No More Learning

He names individuals among them (myself included), whom he could
undertake to settle with one hand, and the other tied behind him. He
waylays the smaller boys to punch their unprotected heads, and calls
challenges after me in the open streets. For these sufficient reasons I
resolve to fight the butcher.

It is a summer evening, down in a green hollow, at the corner of a wall.
I meet the butcher by appointment. I am attended by a select body of our
boys; the butcher, by two other butchers, a young publican, and a sweep.
The preliminaries are adjusted, and the butcher and myself stand face to
face. In a moment the butcher lights ten thousand candles out of my left
eyebrow. In another moment, I don't know where the wall is, or where
I am, or where anybody is. I hardly know which is myself and which the
butcher, we are always in such a tangle and tussle, knocking about upon
the trodden grass. Sometimes I see the butcher, bloody but confident;
sometimes I see nothing, and sit gasping on my second's knee; sometimes
I go in at the butcher madly, and cut my knuckles open against his face,
without appearing to discompose him at all. At last I awake, very queer
about the head, as from a giddy sleep, and see the butcher walking off,
congratulated by the two other butchers and the sweep and publican, and
putting on his coat as he goes; from which I augur, justly, that the
victory is his.

I am taken home in a sad plight, and I have beef-steaks put to my eyes,
and am rubbed with vinegar and brandy, and find a great puffy place
bursting out on my upper lip, which swells immoderately. For three or
four days I remain at home, a very ill-looking subject, with a green
shade over my eyes; and I should be very dull, but that Agnes is a
sister to me, and condoles with me, and reads to me, and makes the time
light and happy. Agnes has my confidence completely, always; I tell her
all about the butcher, and the wrongs he has heaped upon me; she thinks
I couldn't have done otherwise than fight the butcher, while she shrinks
and trembles at my having fought him.

Time has stolen on unobserved, for Adams is not the head-boy in the days
that are come now, nor has he been this many and many a day. Adams has
left the school so long, that when he comes back, on a visit to Doctor
Strong, there are not many there, besides myself, who know him. Adams is
going to be called to the bar almost directly, and is to be an advocate,
and to wear a wig. I am surprised to find him a meeker man than I had
thought, and less imposing in appearance. He has not staggered the world
yet, either; for it goes on (as well as I can make out) pretty much the
same as if he had never joined it.

A blank, through which the warriors of poetry and history march on in
stately hosts that seem to have no end--and what comes next! I am
the head-boy, now! I look down on the line of boys below me, with a
condescending interest in such of them as bring to my mind the boy I was
myself, when I first came there. That little fellow seems to be no part
of me; I remember him as something left behind upon the road of life--as
something I have passed, rather than have actually been--and almost
think of him as of someone else.

And the little girl I saw on that first day at Mr. Wickfield's, where
is she? Gone also. In her stead, the perfect likeness of the picture,
a child likeness no more, moves about the house; and Agnes--my sweet
sister, as I call her in my thoughts, my counsellor and friend, the
better angel of the lives of all who come within her calm, good,
self-denying influence--is quite a woman.

What other changes have come upon me, besides the changes in my growth
and looks, and in the knowledge I have garnered all this while? I wear
a gold watch and chain, a ring upon my little finger, and a long-tailed
coat; and I use a great deal of bear's grease--which, taken in
conjunction with the ring, looks bad. Am I in love again? I am. I
worship the eldest Miss Larkins.

The eldest Miss Larkins is not a little girl. She is a tall, dark,
black-eyed, fine figure of a woman. The eldest Miss Larkins is not a
chicken; for the youngest Miss Larkins is not that, and the eldest must
be three or four years older. Perhaps the eldest Miss Larkins may be
about thirty. My passion for her is beyond all bounds.

The eldest Miss Larkins knows officers. It is an awful thing to bear. I
see them speaking to her in the street. I see them cross the way to meet
her, when her bonnet (she has a bright taste in bonnets) is seen coming
down the pavement, accompanied by her sister's bonnet. She laughs and
talks, and seems to like it. I spend a good deal of my own spare time in
walking up and down to meet her. If I can bow to her once in the day (I
know her to bow to, knowing Mr. Larkins), I am happier. I deserve a bow
now and then. The raging agonies I suffer on the night of the Race Ball,
where I know the eldest Miss Larkins will be dancing with the military,
ought to have some compensation, if there be even-handed justice in the
world.

