David Copperfield

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'So my son took, of his own will, and on no compulsion, to the
course in which he can always, when it is his pleasure, outstrip
every competitor,' she pursued. 'My son informs me, Mr.
Copperfield, that you were quite devoted to him, and that when you
met yesterday you made yourself known to him with tears of joy. I
should be an affected woman if I made any pretence of being
surprised by my son's inspiring such emotions; but I cannot be
indifferent to anyone who is so sensible of his merit, and I am
very glad to see you here, and can assure you that he feels an
unusual friendship for you, and that you may rely on his
protection.'

Miss Dartle played backgammon as eagerly as she did everything
else. If I had seen her, first, at the board, I should have
fancied that her figure had got thin, and her eyes had got large,
over that pursuit, and no other in the world. But I am very much
mistaken if she missed a word of this, or lost a look of mine as I
received it with the utmost pleasure, and honoured by Mrs.
Steerforth's confidence, felt older than I had done since I left
Canterbury.

When the evening was pretty far spent, and a tray of glasses and
decanters came in, Steerforth promised, over the fire, that he
would seriously think of going down into the country with me.
There was no hurry, he said; a week hence would do; and his mother
hospitably said the same. While we were talking, he more than once
called me Daisy; which brought Miss Dartle out again.

'But really, Mr. Copperfield,' she asked, 'is it a nickname? And
why does he give it you? Is it - eh? - because he thinks you young
and innocent? I am so stupid in these things.'

I coloured in replying that I believed it was.

'Oh!' said Miss Dartle. 'Now I am glad to know that! I ask for
information, and I am glad to know it. He thinks you young and
innocent; and so you are his friend. Well, that's quite
delightful!'

She went to bed soon after this, and Mrs. Steerforth retired too.
Steerforth and I, after lingering for half-an-hour over the fire,
talking about Traddles and all the rest of them at old Salem House,
went upstairs together. Steerforth's room was next to mine, and I
went in to look at it. It was a picture of comfort, full of
easy-chairs, cushions and footstools, worked by his mother's hand,
and with no sort of thing omitted that could help to render it
complete. Finally, her handsome features looked down on her
darling from a portrait on the wall, as if it were even something
to her that her likeness should watch him while he slept.

I found the fire burning clear enough in my room by this time, and
the curtains drawn before the windows and round the bed, giving it
a very snug appearance. I sat down in a great chair upon the
hearth to meditate on my happiness; and had enjoyed the
contemplation of it for some time, when I found a likeness of Miss
Dartle looking eagerly at me from above the chimney-piece.

It was a startling likeness, and necessarily had a startling look.
The painter hadn't made the scar, but I made it; and there it was,
coming and going; now confined to the upper lip as I had seen it at
dinner, and now showing the whole extent of the wound inflicted by
the hammer, as I had seen it when she was passionate.

I wondered peevishly why they couldn't put her anywhere else
instead of quartering her on me. To get rid of her, I undressed
quickly, extinguished my light, and went to bed. But, as I fell
asleep, I could not forget that she was still there looking, 'Is it
really, though? I want to know'; and when I awoke in the night, I
found that I was uneasily asking all sorts of people in my dreams
whether it really was or not - without knowing what I meant.

CHAPTER 21
LITTLE EM'LY

There was a servant in that house, a man who, I understood, was
usually with Steerforth, and had come into his service at the
University, who was in appearance a pattern of respectability. I
believe there never existed in his station a more
respectable-looking man. He was taciturn, soft-footed, very quiet
in his manner, deferential, observant, always at hand when wanted,
and never near when not wanted; but his great claim to
consideration was his respectability. He had not a pliant face, he
had rather a stiff neck, rather a tight smooth head with short hair
clinging to it at the sides, a soft way of speaking, with a
peculiar habit of whispering the letter S so distinctly, that he
seemed to use it oftener than any other man; but every peculiarity
that he had he made respectable. If his nose had been upside-down,
he would have made that respectable. He surrounded himself with an
atmosphere of respectability, and walked secure in it. It would
have been next to impossible to suspect him of anything wrong, he
was so thoroughly respectable. Nobody could have thought of
putting him in a livery, he was so highly respectable. To have
imposed any derogatory work upon him, would have been to inflict a
wanton insult on the feelings of a most respectable man. And of
this, I noticed- the women-servants in the household were so
intuitively conscious, that they always did such work themselves,
and generally while he read the paper by the pantry fire.

