"Well, Wickfield!" said my aunt; and he looked up at her for the first time. "I have been telling your daughter how well I have been disposing of my money for myself, because I couldn"t trust it to you, as you were growing rusty in business matters. We have been taking counsel together, and getting on very well, all things considered. Agnes is worth the whole firm, in my opinion."
"If I may umbly make the remark," said Uriah Heep, with a writhe, "I fully agree with Miss Betsey Trotwood, and should be only too appy if Miss Agnes was a partner."
"You"re a partner yourself, you know," returned my aunt, "and that"s about enough for you, I expect. How do you find yourself, sir?"
In acknowledgement of this question, addressed to him with extraordinary curtness, Mr. Heep, uncomfortably clutching the blue bag he carried, replied that he was pretty well, he thanked my aunt, and hoped she was the same.
"And you, Master--I should say, Mister Copperfield," pursued Uriah. "I hope I see you well! I am rejoiced to see you, Mister Copperfield, even under present circ.u.mstances." I believed that; for he seemed to relish them very much. "Present circ.u.mstances is not what your friends would wish for you, Mister Copperfield, but it isn"t money makes the man: it"s--I am really unequal with my umble powers to express what it is,"
said Uriah, with a fawning jerk, "but it isn"t money!"
Here he shook hands with me: not in the common way, but standing at a good distance from me, and lifting my hand up and down like a pump handle, that he was a little afraid of.
"And how do you think we are looking, Master Copperfield,--I should say, Mister?" fawned Uriah. "Don"t you find Mr. Wickfield blooming, sir?
Years don"t tell much in our firm, Master Copperfield, except in raising up the umble, namely, mother and self--and in developing," he added, as an afterthought, "the beautiful, namely, Miss Agnes."
He jerked himself about, after this compliment, in such an intolerable manner, that my aunt, who had sat looking straight at him, lost all patience.
"Deuce take the man!" said my aunt, sternly, "what"s he about? Don"t be galvanic, sir!"
"I ask your pardon, Miss Trotwood," returned Uriah; "I"m aware you"re nervous."
"Go along with you, sir!" said my aunt, anything but appeased. "Don"t presume to say so! I am nothing of the sort. If you"re an eel, sir, conduct yourself like one. If you"re a man, control your limbs, sir!
Good G.o.d!" said my aunt, with great indignation, "I am not going to be serpentined and corkscrewed out of my senses!"
Mr. Heep was rather abashed, as most people might have been, by this explosion; which derived great additional force from the indignant manner in which my aunt afterwards moved in her chair, and shook her head as if she were making snaps or bounces at him. But he said to me aside in a meek voice:
"I am well aware, Master Copperfield, that Miss Trotwood, though an excellent lady, has a quick temper (indeed I think I had the pleasure of knowing her, when I was a numble clerk, before you did, Master Copperfield), and it"s only natural, I am sure, that it should be made quicker by present circ.u.mstances. The wonder is, that it isn"t much worse! I only called to say that if there was anything we could do, in present circ.u.mstances, mother or self, or Wickfield and Heep,--we should be really glad. I may go so far?" said Uriah, with a sickly smile at his partner.
"Uriah Heep," said Mr. Wickfield, in a monotonous forced way, "is active in the business, Trotwood. What he says, I quite concur in. You know I had an old interest in you. Apart from that, what Uriah says I quite concur in!"
"Oh, what a reward it is," said Uriah, drawing up one leg, at the risk of bringing down upon himself another visitation from my aunt, "to be so trusted in! But I hope I am able to do something to relieve him from the fatigues of business, Master Copperfield!"
"Uriah Heep is a great relief to me," said Mr. Wickfield, in the same dull voice. "It"s a load off my mind, Trotwood, to have such a partner."
The red fox made him say all this, I knew, to exhibit him to me in the light he had indicated on the night when he poisoned my rest. I saw the same ill-favoured smile upon his face again, and saw how he watched me.
"You are not going, papa?" said Agnes, anxiously. "Will you not walk back with Trotwood and me?"
He would have looked to Uriah, I believe, before replying, if that worthy had not antic.i.p.ated him.
"I am bespoke myself," said Uriah, "on business; otherwise I should have been appy to have kept with my friends. But I leave my partner to represent the firm. Miss Agnes, ever yours! I wish you good-day, Master Copperfield, and leave my umble respects for Miss Betsey Trotwood."
With those words, he retired, kissing his great hand, and leering at us like a mask.
We sat there, talking about our pleasant old Canterbury days, an hour or two. Mr. Wickfield, left to Agnes, soon became more like his former self; though there was a settled depression upon him, which he never shook off. For all that, he brightened; and had an evident pleasure in hearing us recall the little incidents of our old life, many of which he remembered very well. He said it was like those times, to be alone with Agnes and me again; and he wished to Heaven they had never changed. I am sure there was an influence in the placid face of Agnes, and in the very touch of her hand upon his arm, that did wonders for him.
My aunt (who was busy nearly all this while with Peggotty, in the inner room) would not accompany us to the place where they were staying, but insisted on my going; and I went. We dined together. After dinner, Agnes sat beside him, as of old, and poured out his wine. He took what she gave him, and no more--like a child--and we all three sat together at a window as the evening gathered in. When it was almost dark, he lay down on a sofa, Agnes pillowing his head and bending over him a little while; and when she came back to the window, it was not so dark but I could see tears glittering in her eyes.
