Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the thirty-sixth chapter of Great Expectations.

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Today we'll be continuing Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.

Chapter 36.

Herbert and I went on from bad to worse in the way of increasing our debts, looking into our affairs, leaving margins in the like, exemplary transactions.

And time went on, whether or not as he has a way of doing.

And I came of age in fulfillment of Herbert's prediction that I should do so before I knew where I was.

Herbert himself had come of age eight months before me, as he had nothing else than his majority to come into the event did not make a profound sensation in Barnard's Inn.

But we had looked forward to my one in 20th birthday with a crowd of speculations and anticipations, for we had both considered that my guardian could hardly help saying something definite.

On that occasion I had taken care to have it well understood in Little Britain when my birthday was.

On the day before it, I received an official note from Wimick informing me that Mr.

Jaggers would be glad if I would call upon him at five in the afternoon of the auspicious day.

This convinced us that something great was to happen and threw me into an unusual flutter.

When I repaired to my guardian's office a model of punctuality in the outer office, wimick offered me his congratulations and incidentally rubbed the side of his nose with a folded piece of tissue paper that I liked the look of but he said nothing respecting it, and motioned me with a nod into my guardian's room.

It was November, and my guardian was standing before his fire, leaning his back against the chimney piece with his hands under his coattails.

Well, Pip said he I must call you Mr.

Pip today.

Congratulations, Mr.

Pip.

We shook hands.

He was always a remarkably short shaker, and I thanked him.

Take a chair, Mr.

Pip, said my guardian, as I sat down, and he preserved his attitude and bent his brows at his boots.

I felt at a disadvantage, which reminded me of that old time when I'd been put upon a tombstone.

The two ghastly casts on the shelf were not too far from him, and their expression was as if they were making a stupid, apoplectic attempt to attend to the conversation.

Now, my young friend, my guardian began as if I were a witness in the box.

I'm going to have a word or two with you, if you please, sir.

What do you suppose, said Mr.

Jaggers, bending forward to look at the ground and then throwing his head back to look at the ceiling, what do you suppose you are living at the rate of?

At the rate of, sir?

At repeated Mr.

Jaggers, still looking at the ceiling.

The rate of and then looked all round the room and paused with his pocket handkerchief in his hand halfway to his nose.

I had looked into my affairs so often, I had thoroughly destroyed any slight notion I might ever have had of their bearings.

Reluctantly, I confessed myself quite unable to answer the question.

This reply seemed agreeable to Mr.

Jaggers, who said I thought so, and blew its nose with an air of satisfaction.

Now I have asked you a question, my friend, said Mr.

Jaggers.

Have you anything to ask me?

Of course, it would be a great relief to me to ask you several questions, sir, but I remember your prohibition.

Ask one, said Mr.

Jaggers.

Is my benefactor to be made known to me today?

No.

Ask another.

Is that confidence to be imparted to me soon?

Wave that a moment, said Mr.

Jaggers, and ask another.

I looked about me, but there appeared to be now no possible escape from the inquiry.

Have I anything to receive, sir?

On that?

Mr.

Jagger said triumphantly.

I thought we should come to it and called Wimick to give him that piece of paper.

Wimick appeared, handed it in and disappeared.

Now, Mr.

Pip said Mr.

Jaggers.

Attend, if you please.

You've been drawing pretty freely here.

Your name occurs pretty often in Wimick's cashbook, but you are in debt, of course.

I'm afraid I must say yes, sir.

You know you must say yes, don't you?

Said Mr.

Jaggers.

Yes, sir.

I don't ask you what you owe, because you don't know.

And if you did know, you wouldn't tell me.

You would say less.

Yes, yes, my friend.

Cried Mr.

Jaggers, waving his forefinger to stop me, as I made a show of protesting.

It's likely enough that you think you wouldn't, but you would.

You'll excuse me, but I know better than you.

Now, take this piece of paper in your hand.

You've got it?

Very good.

Now unfold it and tell me what it is.

This is a banknote, said I, for 500 pounds.

That is a banknote, repeated Mr.

Jaggers, for 500 pounds, and a very handsome sum of money, too.

I think you consider it so.

How could I do otherwise?

But answer the question, said Mr.

Jaggers.

Undoubtedly you consider it undoubtedly a handsome sum of money.