Such a self-contained man I never saw. But in that quality, as in
every other he possessed, he only seemed to be the more
respectable. Even the fact that no one knew his Christian name,
seemed to form a part of his respectability. Nothing could be
objected against his surname, Littimer, by which he was known.
Peter might have been hanged, or Tom transported; but Littimer was
perfectly respectable.

It was occasioned, I suppose, by the reverend nature of
respectability in the abstract, but I felt particularly young in
this man's presence. How old he was himself, I could not guess -
and that again went to his credit on the same score; for in the
calmness of respectability he might have numbered fifty years as
well as thirty.

Littimer was in my room in the morning before I was up, to bring me
that reproachful shaving-water, and to put out my clothes. When I
undrew the curtains and looked out of bed, I saw him, in an equable
temperature of respectability, unaffected by the east wind of
January, and not even breathing frostily, standing my boots right
and left in the first dancing position, and blowing specks of dust
off my coat as he laid it down like a baby.

I gave him good morning, and asked him what o'clock it was. He
took out of his pocket the most respectable hunting-watch I ever
saw, and preventing the spring with his thumb from opening far,
looked in at the face as if he were consulting an oracular oyster,
shut it up again, and said, if I pleased, it was half past eight.

'Mr. Steerforth will be glad to hear how you have rested, sir.'

'Thank you,' said I, 'very well indeed. Is Mr. Steerforth quite
well?'

'Thank you, sir, Mr. Steerforth is tolerably well.' Another of his
characteristics - no use of superlatives. A cool calm medium
always.

'Is there anything more I can have the honour of doing for you,
sir? The warning-bell will ring at nine; the family take breakfast
at half past nine.'

'Nothing, I thank you.'

'I thank YOU, sir, if you please'; and with that, and with a little
inclination of his head when he passed the bed-side, as an apology
for correcting me, he went out, shutting the door as delicately as
if I had just fallen into a sweet sleep on which my life depended.

Every morning we held exactly this conversation: never any more,
and never any less: and yet, invariably, however far I might have
been lifted out of myself over-night, and advanced towards maturer
years, by Steerforth's companionship, or Mrs. Steerforth's
confidence, or Miss Dartle's conversation, in the presence of this
most respectable man I became, as our smaller poets sing, 'a boy
again'.

He got horses for us; and Steerforth, who knew everything, gave me
lessons in riding. He provided foils for us, and Steerforth gave
me lessons in fencing - gloves, and I began, of the same master, to
improve in boxing. It gave me no manner of concern that Steerforth
should find me a novice in these sciences, but I never could bear
to show my want of skill before the respectable Littimer. I had no
reason to believe that Littimer understood such arts himself; he
never led me to suppose anything of the kind, by so much as the
vibration of one of his respectable eyelashes; yet whenever he was
by, while we were practising, I felt myself the greenest and most
inexperienced of mortals.

I am particular about this man, because he made a particular effect
on me at that time, and because of what took place thereafter.

The week passed away in a most delightful manner. It passed
rapidly, as may be supposed, to one entranced as I was; and yet it
gave me so many occasions for knowing Steerforth better, and
admiring him more in a thousand respects, that at its close I
seemed to have been with him for a much longer time. A dashing way
he had of treating me like a plaything, was more agreeable to me
than any behaviour he could have adopted. It reminded me of our
old acquaintance; it seemed the natural sequel of it; it showed me
that he was unchanged; it relieved me of any uneasiness I might
have felt, in comparing my merits with his, and measuring my claims
upon his friendship by any equal standard; above all, it was a
familiar, unrestrained, affectionate demeanour that he used towards
no one else. As he had treated me at school differently from all
the rest, I joyfully believed that he treated me in life unlike any
other friend he had. I believed that I was nearer to his heart
than any other friend, and my own heart warmed with attachment to
him.
He made up his mind to go with me into the country, and the day
arrived for our departure. He had been doubtful at first whether
to take Littimer or not, but decided to leave him at home. The
respectable creature, satisfied with his lot whatever it was,
arranged our portmanteaux on the little carriage that was to take
us into London, as if they were intended to defy the shocks of
ages, and received my modestly proffered donation with perfect
tranquillity.

We bade adieu to Mrs. Steerforth and Miss Dartle, with many thanks
on my part, and much kindness on the devoted mother's. The last
thing I saw was Littimer's unruffled eye; fraught, as I fancied,
with the silent conviction that I was very young indeed.

