Deeming Sunday the best day for taking Mr. Wemmick’s
Walworth sentiments, I devoted the next ensuing Sunday
afternoon to a pilgrimage to the Castle. On
arriving before the battlements, I found the Union
Jack flying and the drawbridge up; but undeterred
by this show of defiance and resistance, I rang at
the gate, and was admitted in a most pacific manner
by the Aged.
“My son, sir,” said the old man, after
securing the drawbridge, “rather had it in his
mind that you might happen to drop in, and he left
word that he would soon be home from his afternoon’s
walk. He is very regular in his walks, is my
son. Very regular in everything, is my son.”
I nodded at the old gentleman as Wemmick himself might
have nodded, and we went in and sat down by the fireside.
“You made acquaintance with my son, sir,”
said the old man, in his chirping way, while he warmed
his hands at the blaze, “at his office, I expect?”
I nodded. “Hah! I have heerd that
my son is a wonderful hand at his business, sir?”
I nodded hard. “Yes; so they tell me.
His business is the Law?” I nodded harder.
“Which makes it more surprising in my son,”
said the old man, “for he was not brought up
to the Law, but to the Wine-Coopering.”
Curious to know how the old gentleman stood informed
concerning the reputation of Mr. Jaggers, I roared
that name at him. He threw me into the greatest
confusion by laughing heartily and replying in a very
sprightly manner, “No, to be sure; you’re
right.” And to this hour I have not the
faintest notion what he meant, or what joke he thought
I had made.
As I could not sit there nodding at him perpetually,
without making some other attempt to interest him,
I shouted at inquiry whether his own calling in life
had been “the Wine-Coopering.” By
dint of straining that term out of myself several
times and tapping the old gentleman on the chest to
associate it with him, I at last succeeded in making
my meaning understood.
“No,” said the old gentleman; “the
warehousing, the warehousing. First, over yonder;”
he appeared to mean up the chimney, but I believe
he intended to refer me to Liverpool; “and then
in the City of London here. However, having
an infirmity — for I am hard of hearing, sir—”
I expressed in pantomime the greatest astonishment.
" — Yes, hard of hearing; having that infirmity
coming upon me, my son he went into the Law, and he
took charge of me, and he by little and little made
out this elegant and beautiful property. But
returning to what you said, you know,” pursued
the old man, again laughing heartily, “what
I say is, No to be sure; you’re right.”
I was modestly wondering whether my utmost ingenuity
would have enabled me to say anything that would have
amused him half as much as this imaginary pleasantry,
when I was startled by a sudden click in the wall
on one side of the chimney, and the ghostly tumbling
open of a little wooden flap with “John”
upon it. The old man, following my eyes, cried
with great triumph, “My son’s come home!”
and we both went out to the drawbridge.