I pray Heaven that I never may forget the dear girl in her love and truth, at that time of my life; for if I should, I must be drawing near the end, and then I would desire to remember her best! She filled my heart with such good resolutions, strengthened my weakness so, by her example, so directed--I know not how, she was too modest and gentle to advise me in many words--the wandering ardour and unsettled purpose within me, that all the little good I have done, and all the harm I have forborne, I solemnly believe I may refer to her.
And how she spoke to me of Dora, sitting at the window in the dark; listened to my praises of her; praised again; and round the little fairy-figure shed some glimpses of her own pure light, that made it yet more precious and more innocent to me! Oh, Agnes, sister of my boyhood, if I had known then, what I knew long afterwards--!
There was a beggar in the street, when I went down; and as I turned my head towards the window, thinking of her calm seraphic eyes, he made me start by muttering, as if he were an echo of the morning: "Blind! Blind!
Blind!"
CHAPTER 36. ENTHUSIASM
I began the next day with another dive into the Roman bath, and then started for Highgate. I was not dispirited now. I was not afraid of the shabby coat, and had no yearnings after gallant greys. My whole manner of thinking of our late misfortune was changed. What I had to do, was, to show my aunt that her past goodness to me had not been thrown away on an insensible, ungrateful object. What I had to do, was, to turn the painful discipline of my younger days to account, by going to work with a resolute and steady heart. What I had to do, was, to take my woodman"s axe in my hand, and clear my own way through the forest of difficulty, by cutting down the trees until I came to Dora. And I went on at a mighty rate, as if it could be done by walking.
When I found myself on the familiar Highgate road, pursuing such a different errand from that old one of pleasure, with which it was a.s.sociated, it seemed as if a complete change had come on my whole life.
But that did not discourage me. With the new life, came new purpose, new intention. Great was the labour; priceless the reward. Dora was the reward, and Dora must be won.
I got into such a transport, that I felt quite sorry my coat was not a little shabby already. I wanted to be cutting at those trees in the forest of difficulty, under circ.u.mstances that should prove my strength.
I had a good mind to ask an old man, in wire spectacles, who was breaking stones upon the road, to lend me his hammer for a little while, and let me begin to beat a path to Dora out of granite. I stimulated myself into such a heat, and got so out of breath, that I felt as if I had been earning I don"t know how much.
In this state, I went into a cottage that I saw was to let, and examined it narrowly,--for I felt it necessary to be practical. It would do for me and Dora admirably: with a little front garden for Jip to run about in, and bark at the tradespeople through the railings, and a capital room upstairs for my aunt. I came out again, hotter and faster than ever, and dashed up to Highgate, at such a rate that I was there an hour too early; and, though I had not been, should have been obliged to stroll about to cool myself, before I was at all presentable.
My first care, after putting myself under this necessary course of preparation, was to find the Doctor"s house. It was not in that part of Highgate where Mrs. Steerforth lived, but quite on the opposite side of the little town. When I had made this discovery, I went back, in an attraction I could not resist, to a lane by Mrs. Steerforth"s, and looked over the corner of the garden wall. His room was shut up close.
The conservatory doors were standing open, and Rosa Dartle was walking, bareheaded, with a quick, impetuous step, up and down a gravel walk on one side of the lawn. She gave me the idea of some fierce thing, that was dragging the length of its chain to and fro upon a beaten track, and wearing its heart out.
I came softly away from my place of observation, and avoiding that part of the neighbourhood, and wishing I had not gone near it, strolled about until it was ten o"clock. The church with the slender spire, that stands on the top of the hill now, was not there then to tell me the time. An old red-brick mansion, used as a school, was in its place; and a fine old house it must have been to go to school at, as I recollect it.
When I approached the Doctor"s cottage--a pretty old place, on which he seemed to have expended some money, if I might judge from the embellishments and repairs that had the look of being just completed--I saw him walking in the garden at the side, gaiters and all, as if he had never left off walking since the days of my pupilage. He had his old companions about him, too; for there were plenty of high trees in the neighbourhood, and two or three rooks were on the gra.s.s, looking after him, as if they had been written to about him by the Canterbury rooks, and were observing him closely in consequence.
Knowing the utter hopelessness of attracting his attention from that distance, I made bold to open the gate, and walk after him, so as to meet him when he should turn round. When he did, and came towards me, he looked at me thoughtfully for a few moments, evidently without thinking about me at all; and then his benevolent face expressed extraordinary pleasure, and he took me by both hands.
"Why, my dear Copperfield," said the Doctor, "you are a man! How do you do? I am delighted to see you. My dear Copperfield, how very much you have improved! You are quite--yes--dear me!"
I hoped he was well, and Mrs. Strong too.
"Oh dear, yes!" said the Doctor; "Annie"s quite well, and she"ll be delighted to see you. You were always her favourite. She said so, last night, when I showed her your letter. And--yes, to be sure--you recollect Mr. Jack Maldon, Copperfield?"
"Perfectly, sir."
"Of course," said the Doctor. "To be sure. He"s pretty well, too."
"Has he come home, sir?" I inquired.
"From India?" said the Doctor. "Yes. Mr. Jack Maldon couldn"t bear the climate, my dear. Mrs. Markleham--you have not forgotten Mrs.
Markleham?"
Forgotten the Old Soldier! And in that short time!
"Mrs. Markleham," said the Doctor, "was quite vexed about him, poor thing; so we have got him at home again; and we have bought him a little Patent place, which agrees with him much better." I knew enough of Mr.
Jack Maldon to suspect from this account that it was a place where there was not much to do, and which was pretty well paid. The Doctor, walking up and down with his hand on my shoulder, and his kind face turned encouragingly to mine, went on: