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Elisha Cuthbert Photos Books: Martin Eden The Pickwick Papers The Sea Wolf |
for your condolence on what you
presume to be my melancholy case, said Mr. Pickwick, winding
up his watch, and laying it on the table, but--
No, no, said Mr. Peter Magnus, not a word more; its a
painful subject. I see, I see. Whats the time, Mr. Pickwick?
Past twelve.
Dear me, its time to go to bed. It will never do, sitting here. I
shall be pale to-morrow, Mr. Pickwick.
At the bare notion of such a calamity, Mr. Peter Magnus rang
the bell for the chambermaid; and the striped bag, the red bag,
the leathern hat-box, and the brown-paper parcel, having been
conveyed to his bedroom, he retired in company with a japanned
candlestick, to one side of the house, while Mr. Pickwick, and
another japanned candlestick, were conducted through a multitude
of tortuous windings, to another.
This is your room, sir, said the chambermaid.
Very well, replied Mr. Pickwick, looking round him. It was a
tolerably large double-bedded room, with a fire; upon the whole,
a more comfortable-looking apartment than Mr. Pickwicks
short experience of the accommodations of the Great White
Horse had led him to expect.
Nobody sleeps in the other bed, of course, said Mr. Pickwick.
Oh, no, Sir.
Very good. Tell my servant to bring me up some hot water at
half-past eight in the morning, and that I shall not want him any
more to-night.
Yes, Sir, and bidding Mr. Pickwick good-night, the chambermaid
retired, and left him alone.
Mr. Pickwick sat himself down in a chair before the fire, and
fell into a train of rambling meditations. First he thought of his
friends, and wondered when they would join him; then his mind
reverted to Mrs. Martha Bardell; and from that lady it wandered,
by a natural process, to the dingy counting-house of Dodson &
Fogg. From Dodson & Foggs it flew off at a tangent, to the very
centre of the history of the queer client; and then it came back to
the Great White Horse at Ipswich, with sufficient clearness to
convince Mr. Pickwick that he was falling asleep. So he roused
himself, and began to undress, when he recollected he had left his
watch on the table downstairs.
Now this watch was a special favourite with Mr. Pickwick,
having been carried about, beneath the shadow of his waistcoat,
for a greater number of years than we feel called upon to state at
present. The possibility of going to sleep, unless it were ticking
gently beneath his pillow, or in the watch-pocket over his head,
had never entered Mr. Pickwicks brain. So as it was pretty late
now, and he was unwilling to ring his bell at that hour of the
night, he slipped on his coat, of which he had just divested
himself, and taking the japanned candlestick in his hand, walked
quietly downstairs.
The more stairs Mr. Pickwick went down, the more stairs
there seemed to be to descend, and again and again, when Mr.
Pickwick got into some narrow passage, and began to congratulate
himself on having gained the ground-floor, did another flight
of stairs appear before his astonished eyes. At last he reached a
stone hall, which he remembered to have seen when he entered
the house. Passage after passage did he explore; room after room
did he peep into; at length, as he was on the point of giving up the
search in despair, he opened the door of the identical room in
which he had spent the evening, and beheld his missing property
on the table.
Mr. Pickwick seized the watch in triumph, and proceeded to
retrace his steps to his bedchamber. If his progress downward had
been attended with difficulties and uncertainty, his journey back
was infinitely more perplexing. Rows of doors, garnished with
boots of every shape, make, and size, branched off in every
possible direction. A dozen times did he softly turn the handle of
some bedroom door which resembled his own, when a gruff cry
from within of Who the devils that? or What do you want
here? caused him to steal away, on tiptoe, with a perfectly
marvellous celerity. He was reduced to the verge of despair, when
an open door attracted his attention. He peeped in. Right at last!
There were the two beds, whose situation he perfectly remembered,
and the fire still burning. His candle, not a long one when he
first received it, had flickered away in the drafts of air through
which he had passed and sank into The Pickwick Papers page 148 The Pickwick Papers page 150 |