Chapter Thirteen

Martin Chuzzlewit

by Charles Dickens

SHOWING WHAT BECAME OF MARTIN AND HIS DESPARATE RESOLVE, AFTER HE
LEFT MR PECKSNIFF'S HOUSE; WHAT PERSONS HE ENCOUNTERED; WHAT
ANXIETIES HE SUFFERED; AND WHAT NEWS HE HEARD

Carrying Tom Pinch's book quite unconsciously under his arm, and
not even buttoning his coat as a protection against the heavy rain,
Martin went doggedly forward at the same quick pace, until he had
passed the finger-post, and was on the high road to London. He
slackened very little in his speed even then, but he began to think,
and look about him, and to disengage his senses from the coil of
angry passions which hitherto had held them prisoner.

It must be confessed that, at that moment, he had no very
agreeable employment either for his moral or his physical
perceptions. The day was dawning from a patch of watery light in the
east, and sullen clouds came driving up before it, from which the
rain descended in a thick, wet mist. It streamed from every twig and
bramble in the hedge; made little gullies in the path; ran down a
hundred channels in the road; and punched innumerable holes into the
face of every pond and gutter. It fell with an oozy, slushy sound
among the grass; and made a muddy kennel of every furrow in the
ploughed fields. No living creature was anywhere to be seen. The
prospect could hardly have been more desolate if animated nature had
been dissolved in water, and poured down upon the earth again in that
form.

The range of view within the solitary traveller was quite as
cheerless as the scene without. Friendless and penniless; incensed
to the last degree; deeply wounded in his pride and self-love; full
of independent schemes, and perfectly destitute of any means of
realizing them; his most vindictive enemy might have been satisfied
with the extent of his troubles. To add to his other miseries, he
was by this time sensible of being wet to the skin, and cold at his
very heart.

In this deplorable condition he remembered Mr Pinch's book; more
because it was rather troublesome to carry, than from any hope of
being comforted by that parting gift. He looked at the dingy
lettering on the back, and finding it to be an odd volume of the
'Bachelor of Salamanca,' in the French tongue, cursed Tom Pinch's
folly twenty times. He was on the point of throwing it away, in his
ill-humour and vexation, when he bethought himself that Tom had
referred him to a leaf, turned down; and opening it at that place,
that he might have additional cause of complaint against him for
supposing that any cold scrap of the Bachelor's wisdom could cheer
him in such circumstances, found!--

Well, well! not much, but Tom's all. The half-sovereign. He
had wrapped it hastily in a piece of paper, and pinned it to the
leaf. These words were scrawled in pencil on the inside: 'I don't
want it indeed. I should not know what to do with it if I had
it.'

There are some falsehoods, Tom, on which men mount, as on bright
wings, towards Heaven. There are some truths, cold bitter taunting
truths, wherein your worldly scholars are very apt and punctual,
which bind men down to earth with leaden chains. Who would not
rather have to fan him, in his dying hour, the lightest feather of a
falsehood such as thine, than all the quills that have been plucked
from the sharp porcupine, reproachful truth, since time began!

Martin felt keenly for himself, and he felt this good deed of
Tom's keenly. After a few minutes it had the effect of raising his
spirits, and reminding him that he was not altogether destitute, as
he had left a fair stock of clothes behind him, and wore a gold
hunting-watch in his pocket. He found a curious gratification, too,
in thinking what a winning fellow he must be to have made such an
impression on Tom; and in reflecting how superior he was to Tom; and
how much more likely to make his way in the world. Animated by these
thoughts, and strengthened in his design of endeavouring to push his
fortune in another country, he resolved to get to London as a
rallying-point, in the best way he could; and to lose no time about
it.

He was ten good miles from the village made illustrious by being
the abiding-place of Mr Pecksniff, when he stopped to breakfast at a
little roadside alehouse; and resting upon a high-backed settle
before the fire, pulled off his coat, and hung it before the cheerful
blaze to dry. It was a very different place from the last tavern in
which he had regaled; boasting no greater extent of accommodation
than the brick-floored kitchen yielded; but the mind so soon
accommodates itself to the necessities of the body, that this poor
waggoner's house-of-call, which he would have despised yesterday,
became now quite a choice hotel; while his dish of eggs and bacon,
and his mug of beer, were not by any means the coarse fare he had
supposed, but fully bore out the inscription on the window-shutter,
which proclaimed those viands to be 'Good entertainment for
Travellers.'

He pushed away his empty plate; and with a second mug upon the
hearth before him, looked thoughtfully at the fire until his eyes
ached. Then he looked at the highly-coloured scripture pieces on the
walls, in little black frames like common shaving-glasses, and saw
how the Wise Men (with a strong family likeness among them)
worshipped in a pink manger; and how the Prodigal Son came home in
red rags to a purple father, and already feasted his imagination on a
sea-green calf. Then he glanced through the window at the falling
rain, coming down aslant upon the sign-post over against the house,
and overflowing the horse-trough; and then he looked at the fire
again, and seemed to descry a double distant London, retreating among
the fragments of the burning wood.

He had repeated this process in just the same order, many times,
as if it were a matter of necessity, when the sound of wheels called
his attention to the window out of its regular turn; and there he
beheld a kind of light van drawn by four horses, and laden, as well
as he could see (for it was covered in), with corn and straw. The
driver, who was alone, stopped at the door to water his team, and
presently came stamping and shaking the wet off his hat and coat,
into the room where Martin sat.

