Part 16

Here somebody cried out, "Shame, J. Steerforth! Too bad!" It was Traddles, whom Mr. Mell instantly routed by bidding him hold his tongue.

--"To insult one who is not fortunate in life, sir, and who never gave you the least offence," continued Mr. Mell, his lip trembling, "you commit a mean and base action. You can sit down or stand up as you please, sir. Copperfield, go on."

"Young Copperfield," said Steerforth, coming forward, "stop a bit. I tell you what, Mr. Mell, once for all. When you take the liberty of calling men mean and base, or anything of that sort, you are an impudent beggar. You are always a beggar, you know; but when you do that, you are an impudent beggar."

I am not clear whether he was going to strike Mr. Mell, or Mr. Mell was going to strike him, or there was any such intention on either side. I saw a rigidity come upon the whole school as if they had been turned into stone, and found Mr. Creakle in the midst of us. Mr. Mell, with his elbows on his desk and his face in his hands, sat for some moments quite still.

"Mr. Mell," said Mr. Creakle, shaking him by the arm; and his whisper was very audible now; "you have not forgotten yourself, I hope?"

"No, sir," said Mr. Mell.

Mr. Creakle looked hard at him and then turned to Steerforth.

"Now, sir, will you tell me what this is about?"

Steerforth evaded the question for a little while; looking in scorn and anger on his opponent, and remaining silent. I could not help thinking what a fine-looking fellow he was, and how homely and plain Mr. Mell looked opposed to him.

"What did he mean by talking about favorites, then?" said Steerforth at length.

"Favorites?" repeated Mr. Creakle, with the veins in his forehead swelling quickly. "Who talked about favorites?"

"He did," said Steerforth.

"And pray, what did you mean by that, sir?" demanded Mr. Creakle, turning angrily on his assistant.

"I meant, Mr. Creakle," he returned, in a low voice, "as I said; that no pupil had a right to avail himself of his position of favoritism to degrade me."

"To degrade _you_?" said Mr. Creakle. "My stars! But give me leave to ask you, Mr. What's your name, whether, when you talk about favorites, you showed proper respect to me? To me, sir," said Mr. Creakle, darting his head at him suddenly and drawing it back again, "the principal of this establishment and your employer."

"It was not judicious, sir, I am willing to admit," said Mr. Mell. "I should not have done so if I had been cool."

Here Steerforth struck in.

"Then he said I was mean, and then he said I was base, and then I called him a beggar. If _I_ had been cool, perhaps I shouldn't have called him a beggar. But I did, and I am ready to take the consequences of it."

Without considering, perhaps, whether there were any consequences to be taken, I felt quite in a glow at this gallant speech. It made an impression on the boys, too, for there was a low stir among them, though no one spoke a word.

"I am surprised, Steerforth,--although your candor does you honor," said Mr. Creakle, "does you honor, certainly,--I am surprised, Steerforth, I must say, that you should attach such an epithet to any person employed and paid in Salem House, sir."

Steerforth gave a short laugh.

"That's not an answer, sir," said Mr. Creakle, "to my remark. I expect more than that from you, Steerforth."

If Mr. Mell looked homely in my eyes before the handsome boy, it would be quite impossible to say how homely Mr. Creakle looked.

"Let him deny it," said Steerforth.

"Deny that he is a beggar, Steerforth?" cried Mr. Creakle. "Why, where does he go a begging?"

"If he is not a beggar himself, his near relation's one," said Steerforth. "It's all the same."

"What do you mean?"

"Since you expect me, Mr. Creakle, to justify myself," said Steerforth, "and to say what I mean,--what I have to say is, that his mother lives on charity in an almshouse."

Mr. Creakle turned to his assistant with a severe frown and labored politeness:

"Now you hear what this gentleman says, Mr. Mell. Have the goodness, if you please, to set him right before the assembled school."

"He is right, sir, without correction," returned Mr. Mell, in the midst of a dead silence; "what he has said is true."

"Be so good then as to declare publicly, will you," said Mr. Creakle, putting his head on one side and rolling his eyes round the school, "whether it ever came to my knowledge until this moment?"

