BOOK THE SECOND: RICHES - CHAPTER 13 The Progress of an Epidemic

That it is at least as difficult to stay a moral infection as a

physical one; that such a disease will spread with the malignity

and rapidity of the Plague; that the contagion, when it has once

made head, will spare no pursuit or condition, but will lay hold on

people in the soundest health, and become developed in the most

unlikely constitutions: is a fact as firmly established by

experience as that we human creatures breathe an atmosphere. A

blessing beyond appreciation would be conferred upon mankind, if

the tainted, in whose weakness or wickedness these virulent

disorders are bred, could be instantly seized and placed in close

confinement (not to say summarily smothered) before the poison is

communicable.

As a vast fire will fill the air to a great distance with its roar,

so the sacred flame which the mighty Barnacles had fanned caused

the air to resound more and more with the name of Merdle. It was

deposited on every lip, and carried into every ear. There never

was, there never had been, there never again should be, such a man

as Mr Merdle. Nobody, as aforesaid, knew what he had done; but

everybody knew him to be the greatest that had appeared.

Down in Bleeding Heart Yard, where there was not one unappropriated

halfpenny, as lively an interest was taken in this paragon of men

as on the Stock Exchange. Mrs Plornish, now established in the

small grocery and general trade in a snug little shop at the crack

end of the Yard, at the top of the steps, with her little old

father and Maggy acting as assistants, habitually held forth about

him over the counter in conversation with her customers. Mr

Plornish, who had a small share in a small builder's business in

the neighbourhood, said, trowel in hand, on the tops of scaffolds

and on the tiles of houses, that people did tell him as Mr Merdle

was the one, mind you, to put us all to rights in respects of that

which all on us looked to, and to bring us all safe home as much as

we needed, mind you, fur toe be brought. Mr Baptist, sole lodger

of Mr and Mrs Plornish was reputed in whispers to lay by the

savings which were the result of his simple and moderate life, for

investment in one of Mr Merdle's certain enterprises. The female

Bleeding Hearts, when they came for ounces of tea, and

hundredweights of talk, gave Mrs Plornish to understand, That how,

ma'am, they had heard from their cousin Mary Anne, which worked in

the line, that his lady's dresses would fill three waggons. That

how she was as handsome a lady, ma'am, as lived, no matter wheres,

and a busk like marble itself. That how, according to what they

was told, ma'am, it was her son by a former husband as was took

into the Government; and a General he had been, and armies he had

marched again and victory crowned, if all you heard was to be

believed. That how it was reported that Mr Merdle's words had

been, that if they could have made it worth his while to take the

whole Government he would have took it without a profit, but that

take it he could not and stand a loss. That how it was not to be

expected, ma'am, that he should lose by it, his ways being, as you

might say and utter no falsehood, paved with gold; but that how it

was much to be regretted that something handsome hadn't been got up

to make it worth his while; for it was such and only such that

knowed the heighth to which the bread and butchers' meat had rose,

and it was such and only such that both could and would bring that

heighth down.

So rife and potent was the fever in Bleeding Heart Yard, that Mr

Pancks's rent-days caused no interval in the patients. The disease

took the singular form, on those occasions, of causing the infected

to find an unfathomable excuse and consolation in allusions to the

magic name.

'Now, then!' Mr Pancks would say, to a defaulting lodger. 'Pay up!

Come on!'

'I haven't got it, Mr Pancks,' Defaulter would reply. 'I tell you

the truth, sir, when I say I haven't got so much as a single

sixpence of it to bless myself with.'

'This won't do, you know,' Mr Pancks would retort. 'You don't

expect it will do; do you?'

Defaulter would admit, with a low-spirited 'No, sir,' having no

such expectation.

'My proprietor isn't going to stand this, you know,' Mr Pancks

would proceed. 'He don't send me here for this. Pay up! Come!'

The Defaulter would make answer, 'Ah, Mr Pancks. If I was the rich

gentleman whose name is in everybody's mouth--if my name was

Merdle, sir--I'd soon pay up, and be glad to do it.'