What I felt, in returning so auspiciously to the old familiar
places, I shall not endeavour to describe. We went down by the
Mail. I was so concerned, I recollect, even for the honour of
Yarmouth, that when Steerforth said, as we drove through its dark
streets to the inn, that, as well as he could make out, it was a
good, queer, out-of-the-way kind of hole, I was highly pleased. We
went to bed on our arrival (I observed a pair of dirty shoes and
gaiters in connexion with my old friend the Dolphin as we passed
that door), and breakfasted late in the morning. Steerforth, who
was in great spirits, had been strolling about the beach before I
was up, and had made acquaintance, he said, with half the boatmen
in the place. Moreover, he had seen, in the distance, what he was
sure must be the identical house of Mr. Peggotty, with smoke coming
out of the chimney; and had had a great mind, he told me, to walk
in and swear he was myself grown out of knowledge.

'When do you propose to introduce me there, Daisy?' he said. 'I am
at your disposal. Make your own arrangements.'

'Why, I was thinking that this evening would be a good time,
Steerforth, when they are all sitting round the fire. I should
like you to see it when it's snug, it's such a curious place.'

'So be it!' returned Steerforth. 'This evening.'

'I shall not give them any notice that we are here, you know,' said
I, delighted. 'We must take them by surprise.'

'Oh, of course! It's no fun,' said Steerforth, 'unless we take
them by surprise. Let us see the natives in their aboriginal
condition.'

'Though they ARE that sort of people that you mentioned,' I
returned.

'Aha! What! you recollect my skirmishes with Rosa, do you?' he
exclaimed with a quick look. 'Confound the girl, I am half afraid
of her. She's like a goblin to me. But never mind her. Now what
are you going to do? You are going to see your nurse, I suppose?'

'Why, yes,' I said, 'I must see Peggotty first of all.'

'Well,' replied Steerforth, looking at his watch. 'Suppose I
deliver you up to be cried over for a couple of hours. Is that
long enough?'

I answered, laughing, that I thought we might get through it in
that time, but that he must come also; for he would find that his
renown had preceded him, and that he was almost as great a
personage as I was.

'I'll come anywhere you like,' said Steerforth, 'or do anything you
like. Tell me where to come to; and in two hours I'll produce
myself in any state you please, sentimental or comical.'

I gave him minute directions for finding the residence of Mr.
Barkis, carrier to Blunderstone and elsewhere; and, on this
understanding, went out alone. There was a sharp bracing air; the
ground was dry; the sea was crisp and clear; the sun was diffusing
abundance of light, if not much warmth; and everything was fresh
and lively. I was so fresh and lively myself, in the pleasure of
being there, that I could have stopped the people in the streets
and shaken hands with them.

The streets looked small, of course. The streets that we have only
seen as children always do, I believe, when we go back to them.
But I had forgotten nothing in them, and found nothing changed,
until I came to Mr. Omer's shop. OMER AND Joram was now written
up, where OMER used to be; but the inscription, DRAPER, TAILOR,
HABERDASHER, FUNERAL FURNISHER, &c., remained as it was.

My footsteps seemed to tend so naturally to the shop door, after I
had read these words from over the way, that I went across the road
and looked in. There was a pretty woman at the back of the shop,
dancing a little child in her arms, while another little fellow
clung to her apron. I had no difficulty in recognizing either
Minnie or Minnie's children. The glass door of the parlour was not
open; but in the workshop across the yard I could faintly hear the
old tune playing, as if it had never left off.

'Is Mr. Omer at home?' said I, entering. 'I should like to see
him, for a moment, if he is.'

'Oh yes, sir, he is at home,' said Minnie; 'the weather don't suit
his asthma out of doors. Joe, call your grandfather!'

The little fellow, who was holding her apron, gave such a lusty
shout, that the sound of it made him bashful, and he buried his
face in her skirts, to her great admiration. I heard a heavy
puffing and blowing coming towards us, and soon Mr. Omer,
shorter-winded than of yore, but not much older-looking, stood
before me.

'Servant, sir,' said Mr. Omer. 'What can I do for you, sir?'
'You can shake hands with me, Mr. Omer, if you please,' said I,
putting out my own. 'You were very good-natured to me once, when
I am afraid I didn't show that I thought so.'

'Was I though?' returned the old man. 'I'm glad to hear it, but I
don't remember when. Are you sure it was me?'

'Quite.'

'I think my memory has got as short as my breath,' said Mr. Omer,
looking at me and shaking his head; 'for I don't remember you.'