He was a red-faced burly young fellow; smart in his way, and
with a good-humoured countenance. As he advanced towards the fire he
touched his shining forehead with the forefinger of his stiff leather
glove, by way of salutation; and said (rather unnecessarily) that it
was an uncommon wet day.

'Very wet,' said Martin.

'I don't know as ever I see a wetter.'

'I never felt one,' said Martin.

The driver glanced at Martin's soiled dress, and his damp shirt-
sleeves, and his coat hung up to dry; and said, after a pause, as he
warmed his hands:

'You have been caught in it, sir?'

'Yes,' was the short reply.

'Out riding, maybe?' said the driver

'I should have been, if I owned a horse; but I don't,' returned
Martin.

'That's bad,' said the driver.

'And may be worse,' said Martin.

Now the driver said 'That's bad,' not so much because Martin
didn't own a horse, as because he said he didn't with all the
reckless desperation of his mood and circumstances, and so left a
great deal to be inferred. Martin put his hands in his pockets and
whistled when he had retorted on the driver; thus giving him to
understand that he didn't care a pin for Fortune; that he was above
pretending to be her favourite when he was not; and that he snapped
his fingers at her, the driver, and everybody else.

The driver looked at him stealthily for a minute or so; and in
the pauses of his warming whistled too. At length he asked, as he
pointed his thumb towards the road.

'Up or down?'

'Which is up?' said Martin.

'London, of course,' said the driver.

'Up then,' said Martin. He tossed his head in a careless manner
afterwards, as if he would have added, 'Now you know all about it.'
put his hands deeper into his pockets; changed his tune, and whistled
a little louder.

'I'm going up,' observed the driver; 'Hounslow, ten miles this
side London.'

'Are you?' cried Martin, stopping short and looking at him.

The driver sprinkled the fire with his wet hat until it hissed
again and answered, 'Aye, to be sure he was.'

'Why, then,' said Martin, 'I'll be plain with you. You may
suppose from my dress that I have money to spare. I have not. All I
can afford for coach-hire is a crown, for I have but two. If you can
take me for that, and my waistcoat, or this silk handkerchief, do. If
you can't, leave it alone.'

'Short and sweet,' remarked the driver.

'You want more?' said Martin. 'Then I haven't got more, and I
can't get it, so there's an end of that.' Whereupon he began to
whistle again.

'I didn't say I wanted more, did I?' asked the driver, with
something like indignation.

'You didn't say my offer was enough,' rejoined Martin.

'Why, how could I, when you wouldn't let me? In regard to the
waistcoat, I wouldn't have a man's waistcoat, much less a gentleman's
waistcoat, on my mind, for no consideration; but the silk
handkerchief's another thing; and if you was satisfied when we got to
Hounslow, I shouldn't object to that as a gift.'

'Is it a bargain, then?' said Martin.

'Yes, it is,' returned the other.

'Then finish this beer,' said Martin, handing him the mug, and
pulling on his coat with great alacrity; 'and let us be off as soon
as you like.'

In two minutes more he had paid his bill, which amounted to a
shilling; was lying at full length on a truss of straw, high and dry
at the top of the van, with the tilt a little open in front for the
convenience of talking to his new friend; and was moving along in the
right direction with a most satisfactory and encouraging
briskness.

The driver's name, as he soon informed Martin, was William
Simmons, better known as Bill; and his spruce appearance was
sufficiently explained by his connection with a large stage-coaching
establishment at Hounslow, whither he was conveying his load from a
farm belonging to the concern in Wiltshire. He was frequently up and
down the road on such errands, he said, and to look after the sick
and rest horses, of which animals he had much to relate that occupied
a long time in the telling. He aspired to the dignity of the regular
box, and expected an appointment on the first vacancy. He was
musical besides, and had a little key-bugle in his pocket, on which,
whenever the conversation flagged, he played the first part of a
great many tunes, and regularly broke down in the second.

'Ah!' said Bill, with a sigh, as he drew the back of his hand
across his lips, and put this instrument in his pocket, after
screwing off the mouth-piece to drain it; 'Lummy Ned of the Light
Salisbury, he was the one for musical talents. He was a guard. What
you may call a Guard'an Angel, was Ned.'

'Is he dead?' asked Martin.

'Dead!' replied the other, with a contemptuous emphasis. 'Not
he. You won't catch Ned a-dying easy. No, no. He knows better than
that.'

'You spoke of him in the past tense,' observed Martin, 'so I
supposed he was no more.

'He's no more in England,' said Bill, 'if that's what you mean.
He went to the U-nited States.'

'Did he?' asked Martin, with sudden interest. 'When?'

'Five year ago, or then about,' said Bill. 'He had set up in
the public line here, and couldn't meet his engagements, so he cut
off to Liverpool one day, without saying anything about it, and went
and shipped himself for the U-nited States.'

'Well?' said Martin.

'Well! as he landed there without a penny to bless himself with,
of course they wos very glad to see him in the U-nited States.'

'What do you mean?' asked Martin, with some scorn.

'What do I mean?' said Bill. 'Why, that. All men are alike in
the U-nited States, an't they? It makes no odds whether a man has a
thousand pound, or nothing, there. Particular in New York, I'm told,
where Ned landed.'

'New York, was it?' asked Martin, thoughtfully.

