第33章

`Now?' said she. `You little coarse monster, what do you think of me now?'

`I shall not tell you.'

`Because you are going to tell, up-stairs. It that it?'

`No,' said I, `that's not it.'

`Why don't you cry again, you little wretch?'

`Because I'll never cry for you again,' said I. Which was, I suppose, as false a declaration as ever was made; for I was inwardly crying for her then, and I know what I know of the pain she cost me afterwards.

We went on our way up-stairs after this episode; and, as we were going up, we met a gentleman groping his way down.

`Whom have we here?' asked the gentleman, stopping and looking at me.

`A boy,' said Estella.

He was a burly man of an exceedingly dark complexion, with an exceedingly large head and a corresponding large hand. He took my chin in his large hand and turned up my face to have a look at me by the light of the candle.

He was prematurely bald on the top of his head, and had bushy black eyebrows that wouldn't lie down but stood up bristling. His eyes were set very deep in his head, and were disagreeably sharp and suspicious. He had a large watchchain, and strong black dots where his beard and whiskers would have been if he had let them. He was nothing to me, and I could have had no foresight then, that he ever would be anything to me, but it happened that I had this opportunity of observing him well.

`Boy of the neighbourhood? Hey?' said he.

`Yes, sir,' said I.

`How do you come here?'

`Miss Havisham sent for me, sir,' I explained.

`Well! Behave yourself. I have a pretty large experience of boys, and you're a bad set of fellows. Now mind!' said he, biting the side of his great forefinger as he frowned at me, `you behave yourself!'

With those words, he released me - which I was glad of, for his hand smelt of scented soap - and went his way down-stairs. I wondered whether he could be a doctor; but no, I thought; he couldn't be a doctor, or he would have a quieter and more persuasive manner. There was not much time to consider the subject, for we were soon in Miss Havisham's room, where she and everything else were just as I had left them. Estella left me standing near the door, and I stood there until Miss Havisham cast her eyes upon me from the dressing-table.

`So!' she said, without being startled or surprised; `the days have worn away, have they?'

`Yes, ma'am. To-day is--'

`There, there, there!' with the impatient movement of her fingers. `Idon't want to know. Are you ready to play?'

I was obliged to answer in some confusion, `I don't think I am, ma'am.'

`Not at cards again?' she demanded, with a searching look.

`Yes, ma'am; I could do that, if I was wanted.'

`Since this house strikes you old and grave, boy,' said Miss Havisham, impatiently, `and you are unwilling to play, are you willing to work?'

I could answer this inquiry with a better heart than I had been able to find for the other question, and I said I was quite willing.

`Then go into that opposite room,' said she, pointing at the door behind me with her withered hand, `and wait there till I come.'

I crossed the staircase landing, and entered the room she indicated.

From that room, too, the daylight was completely excluded, and it had an airless smell that was oppressive. A fire had been lately kindled in the damp old-fashioned grate, and it was more disposed to go out than to burn up, and the reluctant smoke which hung in the room seemed colder than the clearer air - like our own marsh mist. Certain wintry branches of candles on the high chimneypiece faintly lighted the chamber: or, it would be more expressive to say, faintly troubled its darkness. It was spacious, and I dare say had once been handsome, but every discernible thing in it was covered with dust and mould, and dropping to pieces. The most prominent object was a long table with a tablecloth spread on it, as if a feast had been in preparation when the house and the clocks all stopped together.

An épergne or centrepiece of some kind was in the middle of this cloth; it was so heavily overhung with cobwebs that its form was quite undistinguishable; and, as I looked along the yellow expanse out of which I remember its seeming to grow, like a black fungus, I saw speckled-legged spiders with blotchy bodies running home to it, and running out from it, as if some circumstances of the greatest public importance had just transpired in the spider community.

I heard the mice too, rattling behind the panels, as if the same occurrence were important to their interests. But, the blackbeetles took no notice of the agitation, and groped about the hearth in a ponderous elderly way, as if they were short-sighted and hard of hearing, and not on terms with one another.

These crawling things had fascinated my attention and I was watching them from a distance, when Miss Havisham laid a hand upon my shoulder.

In her other hand she had a crutch-headed stick on which she leaned, and she looked like the Witch of the place.

`This,' said she, pointing to the long table with her stick, `is where I will be laid when I am dead. They shall come and look at me here.'

With some vague misgiving that she might get upon the table then and there and die at once, the complete realization of the ghastly waxwork at the Fair, I shrank under her touch.

`What do you think that is?' she asked me, again pointing with her stick;`that, where those cobwebs are?'

`I can't guess what it is, ma'am.'

`It's a great cake. A bride-cake. Mine!'

She looked all round the room in a glaring manner, and then said, leaning on me while her hand twitched my shoulder, `Come, come, come! Walk me, walk me!'

I made out from this, that the work I had to do, was to walk Miss Havisham round and round the room. Accordingly, I stated at once, and she leaned upon my shoulder, and we went away at a pace that might have been an imitation (founded on my first impulse under that roof) of Mr Pumblechook's chaise-cart.

She was not physically strong, and after a little time said, `Slower!'