The ringing of a distant bell, combined with the echoing of some cry or call along the passage by which I had come, interrupted the conversation and caused Estella to say to me, Now, boy! On my turning round, they all looked at me with the utmost contempt, and, as I went out, I heard Sarah Pocket say, Well I am sure! What next! and Camilla add, with indignation, Was there ever such a fancy! The i-de-a!
As we were going with our candle along the dark passage, Estella stopped all of a sudden, and, facing round, said in her taunting manner, with her face quite close to mine,-
Well?
Well, miss? I answered, almost falling over her and checking myself.
She stood looking at me, and, of course, I stood looking at her.
Am I pretty?
Yes; I think you are very pretty.
Am I insulting?
Not so much so as you were last time, said I.
Not so much so?
No.
She fired when she asked the last question, and she slapped my face with such force as she had, when I answered it.
Now? said she. You little coarse monster, what do you think of me now?
I shall not tell you.
Because you are going to tell upstairs. Is that it?
No, said I, that's not it.
Why don't you cry again, you little wretch?
Because I'll never cry for you again, said I. Which was, I suppose, as false a declaration as ever was made; for I was inwardly crying for her then, and I know what I know of the pain she cost me afterwards.
We went on our way upstairs after this episode; and, as we were going up, we met a gentleman groping his way down.
Whom have we here? asked the gentleman, stopping and looking at me.
A boy, said Estella.
He was a burly man of an exceedingly dark complexion, with an exceedingly large head, and a corresponding large hand. He took my chin in his large hand and turned up my face to have a look at me by the light of the candle. He was prematurely bald on the top of his head, and had bushy black eyebrows that wouldn't lie down but stood up bristling. His eyes were set very deep in his head, and were disagreeably sharp and suspicious. He had a large watch-chain, and strong black dots where his beard and whiskers would have been if he had let them. He was nothing to me, and I could have had no foresight then, that he ever would be anything to me, but it happened that I had this opportunity of observing him well.
Boy of the neighbourhood? Hey? said he.
Yes, sir, said I.
How do you come here?
Miss Havisham sent for me, sir, I explained.
Well! Behave yourself. I have a pretty large experience of boys, and you're a bad set of fellows. Now mind! said he, biting the side of his great forefinger as he frowned at me, you behave yourself!
With those words, he released me which I was glad of, for his hand smelt of scented soap and went his way downstairs. I wondered whether he could be a doctor; but no, I thought; he couldn't be a doctor, or he would have a quieter and more persuasive manner. There was not much time to consider the subject, for we were soon in Miss Havisham's room, where she and everything else were just as I had left them. Estella left me standing near the door, and I stood there until Miss Havisham cast her eyes upon me from the dressing-table.
So! she said, without being startled or surprised: the days have worn away, have they?
Yes, ma'am. To-day is-
There, there, there! with the impatient movement of her fingers. I don't want to know. Are you ready to play?
I was obliged to answer in some confusion, I don't think I am, ma'am.
Not at cards again? she demanded, with a searching look.
Yes, ma'am; I could do that, if I was wanted.
Since this house strikes you old and grave, boy, said Miss Havisham, impatiently, and you are unwilling to play, are you willing to work?
I could answer this inquiry with a better heart than I had been able to find for the other question, and I said I was quite willing.
Then go into that opposite room, said she, pointing at the door behind me with her withered hand, and wait there till I come.
I crossed the staircase landing, and entered the room she indicated. From that room, too, the daylight was completely excluded, and it had an airless smell that was oppressive. A fire had been lately kindled in the damp old-fashioned grate, and it was more disposed to go out than to burn up, and the reluctant smoke which hung in the room seemed colder than the clearer air, like our own marsh mist. Certain wintry branches of candles on the high chimney-piece faintly lighted the chamber; or it would be more expressive to say, faintly troubled its darkness. It was spacious, and I dare say had once been handsome, but every discernible thing in it was covered with dust and mould, and dropping to pieces. The most prominent object was a long table with a tablecloth spread on it, as if a feast had been in preparation when the house and the clocks all stopped together. An epergne or centre-piece of some kind was in the middle of this cloth; it was so heavily overhung with cobwebs that its form was quite undistinguishable; and, as I looked along the yellow expanse out of which I remember its seeming to grow, like a black fungus, I saw speckle-legged spiders with blotchy bodies running home to it, and running out from it, as if some circumstances of the greatest public importance had just transpired in the spider community.