Dialogues on the rent-question usually took place at the house-

doors or in the entries, and in the presence of several deeply

interested Bleeding Hearts. They always received a reference of

this kind with a low murmur of response, as if it were convincing;

and the Defaulter, however black and discomfited before, always

cheered up a little in making it.

'If I was Mr Merdle, sir, you wouldn't have cause to complain of me

then. No, believe me!' the Defaulter would proceed with a shake of

the head. 'I'd pay up so quick then, Mr Pancks, that you shouldn't

have to ask me.'

The response would be heard again here, implying that it was

impossible to say anything fairer, and that this was the next thing

to paying the money down.

Mr Pancks would be now reduced to saying as he booked the case,

'Well! You'll have the broker in, and be turned out; that's

what'll happen to you. It's no use talking to me about Mr Merdle.

You are not Mr Merdle, any more than I am.'

'No, sir,' the Defaulter would reply. 'I only wish you were him,

sir.'

The response would take this up quickly; replying with great

feeling, 'Only wish you were him, sir.'

'You'd be easier with us if you were Mr Merdle, sir,' the Defaulter

would go on with rising spirits, 'and it would be better for all

parties. Better for our sakes, and better for yours, too. You

wouldn't have to worry no one, then, sir. You wouldn't have to

worry us, and you wouldn't have to worry yourself. You'd be easier

in your own mind, sir, and you'd leave others easier, too, you

would, if you were Mr Merdle.'

Mr Pancks, in whom these impersonal compliments produced an

irresistible sheepishness, never rallied after such a charge. He

could only bite his nails and puff away to the next Defaulter. The

responsive Bleeding Hearts would then gather round the Defaulter

whom he had just abandoned, and the most extravagant rumours would

circulate among them, to their great comfort, touching the amount

of Mr Merdle's ready money.

From one of the many such defeats of one of many rent-days, Mr

Pancks, having finished his day's collection, repaired with his

note-book under his arm to Mrs Plornish's corner. Mr Pancks's

object was not professional, but social. He had had a trying day,

and wanted a little brightening. By this time he was on friendly

terms with the Plornish family, having often looked in upon them at

similar seasons, and borne his part in recollections of Miss

Dorrit.

Mrs Plornish's shop-parlour had been decorated under her own eye,

and presented, on the side towards the shop, a little fiction in

which Mrs Plornish unspeakably rejoiced. This poetical heightening

of the parlour consisted in the wall being painted to represent the

exterior of a thatched cottage; the artist having introduced (in as

effective a manner as he found compatible with their highly

disproportionate dimensions) the real door and window. The modest

sunflower and hollyhock were depicted as flourishing with great

luxuriance on this rustic dwelling, while a quantity of dense smoke

issuing from the chimney indicated good cheer within, and also,

perhaps, that it had not been lately swept. A faithful dog was

represented as flying at the legs of the friendly visitor, from the

threshold; and a circular pigeon-house, enveloped in a cloud of

pigeons, arose from behind the garden-paling. On the door (when it

was shut), appeared the semblance of a brass-plate, presenting the

inscription, Happy Cottage, T. and M. Plornish; the partnership

expressing man and wife. No Poetry and no Art ever charmed the

imagination more than the union of the two in this counterfeit

cottage charmed Mrs Plornish. It was nothing to her that Plornish

had a habit of leaning against it as he smoked his pipe after work,

when his hat blotted out the pigeon-house and all the pigeons, when

his back swallowed up the dwelling, when his hands in his pockets

uprooted the blooming garden and laid waste the adjacent country.

To Mrs Plornish, it was still a most beautiful cottage, a most

wonderful deception; and it made no difference that Mr Plornish's

eye was some inches above the level of the gable bed-room in the

thatch. To come out into the shop after it was shut, and hear her

father sing a song inside this cottage, was a perfect Pastoral to

Mrs Plornish, the Golden Age revived. And truly if that famous

period had been revived, or had ever been at all, it may be doubted

whether it would have produced many more heartily admiring

daughters than the poor woman.

