Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (speed reading book TXT) 📕

which I suppose to be always got up with a flat iron), a

conversation took place in the gallery respecting the paleness of

his leg, and whether it was occasioned by the turn the ghost had

given him. On his taking the recorders,—very like a little black

flute that had just been played in the orchestra and handed out at

the door,—he was called upon unanimously for Rule Britannia. When

he recommended the player not to saw the air thus, the sulky man

said, “And don’t you do it, neither; you’re a deal worse than him!”

And I grieve to add that peals of laughter greeted Mr. Wopsle on

every one of these occasions.

But his greatest trials were in the churchyard, which had the

appearance of a primeval forest, with a kind of small

ecclesiastical wash-house on one side, and a turnpike gate on the

other. Mr. Wopsle in a comprehensive black cloak, being descried

entering at the turnpike, the gravedigger was admonished in a

friendly way, “Look out! Here’s the undertaker a coming, to see how

you’re a getting on with your work!” I believe it is well known in

a constitutional country that Mr. Wopsle could not possibly have

returned the skull, after moralizing over it, without dusting his

fingers on a white napkin taken from his breast; but even that

innocent and indispensable action did not pass without the comment,

“Wai-ter!” The arrival of the body for interment (in an empty black

box with the lid tumbling open), was the signal for a general joy,

which was much enhanced by the discovery, among the bearers, of an

individual obnoxious to identification. The joy attended Mr. Wopsle

through his struggle with Laertes on the brink of the orchestra and

the grave, and slackened no more until he had tumbled the king off

the kitchen-table, and had died by inches from the ankles upward.

We had made some pale efforts in the beginning to applaud Mr.

Wopsle; but they were too hopeless to be persisted in. Therefore we

had sat, feeling keenly for him, but laughing, nevertheless, from

ear to ear. I laughed in spite of myself all the time, the whole

thing was so droll; and yet I had a latent impression that there

was something decidedly fine in Mr. Wopsle’s elocution,—not for old

associations’ sake, I am afraid, but because it was very slow, very

dreary, very up-hill and down-hill, and very unlike any way in

which any man in any natural circumstances of life or death ever

expressed himself about anything. When the tragedy was over, and he

had been called for and hooted, I said to Herbert, “Let us go at

once, or perhaps we shall meet him.”

We made all the haste we could down stairs, but we were not quick

enough either. Standing at the door was a Jewish man with an

unnatural heavy smear of eyebrow, who caught my eyes as we

advanced, and said, when we came up with him,—

“Mr. Pip and friend?”

Identity of Mr. Pip and friend confessed.

“Mr. Waldengarver,” said the man, “would be glad to have the

honor.”

“Waldengarver?” I repeated—when Herbert murmured in my ear,

“Probably Wopsle.”

“Oh!” said I. “Yes. Shall we follow you?”

“A few steps, please.” When we were in a side alley, he turned and

asked, “How did you think he looked?—I dressed him.”

I don’t know what he had looked like, except a funeral; with the

addition of a large Danish sun or star hanging round his neck by a

blue ribbon, that had given him the appearance of being insured in

some extraordinary Fire Office. But I said he had looked very nice.

“When he come to the grave,” said our conductor, “he showed his

cloak beautiful. But, judging from the wing, it looked to me that

when he see the ghost in the queen’s apartment, he might have made

more of his stockings.”

I modestly assented, and we all fell through a little dirty swing

door, into a sort of hot packing-case immediately behind it. Here

Mr. Wopsle was divesting himself of his Danish garments, and here

there was just room for us to look at him over one another’s

shoulders, by keeping the packing-case door, or lid, wide open.

“Gentlemen,” said Mr. Wopsle, “I am proud to see you. I hope, Mr.

Pip, you will excuse my sending round. I had the happiness to know

you in former times, and the Drama has ever had a claim which has

ever been acknowledged, on the noble and the affluent.”

