The Personal History of David Copperfield

“Is Sophy the youngest?” I hazarded.

“Oh dear, no!” said Traddles, stroking his chin. “The two youngest are only nine and ten. Sophy educates ’em.”

“The second daughter, perhaps?” I hazarded.

“No,” said Traddles. “Sarah’s the second. Sarah has something the matter with her spine, poor girl. The malady will wear out by-and-by, the doctors say, but in the meantime she has to lie down for a twelvemonth. Sophy nurses her. Sophy’s the fourth.”

“Is the mother living?” I inquired.

“Oh yes,” said Traddles, “she is alive. She is a very superior woman, indeed, but the damp country is not adapted to her constitution, and – in fact, she has lost the use of her limbs.”

“Dear me!” said I.

“Very sad, is it not?” returned Traddles. “But in a merely domestic view it is not so bad as it might be, because Sophy takes her place. She is quite as much a mother to her mother, as she is to the other nine.”

I felt the greatest admiration for the virtues of this young lady; and, honestly with the view of doing my best to prevent the good-nature of Traddles from being imposed upon, to the detriment of their joint prospects in life, inquired how Mr. Micawber was?

“He is quite well, Copperfield, thank you,” said Traddles. “I am not living with him at present.”

“No?”

“No. You see the truth is,” said Traddles, in a whisper, “he has changed his name to Mortimer, in consequence of his temporary embarrassments; and he don’t come out till after dark – and then in spectacles. There was an execution put into our house, for rent. Mrs. Micawber was in such a dreadful state that I really couldn’t resist giving my name to that second bill we spoke of here. You may imagine how delightful it was to my feelings, Copperfield, to see the matter settled with it, and Mrs. Micawber recover her spirits.”

“Hum!” said I.

“Not that her happiness was of long duration,” pursued Traddles, “for, unfortunately, within a week another execution came in. It broke up the establishment. I have been living in a furnished apartment since then, and the Mortimers have been very private indeed. I hope you won’t think it selfish, Copperfield, if I mention that the broker carried off my little round table with the marble top, and Sophy’s flower-pot and stand?”

“What a hard thing!” I exclaimed indignantly.

“It was a – it was a pull,” said Traddles, with his usual wince at that expression. “I don’t mention it reproachfully, however, but with a motive. The fact is, Copperfield, I was unable to repurchase them at the time of their seizure; in the first place, because the broker, having an idea that I wanted them, ran the price up to an extravagant extent; and, in the second place, because I – hadn’t any money. Now, I have kept my eye since, upon the broker’s shop,” said Traddles, with a great enjoyment of his mystery, “which is up at the top of Tottenham Court Road, and, at last, to-day I find them put out for sale. I have only noticed them from over the way, because if the broker saw me, bless you, he’d ask any price for them! What has occurred to me, having now the money, is, that perhaps you wouldn’t object to ask that good nurse of yours to come with me to the shop – I can show it her from round the corner of the next street – and make the best bargain for them, as if they were for herself, that she can!”

The delight with which Traddles propounded this plan to me, and the sense he had of its uncommon artfulness, are among the freshest things in my remembrance.

I told him that my old nurse would be delighted to assist him, and that we would all three take the field together, but on one condition. That condition was, that he should make a solemn resolution to grant no more loans of his name, or anything else, to Mr. Micawber.

“My dear Copperfield,” said Traddles, “I have already done so, because I begin to feel that I have not only been inconsiderate, but that I have been positively unjust to Sophy. My word being passed to myself, there is no longer any apprehension; but I pledge it to you, too, with the greatest readiness. That first unlucky obligation, I have paid. I have no doubt Mr. Micawber would have paid it if he could, but he could not. One thing I ought to mention, which I like very much in Mr. Micawber, Copperfield. It refers to the second obligation, which is not yet due. He don’t tell me that it is provided for, but he says it will be. Now, I think there is something very fair and honest about that!”

I was unwilling to damp my good friend’s confidence, and therefore assented. After a little further conversation, we went round to the chandler’s shop, to enlist Peggotty; Traddles declining to pass the evening with me, both because he endured the liveliest apprehensions that his property would be bought by somebody else before he could re-purchase it, and because it was the evening he always devoted to writing to the dearest girl in the world.