My passion takes away my appetite, and makes me wear my newest silk
neckerchief continually. I have no relief but in putting on my best
clothes, and having my boots cleaned over and over again. I seem, then,
to be worthier of the eldest Miss Larkins. Everything that belongs to
her, or is connected with her, is precious to me. Mr. Larkins (a gruff
old gentleman with a double chin, and one of his eyes immovable in his
head) is fraught with interest to me. When I can't meet his daughter,
I go where I am likely to meet him. To say 'How do you do, Mr. Larkins?
Are the young ladies and all the family quite well? ' seems so pointed,
that I blush.

I think continually about my age. Say I am seventeen, and say that
seventeen is young for the eldest Miss Larkins, what of that? Besides,
I shall be one-and-twenty in no time almost. I regularly take walks
outside Mr. Larkins's house in the evening, though it cuts me to the
heart to see the officers go in, or to hear them up in the drawing-room,
where the eldest Miss Larkins plays the harp. I even walk, on two or
three occasions, in a sickly, spoony manner, round and round the house
after the family are gone to bed, wondering which is the eldest Miss
Larkins's chamber (and pitching, I dare say now, on Mr. Larkins's
instead); wishing that a fire would burst out; that the assembled crowd
would stand appalled; that I, dashing through them with a ladder, might
rear it against her window, save her in my arms, go back for something
she had left behind, and perish in the flames. For I am generally
disinterested in my love, and think I could be content to make a figure
before Miss Larkins, and expire.

Generally, but not always. Sometimes brighter visions rise before me.
When I dress (the occupation of two hours), for a great ball given at
the Larkins's (the anticipation of three weeks), I indulge my fancy with
pleasing images. I picture myself taking courage to make a declaration
to Miss Larkins. I picture Miss Larkins sinking her head upon my
shoulder, and saying, 'Oh, Mr. Copperfield, can I believe my ears! ' I
picture Mr. Larkins waiting on me next morning, and saying, 'My dear
Copperfield, my daughter has told me all. Youth is no objection. Here
are twenty thousand pounds. Be happy! ' I picture my aunt relenting,
and blessing us; and Mr. Dick and Doctor Strong being present at the
marriage ceremony. I am a sensible fellow, I believe--I believe,
on looking back, I mean--and modest I am sure; but all this goes on
notwithstanding. I repair to the enchanted house, where there are
lights, chattering, music, flowers, officers (I am sorry to see), and
the eldest Miss Larkins, a blaze of beauty. She is dressed in blue, with
blue flowers in her hair--forget-me-nots--as if SHE had any need to wear
forget-me-nots. It is the first really grown-up party that I have ever
been invited to, and I am a little uncomfortable; for I appear not to
belong to anybody, and nobody appears to have anything to say to me,
except Mr. Larkins, who asks me how my schoolfellows are, which he
needn't do, as I have not come there to be insulted.

But after I have stood in the doorway for some time, and feasted my eyes
upon the goddess of my heart, she approaches me--she, the eldest Miss
Larkins! --and asks me pleasantly, if I dance?

I stammer, with a bow, 'With you, Miss Larkins. '

'With no one else? ' inquires Miss Larkins.

'I should have no pleasure in dancing with anyone else. '

Miss Larkins laughs and blushes (or I think she blushes), and says,
'Next time but one, I shall be very glad. '

The time arrives. 'It is a waltz, I think,' Miss Larkins doubtfully
observes, when I present myself. 'Do you waltz? If not, Captain
Bailey--'

But I do waltz (pretty well, too, as it happens), and I take Miss
Larkins out. I take her sternly from the side of Captain Bailey. He
is wretched, I have no doubt; but he is nothing to me. I have been
wretched, too. I waltz with the eldest Miss Larkins! I don't know where,
among whom, or how long. I only know that I swim about in space, with a
blue angel, in a state of blissful delirium, until I find myself alone
with her in a little room, resting on a sofa. She admires a flower (pink
camellia japonica, price half-a-crown), in my button-hole. I give it
her, and say:

'I ask an inestimable price for it, Miss Larkins. '

'Indeed! What is that? ' returns Miss Larkins.