Warned of a visitor by the tinkling bell at the shop-door, Mrs

Plornish came out of Happy Cottage to see who it might be. 'I

guessed it was you, Mr Pancks,' said she, 'for it's quite your

regular night; ain't it? Here's father, you see, come out to serve

at the sound of the bell, like a brisk young shopman. Ain't he

looking well? Father's more pleased to see you than if you was a

customer, for he dearly loves a gossip; and when it turns upon Miss

Dorrit, he loves it all the more. You never heard father in such

voice as he is at present,' said Mrs Plornish, her own voice

quavering, she was so proud and pleased. 'He gave us Strephon last

night to that degree that Plornish gets up and makes him this

speech across the table. "John Edward Nandy," says Plornish to

father, "I never heard you come the warbles as I have heard you

come the warbles this night." An't it gratifying, Mr Pancks,

though; really?'

Mr Pancks, who had snorted at the old man in his friendliest

manner, replied in the affirmative, and casually asked whether that

lively Altro chap had come in yet? Mrs Plornish answered no, not

yet, though he had gone to the West-End with some work, and had

said he should be back by tea-time. Mr Pancks was then hospitably

pressed into Happy Cottage, where he encountered the elder Master

Plornish just come home from school. Examining that young student,

lightly, on the educational proceedings of the day, he found that

the more advanced pupils who were in the large text and the letter

M, had been set the copy 'Merdle, Millions.'

'And how are you getting on, Mrs Plornish,' said Pancks, 'since

we're mentioning millions?'

'Very steady, indeed, sir,' returned Mrs Plornish. 'Father, dear,

would you go into the shop and tidy the window a little bit before

tea, your taste being so beautiful?'

John Edward Nandy trotted away, much gratified, to comply with his

daughter's request. Mrs Plornish, who was always in mortal terror

of mentioning pecuniary affairs before the old gentleman, lest any

disclosure she made might rouse his spirit and induce him to run

away to the workhouse, was thus left free to be confidential with

Mr Pancks.

'It's quite true that the business is very steady indeed,' said Mrs

Plornish, lowering her voice; 'and has a excellent connection. The

only thing that stands in its way, sir, is the Credit.'

This drawback, rather severely felt by most people who engaged in

commercial transactions with the inhabitants of Bleeding Heart

Yard, was a large stumbling-block in Mrs Plornish's trade. When Mr

Dorrit had established her in the business, the Bleeding Hearts had

shown an amount of emotion and a determination to support her in

it, that did honour to human nature. Recognising her claim upon

their generous feelings as one who had long been a member of their

community, they pledged themselves, with great feeling, to deal

with Mrs Plornish, come what would and bestow their patronage on no

other establishment. Influenced by these noble sentiments, they

had even gone out of their way to purchase little luxuries in the

grocery and butter line to which they were unaccustomed; saying to

one another, that if they did stretch a point, was it not for a

neighbour and a friend, and for whom ought a point to be stretched

if not for such? So stimulated, the business was extremely brisk,

and the articles in stock went off with the greatest celerity. In

short, if the Bleeding Hearts had but paid, the undertaking would

have been a complete success; whereas, by reason of their

exclusively confining themselves to owing, the profits actually

realised had not yet begun to appear in the books.

Mr Pancks was making a very porcupine of himself by sticking his

hair up in the contemplation of this state of accounts, when old Mr

Nandy, re-entering the cottage with an air of mystery, entreated

them to come and look at the strange behaviour of Mr Baptist, who

seemed to have met with something that had scared him. All three

going into the shop, and watching through the window, then saw Mr

Baptist, pale and agitated, go through the following extraordinary

performances. First, he was observed hiding at the top of the

steps leading down into the Yard, and peeping up and down the

street with his head cautiously thrust out close to the side of the

shop-door. After very anxious scrutiny, he came out of his

retreat, and went briskly down the street as if he were going away

altogether; then, suddenly turned about, and went, at the same

pace, and with the same feint, up the street. He had gone no

further up the street than he had gone down, when he crossed the

road and disappeared. The object of this last manoeuvre was only

apparent, when his entering the shop with a sudden twist, from the

steps again, explained that he had made a wide and obscure circuit

round to the other, or Doyce and Clennam, end of the Yard, and had

come through the Yard and bolted in. He was out of breath by that

time, as he might well be, and his heart seemed to jerk faster than

the little shop-bell, as it quivered and jingled behind him with

his hasty shutting of the door.

