|
THE SEQUEL OF MY RESOLUTION
For anything I know, I may have had some wild idea of running
all the way to Dover, when I gave up the pursuit of the young man
with the donkey-cart, and started for Greenwich. My scattered senses
were soon collected as to that point, if I had; for I came to a
stop in the Kent Road, at a terrace with a piece of water before
it, and a great foolish image in the middle, blowing a dry shell.
Here I sat down on a doorstep, quite spent and exhausted with the
efforts I had already made, and with hardly breath enough to cry
for the loss of my box and half-guinea.
It was by this time dark; I heard the clocks strike ten, as I
sat resting. But it was a summer night, fortunately, and fine weather.
When I had recovered my breath, and had got rid of a stifling sensation
in my throat, I rose up and went on. In the midst of my distress,
I had no notion of going back. I doubt if I should have had any,
though there had been a Swiss snow-drift in the Kent Road.
But my standing possessed of only three-halfpence in the world
(and I am sure I wonder how they came to be left in my pocket on
a Saturday night!) troubled me none the less because I went on.
I began to picture to myself, as a scrap of newspaper intelligence,
my being found dead in a day or two, under some hedge; and I trudged
on miserably, though as fast as I could, until I happened to pass
a little shop, where it was written up that ladies' and gentlemen's
wardrobes were bought, and that the best price was given for rags,
bones, and kitchen-stuff. The master of this shop was sitting at
the door in his shirt-sleeves, smoking; and as there were a great
many coats and pairs of trousers dangling from the low ceiling,
and only two feeble candles burning inside to show what they were,
I fancied that he looked like a man of a revengeful disposition,
who had hung all his enemies, and was enjoying himself.
My late experiences with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber suggested to me
that here might be a means of keeping off the wolf for a little
while. I went up the next by-street, took off my waistcoat, rolled
it neatly under my arm, and came back to the shop door.
'If you please, sir,' I said, 'I am to sell this for a fair price.'
Mr. Dolloby - Dolloby was the name over the shop door, at least
- took the waistcoat, stood his pipe on its head, against the door-post,
went into the shop, followed by me, snuffed the two candles with
his fingers, spread the waistcoat on the counter, and looked at
it there, held it up against the light, and looked at it there,
and ultimately said:
'What do you call a price, now, for this here little weskit?'
'Oh! you know best, sir,' I returned modestly.
'I can't be buyer and seller too,' said Mr. Dolloby. 'Put a price
on this here little weskit.'
'Would eighteenpence be?'- I hinted, after some hesitation.
Mr. Dolloby rolled it up again, and gave it me back. 'I should
rob my family,' he said, 'if I was to offer ninepence for it.'
This was a disagreeable way of putting the business; because
it imposed upon me, a perfect stranger, the unpleasantness of asking
Mr. Dolloby to rob his family on my account. My circumstances being
so very pressing, however, I said I would take ninepence for it,
if he pleased. Mr. Dolloby, not without some grumbling, gave ninepence.
I wished him good night, and walked out of the shop the richer by
that sum, and the poorer by a waistcoat. But when I buttoned my
jacket, that was not much. Indeed, I foresaw pretty clearly that
my jacket would go next, and that I should have to make the best
of my way to Dover in a shirt and a pair of trousers, and might
deem myself lucky if I got there even in that trim. But my mind
did not run so much on this as might be supposed. Beyond a general
impression of the distance before me, and of the young man with
the donkey-cart having used me cruelly, I think I had no very urgent
sense of my difficulties when I once again set off with my ninepence
in my pocket.
A plan had occurred to me for passing the night, which I was
going to carry into execution. This was, to lie behind the wall
at the back of my old school, in a corner where there used to be
a haystack. I imagined it would be a kind of company to have the
boys, and the bedroom where I used to tell the stories, so near
me: although the boys would know nothing of my being there, and
the bedroom would yield me no shelter.
I had had a hard day's work, and was pretty well jaded when I
came climbing out, at last, upon the level of Blackheath. It cost
me some trouble to find out Salem House; but I found it, and I found
a haystack in the corner, and I lay down by it; having first walked
round the wall, and looked up at the windows, and seen that all
was dark and silent within. Never shall I forget the lonely sensation
of first lying down, without a roof above my head!