'A flower of yours, that I may treasure it as a miser does gold. '

'You're a bold boy,' says Miss Larkins. 'There. '

She gives it me, not displeased; and I put it to my lips, and then into
my breast. Miss Larkins, laughing, draws her hand through my arm, and
says, 'Now take me back to Captain Bailey. '

I am lost in the recollection of this delicious interview, and the
waltz, when she comes to me again, with a plain elderly gentleman who
has been playing whist all night, upon her arm, and says:

'Oh! here is my bold friend! Mr. Chestle wants to know you, Mr.
Copperfield. '

I feel at once that he is a friend of the family, and am much gratified.

'I admire your taste, sir,' says Mr. Chestle. 'It does you credit. I
suppose you don't take much interest in hops; but I am a pretty
large grower myself; and if you ever like to come over to our
neighbourhood--neighbourhood of Ashford--and take a run about our
place,--we shall be glad for you to stop as long as you like. '

I thank Mr. Chestle warmly, and shake hands. I think I am in a happy
dream. I waltz with the eldest Miss Larkins once again. She says I
waltz so well! I go home in a state of unspeakable bliss, and waltz in
imagination, all night long, with my arm round the blue waist of my dear
divinity. For some days afterwards, I am lost in rapturous reflections;
but I neither see her in the street, nor when I call. I am imperfectly
consoled for this disappointment by the sacred pledge, the perished
flower.

'Trotwood,' says Agnes, one day after dinner. 'Who do you think is going
to be married tomorrow? Someone you admire. '

'Not you, I suppose, Agnes? '

'Not me! ' raising her cheerful face from the music she is copying. 'Do
you hear him, Papa? --The eldest Miss Larkins. '

'To--to Captain Bailey? ' I have just enough power to ask.

'No; to no Captain. To Mr. Chestle, a hop-grower. '

I am terribly dejected for about a week or two. I take off my ring, I
wear my worst clothes, I use no bear's grease, and I frequently lament
over the late Miss Larkins's faded flower. Being, by that time, rather
tired of this kind of life, and having received new provocation from
the butcher, I throw the flower away, go out with the butcher, and
gloriously defeat him.

This, and the resumption of my ring, as well as of the bear's grease
in moderation, are the last marks I can discern, now, in my progress to
seventeen.



CHAPTER 19. I LOOK ABOUT ME, AND MAKE A DISCOVERY


I am doubtful whether I was at heart glad or sorry, when my school-days
drew to an end, and the time came for my leaving Doctor Strong's. I had
been very happy there, I had a great attachment for the Doctor, and I
was eminent and distinguished in that little world. For these reasons
I was sorry to go; but for other reasons, unsubstantial enough, I
was glad. Misty ideas of being a young man at my own disposal, of
the importance attaching to a young man at his own disposal, of the
wonderful things to be seen and done by that magnificent animal, and the
wonderful effects he could not fail to make upon society, lured me away.
So powerful were these visionary considerations in my boyish mind, that
I seem, according to my present way of thinking, to have left school
without natural regret. The separation has not made the impression on
me, that other separations have. I try in vain to recall how I felt
about it, and what its circumstances were; but it is not momentous in my
recollection. I suppose the opening prospect confused me. I know that my
juvenile experiences went for little or nothing then; and that life was
more like a great fairy story, which I was just about to begin to read,
than anything else.

My aunt and I had held many grave deliberations on the calling to which
I should be devoted. For a year or more I had endeavoured to find a
satisfactory answer to her often-repeated question, 'What I would like
to be? ' But I had no particular liking, that I could discover, for
anything. If I could have been inspired with a knowledge of the science
of navigation, taken the command of a fast-sailing expedition, and gone
round the world on a triumphant voyage of discovery, I think I might
have considered myself completely suited. But, in the absence of any
such miraculous provision, my desire was to apply myself to some pursuit
that would not lie too heavily upon her purse; and to do my duty in it,
whatever it might be.