I never shall forget him peeping round the corner of the street in Tottenham Court Road, while Peggotty was bargaining for the precious articles; or his agitation when she came slowly towards us after vainly offering a price, and was hailed by the relenting broker, and went back again. The end of the negotiation was, that she bought the property on tolerably easy terms, and Traddles was transported with pleasure.

“I am very much obliged to you, indeed,” said Traddles, on hearing it was to be sent to where he lived, that night. “If I might ask one other favor, I hope you wouldn’t think it absurd, Copperfield?”

I said beforehand, certainly not.

“Then if you would be good enough,” said Traddles to Peggotty, “to get the flower-pot now, I think I should like (it being Sophy’s, Copperfield) to carry it home myself!”

Peggotty was glad to get it for him, and he overwhelmed her with thanks, and went his way up Tottenham Court Road, carrying the flower-pot affectionately in his arms, with one of the most delighted expressions of countenance I ever saw.

We then turned back towards my chambers. As the shops had charms for Peggotty which I never knew them possess in the same degree for anybody else, I sauntered easily along, amused by her staring in at the windows, and waiting for her as often as she chose. We were thus a good while in getting to the Adelphi.

On our way upstairs, I called her attention to the sudden disappearance of Mrs. Crupp’s pitfalls, and also to the prints of recent footsteps. We were both very much surprised, coming higher up, to find my outer door standing open (which I had shut), and to hear voices inside.

We looked at one another, without knowing what to make of this, and went into the sitting-room. What was my amazement to find, of all people upon earth, my aunt there, and Mr. Dick! My aunt sitting on a quantity of luggage, with her two birds before her, and her cat on her knee, like a female Robinson Crusoe, drinking tea. Mr. Dick leaning thoughtfully on a great kite, such as we had often been out together to fly, with more luggage piled about him!

“My dear aunt!” cried I. “Why, what an unexpected pleasure!”

We cordially embraced; and Mr. Dick and I cordially shook hands; and Mrs. Crupp, who was busy making tea, and could not be too attentive, cordially said she had knowed well as Mr. Copperfull would have his heart in his mouth, when he see his dear relations.

“Halloa!” said my aunt to Peggotty, who quailed before her awful presence. “How are you?”

“You remember my aunt, Peggotty?” said I.

“For the love of goodness, child,” exclaimed my aunt, “don’t call the woman by that South Sea Island name! If she married and got rid of it, which was the best thing she could do, why don’t you give her the benefit of the change? What’s your name now, – P?” said my aunt, as a compromise for the obnoxious appellation.

“Barkis, ma’am,” said Peggotty, with a curtsey.

“Well! that’s human,” said my aunt. “It sounds less as if you wanted a Missionary. How d’ ye do, Barkis? I hope you’re well?”

Encouraged by these gracious words, and by my aunt’s extending her hand, Barkis came forward, and took the hand, and curtseyed her acknowledgments.

“We are older than we were, I see,” said my aunt. “We have only met each other once before, you know. A nice business we made of it then! Trot, my dear, another cup.”

I handed it dutifully to my aunt, who was in her usual inflexible state of figure; and ventured a remonstrance with her on the subject of her sitting on a box.

“Let me draw the sofa here, or the easy chair, aunt,” said I. “Why should you be so uncomfortable?”

“Thank you, Trot,” replied my aunt, “I prefer to sit upon my property.” Here my aunt looked hard at Mrs. Crupp, and observed, “We needn’t trouble you to wait, ma’am.”

“Shall I put a little more tea in the pot afore I go, ma’am?” said Mrs. Crupp.

“No, I thank you, ma’am,” replied my aunt.

“Would you let me fetch another pat of butter, ma’am?” said Mrs. Crupp. “Or would you be persuaded to try a new-laid hegg? or should I brile a rasher? Ain’t there nothing I could do for your dear aunt, Mr. Copperfull?”

“Nothing, ma’am,” returned my aunt. “I shall do very well, I thank you.”

Mrs. Crupp, who had been incessantly smiling to express sweet temper, and incessantly holding her head on one side, to express a general feebleness of constitution, and incessantly rubbing her hands, to express a desire to be of service to all deserving objects, gradually smiled herself, one-sided herself, and rubbed herself, out of the room.

“Dick!” said my aunt. “You know what I told you about time-servers and wealth-worshippers?”

Mr. Dick – with rather a scared look, as if he had forgotten it – returned a hasty answer in the affirmative.