"I believe not directly," he returned.

"Why, you _know_ not," said Mr. Creakle. "Don't you, man?"

"Sir, I think you knew my circumstances when I came here, and that a bare living wage--"

"I think, if you come to that," said Mr. Creakle, with his veins swelling again bigger than ever, "that you've been in a wrong position altogether, and mistook this for a charity school. Mr. Mell, we'll part if you please. The sooner the better."

"There is no time," answered Mr. Mell, rising, "like the present."

"Sir, to you!" said Mr. Creakle.

"I take my leave of you, Mr. Creakle, and of all of you," said Mr. Mell, glancing round the room and patting me gently on the shoulder. "James Steerforth, the best wish I can leave you is that you may come to be ashamed of what you have done to-day. At present I would prefer to see you anything rather than a friend to me or to any one in whom I feel an interest."

Then Mr. Mell walked out with his property under his arm.

Mr. Creakle made a speech, in which he thanked Steerforth for asserting (though perhaps too warmly) the independence and respectability of Salem House; and which he wound up by shaking hands with Steerforth, while we gave three cheers,--I did not quite know what for, but I suppose for Steerforth, and so joined in them ardently, though I felt miserable. Mr. Creakle then caned Tommy Traddles for being discovered in tears instead of cheers on account of Mr. Mell's departure: and went back to his sofa or wherever he had come from.

When he had gone there was an awkward silence. Somehow we all felt uncomfortable or ashamed. As for Steerforth, he said he was angry with Traddles and glad he had caught it.

Poor Traddles, who was relieving himself as usual with a burst of skeletons, said he didn't care. Mr. Mell was ill-used.

"Who has ill-used him, you girl?" said Steerforth.

"Why, _you_ have," returned Traddles.

"What have I done?" said Steerforth.

"What have you done?" retorted Traddles.

"Hurt his feelings and lost him his situation."

"His feelings!" repeated Steerforth, disdainfully. "His feelings will soon get the better of it, I'll be bound. His feelings are not like yours, Miss Traddles. As to his situation,--which was a precious one, wasn't it?--do you suppose I am not going to write home and take care that he gets some money? Polly?"

We thought this intention very noble in Steerforth, whose mother was a widow, and rich, and would do almost anything, it was said, that he asked her. We were all extremely glad to see Traddles so put down, and exalted Steerforth to the skies. But as I look back at it now, I should rather have been Traddles that day than any other boy in the room. And I think the other boys will say so too.

I pass over all that happened at school, until the anniversary of my birthday came round in March. Except that Steerforth was more to be admired than ever, I remember nothing. He was going away at the end of the half-year, if not sooner, and was more spirited and independent than ever; but beyond this I remember nothing. The great event by which that time is marked in my mind, seems to have swallowed up all lesser recollections, and to exist alone.

It was after breakfast, and we had been summoned in from the playground, when Mr. Creakle entered and said:

"David Copperfield is to go into the parlor."

I expected a hamper from Peggotty, and brightened at the order. Some of the boys about me put in their claim not to be forgotten in the distribution of the good things, as I got out of my seat with great alacrity. But when I reached the parlor I saw no one except Mrs. Creakle, who held an open letter in her hand and looked at me gravely.

"You are too young to know how the world changes every day," said Mrs. Creakle, "and how the people in it pass away. But we all have to learn it, David; some of us when we are young, some of us when we are old, some of us at all times of our lives."

I looked at her earnestly.

"When you came away from home," said Mrs. Creakle, after a pause, "were they all well?" After another pause, "Was your mamma well?"

I trembled without distinctly knowing why, and still looked at her earnestly, making no attempt to answer.

"Because," said she, "I grieve to tell you that I hear this morning your mamma is very ill."

A mist arose between Mrs. Creakle and me, and her figure seemed to move in it for an instant. Then I felt the burning tears run down my face, and it was steady again.

"She is very dangerously ill," she added.

I knew all now.

"She is dead."

There was no need to tell me so. I had already broken out into a desolate cry, and felt an orphan in the wide world.

She was very kind to me. She kept me there all day, and left me alone sometimes; and I cried and wore myself to sleep, and awoke and cried again.

