Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

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My first impulse was to call up Herbert, and show him the two men
going away. But, reflecting before I got into his room, which was
at the back of the house and adjoined mine, that he and Startop had
had a harder day than I, and were fatigued, I forbore. Going back
to my window, I could see the two men moving over the marsh. In
that light, however, I soon lost them, and feeling very cold, lay
down to think of the matter, and fell asleep again.

We were up early. As we walked to and fro, all four together,
before breakfast, I deemed it right to recount what I had seen.
Again our charge was the least anxious of the party. It was very
likely that the men belonged to the Custom House, he said quietly,
and that they had no thought of us. I tried to persuade myself that
it was so - as, indeed, it might easily be. However, I proposed
that he and I should walk away together to a distant point we could
see, and that the boat should take us aboard there, or as near
there as might prove feasible, at about noon. This being considered
a good precaution, soon after breakfast he and I set forth, without
saying anything at the tavern.

He smoked his pipe as we went along, and sometimes stopped to clap
me on the shoulder. One would have supposed that it was I who was
in danger, not he, and that he was reassuring me. We spoke very
little. As we approached the point, I begged him to remain in a
sheltered place, while I went on to reconnoitre; for, it was
towards it that the men had passed in the night. He complied, and I
went on alone. There was no boat off the point, nor any boat drawn
up anywhere near it, nor were there any signs of the men having
embarked there. But, to be sure the tide was high, and there might
have been some footprints under water.

When he looked out from his shelter in the distance, and saw that I
waved my hat to him to come up, he rejoined me, and there we
waited; sometimes lying on the bank wrapped in our coats, and
sometimes moving about to warm ourselves: until we saw our boat
coming round. We got aboard easily, and rowed out into the track of
the steamer. By that time it wanted but ten minutes of one o'clock,
and we began to look out for her smoke.

But, it was half-past one before we saw her smoke, and soon
afterwards we saw behind it the smoke of another steamer. As they
were coming on at full speed, we got the two bags ready, and took
that opportunity of saying good-bye to Herbert and Startop. We had
all shaken hands cordially, and neither Herbert's eyes nor mine
were quite dry, when I saw a four-oared galley shoot out from under
the bank but a little way ahead of us, and row out into the same
track.

A stretch of shore had been as yet between us and the steamer's
smoke, by reason of the bend and wind of the river; but now she was
visible, coming head on. I called to Herbert and Startop to keep
before the tide, that she might see us lying by for her, and I
adjured Provis to sit quite still, wrapped in his cloak. He
answered cheerily, "Trust to me, dear boy," and sat like a statue.
Meantime the galley, which was very skilfully handled, had crossed
us, let us come up with her, and fallen alongside. Leaving just
room enough for the play of the oars, she kept alongside, drifting
when we drifted, and pulling a stroke or two when we pulled. Of the
two sitters one held the rudder lines, and looked at us attentively
- as did all the rowers; the other sitter was wrapped up, much as
Provis was, and seemed to shrink, and whisper some instruction to
the steerer as he looked at us. Not a word was spoken in either
boat.

Startop could make out, after a few minutes, which steamer was
first, and gave me the word "Hamburg," in a low voice as we sat
face to face. She was nearing us very fast, and the beating of her
peddles grew louder and louder. I felt as if her shadow were
absolutely upon us, when the galley hailed us. I answered.

"You have a returned Transport there," said the man who held the
lines. "That's the man, wrapped in the cloak. His name is Abel
Magwitch, otherwise Provis. I apprehend that man, and call upon him
to surrender, and you to assist."

At the same moment, without giving any audible direction to his
crew, he ran the galley abroad of us. They had pulled one sudden
stroke ahead, had got their oars in, had run athwart us, and were
holding on to our gunwale, before we knew what they were doing.
This caused great confusion on board the steamer, and I heard them
calling to us, and heard the order given to stop the paddles, and
heard them stop, but felt her driving down upon us irresistibly. In
the same moment, I saw the steersman of the galley lay his hand on
his prisoner's shoulder, and saw that both boats were swinging
round with the force of the tide, and saw that all hands on board
the steamer were running forward quite frantically. Still in the
same moment, I saw the prisoner start up, lean across his captor,
and pull the cloak from the neck of the shrinking sitter in the
galley. Still in the same moment, I saw that the face disclosed,
was the face of the other convict of long ago. Still in the same
moment, I saw the face tilt backward with a white terror on it that
I shall never forget, and heard a great cry on board the steamer
and a loud splash in the water, and felt the boat sink from under
me.