'Hallo, old chap!' said Mr Pancks. 'Altro, old boy! What's the

matter?'

Mr Baptist, or Signor Cavalletto, understood English now almost as

well as Mr Pancks himself, and could speak it very well too.

Nevertheless, Mrs Plornish, with a pardonable vanity in that

accomplishment of hers which made her all but Italian, stepped in

as interpreter.

'E ask know,' said Mrs Plornish, 'What go wrong?'

'Come into the happy little cottage, Padrona,' returned Mr Baptist,

imparting great stealthiness to his flurried back-handed shake of

his right forefinger. 'Come there!'

Mrs Plornish was proud of the title Padrona, which she regarded as

signifying: not so much Mistress of the house, as Mistress of the

Italian tongue. She immediately complied with Mr Baptist's

request, and they all went into the cottage.

'E ope you no fright,' said Mrs Plornish then, interpreting Mr

Pancks in a new way with her usual fertility of resource. 'What

appen? Peaka Padrona!'

'I have seen some one,' returned Baptist. 'I have rincontrato

him.'

'Im? Oo him?' asked Mrs Plornish.

'A bad man. A baddest man. I have hoped that I should never see

him again.'

'Ow you know him bad?' asked Mrs Plornish.

'It does not matter, Padrona. I know it too well.'

''E see you?' asked Mrs Plornish.

'No. I hope not. I believe not.'

'He says,' Mrs Plornish then interpreted, addressing her father and

Pancks with mild condescension, 'that he has met a bad man, but he

hopes the bad man didn't see him--Why,' inquired Mrs Plornish,

reverting to the Italian language, 'why ope bad man no see?'

'Padrona, dearest,' returned the little foreigner whom she so

considerately protected, 'do not ask, I pray. Once again I say it

matters not. I have fear of this man. I do not wish to see him,

I do not wish to be known of him--never again! Enough, most

beautiful. Leave it.'

The topic was so disagreeable to him, and so put his usual

liveliness to the rout, that Mrs Plornish forbore to press him

further: the rather as the tea had been drawing for some time on

the hob. But she was not the less surprised and curious for asking

no more questions; neither was Mr Pancks, whose expressive

breathing had been labouring hard since the entrance of the little

man, like a locomotive engine with a great load getting up a steep

incline. Maggy, now better dressed than of yore, though still

faithful to the monstrous character of her cap, had been in the

background from the first with open mouth and eyes, which staring

and gaping features were not diminished in breadth by the untimely

suppression of the subject. However, no more was said about it,

though much appeared to be thought on all sides: by no means

excepting the two young Plornishes, who partook of the evening meal

as if their eating the bread and butter were rendered almost

superfluous by the painful probability of the worst of men shortly

presenting himself for the purpose of eating them. Mr Baptist, by

degrees began to chirp a little; but never stirred from the seat he

had taken behind the door and close to the window, though it was

not his usual place. As often as the little bell rang, he started

and peeped out secretly, with the end of the little curtain in his

hand and the rest before his face; evidently not at all satisfied

but that the man he dreaded had tracked him through all his

doublings and turnings, with the certainty of a terrible

bloodhound.

The entrance, at various times, of two or three customers and of Mr

Plornish, gave Mr Baptist just enough of this employment to keep

the attention of the company fixed upon him. Tea was over, and the

children were abed, and Mrs Plornish was feeling her way to the

dutiful proposal that her father should favour them with Chloe,

when the bell rang again, and Mr Clennam came in.