I heard the mice too, rattling behind the panels, as if the same occurrence were important to their interests. But the black beetles took no notice of the agitation, and groped about the hearth in a ponderous elderly way, as if they were short-sighted and hard of hearing, and not on terms with one another.
These crawling things had fascinated my attention, and I was watching them from a distance, when Miss Havisham laid a hand upon my shoulder. In her other hand she had a crutch-headed stick on which she leaned, and she looked like the Witch of the place.
This, said she, pointing to the long table with her stick, is where I will be laid when I am dead. They shall come and look at me here.
With some vague misgiving that she might get upon the table then and there and die at once, the complete realisation of the ghastly waxwork at the Fair, I shrank under her touch.
What do you think that is? she asked me, again pointing with her stick; that, where those cobwebs are?
I can't guess what it is, ma'am.
It's a great cake. A bride-cake. Mine!
She looked all round the room in a glaring manner, and then said, leaning on me while her hand twitched my shoulder, Come, come, come! Walk me, walk me!
I made out from this, that the work I had to do, was to walk Miss Havisham round and round the room. Accordingly, I started at once, and she leaned upon my shoulder, and we went away at a pace that might have been an imitation (founded on my first impulse under that roof) of Mr. Pumblechook's chaise-cart.
She was not physically strong, and after a little time said, Slower! Still, we went at an impatient fitful speed, and as we went, she twitched the hand upon my shoulder, and worked her mouth, and led me to believe that we were going fast because her thoughts went fast. After a while she said, Call Estella! so I went out on the landing and roared that name as I had done on the previous occasion. When her light appeared, I returned to Miss Havisham, and we started away again round and round the room.
If only Estella had come to be a spectator of our proceedings, I should have felt sufficiently discontented; but as she brought with her the three ladies and the gentleman whom I had seen below, I didn't know what to do. In my politeness, I would have stopped; but Miss Havisham twitched my shoulder, and we posted on, with a shame-faced consciousness on my part that they would think it was all my doing.
Dear Miss Havisham, said Miss Sarah Pocket. How well you look!
I do not, returned Miss Havisham. I am yellow skin and bone.
Camilla brightened when Miss Pocket met with this rebuff; and she murmured, as she plaintively contemplated Miss Havisham, Poor dear soul! Certainly not to be expected to look well, poor thing. The idea!
And how are you? said Miss Havisham to Camilla. As we were close to Camilla then, I would have stopped as a matter of course, only Miss Havisham wouldn't stop. We swept on, and I felt that I was highly obnoxious to Camilla.
Thank you, Miss Havisham, she returned, I am as well as can be expected.
Why, what's the matter with you? asked Miss Havisham, with exceeding sharpness.
Nothing worth mentioning, replied Camilla. I don't wish to make a display of my feelings, but I have habitually thought of you more in the night than I am quite equal to.
Then don't think of me, retorted Miss Havisham.
Very easily said! remarked Camilla, amiably repressing a sob, while a hitch came into her upper lip, and her tears overflowed. Raymond is a witness what ginger and sal volatile I am obliged to take in the night. Raymond is a witness what nervous jerkings I have in my legs. Chokings and nervous jerkings, however, are nothing new to me when I think with anxiety of those I love. If I could be less affectionate and sensitive, I should have a better digestion and an iron set of nerves. I am sure I wish it could be so. But as to not thinking of you in the night The idea! Here, a burst of tears.
The Raymond referred to, I understood to be the gentleman present, and him I understood to be Mr. Camilla. He came to the rescue at this point, and said in a consolatory and complimentary voice, Camilla, my dear, it is well known that your family feelings are gradually undermining you to the extent of making one of your legs shorter than the other.
I am not aware, observed the grave lady whose voice I had heard but once, that to think of any person is to make a great claim upon that person, my dear.
Miss Sarah Pocket, whom I now saw to be a little dry, brown, corrugated old woman, with a small face that might have been made of walnut-shells, and a large mouth like a cat's without the whiskers, supported this position by saying, No, indeed, my dear. Hem!
Thinking is easy enough, said the grave lady.
What is easier, you know? assented Miss Sarah Pocket.