It was but for an instant that I seemed to struggle with a thousand
mill-weirs and a thousand flashes of light; that instant past, I
was taken on board the galley. Herbert was there, and Startop was
there; but our boat was gone, and the two convicts were gone.

What with the cries aboard the steamer, and the furious blowing off
of her steam, and her driving on, and our driving on, I could not
at first distinguish sky from water or shore from shore; but, the
crew of the galley righted her with great speed, and, pulling
certain swift strong strokes ahead, lay upon their oars, every man
looking silently and eagerly at the water astern. Presently a dark
object was seen in it, bearing towards us on the tide. No man
spoke, but the steersman held up his hand, and all softly backed
water, and kept the boat straight and true before it. As it came
nearer, I saw it to be Magwitch, swimming, but not swimming freely.
He was taken on board, and instantly manacled at the wrists and
ankles.

The galley was kept steady, and the silent eager look-out at the
water was resumed. But, the Rotterdam steamer now came up, and
apparently not understanding what had happened, came on at speed.
By the time she had been hailed and stopped, both steamers were
drifting away from us, and we were rising and falling in a troubled
wake of water. The look-out was kept, long after all was still
again and the two steamers were gone; but, everybody knew that it
was hopeless now.

At length we gave it up, and pulled under the shore towards the
tavern we had lately left, where we were received with no little
surprise. Here, I was able to get some comforts for Magwitch -
Provis no longer - who had received some very severe injury in the
chest and a deep cut in the head.

He told me that he believed himself to have gone under the keel of
the steamer, and to have been struck on the head in rising. The
injury to his chest (which rendered his breathing extremely
painful) he thought he had received against the side of the galley.
He added that he did not pretend to say what he might or might not
have done to Compeyson, but, that in the moment of his laying his
hand on his cloak to identify him, that villain had staggered up
and staggered back, and they had both gone overboard together; when
the sudden wrenching of him (Magwitch) out of our boat, and the
endeavour of his captor to keep him in it, had capsized us. He told
me in a whisper that they had gone down, fiercely locked in each
other's arms, and that there had been a struggle under water, and
that he had disengaged himself, struck out, and swum away.

I never had any reason to doubt the exact truth of what he thus
told me. The officer who steered the galley gave the same account
of their going overboard.

When I asked this officer's permission to change the prisoner's wet
clothes by purchasing any spare garments I could get at the
public-house, he gave it readily: merely observing that he must
take charge of everything his prisoner had about him. So the
pocketbook which had once been in my hands, passed into the
officer's. He further gave me leave to accompany the prisoner to
London; but, declined to accord that grace to my two friends.

The Jack at the Ship was instructed where the drowned man had gone
down, and undertook to search for the body in the places where it
was likeliest to come ashore. His interest in its recovery seemed
to me to be much heightened when he heard that it had stockings on.
Probably, it took about a dozen drowned men to fit him out
completely; and that may have been the reason why the different
articles of his dress were in various stages of decay.

We remained at the public-house until the tide turned, and then
Magwitch was carried down to the galley and put on board. Herbert
and Startop were to get to London by land, as soon as they could.
We had a doleful parting, and when I took my place by Magwitch's
side, I felt that that was my place henceforth while he lived.

For now, my repugnance to him had all melted away, and in the
hunted wounded shackled creature who held my hand in his, I only
saw a man who had meant to be my benefactor, and who had felt
affectionately, gratefully, and generously, towards me with great
constancy through a series of years. I only saw in him a much
better man than I had been to Joe.

His breathing became more difficult and painful as the night drew
on, and often he could not repress a groan. I tried to rest him on
the arm I could use, in any easy position; but, it was dreadful to
think that I could not be sorry at heart for his being badly hurt,
since it was unquestionably best that he should die. That there
were, still living, people enough who were able and willing to
identify him, I could not doubt. That he would be leniently
treated, I could not hope. He who had been presented in the worst
light at his trial, who had since broken prison and had been tried
again, who had returned from transportation under a life sentence,
and who had occasioned the death of the man who was the cause of
his arrest.

