Chapter 50

Great Expectations

by Charles Dickens

My hands had been dressed twice or thrice in the night, and again
in the morning. My left arm was a good deal burned to the elbow,
and, less severely, as high as the shoulder; it was very painful, but
the flames had set in that direction, and I felt thankful it was no
worse. My right hand was not so badly burnt but that I could move
the fingers. It was bandaged, of course, but much less
inconveniently than my left hand and arm; those I carried in a sling;
and I could only wear my coat like a cloak, loose over my shoulders
and fastened at the neck. My hair had been caught by the fire, but
not my head or face.

When Herbert had been down to Hammersmith and seen his father,
he came back to me at our chambers, and devoted the day to attending
on me. He was the kindest of nurses, and at stated times took off
the bandages, and steeped them in the cooling liquid that was kept
ready, and put them on again, with a patient tenderness that I was
deeply grateful for.

At first, as I lay quiet on the sofa, I found it painfully
difficult, I might say impossible, to get rid of the impression of
the glare of the flames, their hurry and noise, and the fierce
burning smell. If I dozed for a minute, I was awakened by Miss
Havisham's cries, and by her running at me with all that height of
fire above her head. This pain of the mind was much harder to strive
against than any bodily pain I suffered; and Herbert, seeing that,
did his utmost to hold my attention engaged.

Neither of us spoke of the boat, but we both thought of it.
That was made apparent by our avoidance of the subject, and by our
agreeing - without agreement - to make my recovery of the use of my
hands, a question of so many hours, not of so many weeks.

My first question when I saw Herbert had been of course, whether
all was well down the river? As he replied in the affirmative, with
perfect confidence and cheerfulness, we did not resume the subject
until the day was wearing away. But then, as Herbert changed the
bandages, more by the light of the fire than by the outer light, he
went back to it spontaneously.

"I sat with Provis last night, Handel, two good hours."

"Where was Clara?"

"Dear little thing!" said Herbert. "She was up and down with
Gruffandgrim all the evening. He was perpetually pegging at the
floor, the moment she left his sight. I doubt if he can hold out
long though. What with rum and pepper - and pepper and rum - I
should think his pegging must be nearly over."

"And then you will be married, Herbert?"

"How can I take care of the dear child otherwise? - Lay your arm
out upon the back of the sofa, my dear boy, and I'll sit down here,
and get the bandage off so gradually that you shall not know when it
comes. I was speaking of Provis. Do you know, Handel, he
improves?"

"I said to you I thought he was softened when I last saw
him."

"So you did. And so he is. He was very communicative last
night, and told me more of his life. You remember his breaking off
here about some woman that he had had great trouble with. - Did I
hurt you?"

I had started, but not under his touch. His words had given me
a start.

"I had forgotten that, Herbert, but I remember it now you speak
of it."

"Well! He went into that part of his life, and a dark wild part
it is. Shall I tell you? Or would it worry you just now?"

"Tell me by all means. Every word."

Herbert bent forward to look at me more nearly, as if my reply
had been rather more hurried or more eager than he could quite
account for. "Your head is cool?" he said, touching it.

"Quite," said I. "Tell me what Provis said, my dear
Herbert."

"It seems," said Herbert, " - there's a bandage off most
charmingly, and now comes the cool one - makes you shrink at first,
my poor dear fellow, don't it? but it will be comfortable presently
- it seems that the woman was a young woman, and a jealous woman, and
a revengeful woman; revengeful, Handel, to the last degree."

"To what last degree?"

"Murder. - Does it strike too cold on that sensitive place?"

"I don't feel it. How did she murder? Whom did she murder?"
"Why, the deed may not have merited quite so terrible a name," said
Herbert, "but, she was tried for it, and Mr. Jaggers defended her,
and the reputation of that defence first made his name known to
Provis. It was another and a stronger woman who was the victim, and
there had been a struggle - in a barn. Who began it, or how fair it
was, or how unfair, may be doubtful; but how it ended, is certainly
not doubtful, for the victim was found throttled."

"Was the woman brought in guilty?"

"No; she was acquitted. - My poor Handel, I hurt you!"

"It is impossible to be gentler, Herbert. Yes? What else?"

"This acquitted young woman and Provis had a little child: a
little child of whom Provis was exceedingly fond. On the evening of
the very night when the object of her jealousy was strangled as I
tell you, the young woman presented herself before Provis for one
moment, and swore that she would destroy the child (which was in her
possession), and he should never see it again; then, she vanished. -
There's the worst arm comfortably in the sling once more, and now
there remains but the right hand, which is a far easier job. I can
do it better by this light than by a stronger, for my hand is
steadiest when I don't see the poor blistered patches too distinctly.
- You don't think your breathing is affected, my dear boy? You seem
to breathe quickly."

"Perhaps I do, Herbert. Did the woman keep her oath?"

"There comes the darkest part of Provis's life. She did."

"That is, he says she did."

"Why, of course, my dear boy," returned Herbert, in a tone of
surprise, and again bending forward to get a nearer look at me. "He
says it all. I have no other information."

"No, to be sure."

"Now, whether," pursued Herbert, "he had used the child's mother
ill, or whether he had used the child's mother well, Provis doesn't
say; but, she had shared some four or five years of the wretched life
he described to us at this fireside, and he seems to have felt pity
for her, and forbearance towards her. Therefore, fearing he should
be called upon to depose about this destroyed child, and so be the
cause of her death, he hid himself (much as he grieved for the
child), kept himself dark, as he says, out of the way and out of the
trial, and was only vaguely talked of as a certain man called Abel,
out of whom the jealousy arose. After the acquittal she disappeared,
and thus he lost the child and the child's mother."

"I want to ask--"

"A moment, my dear boy, and I have done. That evil genius,
Compeyson, the worst of scoundrels among many scoundrels, knowing of
his keeping out of the way at that time, and of his reasons for doing
so, of course afterwards held the knowledge over his head as a means
of keeping him poorer, and working him harder. It was clear last
night that this barbed the point of Provis's animosity."

"I want to know," said I, "and particularly, Herbert, whether he
told you when this happened?"

"Particularly? Let me remember, then, what he said as to that.
His expression was, 'a round score o' year ago, and a'most directly
after I took up wi' Compeyson.' How old were you when you came upon
him in the little churchyard?"

"I think in my seventh year."

"Ay. It had happened some three or four years then, he said,
and you brought into his mind the little girl so tragically lost, who
would have been about your age."

"Herbert," said I, after a short silence, in a hurried way, "can
you see me best by the light of the window, or the light of the
fire?"

"By the firelight," answered Herbert, coming close again.

"Look at me."

"I do look at you, my dear boy."

"Touch me."

"I do touch you, my dear boy."

"You are not afraid that I am in any fever, or that my head is
much disordered by the accident of last night?"

"N-no, my dear boy," said Herbert, after taking time to examine
me. "You are rather excited, but you are quite yourself."

"I know I am quite myself. And the man we have in hiding down
the river, is Estella's Father."