The next night I left Salem House, after a tender adieu to Steerforth, Traddles, and all the rest. I little thought that I left the school never to return.

When I reached home I was in Peggotty's arms before I got to the door, and she took me into the house. Her grief burst out when she first saw me; but she controlled it soon, and spoke in whispers, and walked softly, as if the dead could be disturbed. She had not been in bed, I found, for a long time. She sat up at night still, and watched. As long as her poor dear pretty was above the ground, she said, she would never desert her.

Mr. Murdstone took no heed of me when I went into the parlor where he was, but sat by the fireside, weeping silently, and pondering in his elbow-chair. Miss Murdstone, who was busy at her writing-desk, which was covered with letters and papers, gave me her cold finger-nails, and asked me, in an iron whisper, if I had been measured for my mourning.

I will not dwell upon the dull, sorrowful days before and after my dear mother's funeral. The house had been cold and quiet enough before, but was now almost terrifying. And had it not been for Peggotty I do not know how I should have stood it.

But soon even she was denied me. Miss Murdstone had never liked her, and now lost no time in dismissing her from our service. The single ray of light in this gloomy time is a little visit I was allowed to make with her to Yarmouth, to our old friends, Mr. Peggotty, Ham, and Emily. The latter was much grown now, but prettier than ever, and shyer about letting me kiss her.

And Barkis, the honest carrier, after having been "willing" all this time, was hugely gratified to gain a favorable answer from Peggotty. They were married while I was there, and I was glad to leave my faithful old nurse so well provided for.

Then I returned home--no, I cannot say that word--to Mr. and Miss Murdstone.

*IV. I BEGIN LIFE ON MY OWN ACCOUNT*

And now I fell into a state of neglect, which I cannot look back upon without sorrow. I was as one alone--apart from all friendly notice, apart from the society of all other boys of my own age, apart from all companionship but my own spiritless thoughts,--which seems to cast its gloom upon this paper as I write.

What would I have given to have been sent to the hardest school that ever was kept--to have been taught something, anyhow, anywhere? No such hope dawned upon me. They disliked me; and they steadily overlooked me. I think Mr. Murdstone's means were straitened at about this time; but it is little to the purpose. He could not bear me; and in putting me from him he tried, as I believe, to put away the notion that I had any claim upon him--and succeeded.

I was not actively ill-used. I was not beaten, or starved; but day by day I was made to feel that I was in the way, and an altogether useless member of society. Finally Mr. Murdstone called me to him one day, and told me that he could not afford to send me to school, but that I must go to work for myself. He had a partner in the wine trade in London, and I was to be given a position there.

Accordingly, Miss Murdstone packed me off without loss of time; and I went to work--at ten years old--washing bottles in a vile-smelling warehouse down by the water-side.

There were three or four of us boys, counting me; and I was shown how to work by an older lad whose name was Mick Walker, and who wore a ragged apron and paper cap. He introduced me to another boy by the queer name of Mealy Potatoes. I discovered, later, that this youth had started out with another name, but had been given this one on account of a pale, mealy complexion.

No words can express the secret agony of my soul as I sank into this companionship; compared these associates with those of my happier childhood--not to say with Steerforth, Traddles, and the rest of those boys; and felt my hopes of growing up to be a learned and distinguished man crushed in my bosom. The feeling of being utterly without hope; of the shame I felt in my position; of the misery it was to believe that what I had learned would pass away from me, little by little, never to be brought back any more; cannot be written. As often as Mick Walker went away in the course of that forenoon, I mingled my tears with the water in which I was washing the bottles. But I was careful never to let the others see me in tears.

I was given the splendid salary of seven shillings[#] a week for my services, and out of that I had to feed and clothe myself. My lodgings were provided for, at the home of a Mr. Micawber, a portly, dignified man with a large, shiny bald head and rusty, genteel clothes. Mr. Micawber was perpetually dodging creditors while he waited for "something to turn up," as he expressed it. But in his way he was kind to me.

[#] About $1.68.