'Yes,' said Bill. 'New York. I know that, because he sent word
home that it brought Old York to his mind, quite vivid, in
consequence of being so exactly unlike it in every respect. I don't
understand what particular business Ned turned his mind to, when he
got there; but he wrote home that him and his friends was always a-
singing, Ale Columbia, and blowing up the President, so I suppose it
was something in the public line; or free-and-easy way again. Anyhow,
he made his fortune.'

'No!' cried Martin.

'Yes, he did,' said Bill. 'I know that, because he lost it all
the day after, in six-and-twenty banks as broke. He settled a lot of
the notes on his father, when it was ascertained that they was really
stopped and sent 'em over with a dutiful letter. I know that,
because they was shown down our yard for the old gentleman's benefit,
that he might treat himself with tobacco in the workus.'

'He was a foolish fellow not to take care of his money when he
had it,' said Martin, indignantly.

'There you're right,' said Bill, 'especially as it was all in
paper, and he might have took care of it so very easy, by folding it
up in a small parcel.'

Martin said nothing in reply, but soon afterwards fell asleep,
and remained so for an hour or more. When he awoke, finding it had
ceased to rain, he took his seat beside the driver, and asked him
several questions; as how long had the fortunate guard of the Light
Salisbury been in crossing the Atlantic; at what time of the year had
he sailed; what was the name of the ship in which he made the voyage;
how much had he paid for passage-money; did he suffer greatly from
sea-sickness? and so forth. But on these points of detail his friend
was possessed of little or no information; either answering obviously
at random or acknowledging that he had never heard, or had forgotten;
nor, although he returned to the charge very often, could he obtain
any useful intelligence on these essential particulars.

They jogged on all day, and stopped so often--now to refresh,
now to change their team of horses, now to exchange or bring away a
set of harness, now on one point of business, and now upon another,
connected with the coaching on that line of road--that it was
midnight when they reached Hounslow. A little short of the stables
for which the van was bound, Martin got down, paid his crown, and
forced his silk handkerchief upon his honest friend, notwithstanding
the many protestations that he didn't wish to deprive him of it, with
which he tried to give the lie to his longing looks. That done, they
parted company; and when the van had driven into its own yard and the
gates were closed, Martin stood in the dark street, with a pretty
strong sense of being shut out, alone, upon the dreary world, without
the key of it.

But in this moment of despondency, and often afterwards, the
recollection of Mr Pecksniff operated as a cordial to him; awakening
in his breast an indignation that was very wholesome in nerving him
to obstinate endurance. Under the influence of this fiery dram he
started off for London without more ado. Arriving there in the
middle of the night, and not knowing where to find a tavern open, he
was fain to stroll about the streets and market-places until
morning.

He found himself, about an hour before dawn, in the humbler
regions of the Adelphi; and addressing himself to a man in a fur-cap,
who was taking down the shutters of an obscure public-house, informed
him that he was a stranger, and inquired if he could have a bed
there. It happened by good luck that he could. Though none of the
gaudiest, it was tolerably clean, and Martin felt very glad and
grateful when he crept into it, for warmth, rest, and
forgetfulness.

It was quite late in the afternoon when he awoke; and by the
time he had washed and dressed, and broken his fast, it was growing
dusk again. This was all the better, for it was now a matter of
absolute necessity that he should part with his watch to some
obliging pawn- broker. He would have waited until after dark for
this purpose, though it had been the longest day in the year, and he
had begun it without a breakfast.

He passed more Golden Balls than all the jugglers in Europe have
juggled with, in the course of their united performances, before he
could determine in favour of any particular shop where those symbols
were displayed. In the end he came back to one of the first he had
seen, and entering by a side-door in a court, where the three balls,
with the legend 'Money Lent,' were repeated in a ghastly
transparency, passed into one of a series of little closets, or
private boxes, erected for the accommodation of the more bashful and
uninitiated customers. He bolted himself in; pulled out his watch;
and laid it on the counter.

'Upon my life and soul!' said a low voice in the next box to the
shopman who was in treaty with him, 'you must make it more; you must
make it a trifle more, you must indeed! You must dispense with one
half-quarter of an ounce in weighing out your pound of flesh, my best
of friends, and make it two-and-six.'

Martin drew back involuntarily, for he knew the voice at
once.

'You're always full of your chaff,' said the shopman, rolling up
the article (which looked like a shirt) quite as a matter of course,
and nibbing his pen upon the counter.

'I shall never be full of my wheat,' said Mr Tigg, 'as long as I
come here. Ha, ha! Not bad! Make it two-and-six, my dear friend,
positively for this occasion only. Half-a-crown is a delightful
coin. Two-and-six. Going at two-and-six! For the last time at
two-and-six!'

'It'll never be the last time till it's quite worn out,'
rejoined the shopman. 'It's grown yellow in the service as it
is.'

'Its master has grown yellow in the service, if you mean that,
my friend,' said Mr Tigg; 'in the patriotic service of an ungrateful
country. You are making it two-and-six, I think?'

'I'm making it,' returned the shopman, 'what it always has
been--two shillings. Same name as usual, I suppose?'

'Still the same name,' said Mr Tigg; 'my claim to the dormant
peerage not being yet established by the House of Lords.'

'The old address?'

'Not at all,' said Mr Tigg; 'I have removed my town
establishment from thirty-eight, Mayfair, to number
fifteen-hundred-and-forty-two, Park Lane.'

'Come, I'm not going to put down that, you know,' said the
shopman with a grin.