Clennam had been poring late over his books and letters; for the

waiting-rooms of the Circumlocution Office ravaged his time sorely.

Over and above that, he was depressed and made uneasy by the late

occurrence at his mother's. He looked worn and solitary. He felt

so, too; but, nevertheless, was returning home from his counting-

house by that end of the Yard to give them the intelligence that he

had received another letter from Miss Dorrit.

The news made a sensation in the cottage which drew off the general

attention from Mr Baptist. Maggy, who pushed her way into the

foreground immediately, would have seemed to draw in the tidings of

her Little Mother equally at her ears, nose, mouth, and eyes, but

that the last were obstructed by tears. She was particularly

delighted when Clennam assured her that there were hospitals, and

very kindly conducted hospitals, in Rome. Mr Pancks rose into new

distinction in virtue of being specially remembered in the letter.

Everybody was pleased and interested, and Clennam was well repaid

for his trouble.

'But you are tired, sir. Let me make you a cup of tea,' said Mrs

Plornish, 'if you'd condescend to take such a thing in the cottage;

and many thanks to you, too, I am sure, for bearing us in mind so

kindly.'

Mr Plornish deeming it incumbent on him, as host, to add his

personal acknowledgments, tendered them in the form which always

expressed his highest ideal of a combination of ceremony with

sincerity.

'John Edward Nandy,' said Mr Plornish, addressing the old

gentleman. 'Sir. It's not too often that you see unpretending

actions without a spark of pride, and therefore when you see them

give grateful honour unto the same, being that if you don't, and

live to want 'em, it follows serve you right.'

To which Mr Nandy replied:

'I am heartily of your opinion, Thomas, and which your opinion is

the same as mine, and therefore no more words and not being

backwards with that opinion, which opinion giving it as yes,

Thomas, yes, is the opinion in which yourself and me must ever be

unanimously jined by all, and where there is not difference of

opinion there can be none but one opinion, which fully no, Thomas,

Thomas, no !'

Arthur, with less formality, expressed himself gratified by their

high appreciation of so very slight an attention on his part; and

explained as to the tea that he had not yet dined, and was going

straight home to refresh after a long day's labour, or he would

have readily accepted the hospitable offer. As Mr Pancks was

somewhat noisily getting his steam up for departure, he concluded

by asking that gentleman if he would walk with him? Mr Pancks said

he desired no better engagement, and the two took leave of Happy

Cottage.

'If you will come home with me, Pancks,' said Arthur, when they got

into the street, 'and will share what dinner or supper there is, it

will be next door to an act of charity; for I am weary and out of

sorts to-night.'

'Ask me to do a greater thing than that,' said Pancks, 'when you

want it done, and I'll do it.'

Between this eccentric personage and Clennam, a tacit understanding

and accord had been always improving since Mr Pancks flew over Mr

Rugg's back in the Marshalsea Yard. When the carriage drove away

on the memorable day of the family's departure, these two had

looked after it together, and had walked slowly away together.

When the first letter came from little Dorrit, nobody was more

interested in hearing of her than Mr Pancks. The second letter, at

that moment in Clennam's breast-pocket, particularly remembered him

by name. Though he had never before made any profession or

protestation to Clennam, and though what he had just said was

little enough as to the words in which it was expressed, Clennam

had long had a growing belief that Mr Pancks, in his own odd way,

was becoming attached to him. All these strings intertwining made

Pancks a very cable of anchorage that night.

'I am quite alone,' Arthur explained as they walked on. 'My

partner is away, busily engaged at a distance on his branch of our

business, and you shall do just as you like.'

'Thank you. You didn't take particular notice of little Altro just

now; did you?' said Pancks.

'No. Why?'

'He's a bright fellow, and I like him,' said Pancks. 'Something

has gone amiss with him to-day. Have you any idea of any cause

that can have overset him?'

'You surprise me! None whatever.'