As we returned towards the setting sun we had yesterday left behind
us, and as the stream of our hopes seemed all running back, I told
him how grieved I was to think that he had come home for my sake.

"Dear boy," he answered, "I'm quite content to take my chance. I've
seen my boy, and he can be a gentleman without me."

No. I had thought about that, while we had been there side by side.
No. Apart from any inclinations of my own, I understood Wemmick's
hint now. I foresaw that, being convicted, his possessions would be
forfeited to the Crown.

"Lookee here, dear boy," said he "It's best as a gentleman should
not be knowed to belong to me now. Only come to see me as if you
come by chance alonger Wemmick. Sit where I can see you when I am
swore to, for the last o' many times, and I don't ask no more."

"I will never stir from your side," said I, "when I am suffered to
be near you. Please God, I will be as true to you, as you have been
to me!"

I felt his hand tremble as it held mine, and he turned his face
away as he lay in the bottom of the boat, and I heard that old
sound in his throat - softened now, like all the rest of him. It
was a good thing that he had touched this point, for it put into my
mind what I might not otherwise have thought of until too late:
That he need never know how his hopes of enriching me had perished.

Chapter 55

He was taken to the Police Court next day, and would have been
immediately committed for trial, but that it was necessary to send
down for an old officer of the prison-ship from which he had once
escaped, to speak to his identity. Nobody doubted it; but,
Compeyson, who had meant to depose to it, was tumbling on the
tides, dead, and it happened that there was not at that time any
prison officer in London who could give the required evidence. I
had gone direct to Mr. Jaggers at his private house, on my arrival
over night, to retain his assistance, and Mr. Jaggers on the
prisoner's behalf would admit nothing. It was the sole resource,
for he told me that the case must be over in five minutes when the
witness was there, and that no power on earth could prevent its
going against us.

I imparted to Mr. Jaggers my design of keeping him in ignorance of
the fate of his wealth. Mr. Jaggers was querulous and angry with me
for having "let it slip through my fingers," and said we must
memorialize by-and-by, and try at all events for some of it. But,
he did not conceal from me that although there might be many cases
in which the forfeiture would not be exacted, there were no
circumstances in this case to make it one of them. I understood
that, very well. I was not related to the outlaw, or connected with
him by any recognizable tie; he had put his hand to no writing or
settlement in my favour before his apprehension, and to do so now
would be idle. I had no claim, and I finally resolved, and ever
afterwards abided by the resolution, that my heart should never be
sickened with the hopeless task of attempting to establish one.

There appeared to be reason for supposing that the drowned informer
had hoped for a reward out of this forfeiture, and had obtained
some accurate knowledge of Magwitch's affairs. When his body was
found, many miles from the scene of his death, and so horribly
disfigured that he was only recognizable by the contents of his
pockets, notes were still legible, folded in a case he carried.
Among these, were the name of a banking-house in New South Wales
where a sum of money was, and the designation of certain lands of
considerable value. Both these heads of information were in a list
that Magwitch, while in prison, gave to Mr. Jaggers, of the
possessions he supposed I should inherit. His ignorance, poor
fellow, at last served him; he never mistrusted but that my
inheritance was quite safe, with Mr. Jaggers's aid.

After three days' delay, during which the crown prosecution stood
over for the production of the witness from the prison-ship, the
witness came, and completed the easy case. He was committed to take
his trial at the next Sessions, which would come on in a month.

It was at this dark time of my life that Herbert returned home one
evening, a good deal cast down, and said:

"My dear Handel, I fear I shall soon have to leave you."

His partner having prepared me for that, I was less surprised than
he thought.

"We shall lose a fine opportunity if I put off going to Cairo, and
I am very much afraid I must go, Handel, when you most need me."

"Herbert, I shall always need you, because I shall always love you;
but my need is no greater now, than at another time."

"You will be so lonely."

"I have not leisure to think of that," said I. "You know that I am
always with him to the full extent of the time allowed, and that I
should be with him all day long, if I could. And when I come away
from him, you know that my thoughts are with him."

The dreadful condition to which he was brought, was so appalling to
both of us, that we could not refer to it in plainer words.

"My dear fellow," said Herbert, "let the near prospect of our
separation - for, it is very near - be my justification for
troubling you about yourself. Have you thought of your future?"

"No, for I have been afraid to think of any future."