Oh, yes, yes! cried Camilla, whose fermenting feelings appeared to rise from her legs to her bosom. It's all very true! It's a weakness to be so affectionate, but I can't help it. No doubt my health would be much better if it was otherwise, still I wouldn't change my disposition if I could. It's the cause of much suffering, but it's a consolation to know I posses it, when I wake up in the night. Here another burst of feeling.
Miss Havisham and I had never stopped all this time, but kept going round and round the room; now brushing against the skirts of the visitors, now giving them the whole length of the dismal chamber.
There's Matthew! said Camilla. Never mixing with any natural ties, never coming here to see how Miss Havisham is! I have taken to the sofa with my staylace cut, and have lain there hours insensible, with my head over the side, and my hair all down, and my feet I don't know where-
(Much higher than your head, my love, said Mr. Camilla.)
I have gone off into that state, hours and hours, on account of Matthew's strange and inexplicable conduct, and nobody has thanked me.
Really I must say I should think not! interposed the grave lady.
You see, my dear, added Miss Sarah Pocket (a blandly vicious personage), the question to put to yourself is, who did you expect to thank you, my love?
Without expecting any thanks, or anything of the sort, resumed Camilla, I have remained in that state, hours and hours, and Raymond is a witness of the extent to which I have choked, and what the total inefficacy of ginger has been, and I have been heard at the piano-forte tuner's across the street, where the poor mistaken children have even supposed it to be pigeons cooing at a distance, and now to be told- Here Camilla put her hand to her throat, and began to be quite chemical as to the formation of new combinations there.
When this same Matthew was mentioned, Miss Havisham stopped me and herself, and stood looking at the speaker. This change had a great influence in bringing Camilla's chemistry to a sudden end.
Matthew will come and see me at last, said Miss Havisham, sternly, when I am laid on that table. That will be his place, there, striking the table with her stick, at my head! And yours will be there! And your husband's there! And Sarah Pocket's there! And Georgiana's there! Now you all know where to take your stations when you come to feast upon me. And now go!
At the mention of each name, she had struck the table with her stick in a new place. She now said, Walk me, walk me! and we went on again.
I suppose there's nothing to be done, exclaimed Camilla, but comply and depart. It's something to have seen the object of one's love and duty for even so short a time. I shall think of it with a melancholy satisfaction when I wake up in the night. I wish Matthew could have that comfort, but he sets it at defiance. I am determined not to make a display of my feelings, but it's very hard to be told one wants to feast on one's relations, as if one was a Giant, and to be told to go. The bare idea!
Mr. Camilla interposing, as Mrs. Camilla laid her hand upon her heaving bosom, that lady assumed an unnatural fortitude of manner which I supposed to be expressive of an intention to drop and choke when out of view, and kissing her hand to Miss Havisham, was escorted forth. Sarah Pocket and Georgiana contended who should remain last; but Sarah was too knowing to be outdone, and ambled round Georgiana with that artful slipperiness that the latter was obliged to take precedence. Sarah Pocket then made her separate effect of departing with, Bless you, Miss Havisham dear! and with a smile of forgiving pity on her walnut-shell countenance for the weaknesses of the rest.
While Estella was away lighting them down, Miss Havisham still walked with her hand on my shoulder, but more and more slowly. At last she stopped before the fire, and said, after muttering and looking at it some seconds,-
This is my birthday, Pip.
I was going to wish her many happy returns, when she lifted her stick.
I don't suffer it to be spoken of. I don't suffer those who were here just now, or any one to speak of it. They come here on the day, but they dare not refer to it.
Of course I made no further effort to refer to it.
On this day of the year, long before you were born, this heap of decay, stabbing with her crutched stick at the pile of cobwebs on the table, but not touching it, was brought here. It and I have worn away together. The mice have gnawed at it, and sharper teeth than teeth of mice have gnawed at me.
She held the head of her stick against her heart as she stood looking at the table; she in her once white dress, all yellow and withered; the once white cloth all yellow and withered; everything around in a state to crumble under a touch.
When the ruin is complete, said she, with a ghastly look, and when they lay me dead, in my bride's dress on the bride's table, which shall be done, and which will be the finished curse upon him, so much the better if it is done on this day!
She stood looking at the table as if she stood looking at her own figure lying there. I remained quiet. Estella returned, and she too remained quiet. It seemed to me that we continued thus for a long time. In the heavy air of the room, and the heavy darkness that brooded in its remoter corners, I even had an alarming fancy that Estella and I might presently begin to decay.