Still I had no one upon earth to go to for friendship or advice, I must needs skimp and save to be sure of having enough bread and cheese to eat; and no one lifted a finger to help me, a frightened little stranger in a large, terrifying city. I look back upon it now as a horrible dream. I know that I worked from morning till night with common men and boys, a shabby child. I know that I lounged about the streets poorly clothed and half starved. I know that but for the mercy of God, I might easily have been--for any other care that was taken of me--a little thief or vagabond.

But in these darkest days a bright idea came to me--I don't know when or how, but come it did, and refused to depart. I remembered having heard of an aunt, Miss Betsey Trotwood, my dear father's sister. I had heard both my mother and Peggotty speak of her, with some awe, it is true, as being a rather eccentric woman, who did not like boys, but still I resolved to find her. So I wrote to Peggotty and asked the address, and also for the loan of half a guinea. I had resolved to run away and appeal to my aunt for protection.

Peggotty's answer soon came with much love and the half guinea. She told me that Miss Betsey lived near Dover, but she couldn't say exactly where. This was vague enough, but didn't deter me in the slightest. I worked my week out at the warehouse, and, bidding Mick Walker and Mealy Potatoes good-bye, ran away forthwith. I may have had the notion of running all the way to Dover when I started. I had a small box of clothes and the half guinea, but a carter robbed me of both of them the first day. So, reduced to a few odd pence, I made but slow progress on foot, and sleeping out in the open by night.

For six days I trudged my weary way, pawning my coat for food, and not daring to ask aid from any one, for fear of being seized and sent back to London. But at last I limped in upon the bare white downs near Dover, sunburnt and in rags.

By dint of inquiries I was directed to Miss Betsey Trotwood's house, and I lost no time in going there--a sorry enough figure, as you may imagine. It was a neat little cottage looking out from some cliffs upon the sea.

As I stood at the gate peeping in and wondering how I had best proceed, a tall, slim lady came out of the house. She had a handkerchief tied over her cap, a pair of gardener's gloves on her hands, and carried a pruning-knife.

"Go away!" said Miss Betsey (for it was none other), shaking her head when she saw me, and making a distant chop in the air with her knife. "Go along! No boys here!"

I watched her, with my heart at my lips, as she marched to a corner of her garden, and stooped to dig a root. Then, without a scrap of courage, but with a great deal of desperation, I went softly in and stood beside her, touching her with my finger.

"If you please, ma'am," I began.

She started and looked up.

"If you please, aunt."

"EH?" exclaimed Miss Betsey, in a tone of amazement I have never heard approached.

"If you please, aunt, I am your nephew."

"Oh, Lord!" said my aunt, and sat flat down in the garden-path.

"I am David Copperfield, of the Rookery. I used to hear my dear mamma speak of you before she died. I have been neglected and mistreated, and so I ran away and came to you. I was robbed at first setting out, and have walked all the way, and have never slept in a bed since I began the journey."

Here my self-support gave way all at once; and with a movement of my hands, intended to show her my ragged state, and call it to witness that I had suffered something, I broke into a passion of crying, which I suppose had been pent up within me all the week.

My aunt, with every sort of expression, sat on the gravel, staring at me, until I began to cry; when she got up in a great hurry, collared me, and took me into the parlor. Her first proceeding there was to unlock a tall press, bring out several bottles, and pour some of the contents of each into my mouth. I think they must have been taken out at random, for I am sure I tasted aniseed water, anchovy sauce, and salad dressing. Then she rang the bell.

"Janet," she said, when her servant came in, "go upstairs, give my compliments to Mr. Dick, and say I wish to speak to him."

Mr. Dick proved to be a pleasant-faced man of whimsical ways, but upon whose advice my aunt greatly relied. As he proposed now that I be given a bath and put to bed, my aunt lost no time in following these ideas.

Janet had gone away to get the bath ready, when my aunt, to my great alarm, became in one moment rigid with wrath, and had hardly voice to cry out, "Janet! Donkeys!"

Upon which, Janet came running up the stairs as if the house were in flames, darted out on a little piece of green in front, and warned off two donkeys that had presumed to set hoof upon it; while my aunt, rushing out of the house, seized the bridle of a third animal, led him forth from those sacred precincts, and boxed the ears of the unlucky urchin in attendance.