Mr. Dick had regularly assisted at our councils, with a meditative
and sage demeanour. He never made a suggestion but once; and on that
occasion (I don't know what put it in his head), he suddenly proposed
that I should be 'a Brazier'. My aunt received this proposal so very
ungraciously, that he never ventured on a second; but ever afterwards
confined himself to looking watchfully at her for her suggestions, and
rattling his money.

'Trot, I tell you what, my dear,' said my aunt, one morning in the
Christmas season when I left school: 'as this knotty point is still
unsettled, and as we must not make a mistake in our decision if we can
help it, I think we had better take a little breathing-time. In the
meanwhile, you must try to look at it from a new point of view, and not
as a schoolboy. '

'I will, aunt. '

'It has occurred to me,' pursued my aunt, 'that a little change, and a
glimpse of life out of doors, may be useful in helping you to know your
own mind, and form a cooler judgement. Suppose you were to go down into
the old part of the country again, for instance, and see that--that
out-of-the-way woman with the savagest of names,' said my aunt, rubbing
her nose, for she could never thoroughly forgive Peggotty for being so
called.

'Of all things in the world, aunt, I should like it best! '

'Well,' said my aunt, 'that's lucky, for I should like it too. But
it's natural and rational that you should like it. And I am very
well persuaded that whatever you do, Trot, will always be natural and
rational. '

'I hope so, aunt. '

'Your sister, Betsey Trotwood,' said my aunt, 'would have been as
natural and rational a girl as ever breathed. You'll be worthy of her,
won't you? '

'I hope I shall be worthy of YOU, aunt. That will be enough for me. '

'It's a mercy that poor dear baby of a mother of yours didn't live,'
said my aunt, looking at me approvingly, 'or she'd have been so vain
of her boy by this time, that her soft little head would have been
completely turned, if there was anything of it left to turn. ' (My aunt
always excused any weakness of her own in my behalf, by transferring it
in this way to my poor mother. ) 'Bless me, Trotwood, how you do remind
me of her! '

'Pleasantly, I hope, aunt? ' said I.

'He's as like her, Dick,' said my aunt, emphatically, 'he's as like her,
as she was that afternoon before she began to fret--bless my heart, he's
as like her, as he can look at me out of his two eyes! '

'Is he indeed? ' said Mr. Dick.

'And he's like David, too,' said my aunt, decisively.

'He is very like David! ' said Mr. Dick.

'But what I want you to be, Trot,' resumed my aunt, '--I don't mean
physically, but morally; you are very well physically--is, a firm
fellow. A fine firm fellow, with a will of your own. With resolution,'
said my aunt, shaking her cap at me, and clenching her hand. 'With
determination. With character, Trot--with strength of character that is
not to be influenced, except on good reason, by anybody, or by anything.
That's what I want you to be. That's what your father and mother might
both have been, Heaven knows, and been the better for it.
'

I intimated that I hoped I should be what she described.

'That you may begin, in a small way, to have a reliance upon yourself,
and to act for yourself,' said my aunt, 'I shall send you upon your
trip, alone. I did think, once, of Mr. Dick's going with you; but, on
second thoughts, I shall keep him to take care of me. '

Mr. Dick, for a moment, looked a little disappointed; until the honour
and dignity of having to take care of the most wonderful woman in the
world, restored the sunshine to his face.

'Besides,' said my aunt, 'there's the Memorial--'

'Oh, certainly,' said Mr. Dick, in a hurry, 'I intend, Trotwood, to get
that done immediately--it really must be done immediately! And then it
will go in, you know--and then--' said Mr. Dick, after checking himself,
and pausing a long time, 'there'll be a pretty kettle of fish! '

In pursuance of my aunt's kind scheme, I was shortly afterwards fitted
out with a handsome purse of money, and a portmanteau, and tenderly
dismissed upon my expedition. At parting, my aunt gave me some good
advice, and a good many kisses; and said that as her object was that I
should look about me, and should think a little, she would recommend me
to stay a few days in London, if I liked it, either on my way down into
Suffolk, or in coming back. In a word, I was at liberty to do what I
would, for three weeks or a month; and no other conditions were imposed
upon my freedom than the before-mentioned thinking and looking about me,
and a pledge to write three times a week and faithfully report myself.