“Mrs. Crupp is one of them,” said my aunt. “Barkis, I’ll trouble you to look after the tea, and let me have another cup, for I don’t fancy that woman’s pouring-out!”

I knew my aunt sufficiently well to know that she had something of importance on her mind, and that there was far more matter in this arrival than a stranger might have supposed. I noticed how her eye lighted on me, when she thought my attention otherwise occupied; and what a curious process of hesitation appeared to be going on within her, while she preserved her outward stiffness and composure. I began to reflect whether I had done anything to offend her; and my conscience whispered me that I had not yet told her about Dora. Could it by any means be that, I wondered!

As I knew she would only speak in her own good time, I sat down near her, and spoke to the birds, and played with the cat, and was as easy as I could be. But I was very far from being really easy; and I should still have been so, even if Mr. Dick, leaning over the great kite behind my aunt, had not taken every secret opportunity of shaking his head darkly at me, and pointing at her.

“Trot,” said my aunt at last, when she had finished her tea, and carefully smoothed down her dress, and wiped her lips – “you needn’t go, Barkis! – Trot, have you got to be firm, and self-reliant?”

“I hope so, aunt.”

“What do you think?” inquired Miss Betsey.

“I think so, aunt.”

“Then why, my love,” said my aunt, looking earnestly at me, “why do you think I prefer to sit upon this property of mine to-night?”

I shook my head, unable to guess.

“Because,” said my aunt, “it’s all I have. Because I’m ruined, my dear!”

If the house, and every one of us, had tumbled out into the river together, I could hardly have received a greater shock.

“Dick knows it,” said my aunt, laying her hand calmly on my shoulder. “I am ruined, my dear Trot! All I have in the world is in this room, except the cottage; and that I have left Janet to let. Barkis, I want to get a bed for this gentleman to-night. To save expense, perhaps you can make up something here for myself. Anything will do. It’s only for to-night. We’ll talk about this, more, to-morrow.”

I was roused from my amazement, and concern for her – I am sure, for her – by her falling on my neck, for a moment, and crying that she only grieved for me. In another moment, she suppressed this emotion; and said with an aspect more triumphant than dejected:

“We must meet reverses boldly, and not suffer them to frighten us, my dear. We must learn to act the play out. We must live misfortune down, Trot!”

CHAPTER XXXV.

DEPRESSION

As soon as I could recover my presence of mind, which quite deserted me in the first overpowering shock of my aunt’s intelligence, I proposed to Mr. Dick to come round to the chandler’s shop, and take possession of the bed which Mr. Peggotty had lately vacated. The chandler’s shop being in Hungerford Market, and Hungerford Market being a very different place in those days, there was a low wooden colonnade before the door (not very unlike that before the house where the little man and woman used to live, in the old weather-glass), which pleased Mr. Dick mightily. The glory of lodging over this structure would have compensated him, I dare say, for many inconveniences; but, as there were really few to bear, beyond the compound of flavors I have already mentioned, and perhaps the want of a little more elbow-room, he was perfectly charmed with his accommodation. Mrs. Crupp had indignantly assured him that there wasn’t room to swing a cat there; but, as Mr. Dick justly observed to me, sitting down on the foot of the bed, nursing his leg, “You know, Trotwood, I don’t want to swing a cat. I never do swing a cat. Therefore, what does that signify to me!”

I tried to ascertain whether Mr. Dick had any understanding of the causes of this sudden and great change in my aunt’s affairs. As I might have expected, he had none at all. The only account he could give of it, was, that my aunt had said to him, the day before yesterday, “Now, Dick, are you really and truly the philosopher I take you for?” That then he had said, Yes, he hoped so. That then my aunt had said, “Dick, I am ruined.” That then he had said “Oh, indeed!” That then my aunt had praised him highly, which he was very glad of. And that then they had come to me, and had had bottled porter and sandwiches on the road.

Mr. Dick was so very complacent, sitting on the foot of the bed, nursing his leg, and telling me this, with his eyes wide open and a surprised smile, that I am sorry to say I was provoked into explaining to him that ruin meant distress, want, and starvation; but, I was soon bitterly reproved for this harshness, by seeing his face turn pale, and tears course down his lengthened cheeks, while he fixed upon me a look of such unutterable woe, that it might have softened a far harder heart than mine. I took infinitely greater pains to cheer him up again than I had taken to depress him; and I soon understood (as I ought to have known at first) that he had been so confident, merely because of his faith in the wisest and most wonderful of women, and his unbounded reliance on my intellectual resources. The latter, I believe, he considered a match for any kind of disaster not absolutely mortal.