Sleep came upon me as it came on many other outcasts, against
whom house-doors were locked, and house-dogs barked, that night
- and I dreamed of lying on my old school-bed, talking to the boys
in my room; and found myself sitting upright, with Steerforth's
name upon my lips, looking wildly at the stars that were glistening
and glimmering above me. When I remembered where I was at that untimely
hour, a feeling stole upon me that made me get up, afraid of I don't
know what, and walk about. But the fainter glimmering of the stars,
and the pale light in the sky where the day was coming, reassured
me: and my eyes being very heavy, I lay down again and slept - though
with a knowledge in my sleep that it was cold - until the warm beams
of the sun, and the ringing of the getting-up bell at Salem House,
awoke me. If I could have hoped that Steerforth was there, I would
have lurked about until he came out alone; but I knew he must have
left long since. Traddles still remained, perhaps, but it was very
doubtful; and I had not sufficient confidence in his discretion
or good luck, however strong my reliance was on his good nature,
to wish to trust him with my situation. So I crept away from the
wall as Mr. Creakle's boys were getting up, and struck into the
long dusty track which I had first known to be the Dover Road when
I was one of them, and when I little expected that any eyes would
ever see me the wayfarer I was now, upon it.
What a different Sunday morning from the old Sunday morning at
Yarmouth! In due time I heard the church-bells ringing, as I plodded
on; and I met people who were going to church; and I passed a church
or two where the congregation were inside, and the sound of singing
came out into the sunshine, while the beadle sat and cooled himself
in the shade of the porch, or stood beneath the yew-tree, with his
hand to his forehead, glowering at me going by. But the peace and
rest of the old Sunday morning were on everything, except me. That
was the difference. I felt quite wicked in my dirt and dust, with
my tangled hair. But for the quiet picture I had conjured up, of
my mother in her youth and beauty, weeping by the fire, and my aunt
relenting to her, I hardly think I should have had the courage to
go on until next day. But it always went before me, and I followed.
I got, that Sunday, through three-and-twenty miles on the straight
road, though not very easily, for I was new to that kind of toil.
I see myself, as evening closes in, coming over the bridge at Rochester,
footsore and tired, and eating bread that I had bought for supper.
One or two little houses, with the notice, 'Lodgings for Travellers',
hanging out, had tempted me; but I was afraid of spending the few
pence I had, and was even more afraid of the vicious looks of the
trampers I had met or overtaken. I sought no shelter, therefore,
but the sky; and toiling into Chatham, - which, in that night's
aspect, is a mere dream of chalk, and drawbridges, and mastless
ships in a muddy river, roofed like Noah's arks, - crept, at last,
upon a sort of grass-grown battery overhanging a lane, where a sentry
was walking to and fro. Here I lay down, near a cannon; and, happy
in the society of the sentry's footsteps, though he knew no more
of my being above him than the boys at Salem House had known of
my lying by the wall, slept soundly until morning.
Very stiff and sore of foot I was in the morning, and quite dazed
by the beating of drums and marching of troops, which seemed to
hem me in on every side when I went down towards the long narrow
street. Feeling that I could go but a very little way that day,
if I were to reserve any strength for getting to my journey's end,
I resolved to make the sale of my jacket its principal business.
Accordingly, I took the jacket off, that I might learn to do without
it; and carrying it under my arm, began a tour of inspection of
the various slop-shops.
It was a likely place to sell a jacket in; for the dealers in
second-hand clothes were numerous, and were, generally speaking,
on the look-out for customers at their shop doors. But as most of
them had, hanging up among their stock, an officer's coat or two,
epaulettes and all, I was rendered timid by the costly nature of
their dealings, and walked about for a long time without offering
my merchandise to anyone.
This modesty of mine directed my attention to the marine-store
shops, and such shops as Mr. Dolloby's, in preference to the regular
dealers. At last I found one that I thought looked promising, at
the corner of a dirty lane, ending in an enclosure full of stinging-nettles,
against the palings of which some second-hand sailors' clothes,
that seemed to have overflowed the shop, were fluttering among some
cots, and rusty guns, and oilskin hats, and certain trays full of
so many old rusty keys of so many sizes that they seemed various
enough to open all the doors in the world.
Into this shop, which was low and small, and which was darkened
rather than lighted by a little window, overhung with clothes, and
was descended into by some steps, I went with a palpitating heart;
which was not relieved when an ugly old man, with the lower part
of his face all covered with a stubbly grey beard, rushed out of
a dirty den behind it, and seized me by the hair of my head. He
was a dreadful old man to look at, in a filthy flannel waistcoat,
and smelling terribly of rum. His bedstead, covered with a tumbled
and ragged piece of patchwork, was in the den he had come from,
where another little window showed a prospect of more stinging-nettles,
and a lame donkey.
'Oh, what do you want?' grinned this old man, in a fierce, monotonous
whine. 'Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want? Oh, my lungs and
liver, what do you want? Oh, goroo, goroo!'