'You may put down what you please, my friend,' quoth Mr Tigg.
'The fact is still the same. The apartments for the under-butler and
the fifth footman being of a most confounded low and vulgar kind at
thirty-eight, Mayfair, I have been compelled, in my regard for the
feelings which do them so much honour, to take on lease for seven,
fourteen, or twenty-one years, renewable at the option of the tenant,
the elegant and commodious family mansion, number fifteen-
hundred-and-forty-two Park Lane. Make it two-and-six, and come and
see me!'

The shopman was so highly entertained by this piece of humour
that Mr Tigg himself could not repress some little show of
exultation. It vented itself, in part, in a desire to see how the
occupant of the next box received his pleasantry; to ascertain which
he glanced round the partition, and immediately, by the gaslight,
recognized Martin.

'I wish I may die,' said Mr Tigg, stretching out his body so far
that his head was as much in Martin's little cell as Martin's own
head was, 'but this is one of the most tremendous meetings in Ancient
or Modern History! How are you? What is the news from the
agricultural districts? How are our friends the P.'s? Ha, ha!
David, pay particular attention to this gentleman immediately, as a
friend of mine, I beg.'

'Here! Please to give me the most you can for this,' said
Martin, handing the watch to the shopman. 'I want money sorely.'

'He wants money, sorely!' cried Mr Tigg with excessive sympathy.
'David, will you have the goodness to do your very utmost for my
friend, who wants money sorely. You will deal with my friend as if
he were myself. A gold hunting-watch, David, engine-turned, capped
and jewelled in four holes, escape movement, horizontal lever, and
warranted to perform correctly, upon my personal reputation, who have
observed it narrowly for many years, under the most trying
circumstances'--here he winked at Martin, that he might understand
this recommendation would have an immense effect upon the shopman;
'what do you say, David, to my friend? Be very particular to deserve
my custom and recommendation, David.'

'I can lend you three pounds on this, if you like' said the
shopman to Martin, confidentially. 'It is very old-fashioned. I
couldn't say more.'

'And devilish handsome, too,' cried Mr Tigg. 'Two-twelve-six
for the watch, and seven-and-six for personal regard. I am
gratified; it may be weakness, but I am. Three pounds will do. We
take it. The name of my friend is Smivey: Chicken Smivey, of Holborn,
twenty- six-and-a-half B: lodger.' Here he winked at Martin again,
to apprise him that all the forms and ceremonies prescribed by law
were now complied with, and nothing remained but the receipt for the
money.

In point of fact, this proved to be the case, for Martin, who
had no resource but to take what was offered him, signified his
acquiescence by a nod of his head, and presently came out with the
cash in his pocket. He was joined in the entry by Mr Tigg, who
warmly congratulated him, as he took his arm and accompanied him into
the street, on the successful issue of the negotiation.

'As for my part in the same,' said Mr Tigg, 'don't mention it.
Don't compliment me, for I can't bear it!'

'I have no such intention, I assure you,' retorted Martin,
releasing his arm and stopping.

'You oblige me very much' said Mr Tigg. 'Thank you.'

'Now, sir,' observed Martin, biting his lip, 'this is a large
town, and we can easily find different ways in it. If you will show
me which is your way, I will take another.'

Mr Tigg was about to speak, but Martin interposed:

'I need scarcely tell you, after what you have just seen, that I
have nothing to bestow upon your friend Mr Slyme. And it is quite as
unnecessary for me to tell you that I don't desire the honour of your
company.'

'Stop' cried Mr Tigg, holding out his hand. 'Hold! There is a
most remarkably long-headed, flowing-bearded, and patriarchal
proverb, which observes that it is the duty of a man to be just
before he is generous. Be just now, and you can be generous
presently. Do not confuse me with the man Slyme. Do not distinguish
the man Slyme as a friend of mine, for he is no such thing. I have
been compelled, sir, to abandon the party whom you call Slyme. I
have no knowledge of the party whom you call Slyme. I am, sir,' said
Mr Tigg, striking himself upon the breast, 'a premium tulip, of a
very different growth and cultivation from the cabbage Slyme,
sir.'

'It matters very little to me,' said Martin coolly, 'whether you
have set up as a vagabond on your own account, or are still trading
on behalf of Mr Slyme. I wish to hold no correspondence with you. In
the devil's name, man' said Martin, scarcely able, despite his
vexation, to repress a smile as Mr Tigg stood leaning his back
against the shutters of a shop window, adjusting his hair with great
composure, 'will you go one way or other?'

'You will allow me to remind you, sir,' said Mr Tigg, with
sudden dignity, 'that you--not I--that you--I say emphatically,
you--have reduced the proceedings of this evening to a cold and
distant matter of business, when I was disposed to place them on a
friendly footing. It being made a matter of business, sir, I beg to
say that I expect a trifle (which I shall bestow in charity) as
commission upon the pecuniary advance, in which I have rendered you
my humble services. After the terms in which you have addressed me,
sir,' concluded Mr Tigg, 'you will not insult me, if you please, by
offering more than half-a-crown.'

Martin drew that piece of money from his pocket, and tossed it
towards him. Mr Tigg caught it, looked at it to assure himself of
its goodness, spun it in the air after the manner of a pieman, and
buttoned it up. Finally, he raised his hat an inch or two from his
head with a military air, and, after pausing a moment with deep
gravity, as to decide in which direction he should go, and to what
Earl or Marquis among his friends he should give the preference in
his next call, stuck his hands in his skirt-pockets and swaggered
round the corner. Martin took the directly opposite course; and so,
to his great content, they parted company.

