"You must taste," said my sister, addressing the guests with her best
grace, "you must finish with a pie, in honor of Uncle Pumblechook."
The company murmured their compliments. Uncle Pumblechook, sensible of
having deserved well of his fellow-creatures, said,--quite vivaciously,
all things considered,--"Well, Mrs. Joe, we'll do our best endeavors;
let us have a cut at this same pie."
My sister went out to get it. I heard her steps proceed to the pantry.
I saw Mr. Pumblechook balance his knife. I saw reawakening appetite in
the Roman nostrils of Mr. Wopsle. I heard Mr. Hubble remark that "a bit
of savory pie would lay atop of anything you could mention, and do no
harm," and I heard Joe say "you shall have some, Pip." I have never
been absolutely certain whether I uttered a shrill yell of terror,
merely in spirit, or in the bodily hearing of the company. I felt that
I could bear no more, and that I must run away. I released the leg of
the table, and ran for my life.
But I ran no farther than the house door, for there I ran headforemost
into a party of soldiers with their muskets, one of whom held out a pair
of handcuffs to me, saying, "Here you are, look sharp, come on!"
The vision of a file of soldiers caused the dinner party to rise from
the table in confusion, and caused Mrs. Joe, re-entering the kitchen
empty-handed, to stop short and stare, in her wondering lament of
"Gracious goodness, gracious me, what's gone--with the--pie!"
"Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen," said the sergeant, "but as I have
mentioned at the door to this smart young shaver" (which he hadn't), "I
am on a chase in the name of the king, and I want the blacksmith."
"And pray, what might you want with him?" retorted my sister, quick to
resent his being wanted at all.
"Missis," returned the gallant sergeant, "speaking for myself, I should
reply, the honor and pleasure of his fine wife's acquaintance; speaking
for the king, I answer, a little job done."
This was received as rather neat in the sergeant; insomuch that Mr.
Pumblechook cried audibly, "Good again!"
"You see, blacksmith," said the sergeant, who had by this time picked
out Joe with his eye, "we have had an accident with these, and I find
the lock of one of 'em goes wrong, and the coupling don't act pretty.
As they are wanted for immediate service, will you throw your eye over
them?"
Joe threw his eye over them, and pronounced that the job would
necessitate the lighting of his forge fire, and would take nearer two
hours than one.
"Will it? Then will you set about it at once, blacksmith," said the
off-hand sergeant, "as it's on his Majesty's service. And if my men can
bear a hand anywhere, they'll make themselves useful." With that, he
called to his men, who came trooping into the kitchen one after another,
and piled their arms in a corner.
All these things I saw without then knowing that I saw them, for I was
in an agony of apprehension. But, beginning to perceive that the
handcuffs were not for me, and that the military had so far got the
better of the pie as to put it in the background, I collected a little
more of my scattered wits.
[Illustration: PIP BRINGS THE CONVICT SOME FOOD.]
The soldiers were out hunting for the convicts that had escaped. And as
soon as Joe had mended the handcuffs, they fell in line and started
again for the marshes. Joe caught an appealing look from me, and
timidly asked if he and I might go along with them. The consent was
given and away we went.
After a rough journey over bogs and through briars, a loud shout from
the soldiers in front announced that one of the fugitives had been
caught. We ran hastily up and peered into a ditch. It was my convict.
He was hustled into the handcuffs and hustled up a hill where stood a
rough hut or sentry-box, and here we halted to rest.
My convict never looked at me, except once. While we were in the hut, he
stood before the fire looking thoughtfully at it, or putting up his feet
by turns upon the hob. Suddenly he turned to the sergeant and remarked:
"I wish to say something respecting this escape. It may prevent some
persons laying under suspicion alonger me."
"You can say what you like," returned the sergeant, standing coolly
looking at him with his arms folded, "but you have no call to say it
here. You'll have opportunity enough to say about it, and hear about
it, before it's done with, you know."
"I know, but this is another p'int, a separate matter. A man can't
starve; at least _I_ can't. I took some wittles, up at the village over
yonder--where the church stands a'most out on the marshes."
"You mean stole," said the sergeant.
"And I'll tell you where from. From the blacksmith's."
"Hallo!" said the sergeant, staring at Joe.
"Hallo, Pip!" said Joe, staring at me.
"It was some broken wittle--that's what it was--and a dram of liquor,
and a pie."
"Have you happened to miss such an article as a pie, blacksmith?" asked
the sergeant, confidentially.
"My wife did, at the very moment when you came in. Don't you know,
Pip?"
"So," said my convict, turning his eyes on Joe in a moody manner, and
without the least glance at me; "so you're the blacksmith, are you?
Then I'm sorry to say I've eat your pie."
"God knows you're welcome to it--so far as it was ever mine," returned
Joe, with a saving remembrance of Mrs. Joe. "We don't know what you
have done, but we wouldn't have you starve to death for it, poor
miserable fellow-creatur. Would us, Pip?"