"But yours cannot be dismissed; indeed, my dear dear Handel, it
must not be dismissed. I wish you would enter on it now, as far as
a few friendly words go, with me."

"I will," said I.

"In this branch house of ours, Handel, we must have a--"

I saw that his delicacy was avoiding the right word, so I said, "A
clerk."

"A clerk. And I hope it is not at all unlikely that he may expand
(as a clerk of your acquaintance has expanded) into a partner. Now,
Handel - in short, my dear boy, will you come to me?"

There was something charmingly cordial and engaging in the manner
in which after saying "Now, Handel," as if it were the grave
beginning of a portentous business exordium, he had suddenly given
up that tone, stretched out his honest hand, and spoken like a
schoolboy.

"Clara and I have talked about it again and again," Herbert
pursued, "and the dear little thing begged me only this evening,
with tears in her eyes, to say to you that if you will live with us
when we come together, she will do her best to make you happy, and
to convince her husband's friend that he is her friend too. We
should get on so well, Handel!"

I thanked her heartily, and I thanked him heartily, but said I
could not yet make sure of joining him as he so kindly offered.
Firstly, my mind was too preoccupied to be able to take in the
subject clearly. Secondly - Yes! Secondly, there was a vague
something lingering in my thoughts that will come out very near the
end of this slight narrative.

"But if you thought, Herbert, that you could, without doing any
injury to your business, leave the question open for a little
while--"

"For any while," cried Herbert. "Six months, a year!"

"Not so long as that," said I. "Two or three months at most."

Herbert was highly delighted when we shook hands on this
arrangement, and said he could now take courage to tell me that he
believed he must go away at the end of the week.

"And Clara?" said I.

"The dear little thing," returned Herbert, "holds dutifully to her
father as long as he lasts; but he won't last long. Mrs. Whimple
confides to me that he is certainly going."

"Not to say an unfeeling thing," said I, "he cannot do better than
go."

"I am afraid that must be admitted," said Herbert: "and then I
shall come back for the dear little thing, and the dear little
thing and I will walk quietly into the nearest church. Remember!
The blessed darling comes of no family, my dear Handel, and never
looked into the red book, and hasn't a notion about her grandpapa.
What a fortune for the son of my mother!"

On the Saturday in that same week, I took my leave of Herbert -
full of bright hope, but sad and sorry to leave me - as he sat on
one of the seaport mail coaches. I went into a coffee-house to
write a little note to Clara, telling her he had gone off, sending
his love to her over and over again, and then went to my lonely
home - if it deserved the name, for it was now no home to me, and I
had no home anywhere.

On the stairs I encountered Wemmick, who was coming down, after an
unsuccessful application of his knuckles to my door. I had not seen
him alone, since the disastrous issue of the attempted flight; and
he had come, in his private and personal capacity, to say a few
words of explanation in reference to that failure.

"The late Compeyson," said Wemmick, "had by little and little got
at the bottom of half of the regular business now transacted, and
it was from the talk of some of his people in trouble (some of his
people being always in trouble) that I heard what I did. I kept my
ears open, seeming to have them shut, until I heard that he was
absent, and I thought that would be the best time for making the
attempt. I can only suppose now, that it was a part of his policy,
as a very clever man, habitually to deceive his own instruments.
You don't blame me, I hope, Mr. Pip? I am sure I tried to serve you,
with all my heart."

"I am as sure of that, Wemmick, as you can be, and I thank you most
earnestly for all your interest and friendship."

"Thank you, thank you very much. It's a bad job," said Wemmick,
scratching his head, "and I assure you I haven't been so cut up for
a long time. What I look at, is the sacrifice of so much portable
property. Dear me!"

"What I think of, Wemmick, is the poor owner of the property."

"Yes, to be sure," said Wemmick. "Of course there can be no
objection to your being sorry for him, and I'd put down a
five-pound note myself to get him out of it. But what I look at, is
this. The late Compeyson having been beforehand with him in
intelligence of his return, and being so determined to bring him to
book, I do not think he could have been saved. Whereas, the
portable property certainly could have been saved. That's the
difference between the property and the owner, don't you see?"