Meanwhile, Mr. Waldengarver, in a frightful perspiration, was trying

to get himself out of his princely sables.

“Skin the stockings off Mr. Waldengarver,” said the owner of that

property, “or you’ll bust ‘em. Bust ‘em, and you’ll bust

five-and-thirty shillings. Shakspeare never was complimented with a

finer pair. Keep quiet in your chair now, and leave ‘em to me.”

With that, he went upon his knees, and began to flay his victim;

who, on the first stocking coming off, would certainly have fallen

over backward with his chair, but for there being no room to fall

anyhow.

I had been afraid until then to say a word about the play. But

then, Mr. Waldengarver looked up at us complacently, and said,—

“Gentlemen, how did it seem to you, to go, in front?”

Herbert said from behind (at the same time poking me), “Capitally.”

So I said “Capitally.”

“How did you like my reading of the character, gentlemen?” said Mr.

Waldengarver, almost, if not quite, with patronage.

Herbert said from behind (again poking me), “Massive and concrete.”

So I said boldly, as if I had originated it, and must beg to insist

upon it, “Massive and concrete.”

“I am glad to have your approbation, gentlemen,” said Mr.

Waldengarver, with an air of dignity, in spite of his being ground

against the wall at the time, and holding on by the seat of the

chair.

“But I’ll tell you one thing, Mr. Waldengarver,” said the man who

was on his knees, “in which you’re out in your reading. Now mind! I

don’t care who says contrairy; I tell you so. You’re out in your

reading of Hamlet when you get your legs in profile. The last

Hamlet as I dressed, made the same mistakes in his reading at

rehearsal, till I got him to put a large red wafer on each of his

shins, and then at that rehearsal (which was the last) I went in

front, sir, to the back of the pit, and whenever his reading

brought him into profile, I called out “I don’t see no wafers!” And

at night his reading was lovely.”

Mr. Waldengarver smiled at me, as much as to say “a faithful

Dependent—I overlook his folly;” and then said aloud, “My view is

a little classic and thoughtful for them here; but they will

improve, they will improve.”

Herbert and I said together, O, no doubt they would improve.

“Did you observe, gentlemen,” said Mr. Waldengarver, “that there was

a man in the gallery who endeavored to cast derision on the

service,—I mean, the representation?”

We basely replied that we rather thought we had noticed such a man.

I added, “He was drunk, no doubt.”

“O dear no, sir,” said Mr. Wopsle, “not drunk. His employer would

see to that, sir. His employer would not allow him to be drunk.”

“You know his employer?” said I.

Mr. Wopsle shut his eyes, and opened them again; performing both

ceremonies very slowly. “You must have observed, gentlemen,” said

he, “an ignorant and a blatant ass, with a rasping throat and a

countenance expressive of low malignity, who went through—I will

not say sustained—the r�le (if I may use a French expression) of

Claudius, King of Denmark. That is his employer, gentlemen. Such is

the profession!”

Without distinctly knowing whether I should have been more sorry

for Mr. Wopsle if he had been in despair, I was so sorry for him as

it was, that I took the opportunity of his turning round to have

his braces put on,—which jostled us out at the doorway,—to ask

Herbert what he thought of having him home to supper? Herbert said

he thought it would be kind to do so; therefore I invited him, and

he went to Barnard’s with us, wrapped up to the eyes, and we did

our best for him, and he sat until two o’clock in the morning,

reviewing his success and developing his plans. I forget in detail

what they were, but I have a general recollection that he was to

begin with reviving the Drama, and to end with crushing it;

inasmuch as his decease would leave it utterly bereft and without a

chance or hope.

Miserably I went to bed after all, and miserably thought of

Estella, and miserably dreamed that my expectations were all

cancelled, and that I had to give my hand in marriage to Herbert’s

Clara, or play Hamlet to Miss Havisham’s Ghost, before twenty

thousand people, without knowing twenty words of it.