Something that I had noticed before clicked in the man's throat again,
and he turned his back. The boat had returned, and his guard were
ready, so we followed him to the landing-place made of rough stakes and
stones, and saw him put into the boat, which was rowed by a crew of
convicts like himself. No one seemed surprised to see him, but they
looked at him stolidly and rowed him back to the hulks as a matter of
course.
My state of mind regarding the pie was curious. I do not recall that I
felt any tenderness of conscience in reference to Mrs. Joe, when the
fear of being found out was lifted off me. But I loved Joe--perhaps for
no better reason in those early days than because the dear fellow let me
love him--and, as to him, my inner self was not so easily composed. It
was much upon my mind (particularly when I first saw him looking about
for his file) that I ought to tell Joe the whole truth. Yet I did not,
and for the reason that I mistrusted that if I did he would think me
worse than I was. The fear of losing Joe's confidence and of thenceforth
sitting in the chimney corner at night staring drearily at my forever
lost companion and friend, tied up my tongue. And so the whole truth
never came out.
*II. PIP AND ESTELLA*
At this time I was only an errand boy around the forge, and my education
was limited to spelling out the names on the tombstones. So in the
evenings they sent me to school to Mr. Wopsle's aunt, a worthy woman who
used to go to sleep regularly from six to seven while her small class
was supposed to study.
But I was lucky enough to find a friend in her granddaughter, Biddy.
She was about my own age, and, while her shoes were generally untied and
her hands sometimes dirty, her heart was in the right place and she had
a good head. So with her help I struggled through my letters as if they
had been a bramble-bush, getting considerably worried and scratched by
each letter in turn. Then came the dreaded nine figures to add to my
troubles. But at last I learned to read and cipher.
I do not know which was the prouder, Joe or I, when I wrote him my first
letter (which was hardly needed, as he sat beside me while I wrote it).
"I say, Pip, old chap!" he cried, opening his eyes very wide, "what a
scholar you are! Ain't you?"
"I should like to be," I answered, looking at the slate with
satisfaction.
Mrs. Joe made occasional trips with Uncle Pumblechook on market-days, to
assist him in buying such household stuffs and goods as required a
woman's judgment; Uncle Pumblechook being a bachelor and reposing no
confidences in his domestic servant. On this particular evening she
came home from such a trip, bringing Uncle Pumblechook with her.
"Now," said she, unwrapping herself with haste and excitement, and
throwing her bonnet back on her shoulders where it hung by the strings,
"if this boy ain't grateful this night, he never will be!"
I looked as grateful as any boy possibly could, who was wholly
uninformed why he ought to assume that expression.
"You have heard of Miss Havisham up town, haven't you?" continued my
sister, addressing Joe. "She wants this boy to go and play there. And
of course he's going. And he had _better_ play there," said my sister,
shaking her head at me as an encouragement to be extremely light and
sportive, "or I'll work him!"
I had heard of Miss Havisham up town--everybody for miles round had
heard of Miss Havisham up town--as an immensely rich and grim lady who
lived in a large and dismal house barricaded against robbers, and who
led a life of seclusion.
"Well to be sure!" said Joe, astounded. "I wonder how she come to know
Pip!"
"Noodle!" cried my sister. "Who said she knew him? Couldn't she ask
Uncle Pumblechook if he knew of a boy to go and play there? And couldn't
Uncle Pumblechook, being always considerate and thoughtful of us,
mention this boy that I have been a willing slave to? And couldn't
Uncle Pumblechook, being sensible that for anything we can tell, this
boy's fortune may be made by his going to Miss Havisham's, offer to take
him into town to-night in his own chaise-cart, and to keep him to-night,
and to take him with his own hands to Miss Havisham's to-morrow morning?
And Lor-a-mussy me!" cried my sister, casting off her bonnet in sudden
desperation, "here I stand talking to mere Mooncalfs, with Uncle
Pumblechook waiting, and the mare catching cold at the door, and the boy
grimed with dirt from the hair of his head to the sole of his foot!"
With that, she pounced on me, like an eagle on a lamb, and my face was
squeezed into wooden bowls in sinks, and my head was put under taps of
water-butts, and I was soaped and kneaded, and towelled, and thumped,
and harrowed, and rasped, until I really was quite beside myself.
When my ablutions were completed, I was put into clean linen of the
stiffest character, like a young penitent into sackcloth, and was
trussed up in my tightest and fearfullest suit. I was then delivered
over to Mr. Pumblechook, who formally received me as if he were the
Sheriff, saying pompously, "Boy, be forever grateful to all friends, but
especially unto them which brought you up by hand!"
"Good-bye, Joe!"
"God bless you, Pip, old chap!"
I had never parted from him before, and what with my feelings and what
with soap-suds, I could at first see no stars from the chaise-cart. But
they twinkled out one by one, without throwing any light on the
questions as to why on earth I was going to play at Miss Havisham's, and
what on earth I was expected to play at.
I spent the night at Uncle Pumblechook's, and the next morning after
breakfast we proceeded to Miss Havisham's. It was a dismal looking
house with a great many iron bars to it. Some of the windows had been
walled up, and the others were rustily barred. There was a courtyard in
front, which was also barred; so we had to wait, after ringing the bell,
for some one to open it.