'Don't you remember your coming to the coach to meet me, and my
having breakfast here, and our riding out to Blunderstone together:
you, and I, and Mrs. Joram, and Mr. Joram too - who wasn't her
husband then?'

'Why, Lord bless my soul!' exclaimed Mr. Omer, after being thrown
by his surprise into a fit of coughing, 'you don't say so! Minnie,
my dear, you recollect? Dear me, yes; the party was a lady, I
think?'

'My mother,' I rejoined.

'To - be - sure,' said Mr. Omer, touching my waistcoat with his
forefinger, 'and there was a little child too! There was two
parties. The little party was laid along with the other party.
Over at Blunderstone it was, of course. Dear me! And how have you
been since?'

Very well, I thanked him, as I hoped he had been too.

'Oh! nothing to grumble at, you know,' said Mr. Omer. 'I find my
breath gets short, but it seldom gets longer as a man gets older.
I take it as it comes, and make the most of it. That's the best
way, ain't it?'

Mr. Omer coughed again, in consequence of laughing, and was
assisted out of his fit by his daughter, who now stood close beside
us, dancing her smallest child on the counter.

'Dear me!' said Mr. Omer. 'Yes, to be sure. Two parties! Why, in
that very ride, if you'll believe me, the day was named for my
Minnie to marry Joram. "Do name it, sir," says Joram. "Yes, do,
father," says Minnie. And now he's come into the business. And
look here! The youngest!'

Minnie laughed, and stroked her banded hair upon her temples, as
her father put one of his fat fingers into the hand of the child
she was dancing on the counter.

'Two parties, of course!' said Mr. Omer, nodding his head
retrospectively. 'Ex-actly so! And Joram's at work, at this
minute, on a grey one with silver nails, not this measurement' -
the measurement of the dancing child upon the counter - 'by a good
two inches. - Will you take something?'

I thanked him, but declined.

'Let me see,' said Mr. Omer. 'Barkis's the carrier's wife -
Peggotty's the boatman's sister - she had something to do with your
family? She was in service there, sure?'

My answering in the affirmative gave him great satisfaction.

'I believe my breath will get long next, my memory's getting so
much so,' said Mr. Omer. 'Well, sir, we've got a young relation of
hers here, under articles to us, that has as elegant a taste in the
dress-making business - I assure you I don't believe there's a
Duchess in England can touch her.'

'Not little Em'ly?' said I, involuntarily.

'Em'ly's her name,' said Mr. Omer, 'and she's little too. But if
you'll believe me, she has such a face of her own that half the
women in this town are mad against her.'

'Nonsense, father!' cried Minnie.

'My dear,' said Mr. Omer, 'I don't say it's the case with you,'
winking at me, 'but I say that half the women in Yarmouth - ah! and
in five mile round - are mad against that girl.'

'Then she should have kept to her own station in life, father,'
said Minnie, 'and not have given them any hold to talk about her,
and then they couldn't have done it.'

'Couldn't have done it, my dear!' retorted Mr. Omer. 'Couldn't
have done it! Is that YOUR knowledge of life? What is there that
any woman couldn't do, that she shouldn't do - especially on the
subject of another woman's good looks?'

I really thought it was all over with Mr. Omer, after he had
uttered this libellous pleasantry. He coughed to that extent, and
his breath eluded all his attempts to recover it with that
obstinacy, that I fully expected to see his head go down behind the
counter, and his little black breeches, with the rusty little
bunches of ribbons at the knees, come quivering up in a last
ineffectual struggle. At length, however, he got better, though he
still panted hard, and was so exhausted that he was obliged to sit
on the stool of the shop-desk.

'You see,' he said, wiping his head, and breathing with difficulty,
'she hasn't taken much to any companions here; she hasn't taken
kindly to any particular acquaintances and friends, not to mention
sweethearts. In consequence, an ill-natured story got about, that
Em'ly wanted to be a lady. Now my opinion is, that it came into
circulation principally on account of her sometimes saying, at the
school, that if she was a lady she would like to do so-and-so for
her uncle - don't you see? - and buy him such-and-such fine
things.'

'I assure you, Mr. Omer, she has said so to me,' I returned
eagerly, 'when we were both children.'