I was so much dismayed by these words, and particularly by the
repetition of the last unknown one, which was a kind of rattle in
his throat, that I could make no answer; hereupon the old man, still
holding me by the hair, repeated:
'Oh, what do you want? Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want?
Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goroo!' - which he
screwed out of himself, with an energy that made his eyes start
in his head.
'I wanted to know,' I said, trembling, 'if you would buy a jacket.'
'Oh, let's see the jacket!' cried the old man. 'Oh, my heart
on fire, show the jacket to us! Oh, my eyes and limbs, bring the
jacket out!'
With that he took his trembling hands, which were like the claws
of a great bird, out of my hair; and put on a pair of spectacles,
not at all ornamental to his inflamed eyes.
'Oh, how much for the jacket?' cried the old man, after examining
it. 'Oh - goroo! - how much for the jacket?'
'Half-a-crown,' I answered, recovering myself.
'Oh, my lungs and liver,' cried the old man, 'no! Oh, my eyes,
no! Oh, my limbs, no! Eighteenpence. Goroo!'
Every time he uttered this ejaculation, his eyes seemed to be
in danger of starting out; and every sentence he spoke, he delivered
in a sort of tune, always exactly the same, and more like a gust
of wind, which begins low, mounts up high, and falls again, than
any other comparison I can find for it.
'Well,' said I, glad to have closed the bargain, 'I'll take eighteenpence.'
'Oh, my liver!' cried the old man, throwing the jacket on a shelf.
'Get out of the shop! Oh, my lungs, get out of the shop! Oh, my
eyes and limbs - goroo! - don't ask for money; make it an exchange.'
I never was so frightened in my life, before or since; but I told
him humbly that I wanted money, and that nothing else was of any
use to me, but that I would wait for it, as he desired, outside,
and had no wish to hurry him. So I went outside, and sat down in
the shade in a corner. And I sat there so many hours, that the shade
became sunlight, and the sunlight became shade again, and still
I sat there waiting for the money.
There never was such another drunken madman in that line of business,
I hope. That he was well known in the neighbourhood, and enjoyed
the reputation of having sold himself to the devil, I soon understood
from the visits he received from the boys, who continually came
skirmishing about the shop, shouting that legend, and calling to
him to bring out his gold. 'You ain't poor, you know, Charley, as
you pretend. Bring out your gold. Bring out some of the gold you
sold yourself to the devil for. Come! It's in the lining of the
mattress, Charley. Rip it open and let's have some!' This, and many
offers to lend him a knife for the purpose, exasperated him to such
a degree, that the whole day was a succession of rushes on his part,
and flights on the part of the boys. Sometimes in his rage he would
take me for one of them, and come at me, mouthing as if he were
going to tear me in pieces; then, remembering me, just in time,
would dive into the shop, and lie upon his bed, as I thought from
the sound of his voice, yelling in a frantic way, to his own windy
tune, the 'Death of Nelson'; with an Oh! before every line, and
innumerable Goroos interspersed. As if this were not bad enough
for me, the boys, connecting me with the establishment, on account
of the patience and perseverance with which I sat outside, half-dressed,
pelted me, and used me very ill all day.
He made many attempts to induce me to consent to an exchange;
at one time coming out with a fishing-rod, at another with a fiddle,
at another with a cocked hat, at another with a flute. But I resisted
all these overtures, and sat there in desperation; each time asking
him, with tears in my eyes, for my money or my jacket. At last he
began to pay me in halfpence at a time; and was full two hours getting
by easy stages to a shilling.
'Oh, my eyes and limbs!' he then cried, peeping hideously out
of the shop, after a long pause, 'will you go for twopence more?'
'I can't,' I said; 'I shall be starved.'
'Oh, my lungs and liver, will you go for threepence?'
'I would go for nothing, if I could,' I said, 'but I want the
money badly.'
'Oh, go-roo!' (it is really impossible to express how he twisted
this ejaculation out of himself, as he peeped round the door-post
at me, showing nothing but his crafty old head); 'will you go for
fourpence?'
I was so faint and weary that I closed with this offer; and taking
the money out of his claw, not without trembling, went away more
hungry and thirsty than I had ever been, a little before sunset.
But at an expense of threepence I soon refreshed myself completely;
and, being in better spirits then, limped seven miles upon my road.
My bed at night was under another haystack, where I rested comfortably,
after having washed my blistered feet in a stream, and dressed them
as well as I was able, with some cool leaves. When I took the road
again next morning, I found that it lay through a succession of
hop-grounds and orchards. It was sufficiently late in the year for
the orchards to be ruddy with ripe apples; and in a few places the
hop-pickers were already at work. I thought it all extremely beautiful,
and made up my mind to sleep among the hops that night: imagining
some cheerful companionship in the long perspectives of poles, with
the graceful leaves twining round them.