It was with a bitter sense of humiliation that he cursed, again
and again, the mischance of having encountered this man in the
pawnbroker's shop. The only comfort he had in the recollection was,
Mr Tigg's voluntary avowal of a separation between himself and Slyme,
that would at least prevent his circumstances (so Martin argued) from
being known to any member of his family, the bare possibility of
which filled him with shame and wounded pride. Abstractedly there
was greater reason, perhaps, for supposing any declaration of Mr
Tigg's to be false, than for attaching the least credence to it; but
remembering the terms on which the intimacy between that gentleman
and his bosom friend had subsisted, and the strong probability of Mr
Tigg's having established an independent business of his own on Mr
Slyme's connection, it had a reasonable appearance of probability; at
all events, Martin hoped so; and that went a long way.

His first step, now that he had a supply of ready money for his
present necessities, was, to retain his bed at the public-house until
further notice, and to write a formal note to Tom Pinch (for he knew
Pecksniff would see it) requesting to have his clothes forwarded to
London by coach, with a direction to be left at the office until
called for. These measures taken, he passed the interval before the
box arrived--three days--in making inquiries relative to American
vessels, at the offices of various shipping- agents in the city; and
in lingering about the docks and wharves, with the faint hope of
stumbling upon some engagement for the voyage, as clerk or
supercargo, or custodian of something or somebody, which would enable
him to procure a free passage. But finding, soon, that no such means
of employment were likely to present themselves, and dreading the
consequences of delay, he drew up a short advertisement, stating what
he wanted, and inserted it in the leading newspapers. Pending the
receipt of the twenty or thirty answers which he vaguely expected, he
reduced his wardrobe to the narrowest limits consistent with decent
respectability, and carried the overplus at different times to the
pawnbroker's shop, for conversion into money.

And it was strange, very strange, even to himself, to find how,
by quick though almost imperceptible degrees, he lost his delicacy
and self-respect, and gradually came to do that as a matter of
course, without the least compunction, which but a few short days
before had galled him to the quick. The first time he visited the
pawnbroker's, he felt on his way there as if every person whom he
passed suspected whither he was going; and on his way back again, as
if the whole human tide he stemmed, knew well where he had come from.
When did he care to think of their discernment now! In his first
wanderings up and down the weary streets, he counterfeited the walk
of one who had an object in his view; but soon there came upon him
the sauntering, slipshod gait of listless idleness, and the lounging
at street-corners, and plucking and biting of stray bits of straw,
and strolling up and down the same place, and looking into the same
shop-windows, with a miserable indifference, fifty times a day. At
first, he came out from his lodging with an uneasy sense of being
observed--even by those chance passers-by, on whom he had never
looked before, and hundreds to one would never see again-- issuing in
the morning from a public-house; but now, in his comings- out and
goings-in he did not mind to lounge about the door, or to stand
sunning himself in careless thought beside the wooden stem, studded
from head to heel with pegs, on which the beer-pots dangled like so
many boughs upon a pewter-tree. And yet it took but five weeks to
reach the lowest round of this tall ladder!

Oh, moralists, who treat of happiness and self-respect, innate
in every sphere of life, and shedding light on every grain of dust in
God's highway, so smooth below your carriage-wheels, so rough beneath
the tread of naked feet, bethink yourselves in looking on the swift
descent of men who have lived in their own esteem, that there are
scores of thousands breathing now, and breathing thick with painful
toil, who in that high respect have never lived at all, nor had a
chance of life! Go ye, who rest so placidly upon the sacred Bard who
had been young, and when he strung his harp was old, and had never
seen the righteous forsaken, or his seed begging their bread; go,
Teachers of content and honest pride, into the mine, the mill, the
forge, the squalid depths of deepest ignorance, and uttermost abyss
of man's neglect, and say can any hopeful plant spring up in air so
foul that it extinguishes the soul's bright torch as fast as it is
kindled! And, oh! ye Pharisees of the nineteen hundredth year of
Christian Knowledge, who soundingly appeal to human nature, see that
it be human first. Take heed it has not been transformed, during
your slumber and the sleep of generations, into the nature of the
Beasts!

Five weeks! Of all the twenty or thirty answers, not one had
come. His money--even the additional stock he had raised from the
disposal of his spare clothes (and that was not much, for clothes,
though dear to buy, are cheap to pawn)--was fast diminishing. Yet
what could he do? At times an agony came over him in which he darted
forth again, though he was but newly home, and, returning to some
place where he had been already twenty times, made some new attempt
to gain his end, but always unsuccessfully. He was years and years
too old for a cabin-boy, and years upon years too inexperienced to be
accepted as a common seaman. His dress and manner, too, militated
fatally against any such proposal as the latter; and yet he was
reduced to making it; for even if he could have contemplated the
being set down in America totally without money, he had not enough
left now for a steerage passage and the poorest provisions upon the
voyage.

It is an illustration of a very common tendency in the mind of
man, that all this time he never once doubted, one may almost say the
certainty of doing great things in the New World, if he could only
get there. In proportion as he became more and more dejected by his
present circumstances, and the means of gaining America receded from
his grasp, the more he fretted himself with the conviction that that
was the only place in which he could hope to achieve any high end,
and worried his brain with the thought that men going there in the
meanwhile might anticipate him in the attainment of those objects
which were dearest to his heart. He often thought of John Westlock,
and besides looking out for him on all occasions, actually walked
about London for three days together for the express purpose of
meeting with him. But although he failed in this; and although he
would not have scrupled to borrow money of him; and although he
believed that John would have lent it; yet still he could not bring
his mind to write to Pinch and inquire where he was to be found. For
although, as we have seen, he was fond of Tom after his own fashion,
he could not endure the thought (feeling so superior to Tom) of
making him the stepping-stone to his fortune, or being anything to
him but a patron; and his pride so revolted from the idea that it
restrained him even now.