Mr. Omer nodded his head and rubbed his chin. 'Just so. Then out
of a very little, she could dress herself, you see, better than
most others could out of a deal, and that made things unpleasant.
Moreover, she was rather what might be called wayward - I'll go so
far as to say what I should call wayward myself,' said Mr. Omer; '-
didn't know her own mind quite - a little spoiled - and couldn't,
at first, exactly bind herself down. No more than that was ever
said against her, Minnie?'

'No, father,' said Mrs. Joram. 'That's the worst, I believe.'

'So when she got a situation,' said Mr. Omer, 'to keep a fractious
old lady company, they didn't very well agree, and she didn't stop.
At last she came here, apprenticed for three years. Nearly two of
'em are over, and she has been as good a girl as ever was. Worth
any six! Minnie, is she worth any six, now?'

'Yes, father,' replied Minnie. 'Never say I detracted from her!'

'Very good,' said Mr. Omer. 'That's right. And so, young
gentleman,' he added, after a few moments' further rubbing of his
chin, 'that you may not consider me long-winded as well as
short-breathed, I believe that's all about it.'

As they had spoken in a subdued tone, while speaking of Em'ly, I
had no doubt that she was near. On my asking now, if that were not
so, Mr. Omer nodded yes, and nodded towards the door of the
parlour. My hurried inquiry if I might peep in, was answered with
a free permission; and, looking through the glass, I saw her
sitting at her work. I saw her, a most beautiful little creature,
with the cloudless blue eyes, that had looked into my childish
heart, turned laughingly upon another child of Minnie's who was
playing near her; with enough of wilfulness in her bright face to
justify what I had heard; with much of the old capricious coyness
lurking in it; but with nothing in her pretty looks, I am sure, but
what was meant for goodness and for happiness, and what was on a
good and happy course.

The tune across the yard that seemed as if it never had left off -
alas! it was the tune that never DOES leave off - was beating,
softly, all the while.

'Wouldn't you like to step in,' said Mr. Omer, 'and speak to her?
Walk in and speak to her, sir! Make yourself at home!'

I was too bashful to do so then - I was afraid of confusing her,
and I was no less afraid of confusing myself.- but I informed
myself of the hour at which she left of an evening, in order that
our visit might be timed accordingly; and taking leave of Mr. Omer,
and his pretty daughter, and her little children, went away to my
dear old Peggotty's.

Here she was, in the tiled kitchen, cooking dinner! The moment I
knocked at the door she opened it, and asked me what I pleased to
want. I looked at her with a smile, but she gave me no smile in
return. I had never ceased to write to her, but it must have been
seven years since we had met.

'Is Mr. Barkis at home, ma'am?' I said, feigning to speak roughly
to her.

'He's at home, sir,' returned Peggotty, 'but he's bad abed with the
rheumatics.'

'Don't he go over to Blunderstone now?' I asked.

'When he's well he do,' she answered.

'Do YOU ever go there, Mrs. Barkis?'

She looked at me more attentively, and I noticed a quick movement
of her hands towards each other.

'Because I want to ask a question about a house there, that they
call the - what is it? - the Rookery,' said I.

She took a step backward, and put out her hands in an undecided
frightened way, as if to keep me off.

'Peggotty!' I cried to her.

She cried, 'My darling boy!' and we both burst into tears, and were
locked in one another's arms.

What extravagances she committed; what laughing and crying over me;
what pride she showed, what joy, what sorrow that she whose pride
and joy I might have been, could never hold me in a fond embrace;
I have not the heart to tell. I was troubled with no misgiving
that it was young in me to respond to her emotions. I had never
laughed and cried in all my life, I dare say - not even to her -
more freely than I did that morning.

'Barkis will be so glad,' said Peggotty, wiping her eyes with her
apron, 'that it'll do him more good than pints of liniment. May I
go and tell him you are here? Will you come up and see him, my
dear?'

Of course I would. But Peggotty could not get out of the room as
easily as she meant to, for as often as she got to the door and
looked round at me, she came back again to have another laugh and
another cry upon my shoulder. At last, to make the matter easier,
I went upstairs with her; and having waited outside for a minute,
while she said a word of preparation to Mr. Barkis, presented
myself before that invalid.

He received me with absolute enthusiasm. He was too rheumatic to
be shaken hands with, but he begged me to shake the tassel on the
top of his nightcap, which I did most cordially. When I sat down
by the side of the bed, he said that it did him a world of good to
feel as if he was driving me on the Blunderstone road again. As he
lay in bed, face upward, and so covered, with that exception, that
he seemed to be nothing but a face - like a conventional cherubim
- he looked the queerest object I ever beheld.