I went to Canterbury first, that I might take leave of Agnes and Mr.
Wickfield (my old room in whose house I had not yet relinquished), and
also of the good Doctor. Agnes was very glad to see me, and told me that
the house had not been like itself since I had left it.

'I am sure I am not like myself when I am away,' said I. 'I seem to
want my right hand, when I miss you. Though that's not saying much; for
there's no head in my right hand, and no heart. Everyone who knows you,
consults with you, and is guided by you, Agnes. '

'Everyone who knows me, spoils me, I believe,' she answered, smiling.

'No. It's because you are like no one else. You are so good, and so
sweet-tempered. You have such a gentle nature, and you are always
right. '

'You talk,' said Agnes, breaking into a pleasant laugh, as she sat at
work, 'as if I were the late Miss Larkins. '

'Come! It's not fair to abuse my confidence,' I answered, reddening at
the recollection of my blue enslaver. 'But I shall confide in you, just
the same, Agnes. I can never grow out of that. Whenever I fall into
trouble, or fall in love, I shall always tell you, if you'll let
me--even when I come to fall in love in earnest. '

'Why, you have always been in earnest! ' said Agnes, laughing again.

'Oh! that was as a child, or a schoolboy,' said I, laughing in my turn,
not without being a little shame-faced. 'Times are altering now, and I
suppose I shall be in a terrible state of earnestness one day or other.
My wonder is, that you are not in earnest yourself, by this time,
Agnes. '

Agnes laughed again, and shook her head.

'Oh, I know you are not! ' said I, 'because if you had been you would
have told me. Or at least'--for I saw a faint blush in her face, 'you
would have let me find it out for myself. But there is no one that I
know of, who deserves to love you, Agnes. Someone of a nobler character,
and more worthy altogether than anyone I have ever seen here, must rise
up, before I give my consent. In the time to come, I shall have a wary
eye on all admirers; and shall exact a great deal from the successful
one, I assure you. '

We had gone on, so far, in a mixture of confidential jest and earnest,
that had long grown naturally out of our familiar relations, begun as
mere children. But Agnes, now suddenly lifting up her eyes to mine, and
speaking in a different manner, said:

'Trotwood, there is something that I want to ask you, and that I may not
have another opportunity of asking for a long time, perhaps--something
I would ask, I think, of no one else. Have you observed any gradual
alteration in Papa? '

I had observed it, and had often wondered whether she had too. I must
have shown as much, now, in my face; for her eyes were in a moment cast
down, and I saw tears in them.

'Tell me what it is,' she said, in a low voice.

'I think--shall I be quite plain, Agnes, liking him so much? '

'Yes,' she said.

'I think he does himself no good by the habit that has increased upon
him since I first came here. He is often very nervous--or I fancy so. '

'It is not fancy,' said Agnes, shaking her head.

'His hand trembles, his speech is not plain, and his eyes look wild. I
have remarked that at those times, and when he is least like himself, he
is most certain to be wanted on some business. '

'By Uriah,' said Agnes.

'Yes; and the sense of being unfit for it, or of not having understood
it, or of having shown his condition in spite of himself, seems to make
him so uneasy, that next day he is worse, and next day worse, and so he
becomes jaded and haggard. Do not be alarmed by what I say, Agnes, but
in this state I saw him, only the other evening, lay down his head upon
his desk, and shed tears like a child. '

Her hand passed softly before my lips while I was yet speaking, and in
a moment she had met her father at the door of the room, and was hanging
on his shoulder. The expression of her face, as they both looked towards
me, I felt to be very touching. There was such deep fondness for him,
and gratitude to him for all his love and care, in her beautiful look;
and there was such a fervent appeal to me to deal tenderly by him, even
in my inmost thoughts, and to let no harsh construction find any place
against him; she was, at once, so proud of him and devoted to him, yet
so compassionate and sorry, and so reliant upon me to be so, too; that
nothing she could have said would have expressed more to me, or moved me
more.

We were to drink tea at the Doctor's. We went there at the usual hour;
and round the study fireside found the Doctor, and his young wife, and
her mother. The Doctor, who made as much of my going away as if I were
going to China, received me as an honoured guest; and called for a log
of wood to be thrown on the fire, that he might see the face of his old
pupil reddening in the blaze.