“What can we do, Trotwood?” said Mr. Dick. “There’s the Memorial – ”

“To be sure there is,” said I. “But all we can do just now, Mr. Dick, is to keep a cheerful countenance, and not let my aunt see that we are thinking about it.”

He assented to this in the most earnest manner; and implored me, if I should see him wandering an inch out of the right course, to recal him by some of those superior methods which were always at my command. But I regret to state that the fright I had given him proved too much for his best attempts at concealment. All the evening his eyes wandered to my aunt’s face, with an expression of the most dismal apprehension, as if he saw her growing thin on the spot. He was conscious of this, and put a constraint upon his head; but his keeping that immovable, and sitting rolling his eyes like a piece of machinery, did not mend the matter at all. I saw him look at the loaf at supper (which happened to be a small one), as if nothing else stood between us and famine; and when my aunt insisted on his making his customary repast, I detected him in the act of pocketing fragments of his bread and cheese; I have no doubt for the purpose of reviving us with those savings, when we should have reached an advanced stage of attenuation.

My aunt, on the other hand, was in a composed frame of mind, which was a lesson to all of us – to me, I am sure. She was extremely gracious to Peggotty, except when I inadvertently called her by that name; and, strange as I knew she felt in London, appeared quite at home. She was to have my bed, and I was to lie in the sitting-room, to keep guard over her. She made a great point of being so near the river, in case of a conflagration; and I suppose really did find some satisfaction in that circumstance.

“Trot, my dear,” said my aunt, when she saw me making preparations for compounding her usual night-draught, “No!”

“Nothing, aunt?”

“Not wine, my dear. Ale.”

“But there is wine here, aunt. And you always have it made of wine.”

“Keep that, in case of sickness,” said my aunt. “We mustn’t use it carelessly, Trot. Ale for me. Half a pint.”

I thought Mr. Dick would have fallen, insensible. My aunt being resolute, I went out and got the ale myself. As it was growing late, Peggotty and Mr. Dick took that opportunity of repairing to the chandler’s shop together. I parted from him, poor fellow, at the corner of the street, with his great kite at his back, a very monument of human misery.

My aunt was walking up and down the room when I returned, crimping the borders of her nightcap with her fingers. I warmed the ale and made the toast on the usual infallible principles. When it was ready for her, she was ready for it, with her nightcap on, and the skirt of her gown turned back on her knees.

“My dear,” said my aunt, after taking a spoonful of it; “it’s a great deal better than wine. Not half so bilious.”

I suppose I looked doubtful, for she added:

“Tut, tut, child. If nothing worse than Ale happens to us, we are well off.”

“I should think so myself, aunt, I am sure,” said I.

“Well, then, why don’t you think so?” said my aunt.

“Because you and I are very different people,” I returned.

“Stuff and nonsense, Trot!” replied my aunt.

My aunt went on with a quiet enjoyment, in which there was very little affectation, if any; drinking the warm ale with a teaspoon, and soaking her strips of toast in it.

“Trot,” said she, “I don’t care for strange faces in general, but I rather like that Barkis of yours, do you know!”

“It’s better than a hundred pounds to hear you say so!” said I.

“It’s a most extraordinary world,” observed my aunt, rubbing her nose; “how that woman ever got into it with that name, is unaccountable to me. It would be much more easy to be born a Jackson, or something of that sort, one would think.”

“Perhaps she thinks so, too; it’s not her fault,” said I.

“I suppose not,” returned my aunt, rather grudging the admission; “but it’s very aggravating. However, she’s Barkis now. That’s some comfort. Barkis is uncommonly fond of you, Trot.”

“There is nothing she would leave undone to prove it,” said I.

“Nothing, I believe,” returned my aunt. “Here, the poor fool has been begging and praying about handing over some of her money – because she has got too much of it! A simpleton!”

My aunt’s tears of pleasure were positively trickling down into the warm ale.

“She’s the most ridiculous creature that ever was born,” said my aunt. “I knew, from the first moment when I saw her with that poor dear blessed baby of a mother of yours, that she was the most ridiculous of mortals. But there are good points in Barkis!”