I invited Wemmick to come up-stairs, and refresh himself with a
glass of grog before walking to Walworth. He accepted the
invitation. While he was drinking his moderate allowance, he said,
with nothing to lead up to it, and after having appeared rather
fidgety:

"What do you think of my meaning to take a holiday on Monday, Mr.
Pip?"

"Why, I suppose you have not done such a thing these twelve
months."

"These twelve years, more likely," said Wemmick. "Yes. I'm going to
take a holiday. More than that; I'm going to take a walk. More than
that; I'm going to ask you to take a walk with me."

I was about to excuse myself, as being but a bad companion just
then, when Wemmick anticipated me.

"I know your engagements," said he, "and I know you are out of
sorts, Mr. Pip. But if you could oblige me, I should take it as a
kindness. It ain't a long walk, and it's an early one. Say it might
occupy you (including breakfast on the walk) from eight to twelve.
Couldn't you stretch a point and manage it?"

He had done so much for me at various times, that this was very
little to do for him. I said I could manage it - would manage it -
and he was so very much pleased by my acquiescence, that I was
pleased too. At his particular request, I appointed to call for him
at the Castle at half-past eight on Monday morning, and so we
parted for the time.

Punctual to my appointment, I rang at the Castle gate on the Monday
morning, and was received by Wemmick himself: who struck me as
looking tighter than usual, and having a sleeker hat on. Within,
there were two glasses of rum-and-milk prepared, and two biscuits.
The Aged must have been stirring with the lark, for, glancing into
the perspective of his bedroom, I observed that his bed was empty.

When we had fortified ourselves with the rum-and-milk and biscuits,
and were going out for the walk with that training preparation on
us, I was considerably surprised to see Wemmick take up a
fishing-rod, and put it over his shoulder. "Why, we are not going
fishing!" said I. "No," returned Wemmick, "but I like to walk with
one."

I thought this odd; however, I said nothing, and we set off. We
went towards Camberwell Green, and when we were thereabouts,
Wemmick said suddenly:

"Halloa! Here's a church!"

There was nothing very surprising in that; but a gain, I was rather
surprised, when he said, as if he were animated by a brilliant
idea:

"Let's go in!"

We went in, Wemmick leaving his fishing-rod in the porch, and
looked all round. In the mean time, Wemmick was diving into his
coat-pockets, and getting something out of paper there.

"Halloa!" said he. "Here's a couple of pair of gloves! Let's put
'em on!"

As the gloves were white kid gloves, and as the post-office was
widened to its utmost extent, I now began to have my strong
suspicions. They were strengthened into certainty when I beheld the
Aged enter at a side door, escorting a lady.

"Halloa!" said Wemmick. "Here's Miss Skiffins! Let's have a
wedding."

That discreet damsel was attired as usual, except that she was now
engaged in substituting for her green kid gloves, a pair of white.
The Aged was likewise occupied in preparing a similar sacrifice for
the altar of Hymen. The old gentleman, however, experienced so much
difficulty in getting his gloves on, that Wemmick found it
necessary to put him with his back against a pillar, and then to
get behind the pillar himself and pull away at them, while I for my
part held the old gentleman round the waist, that he might present
and equal and safe resistance. By dint of this ingenious Scheme,
his gloves were got on to perfection.

The clerk and clergyman then appearing, we were ranged in order at
those fatal rails. True to his notion of seeming to do it all
without preparation, I heard Wemmick say to himself as he took
something out of his waistcoat-pocket before the service began,
"Halloa! Here's a ring!"

I acted in the capacity of backer, or best-man, to the bridegroom;
while a little limp pew opener in a soft bonnet like a baby's, made
a feint of being the bosom friend of Miss Skiffins. The
responsibility of giving the lady away, devolved upon the Aged,
which led to the clergyman's being unintentionally scandalized, and
it happened thus. When he said, "Who giveth this woman to be
married to this man?" the old gentlemen, not in the least knowing
what point of the ceremony we had arrived at, stood most amiably
beaming at the ten commandments. Upon which, the clergyman said
again, "WHO giveth this woman to be married to this man?" The old
gentleman being still in a state of most estimable unconsciousness,
the bridegroom cried out in his accustomed voice, "Now Aged P. you
know; who giveth?" To which the Aged replied with great briskness,
before saying that he gave, "All right, John, all right, my boy!"
And the clergyman came to so gloomy a pause upon it, that I had
doubts for the moment whether we should get completely married that
day.

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