'I shall not see many more new faces in Trotwood's stead, Wickfield,'
said the Doctor, warming his hands; 'I am getting lazy, and want ease.
I shall relinquish all my young people in another six months, and lead a
quieter life. '

'You have said so, any time these ten years, Doctor,' Mr. Wickfield
answered.

'But now I mean to do it,' returned the Doctor. 'My first master will
succeed me--I am in earnest at last--so you'll soon have to arrange our
contracts, and to bind us firmly to them, like a couple of knaves. '

'And to take care,' said Mr. Wickfield, 'that you're not imposed on, eh?
As you certainly would be, in any contract you should make for yourself.
Well! I am ready. There are worse tasks than that, in my calling. '

'I shall have nothing to think of then,' said the Doctor, with a smile,
'but my Dictionary; and this other contract-bargain--Annie. '

As Mr. Wickfield glanced towards her, sitting at the tea table by Agnes,
she seemed to me to avoid his look with such unwonted hesitation and
timidity, that his attention became fixed upon her, as if something were
suggested to his thoughts.

'There is a post come in from India, I observe,' he said, after a short
silence.

'By the by! and letters from Mr. Jack Maldon! ' said the Doctor.

'Indeed! ' 'Poor dear Jack! ' said Mrs. Markleham, shaking her head. 'That
trying climate! --like living, they tell me, on a sand-heap, underneath
a burning-glass! He looked strong, but he wasn't. My dear Doctor, it was
his spirit, not his constitution, that he ventured on so boldly. Annie,
my dear, I am sure you must perfectly recollect that your cousin
never was strong--not what can be called ROBUST, you know,' said Mrs.
Markleham, with emphasis, and looking round upon us generally, '--from
the time when my daughter and himself were children together, and
walking about, arm-in-arm, the livelong day. '

Annie, thus addressed, made no reply.

'Do I gather from what you say, ma'am, that Mr. Maldon is ill? ' asked
Mr. Wickfield.

'Ill! ' replied the Old Soldier. 'My dear sir, he's all sorts of things. '

'Except well? ' said Mr. Wickfield.

'Except well, indeed! ' said the Old Soldier. 'He has had dreadful
strokes of the sun, no doubt, and jungle fevers and agues, and every
kind of thing you can mention. As to his liver,' said the Old Soldier
resignedly, 'that, of course, he gave up altogether, when he first went
out! '

'Does he say all this? ' asked Mr. Wickfield.

'Say? My dear sir,' returned Mrs. Markleham, shaking her head and her
fan, 'you little know my poor Jack Maldon when you ask that question.
Say? Not he. You might drag him at the heels of four wild horses first. '

'Mama! ' said Mrs. Strong.

'Annie, my dear,' returned her mother, 'once for all, I must really beg
that you will not interfere with me, unless it is to confirm what I say.
You know as well as I do that your cousin Maldon would be dragged at the
heels of any number of wild horses--why should I confine myself to four!
I WON'T confine myself to four--eight, sixteen, two-and-thirty, rather
than say anything calculated to overturn the Doctor's plans. '

'Wickfield's plans,' said the Doctor, stroking his face, and looking
penitently at his adviser. 'That is to say, our joint plans for him. I
said myself, abroad or at home. '

'And I said' added Mr. Wickfield gravely, 'abroad. I was the means of
sending him abroad. It's my responsibility. '

'Oh! Responsibility! ' said the Old Soldier. 'Everything was done for
the best, my dear Mr. Wickfield; everything was done for the kindest and
best, we know. But if the dear fellow can't live there, he can't live
there. And if he can't live there, he'll die there, sooner than he'll
overturn the Doctor's plans. I know him,' said the Old Soldier, fanning
herself, in a sort of calm prophetic agony, 'and I know he'll die there,
sooner than he'll overturn the Doctor's plans. '

'Well, well, ma'am,' said the Doctor cheerfully, 'I am not bigoted to
my plans, and I can overturn them myself. I can substitute some other
plans. If Mr. Jack Maldon comes home on account of ill health, he must
not be allowed to go back, and we must endeavour to make some more
suitable and fortunate provision for him in this country. '

Mrs. Markleham was so overcome by this generous speech--which, I need
not say, she had not at all expected or led up to--that she could only
tell the Doctor it was like himself, and go several times through that
operation of kissing the sticks of her fan, and then tapping his hand
with it. After which she gently chid her daughter Annie, for not being
more demonstrative when such kindnesses were showered, for her sake, on
her old playfellow; and entertained us with some particulars concerning
other deserving members of her family, whom it was desirable to set on
their deserving legs.