It might have yielded, however; and no doubt must have yielded
soon, but for a very strange and unlooked-for occurrence.

The five weeks had quite run out, and he was in a truly
desperate plight, when one evening, having just returned to his
lodging, and being in the act of lighting his candle at the gas jet
in the bar before stalking moodily upstairs to his own room, his
landlord called him by his name. Now as he had never told it to the
man, but had scrupulously kept it to himself, he was not a little
startled by this; and so plainly showed his agitation that the
landlord, to reassure him, said 'it was only a letter.'

'A letter!' cried Martin.

'For Mr Martin Chuzzlewit,' said the landlord, reading the
superscription of one he held in his hand. 'Noon. Chief office.
Paid.'

Martin took it from him, thanked him, and walked upstairs. It
was not sealed, but pasted close; the handwriting was quite unknown
to him. He opened it and found enclosed, without any name, address,
or other inscription or explanation of any kind whatever, a Bank of
England note for Twenty Pounds.

To say that he was perfectly stunned with astonishment and
delight; that he looked again and again at the note and the wrapper;
that he hurried below stairs to make quite certain that the note was
a good note; and then hurried up again to satisfy himself for the
fiftieth time that he had not overlooked some scrap of writing on the
wrapper; that he exhausted and bewildered himself with conjectures;
and could make nothing of it but that there the note was, and he was
suddenly enriched; would be only to relate so many matters of course
to no purpose. The final upshot of the business at that time was,
that he resolved to treat himself to a comfortable but frugal meal in
his own chamber; and having ordered a fire to be kindled, went out to
purchase it forthwith.

He bought some cold beef, and ham, and French bread, and butter,
and came back with his pockets pretty heavily laden. It was somewhat
of a damping circumstance to find the room full of smoke, which was
attributable to two causes; firstly, to the flue being naturally
vicious and a smoker; and secondly, to their having forgotten, in
lighting the fire, an odd sack or two and some trifles, which had
been put up the chimney to keep the rain out. They had already
remedied this oversight, however; and propped up the window-sash with
a bundle of firewood to keep it open; so that except in being rather
inflammatory to the eyes and choking to the lungs, the apartment was
quite comfortable.

Martin was in no vein to quarrel with it, if it had been in less
tolerable order, especially when a gleaming pint of porter was set
upon the table, and the servant-girl withdrew, bearing with her
particular instructions relative to the production of something hot
when he should ring the bell. The cold meat being wrapped in a
playbill, Martin laid the cloth by spreading that document on the
little round table with the print downwards, and arranging the
collation upon it. The foot of the bed, which was very close to the
fire, answered for a sideboard; and when he had completed these
preparations, he squeezed an old arm-chair into the warmest corner,
and sat down to enjoy himself.

He had begun to eat with great appetite, glancing round the room
meanwhile with a triumphant anticipation of quitting it for ever on
the morrow, when his attention was arrested by a stealthy footstep on
the stairs, and presently by a knock at his chamber door, which,
although it was a gentle knock enough, communicated such a start to
the bundle of firewood, that it instantly leaped out of window, and
plunged into the street.

'More coals, I suppose,' said Martin. 'Come in!'

'It an't a liberty, sir, though it seems so,' rejoined a man's
voice. 'Your servant, sir. Hope you're pretty well, sir.'

Martin stared at the face that was bowing in the doorway,
perfectly remembering the features and expression, but quite
forgetting to whom they belonged.

'Tapley, sir,' said his visitor. 'Him as formerly lived at the
Dragon, sir, and was forced to leave in consequence of a want of
jollity, sir.'

'To be sure!' cried Martin. 'Why, how did you come here?'

'Right through the passage, and up the stairs, sir,' said
Mark.

'How did you find me out, I mean?' asked Martin.

'Why, sir,' said Mark, 'I've passed you once or twice in the
street, if I'm not mistaken; and when I was a-looking in at the
beef-and-ham shop just now, along with a hungry sweep, as was very
much calculated to make a man jolly, sir--I see you a-buying
that.'

Martin reddened as he pointed to the table, and said, somewhat
hastily:

'Well! What then?'

'Why, then, sir,' said Mark, 'I made bold to foller; and as I
told 'em downstairs that you expected me, I was let up.'

'Are you charged with any message, that you told them you were
expected?' inquired Martin.

'No, sir, I an't,' said Mark. 'That was what you may call a
pious fraud, sir, that was.'

Martin cast an angry look at him; but there was something in the
fellow's merry face, and in his manner--which with all its
cheerfulness was far from being obtrusive or familiar--that quite
disarmed him. He had lived a solitary life too, for many weeks, and
the voice was pleasant in his ear.

'Tapley,' he said, 'I'll deal openly with you. From all I can
judge and from all I have heard of you through Pinch, you are not a
likely kind of fellow to have been brought here by impertinent
curiosity or any other offensive motive. Sit down. I'm glad to see
you.'

'Thankee, sir,' said Mark. 'I'd as lieve stand.'

"If you don't sit down,' retorted Martin, 'I'll not talk to
you.'

'Very good, sir,' observed Mark. 'Your will's a law, sir. Down
it is;' and he sat down accordingly upon the bedstead.