To this hour I don't know whether my aunt had any lawful right of way over that patch of green; but she had settled it in her own mind that she had, and it was all the same to her. The one great outrage of her life, demanding to be constantly avenged, was the passage of a donkey over that spot. No matter what she was doing or saying, a donkey turned the current of her ideas in a moment, and she was upon him straight. Jugs of water and watering-pots were kept in secret places ready to be discharged on the offending boys; sticks were laid in ambush behind the door; sallies were made at all hours; and incessant war prevailed.

Perhaps this was an agreeable excitement to the donkey-boys; or perhaps the more sagacious of the donkeys, understanding how the case stood, stubbornly delighted in coming that way. I only know that there were three alarms before the bath was ready; and that on the occasion of the last and most desperate of all, I saw my aunt engage, single-handed, with a sandy-headed lad of fifteen, and bump his sandy head against her own gate, before he realized what was the matter. These interruptions were the more ridiculous to me, because she was giving me broth out of a tablespoon at the time (having firmly persuaded herself that I was actually starving, and must receive food at first in very small quantities), and, while my mouth was yet open to receive the spoon, she would put it back into the basin, cry "Janet! Donkeys!" and go out to the assault.

The bath was a great comfort. For I began to be sensible of acute pains in my limbs from lying out in the fields, and was now so tired and low that I could hardly keep myself awake for five minutes together. When I had bathed they enrobed me in a shirt and a pair of trousers belonging to Mr. Dick, and tied me up in two or three great shawls. What sort of bundle I looked like, I don't know, but I felt a very hot one. Feeling also very faint and drowsy, I soon fell asleep.

The next morning at breakfast my aunt said, with a determined shake of her head, "Well, I've written to him."

"To whom?" I ventured.

"To Mr. Murdstone."

"Does he know where I am, aunt?" I inquired, alarmed.

"I have told him," said my aunt, with a nod.

"Shall I--be--given up to him?" I faltered.

"I don't know," said my aunt. "We shall see."

"Oh! I can't think what I shall do," I exclaimed, "if I have to go back to Mr. Murdstone!"

"I don't know anything about it," said my aunt, shaking her head. "I can't say, I am sure. We shall see."

My spirits sank under these words, and I became very downcast and heavy of heart.

For the next few days I felt like a criminal condemned to die; although my aunt and Mr. Dick both were very kind to me. Finally the day of the expected visit from Mr. Murdstone arrived, but without bringing him till late in the afternoon. Our dinner had been postponed; but it was growing so late that my aunt had ordered it to be got ready, when she gave a sudden alarm of donkeys, and to my consternation, I beheld Miss Murdstone, on a side-saddle, ride deliberately over the sacred piece of green, and stop in front of the house, looking about her.

"Go along with you!" cried my aunt, shaking her head and her fist out of the window. "You have no business there. How dare you trespass? Go along! Oh, you bold-faced thing!"

My aunt was so exasperated by the coolness with which Miss Murdstone looked about her, that I really believe she did not know what to do. I hastened to tell her who it was, and that Mr. Murdstone was following behind, but it made no difference. She glared at them as they entered the room in a most terrible way.

"Oh!" said my aunt, "I was not aware at first to whom I had the pleasure of objecting. But I don't allow anybody to ride over that turf. I make no exceptions. I don't allow anybody to do it."

"Your regulation is rather awkward to strangers," said Miss Murdstone.

"_Is_ it!" said my aunt.

Mr. Murdstone here cleared his throat and began, "Miss Trotwood--"

"I beg your pardon," observed my aunt, with a keen look. "You are the Mr. Murdstone."

"I am," said Mr. Murdstone.

"You'll excuse my saying, sir," returned my aunt, "that I think it would have been a much better and happier thing if you had left that poor child alone."

Mr. Murdstone colored, and Miss Murdstone looked as though she could bite nails.

"I received your letter," said Mr. Murdstone, "and thought it best to see you personally about this unhappy boy who has run away from his friends and his position. I need not tell you that he has always given us great trouble and uneasiness. He is sullen and stubborn and has a violent temper. I thought it best that you should know this."