The trampers were worse than ever that day, and inspired me with
a dread that is yet quite fresh in my mind. Some of them were most
ferocious-looking ruffians, who stared at me as I went by; and stopped,
perhaps, and called after me to come back and speak to them, and
when I took to my heels, stoned me. I recollect one young fellow
- a tinker, I suppose, from his wallet and brazier - who had a woman
with him, and who faced about and stared at me thus; and then roared
to me in such a tremendous voice to come back, that I halted and
looked round.
'Come here, when you're called,' said the tinker, 'or I'll rip
your young body open.'
I thought it best to go back. As I drew nearer to them, trying
to propitiate the tinker by my looks, I observed that the woman
had a black eye.
'Where are you going?' said the tinker, gripping the bosom of
my shirt with his blackened hand.
'I am going to Dover,' I said.
'Where do you come from?' asked the tinker, giving his hand another
turn in my shirt, to hold me more securely.
'I come from London,' I said.
'What lay are you upon?' asked the tinker. 'Are you a prig?'
'N-no,' I said.
'Ain't you, by G--? If you make a brag of your honesty to me,'
said the tinker, 'I'll knock your brains out.'
With his disengaged hand he made a menace of striking me, and
then looked at me from head to foot.
'Have you got the price of a pint of beer about you?' said the
tinker. 'If you have, out with it, afore I take it away!'
I should certainly have produced it, but that I met the woman's
look, and saw her very slightly shake her head, and form 'No!' with
her lips.
'I am very poor,' I said, attempting to smile, 'and have got
no money.'
'Why, what do you mean?' said the tinker, looking so sternly
at me, that I almost feared he saw the money in my pocket.
'Sir!' I stammered.
'What do you mean,' said the tinker, 'by wearing my brother's
silk handkerchief! Give it over here!' And he had mine off my neck
in a moment, and tossed it to the woman.
The woman burst into a fit of laughter, as if she thought this
a joke, and tossed it back to me, nodded once, as slightly as before,
and made the word 'Go!' with her lips. Before I could obey, however,
the tinker seized the handkerchief out of my hand with a roughness
that threw me away like a feather, and putting it loosely round
his own neck, turned upon the woman with an oath, and knocked her
down. I never shall forget seeing her fall backward on the hard
road, and lie there with her bonnet tumbled off, and her hair all
whitened in the dust; nor, when I looked back from a distance, seeing
her sitting on the pathway, which was a bank by the roadside, wiping
the blood from her face with a corner of her shawl, while he went
on ahead.
This adventure frightened me so, that, afterwards, when I saw
any of these people coming, I turned back until I could find a hiding-place,
where I remained until they had gone out of sight; which happened
so often, that I was very seriously delayed. But under this difficulty,
as under all the other difficulties of my journey, I seemed to be
sustained and led on by my fanciful picture of my mother in her
youth, before I came into the world. It always kept me company.
It was there, among the hops, when I lay down to sleep; it was with
me on my waking in the morning; it went before me all day. I have
associated it, ever since, with the sunny street of Canterbury,
dozing as it were in the hot light; and with the sight of its old
houses and gateways, and the stately, grey Cathedral, with the rooks
sailing round the towers. When I came, at last, upon the bare, wide
downs near Dover, it relieved the solitary aspect of the scene with
hope; and not until I reached that first great aim of my journey,
and actually set foot in the town itself, on the sixth day of my
flight, did it desert me. But then, strange to say, when I stood
with my ragged shoes, and my dusty, sunburnt, half-clothed figure,
in the place so long desired, it seemed to vanish like a dream,
and to leave me helpless and dispirited.
I inquired about my aunt among the boatmen first, and received
various answers. One said she lived in the South Foreland Light,
and had singed her whiskers by doing so; another, that she was made
fast to the great buoy outside the harbour, and could only be visited
at half-tide; a third, that she was locked up in Maidstone jail
for child-stealing; a fourth, that she was seen to mount a broom
in the last high wind, and make direct for Calais. The fly-drivers,
among whom I inquired next, were equally jocose and equally disrespectful;
and the shopkeepers, not liking my appearance, generally replied,
without hearing what I had to say, that they had got nothing for
me. I felt more miserable and destitute than I had done at any period
of my running away. My money was all gone, I had nothing left to
dispose of; I was hungry, thirsty, and worn out; and seemed as distant
from my end as if I had remained in London.
|