'Help yourself,' said Martin, handing him the only knife.

'Thankee, sir,' rejoined Mark. 'After you've done.'

'If you don't take it now, you'll not have any,' said Martin.

'Very good, sir,' rejoined Mark. 'That being your desire--now
it is.' With which reply he gravely helped himself and went on
eating. Martin having done the like for a short time in silence, said
abruptly:

'What are you doing in London?'

'Nothing at all, sir,' rejoined Mark.

'How's that?' asked Martin.

'I want a place,' said Mark.

'I'm sorry for you,' said Martin.

'--To attend upon a single gentleman,' resumed Mark. 'If from
the country the more desirable. Makeshifts would be preferred.
Wages no object.'

He said this so pointedly, that Martin stopped in his eating,
and said:

'If you mean me--'

'Yes, I do, sir,' interposed Mark.

'Then you may judge from my style of living here, of my means of
keeping a man-servant. Besides, I am going to America
immediately.'

'Well, sir,' returned Mark, quite unmoved by this intelligence
'from all that ever I heard about it, I should say America is a very
likely sort of place for me to be jolly in!'

Again Martin looked at him angrily; and again his anger melted
away in spite of himself.

'Lord bless you, sir,' said Mark, 'what is the use of us a-going
round and round, and hiding behind the corner, and dodging up and
down, when we can come straight to the point in six words? I've had
my eye upon you any time this fortnight. I see well enough there's a
screw loose in your affairs. I know'd well enough the first time I
see you down at the Dragon that it must be so, sooner or later. Now,
sir here am I, without a sitiwation; without any want of wages for a
year to come; for I saved up (I didn't mean to do it, but I couldn't
help it) at the Dragon--here am I with a liking for what's
wentersome, and a liking for you, and a wish to come out strong under
circumstances as would keep other men down; and will you take me, or
will you leave me?'

'How can I take you?' cried Martin.

'When I say take,' rejoined Mark, 'I mean will you let me go?
and when I say will you let me go, I mean will you let me go along
with you? for go I will, somehow or another. Now that you've said
America, I see clear at once, that that's the place for me to be
jolly in. Therefore, if I don't pay my own passage in the ship you
go in, sir, I'll pay my own passage in another. And mark my words,
if I go alone it shall be, to carry out the principle, in the
rottenest, craziest, leakingest tub of a wessel that a place can be
got in for love or money. So if I'm lost upon the way, sir, there'll
be a drowned man at your door--and always a-knocking double knocks at
it, too, or never trust me!'

'This is mere folly,' said Martin.

'Very good, sir,' returned Mark. 'I'm glad to hear it, because
if you don't mean to let me go, you'll be more comfortable, perhaps,
on account of thinking so. Therefore I contradict no gentleman. But
all I say is, that if I don't emigrate to America in that case, in
the beastliest old cockle-shell as goes out of port, I'm--'

'You don't mean what you say, I'm sure,' said Martin.

'Yes I do,' cried Mark.

'I tell you I know better,' rejoined Martin.

'Very good, sir,' said Mark, with the same air of perfect
satisfaction. 'Let it stand that way at present, sir, and wait and
see how it turns out. Why, love my heart alive! the only doubt I
have is, whether there's any credit in going with a gentleman like
you, that's as certain to make his way there as a gimlet is to go
through soft deal.'

This was touching Martin on his weak point, and having him at a
great advantage. He could not help thinking, either, what a brisk
fellow this Mark was, and how great a change he had wrought in the
atmosphere of the dismal little room already.

'Why, certainly, Mark,' he said, 'I have hopes of doing well
there, or I shouldn't go. I may have the qualifications for doing
well, perhaps.'

'Of course you have, sir,' returned Mark Tapley. 'Everybody
knows that.'

'You see,' said Martin, leaning his chin upon his hand, and
looking at the fire, 'ornamental architecture applied to domestic
purposes, can hardly fail to be in great request in that country; for
men are constantly changing their residences there, and moving
further off; and it's clear they must have houses to live in.'

'I should say, sir,' observed Mark, 'that that's a state of
things as opens one of the jolliest look-outs for domestic
architecture that ever I heerd tell on.'

Martin glanced at him hastily, not feeling quite free from a
suspicion that this remark implied a doubt of the successful issue of
his plans. But Mr Tapley was eating the boiled beef and bread with
such entire good faith and singleness of purpose expressed in his
visage that he could not but be satisfied. Another doubt arose in
his mind however, as this one disappeared. He produced the blank
cover in which the note had been enclosed, and fixing his eyes on
Mark as he put it in his hands, said:

'Now tell me the truth. Do you know anything about that?'

Mark turned it over and over; held it near his eyes; held it
away from him at arm's length; held it with the superscription
upwards and with the superscription downwards; and shook his head
with such a genuine expression of astonishment at being asked the
question, that Martin said, as he took it from him again:

'No, I see you don't. How should you! Though, indeed, your
knowing about it would not be more extraordinary than its being here.
Come, Tapley,' he added, after a moment's thought, 'I'll trust you
with my history, such as it is, and then you'll see more clearly what
sort of fortunes you would link yourself to, if you followed me.'

'I beg your pardon, sir,' said Mark; 'but afore you enter upon
it will you take me if I choose to go? Will you turn off me--Mark
Tapley--formerly of the Blue Dragon, as can be well recommended by Mr
Pinch, and as wants a gentleman of your strength of mind to look up
to; or will you, in climbing the ladder as you're certain to get to
the top of, take me along with you at a respectful dutance? Now,
sir,' said Mark, 'it's of very little importance to you, I know.
there's the difficulty; but it's of very great importance to me, and
will you be so good as to consider of it?'