Mr Pancks gave his reasons for the inquiry. Arthur was quite

unprepared for them, and quite unable to suggest an explanation of

them.

'Perhaps you'll ask him,' said Pancks, 'as he's a stranger?'

'Ask him what?' returned Clennam.

'What he has on his mind.'

'I ought first to see for myself that he has something on his mind,

I think,' said Clennam. 'I have found him in every way so

diligent, so grateful (for little enough), and so trustworthy, that

it might look like suspecting him. And that would be very unjust.'

'True,' said Pancks. 'But, I say! You oughtn't to be anybody's

proprietor, Mr Clennam. You're much too delicate.'

'For the matter of that,' returned Clennam laughing, 'I have not a

large proprietary share in Cavalletto. His carving is his

livelihood. He keeps the keys of the Factory, watches it every

alternate night, and acts as a sort of housekeeper to it generally;

but we have little work in the way of his ingenuity, though we give

him what we have. No! I am rather his adviser than his

proprietor. To call me his standing counsel and his banker would

be nearer the fact. Speaking of being his banker, is it not

curious, Pancks, that the ventures which run just now in so many

people's heads, should run even in little Cavalletto's?'

'Ventures?' retorted Pancks, with a snort. 'What ventures?'

'These Merdle enterprises.'

'Oh! Investments,' said Pancks. 'Ay, ay! I didn't know you were

speaking of investments.'

His quick way of replying caused Clennam to look at him, with a

doubt whether he meant more than he said. As it was accompanied,

however, with a quickening of his pace and a corresponding increase

in the labouring of his machinery, Arthur did not pursue the

matter, and they soon arrived at his house.

A dinner of soup and a pigeon-pie, served on a little round table

before the fire, and flavoured with a bottle of good wine, oiled Mr

Pancks's works in a highly effective manner; so that when Clennam

produced his Eastern pipe, and handed Mr Pancks another Eastern

pipe, the latter gentleman was perfectly comfortable.

They puffed for a while in silence, Mr Pancks like a steam-vessel

with wind, tide, calm water, and all other sea-going conditions in

her favour. He was the first to speak, and he spoke thus:

'Yes. Investments is the word.'

Clennam, with his former look, said 'Ah!'

'I am going back to it, you see,' said Pancks.

'Yes. I see you are going back to it,' returned Clennam, wondering

why.

'Wasn't it a curious thing that they should run in little Altro's

head? Eh?' said Pancks as he smoked. 'Wasn't that how you put

it?'

'That was what I said.'

'Ay! But think of the whole Yard having got it. Think of their

all meeting me with it, on my collecting days, here and there and

everywhere. Whether they pay, or whether they don't pay. Merdle,

Merdle, Merdle. Always Merdle.'

'Very strange how these runs on an infatuation prevail,' said

Arthur.

'An't it?' returned Pancks. After smoking for a minute or so, more

drily than comported with his recent oiling, he added: 'Because you

see these people don't understand the subject.'

'Not a bit,' assented Clennam.

'Not a bit,' cried Pancks. 'Know nothing of figures. Know nothing

of money questions. Never made a calculation. Never worked it,

sir!'

'If they had--' Clennam was going on to say; when Mr Pancks,

without change of countenance, produced a sound so far surpassing

all his usual efforts, nasal or bronchial, that he stopped.

'If they had?' repeated Pancks in an inquiring tone.

'I thought you--spoke,' said Arthur, hesitating what name to give

the interruption.

'Not at all,' said Pancks. 'Not yet. I may in a minute. If they

had?'

'If they had,' observed Clennam, who was a little at a loss how to

take his friend, 'why, I suppose they would have known better.'

'How so, Mr Clennam?' Pancks asked quickly, and with an odd effect

of having been from the commencement of the conversation loaded

with the heavy charge he now fired off. 'They're right, you know.

They don't mean to be, but they're right.'

'Right in sharing Cavalletto's inclination to speculate with Mr

Merdle?'

'Per-fectly, sir,' said Pancks. 'I've gone into it. I've made the

calculations. I've worked it. They're safe and genuine.'