Affecting to laugh, she got an opportunity of putting her hand to her eyes. Having availed herself of it, she resumed her toast and her discourse together.

“Ah! Mercy upon us!” sighed my aunt. “I know all about it, Trot! Barkis and myself had quite a gossip while you were out with Dick. I know all about it. I don’t know where these wretched girls expect to go to, for my part. I wonder they don’t knock out their brains against – against mantelpieces,” said my aunt; an idea which was probably suggested to her by her contemplation of mine.

“Poor Emily!” said I.

“Oh, don’t talk to me about poor,” returned my aunt. “She should have thought of that, before she caused so much misery! Give me a kiss, Trot. I am sorry for your early experience.”

As I bent forward, she put her tumbler on my knee to detain me, and said:

“Oh, Trot, Trot! And so you fancy yourself in love! Do you?”

“Fancy, aunt!” I exclaimed, as red as I could be. “I adore her with my whole soul!”

“Dora, indeed!” returned my aunt. “And you mean to say the little thing is very fascinating, I suppose?”

“My dear aunt,” I replied, “no one can form the least idea what she is!”

“Ah! And not silly?” said my aunt.

“Silly, aunt!”

I seriously believe it had never once entered my head for a single moment, to consider whether she was or not. I resented the idea, of course; but I was in a manner struck by it, as a new one altogether.

“Not light-headed?” said my aunt.

“Light-headed, aunt!” I could only repeat this daring speculation with the same kind of feeling with which I had repeated the preceding question.

“Well, well!” said my aunt. “I only ask. I don’t depreciate her. Poor little couple! And so you think you were formed for one another, and are to go through a party-supper-table kind of life, like two pretty pieces of confectionary, do you, Trot?”

She asked me this so kindly, and with such a gentle air, half playful and half sorrowful, that I was quite touched.

“We are young and inexperienced, aunt, I know,” I replied; “and I dare say we say and think a good deal that is rather foolish. But we love one another truly, I am sure. If I thought Dora could ever love anybody else, or cease to love me; or that I could ever love anybody else, or cease to love her; I don’t know what I should do – go out of my mind, I think!”

“Ah, Trot!” said my aunt, shaking her head, and smiling gravely; “blind, blind, blind!”

“Some one that I know, Trot,” my aunt pursued, after a pause, “though of a very pliant disposition, has an earnestness of affection in him that reminds me of poor Baby. Earnestness is what that Somebody must look for, to sustain him and improve him, Trot. Deep, downright, faithful earnestness.”

“If you only knew the earnestness of Dora, aunt!” I cried.

“Oh, Trot!” she said again; “blind, blind!” and without knowing why, I felt a vague unhappy loss or want of something overshadow me like a cloud.

“However,” said my aunt, “I don’t want to put two young creatures out of conceit with themselves, or to make them unhappy; so, though it is a girl and boy attachment, and girl and boy attachments very often – mind! I don’t say always! – come to nothing, still we’ll be serious about it, and hope for a prosperous issue one of these days. There’s time enough for it to come to anything!”

This was not upon the whole very comforting to a rapturous lover; but I was glad to have my aunt in my confidence, and I was mindful of her being fatigued. So I thanked her ardently for this mark of her affection, and for all her other kindnesses towards me; and after a tender good night, she took her nightcap into my bedroom.

How miserable I was, when I lay down! How I thought and thought about my being poor, in Mr. Spenlow’s eyes; about my not being what I thought I was, when I proposed to Dora; about the chivalrous necessity of telling Dora what my worldly condition was, and releasing her from her engagement if she thought fit; about how I should contrive to live, during the long term of my articles, when I was earning nothing; about doing something to assist my aunt, and seeing no way of doing anything; about coming down to have no money in my pocket, and to wear a shabby coat, and to be able to carry Dora no little presents, and to ride no gallant greys, and to show myself in no agreeable light! Sordid and selfish as I knew it was, and as I tortured myself by knowing that it was, to let my mind run on my own distress so much, I was so devoted to Dora that I could not help it. I knew that it was base in me not to think more of my aunt, and less of myself; but, so far, selfishness was inseparable from Dora, and I could not put Dora on one side for any mortal creature. How exceedingly miserable I was, that night!