If this were meant as a second appeal to Martin's weak side,
founded on his observation of the effect of the first, Mr Tapley was
a skillful and shrewd observer. Whether an intentional or an
accidental shot, it hit the mark fully for Martin, relenting more and
more, said with a condescension which was inexpressibly delicious to
him, after his recent humiliation:

'We'll see about it, Tapley. You shall tell me in what
disposition you find yourself to-morrow.'

'Then, sir,' said Mark, rubbing his hands, 'the job's done. Go
on, sir, if you please. I'm all attention.'

Throwing himself back in his arm-chair, and looking at the fire,
with now and then a glance at Mark, who at such times nodded his head
sagely, to express his profound interest and attention. Martin ran
over the chief points in his history, to the same effect as he had
related them, weeks before, to Mr Pinch. But he adapted them,
according to the best of his judgment, to Mr Tapley's comprehension;
and with that view made as light of his love affair as he could, and
referred to it in very few words. But here he reckoned without his
host; for Mark's interest was keenest in this part of the business,
and prompted him to ask sundry questions in relation to it; for which
he apologised as one in some measure privileged to do so, from having
seen (as Martin explained to him) the young lady at the Blue
Dragon.

'And a young lady as any gentleman ought to feel more proud of
being in love with,' said Mark, energetically, 'don't draw
breath.'

'Aye! You saw her when she was not happy,' said Martin, gazing
at the fire again. 'If you had seen her in the old times,
indeed--'

'Why, she certainly was a little down-hearted, sir, and
something paler in her colour than I could have wished,' said Mark,
'but none the worse in her looks for that. I think she seemed
better, sir, after she come to London.'

Martin withdrew his eyes from the fire; stared at Mark as if he
thought he had suddenly gone mad; and asked him what he meant.

'No offence intended, sir,' urged Mark. 'I don't mean to say
she was any the happier without you; but I thought she was a-looking
better, sir.'

'Do you mean to tell me she has been in London?' asked Martin,
rising hurriedly, and pushing back his chair.

'Of course I do,' said Mark, rising too, in great amazement from
the bedstead.

'Do you mean to tell me she is in London now?'

'Most likely, sir. I mean to say she was a week ago.'

'And you know where?'

'Yes!' cried Mark. 'What! Don't you?'

'My good fellow!' exclaimed Martin, clutching him by both arms,
'I have never seen her since I left my grandfather's house.'

'Why, then!' cried Mark, giving the little table such a blow
with his clenched fist that the slices of beef and ham danced upon
it, while all his features seemed, with delight, to be going up into
his forehead, and never coming back again any more, 'if I an't your
nat'ral born servant, hired by Fate, there an't such a thing in
natur' as a Blue Dragon. What! when I was a-rambling up and down a
old churchyard in the City, getting myself into a jolly state, didn't
I see your grandfather a-toddling to and fro for pretty nigh a mortal
hour! Didn't I watch him into Todgers's commercial boarding-house,
and watch him out, and watch him home to his hotel, and go and tell
him as his was the service for my money, and I had said so, afore I
left the Dragon! Wasn't the young lady a-sitting with him then, and
didn't she fall a-laughing in a manner as was beautiful to see!
Didn't your grandfather say, "Come back again next week," and didn't
I go next week; and didn't he say that he couldn't make up his mind
to trust nobody no more; and therefore wouldn't engage me, but at the
same time stood something to drink as was handsome! Why,' cried Mr
Tapley, with a comical mixture of delight and chagrin, 'where's the
credit of a man's being jolly under such circumstances! Who could
help it, when things come about like this!'

For some moments Martin stood gazing at him, as if he really
doubted the evidence of his senses, and could not believe that Mark
stood there, in the body, before him. At length he asked him
whether, if the young lady were still in London, he thought he could
contrive to deliver a letter to her secretly.

'Do I think I can?' cried Mark. 'Think I can? Here, sit down,
sir. Write it out, sir!'

With that he cleared the table by the summary process of tilting
everything upon it into the fireplace; snatched some writing
materials from the mantel-shelf; set Martin's chair before them;
forced him down into it; dipped a pen into the ink; and put it in his
hand.

'Cut away, sir!' cried Mark. 'Make it strong, sir. Let it be
wery pinted, sir. Do I think so? I should think so. Go to work,
sir!'

Martin required no further adjuration, but went to work at a
great rate; while Mr Tapley, installing himself without any more
formalities into the functions of his valet and general attendant,
divested himself of his coat, and went on to clear the fireplace and
arrange the room; talking to himself in a low voice the whole
time.

'Jolly sort of lodgings,' said Mark, rubbing his nose with the
knob at the end of the fire-shovel, and looking round the poor
chamber; 'that's a comfort. The rain's come through the roof too.
That an't bad. A lively old bedstead, I'll be bound; popilated by
lots of wampires, no doubt. Come! my spirits is a-getting up again.
An uncommon ragged nightcap this. A very good sign. We shall do
yet! Here, Jane, my dear,' calling down the stairs, 'bring up that
there hot tumbler for my master as was a-mixing when I come in.
That's right, sir,' to Martin. 'Go at it as if you meant it, sir.
Be very tender, sir, if you please. You can't make it too strong,
sir!'