Relieved by having got to this, Mr Pancks took as long a pull as

his lungs would permit at his Eastern pipe, and looked sagaciously

and steadily at Clennam while inhaling and exhaling too.

In those moments, Mr Pancks began to give out the dangerous

infection with which he was laden. It is the manner of

communicating these diseases; it is the subtle way in which they go

about.

'Do you mean, my good Pancks,' asked Clennam emphatically, 'that

you would put that thousand pounds of yours, let us say, for

instance, out at this kind of interest?'

'Certainly,' said Pancks. 'Already done it, sir.'

Mr Pancks took another long inhalation, another long exhalation,

another long sagacious look at Clennam.

'I tell you, Mr Clennam, I've gone into it,' said Pancks. 'He's a

man of immense resources--enormous capital--government influence.

They're the best schemes afloat. They're safe. They're certain.'

'Well!' returned Clennam, looking first at him gravely and then at

the fire gravely. 'You surprise me!'

'Bah!' Pancks retorted. 'Don't say that, sir. It's what you ought

to do yourself! Why don't you do as I do?'

Of whom Mr Pancks had taken the prevalent disease, he could no more

have told than if he had unconsciously taken a fever. Bred at

first, as many physical diseases are, in the wickedness of men, and

then disseminated in their ignorance, these epidemics, after a

period, get communicated to many sufferers who are neither ignorant

nor wicked. Mr Pancks might, or might not, have caught the illness

himself from a subject of this class; but in this category he

appeared before Clennam, and the infection he threw off was all the

more virulent.

'And you have really invested,' Clennam had already passed to that

word, 'your thousand pounds, Pancks?'

'To be sure, sir!' replied Pancks boldly, with a puff of smoke.

'And only wish it ten!'

Now, Clennam had two subjects lying heavy on his lonely mind that

night; the one, his partner's long-deferred hope; the other, what

he had seen and heard at his mother's. In the relief of having

this companion, and of feeling that he could trust him, he passed

on to both, and both brought him round again, with an increase and

acceleration of force, to his point of departure.

It came about in the simplest manner. Quitting the investment

subject, after an interval of silent looking at the fire through

the smoke of his pipe, he told Pancks how and why he was occupied

with the great National Department. 'A hard case it has been, and

a hard case it is on Doyce,' he finished by saying, with all the

honest feeling the topic roused in him.

'Hard indeed,' Pancks acquiesced. 'But you manage for him, Mr

Clennam?'

'How do you mean ?'

'Manage the money part of the business?'

'Yes. As well as I can.'

'Manage it better, sir,' said Pancks. 'Recompense him for his

toils and disappointments. Give him the chances of the time.

He'll never benefit himself in that way, patient and preoccupied

workman. He looks to you, sir.'

'I do my best, Pancks,' returned Clennam, uneasily. 'As to duly

weighing and considering these new enterprises of which I have had

no experience, I doubt if I am fit for it, I am growing old.'

'Growing old?' cried Pancks. 'Ha, ha!'

There was something so indubitably genuine in the wonderful laugh,

and series of snorts and puffs, engendered in Mr Pancks's

astonishment at, and utter rejection of, the idea, that his being

quite in earnest could not be questioned.

'Growing old?' cried Pancks. 'Hear, hear, hear! Old? Hear him,

hear him!'

The positive refusal expressed in Mr Pancks's continued snorts, no

less than in these exclamations, to entertain the sentiment for a

single instant, drove Arthur away from it. Indeed, he was fearful

of something happening to Mr Pancks in the violent conflict that

took place between the breath he jerked out of himself and the

smoke he jerked into himself. This abandonment of the second topic

threw him on the third.

'Young, old, or middle-aged, Pancks,' he said, when there was a

favourable pause, 'I am in a very anxious and uncertain state; a

state that even leads me to doubt whether anything now seeming to

belong to me, may be really mine. Shall I tell you how this is?

Shall I put a great trust in you?'

