker 1: of course, since I left home, and its contents were these,
Speaker 1: If you are not afraid to come to the old
Speaker 1: Marshes tonight or tomorrow night at nine, and to come
Speaker 1: to the little Sluice house by the Lime Kiln, you
Speaker 1: had better come. If you want information regarding your uncle,
Speaker 1: provis you had much better come and tell no one
Speaker 1: and lose no time. You must come alone bring this
Speaker 1: with you. I had had load enough upon my mind
Speaker 1: before the receipt of this strange letter. What to do
Speaker 1: now I could not tell, And the worst was that
Speaker 1: I must decide quickly or I should miss the afternoon coach,
Speaker 1: which would take me down in time for tonight tomorrow night.
Speaker 1: I could not think of going, for it would be
Speaker 1: too close upon the time of the flight, and again
Speaker 1: for anything I knew the proffered information might have some
Speaker 1: important bearing on the flight itself. If I had had
Speaker 1: ample time for consideration, I believe I should still gone.
Speaker 1: Having hardly any time for consideration, my watch showing me
Speaker 1: that the coach started within half an hour, I resolved
Speaker 1: to go. I should certainly not have gone, but for
Speaker 1: the reference to my uncle provis that coming on Wemmick's
Speaker 1: letter and the morning's busy preparation turned the scale. It
Speaker 1: is so difficult to become clearly possessed of the contents
Speaker 1: of almost any letter in a violent hurry that I
Speaker 1: had to read this mysterious epistle again twice before its
Speaker 1: injunction to me to be secret got mechanically into my mind.
Speaker 1: Yielding to it in the same mechanical kind of way.
Speaker 1: I left a note in pencil for Herbert, telling him
Speaker 1: that as I should be so soon going away, I
Speaker 1: knew not for how long I had decided to hurry
Speaker 1: down and back to ascertain for myself how Miss Havisham
Speaker 1: was faring. I had then barely time to get my greatcoat,
Speaker 1: lock up the chambers, and make for the coach, off
Speaker 1: off by the short byways. If I had taken a
Speaker 1: hackney chariot and gone by the streets, I should have
Speaker 1: missed my aim. Going as I did, I caught the
Speaker 1: coach just as it came out of the yard. I
Speaker 1: was the only inside passenger, jolding away, knee deep in straw.
Speaker 1: When I came to myself far I really had not
Speaker 1: been myself since the receipt of the letter. It had
Speaker 1: so bewildered me ensuing on the hurry of the morning.
Speaker 1: The morning hurry and flutter had been great for long
Speaker 1: and anxiously as I had waited for Wemmick. His hint
Speaker 1: had come like a surprise at last, And now I
Speaker 1: began to wonder at myself for being in the coach,
Speaker 1: and to doubt whether I had sufficient reason for being there,
Speaker 1: and to consider whether I should get out presently and
Speaker 1: go back, and to argue against ever heating an anonymous communication,
Speaker 1: and in short, to pass through all those phases of
Speaker 1: contradiction and indecision, to which I suppose very few hurried
Speaker 1: people are strangers. Still, the reference to provis by name
Speaker 1: mastered everything I reasoned, as I had reasoned already without
Speaker 1: knowing it. If that be reasoning, in case any harm
Speaker 1: should befall him through my not going, how could I
Speaker 1: ever forgive myself. It was dark before we got down,
Speaker 1: and the journey seemed long and dreary to me, who
Speaker 1: could see little of it inside, and who could not
Speaker 1: go outside in my disabled state. Avoiding the blue boar,
Speaker 1: I put up at an inn of minor reputation down
Speaker 1: the town and ordered some dinner. While it was preparing,
Speaker 1: I went to Satis house and inquired for Miss Havisham.
Speaker 1: She was still very ill, though considered something better. My
Speaker 1: inn had once been a part of an ancient ecclesiastical house,
Speaker 1: and I dined in a little octagonal common room like
Speaker 1: a font. As I was not able to cut my dinner.
Speaker 1: The old landlord, with a shining bald he head did
Speaker 1: it for me, this bringing us into conversation. He was
Speaker 1: so good as to entertain me with my own story,
Speaker 1: of course, with a popular feature that Pumblechuk was my
Speaker 1: earliest benefactor and the founder of my fortunes. Do you
Speaker 1: know the young man said? I know him, repeated the Landlord.
Speaker 1: Ever since he was and no height at all. Does
Speaker 1: he ever come back to this neighborhood? Aye, he comes back,
Speaker 1: said the Landlord, to his great friends now and again,
Speaker 1: and gives the cold shoulder to the man that made him.
Speaker 1: What man is that him that I speak of, said
Speaker 1: the landlord. Mister Pumblechuk. Is he ungrateful to no one else,
Speaker 1: No doubt he would be if he could, returned the Landlord.
Speaker 1: But he can't. And why because Pumblechuk done everything for him?
Speaker 1: Does Pummelchuk say so? Say so? Replied the Landlord. He
Speaker 1: hain't no call to say so. But does he say so?
Speaker 1: It would turn a man's blood to white wine vinigar
Speaker 1: to hear him tell of it, sir, said the Landlord.
Speaker 1: I thought, Yet, Joe, dear Joe, you never tell of it.
Speaker 1: Long suffering and loving Joe, you never complain, nor you
Speaker 1: sweet tempered biddy, your appetite's been touched like by your accident,
Speaker 1: said the landlord, glancing at the bandaged arm under my coat.
Speaker 1: Try a tenderer bit. No thank you, I replied, turning
Speaker 1: from the table to brood over the fire. I can
Speaker 1: eat no more, Please take it away. I had never
Speaker 1: been struck at so keenly for my thanklessness to Joe
Speaker 1: as through the brazen impostor pumblechook, the falser he, the
Speaker 1: truer Joe, the meaner he, the nobler Joe. My heart
Speaker 1: was deeply and most deservedly humbled. As I mused over
Speaker 1: the fire for an hour or more, the striking of
Speaker 1: the clock aroused me, but not from my dejection or remorse,
Speaker 1: and I got up and had my coat fastened round
Speaker 1: my neck and went out. I had previously sought in
Speaker 1: my pockets for the letter, that I might refer to
Speaker 1: it again, but I could not find it, and was
Speaker 1: uneasy to think that it must have been dropped in
Speaker 1: the straw of the coach. I knew very well, however,
Speaker 1: that the appointed place was the little sluice house by
Speaker 1: the lime kiln on the marshes, and the hour nine
Speaker 1: towards the marshes I now went straight, having no time
Speaker 1: to spare. End of chapter