All this time, her daughter Annie never once spoke, or lifted up her
eyes. All this time, Mr. Wickfield had his glance upon her as she sat
by his own daughter's side. It appeared to me that he never thought of
being observed by anyone; but was so intent upon her, and upon his own
thoughts in connexion with her, as to be quite absorbed. He now asked
what Mr. Jack Maldon had actually written in reference to himself, and
to whom he had written?

'Why, here,' said Mrs. Markleham, taking a letter from the chimney-piece
above the Doctor's head, 'the dear fellow says to the Doctor
himself--where is it? Oh! --"I am sorry to inform you that my health is
suffering severely, and that I fear I may be reduced to the necessity
of returning home for a time, as the only hope of restoration. " That's
pretty plain, poor fellow! His only hope of restoration! But Annie's
letter is plainer still. Annie, show me that letter again. '

'Not now, mama,' she pleaded in a low tone.

'My dear, you absolutely are, on some subjects, one of the most
ridiculous persons in the world,' returned her mother, 'and perhaps the
most unnatural to the claims of your own family. We never should have
heard of the letter at all, I believe, unless I had asked for it myself.
Do you call that confidence, my love, towards Doctor Strong? I am
surprised. You ought to know better. '

The letter was reluctantly produced; and as I handed it to the old lady,
I saw how the unwilling hand from which I took it, trembled.

'Now let us see,' said Mrs. Markleham, putting her glass to her eye,
'where the passage is. "The remembrance of old times, my dearest
Annie"--and so forth--it's not there. "The amiable old Proctor"--who's
he? Dear me, Annie, how illegibly your cousin Maldon writes, and how
stupid I am! "Doctor," of course. Ah! amiable indeed! ' Here she left
off, to kiss her fan again, and shake it at the Doctor, who was looking
at us in a state of placid satisfaction. 'Now I have found it. "You may
not be surprised to hear, Annie,"--no, to be sure, knowing that he never
was really strong; what did I say just now? --"that I have undergone
so much in this distant place, as to have decided to leave it at all
hazards; on sick leave, if I can; on total resignation, if that is
not to be obtained. What I have endured, and do endure here, is
insupportable. " And but for the promptitude of that best of creatures,'
said Mrs. Markleham, telegraphing the Doctor as before, and refolding
the letter, 'it would be insupportable to me to think of. '

Mr. Wickfield said not one word, though the old lady looked to him as if
for his commentary on this intelligence; but sat severely silent, with
his eyes fixed on the ground. Long after the subject was dismissed,
and other topics occupied us, he remained so; seldom raising his eyes,
unless to rest them for a moment, with a thoughtful frown, upon the
Doctor, or his wife, or both.

The Doctor was very fond of music. Agnes sang with great sweetness and
expression, and so did Mrs. Strong. They sang together, and played duets
together, and we had quite a little concert. But I remarked two things:
first, that though Annie soon recovered her composure, and was quite
herself, there was a blank between her and Mr. Wickfield which separated
them wholly from each other; secondly, that Mr. Wickfield seemed
to dislike the intimacy between her and Agnes, and to watch it with
uneasiness. And now, I must confess, the recollection of what I had seen
on that night when Mr. Maldon went away, first began to return upon me
with a meaning it had never had, and to trouble me. The innocent beauty
of her face was not as innocent to me as it had been; I mistrusted the
natural grace and charm of her manner; and when I looked at Agnes by her
side, and thought how good and true Agnes was, suspicions arose within
me that it was an ill-assorted friendship.

She was so happy in it herself, however, and the other was so happy too,
that they made the evening fly away as if it were but an hour. It closed
in an incident which I well remember. They were taking leave of each
other, and Agnes was going to embrace her and kiss her, when Mr.
Wickfield stepped between them, as if by accident, and drew Agnes
quickly away.