'You shall, sir,' said Pancks, 'if you believe me worthy of it.'

'I do.'

'You may!' Mr Pancks's short and sharp rejoinder, confirmed by the

sudden outstretching of his coaly hand, was most expressive and

convincing. Arthur shook the hand warmly.

He then, softening the nature of his old apprehensions as much as

was possible consistently with their being made intelligible and

never alluding to his mother by name, but speaking vaguely of a

relation of his, confided to Mr Pancks a broad outline of the

misgivings he entertained, and of the interview he had witnessed.

Mr Pancks listened with such interest that, regardless of the

charms of the Eastern pipe, he put it in the grate among the fire-

irons, and occupied his hands during the whole recital in so

erecting the loops and hooks of hair all over his head, that he

looked, when it came to a conclusion, like a journeyman Hamlet in

conversation with his father's spirit.

'Brings me back, sir,' was his exclamation then, with a startling

touch on Clennam's knee, 'brings me back, sir, to the Investments!

I don't say anything of your making yourself poor to repair a wrong

you never committed. That's you. A man must be himself. But I

say this, fearing you may want money to save your own blood from

exposure and disgrace--make as much as you can!'

Arthur shook his head, but looked at him thoughtfully too.

'Be as rich as you can, sir,' Pancks adjured him with a powerful

concentration of all his energies on the advice. 'Be as rich as

you honestly can. It's your duty. Not for your sake, but for the

sake of others. Take time by the forelock. Poor Mr Doyce (who

really is growing old) depends upon you. Your relative depends

upon you. You don't know what depends upon you.'

'Well, well, well!' returned Arthur. 'Enough for to-night.'

'One word more, Mr Clennam,' retorted Pancks, 'and then enough for

to-night. Why should you leave all the gains to the gluttons,

knaves, and impostors? Why should you leave all the gains that are

to be got to my proprietor and the like of him? Yet you're always

doing it. When I say you, I mean such men as you. You know you

are. Why, I see it every day of my life. I see nothing else.

It's my business to see it. Therefore I say,' urged Pancks, 'Go in

and win!'

'But what of Go in and lose?' said Arthur.

'Can't be done, sir,' returned Pancks. 'I have looked into it.

Name up everywhere--immense resources--enormous capital--great

position--high connection--government influence. Can't be done!'

Gradually, after this closing exposition, Mr Pancks subsided;

allowed his hair to droop as much as it ever would droop on the

utmost persuasion; reclaimed the pipe from the fire-irons, filled

it anew, and smoked it out. They said little more; but were

company to one another in silently pursuing the same subjects, and

did not part until midnight. On taking his leave, Mr Pancks, when

he had shaken hands with Clennam, worked completely round him

before he steamed out at the door. This, Arthur received as an

assurance that he might implicitly rely on Pancks, if he ever

should come to need assistance; either in any of the matters of

which they had spoken that night, or any other subject that could

in any way affect himself.

At intervals all next day, and even while his attention was fixed

on other things, he thought of Mr Pancks's investment of his

thousand pounds, and of his having 'looked into it.' He thought of

Mr Pancks's being so sanguine in this matter, and of his not being

usually of a sanguine character. He thought of the great National

Department, and of the delight it would be to him to see Doyce

better off. He thought of the darkly threatening place that went

by the name of Home in his remembrance, and of the gathering

shadows which made it yet more darkly threatening than of old. He

observed anew that wherever he went, he saw, or heard, or touched,

the celebrated name of Merdle; he found it difficult even to remain

at his desk a couple of hours, without having it presented to one

of his bodily senses through some agency or other. He began to

think it was curious too that it should be everywhere, and that

nobody but he should seem to have any mistrust of it. Though

indeed he began to remember, when he got to this, even he did not

mistrust it; he had only happened to keep aloof from it.

Such symptoms, when a disease of the kind is rife, are usually the

signs of sickening.

Read next: BOOK THE SECOND: RICHES#CHAPTER 14 Taking Advice

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