Now, that handsome sum of money, Pip, is your own.

It is a present to you on this day, in earnest of your expectations, and at the rate of that handsome sum of money per annum, and at no higher rate, you are to live until the donor of The Hole appears.

That is to say, you will now take your money affairs entirely into your own hands, and you will draw from wimic 125 pounds per quarter until you are in communication with The Fountainhead, and no longer with the mere agent.

As I've told you before, I am the mere agent.

I execute my instructions, and I am paid for doing so.

I think them injudicious, but I am not paid for giving any opinion on their merits.

I was beginning to express my gratitude to my benefactor for the great liberality with which I was treated, when Mr.

Jagger stopped me.

I am not paid, Pip said, equally, to carry your words to anyone, and then gathered up his coattails as he had gathered up the subject, and stood frowning at his boots, as if he suspected them of designs against him.

After a pause, I hinted there was a question just now, Mr.

Jaggers, which you desired me to wave for a moment.

I hope I'm doing nothing wrong in asking again.

What is it?

Said he.

I might have known that he would never help me out, but it took me aback to have to shape the question afresh, as if it were quite new.

Is it likely?

I said after hesitating, that my patron, the Fountainhead you've spoken of, Mr.

Jaggers, will soon there I delicately stopped.

We'll.

Soon what?

Asked Mr.

Jaggers.

That's no question, as it stands, you know, will soon come to London, said I, after casting about for a precise form of words, or summon me anywhere else.

No, here, replied Mr.

Jaggers, fixing me for the first time with his dark, deep set eyes.

We must revert to the evening when we first encountered one another in your village.

What did I tell you then, Pip?

You told me, Mr.

Jaggers, that it might be years hence when that person appeared.

Just so, said Mr.

Jaggers.

That's my answer.

As we looked full at one another, I felt my breath come quicker in my strong desire to get something out of him.

And as I felt that it came quicker, and as I felt that he saw that it came quicker, I felt that I had less chance than ever of getting anything out of him.

Do you suppose it will still be yours hence, Mr.

Jaggers?

Mr.

Jagger shook his head, not in negativeing the question, but in altogether negativeing the notion that he could anyhow be got to answer it.

And the two horrible casts of the twitched faces looked when my eyes straight up to them as if they had come to a crisis in their suspended attention and were going to sneeze.

Come, said Mr.

Jaggers, warming the backs of his legs with the backs of his warmed hands.

I'll be plain with you, my friend Pip.

That's a question I must not be asked.

You'll understand that better when I tell you it's a question that might compromise me.

Come, I'll go a little further with you.

I'll say something more.

He bent down so low to frown at his boots that he was able to rub the cows of his legs on the paws he made.

When that person discloses, said Mr.

Jaggers, straightening himself, you and that person will settle your own affairs.

When that person discloses, my part in this business will cease and determine.

When that person discloses, it will not be necessary for me to know anything about it.

And that's all I've got to say.

We looked at one another until I withdrew my eyes and looked thoughtfully at the floor.

From this last speech I derived the notion that Miss Havisham, for some reason or no reason, had not taken him into her confidence as to her designing me for Estella, that he resented this and felt a jealousy about it, or that he really did object to that scheme and would have nothing to do with it.

When I raised my eyes again, I found that he had been truly looking at me all the time and was doing so still.

If that is all you have to say, sir, I remarked, there can be nothing left for me to say.

He nodded ascent and pulled out his thief dreaded watch and asked me where I was going to dine.

I replied at my own chambers with Herbert as a necessary sequence.

I asked him if he would favor us with his company and he promptly accepted the invitation.

But he insisted on walking home with me in order that I might make no extra preparation for him.

And first he had a letter or two to write and of course, had his hands to wash.

So I said I would go into the outer office and talk to Wimick.

The fact was that when the 500 pounds had come into my pocket a thought had come into my head which had been often there before, and it appeared to me that Wimick was a good person to advise with concerning such thought.

He had already locked up his safe and made preparations for going home.

He had left his desk, brought out his two greasy office candlesticks, and stood them in line with the snuffers on a slab near the door, ready to be extinguished.

He had raked his fire low, put his hat and great coat ready, and was beating himself all over the chest with his safekey as an athletic exercise after business, Mr.

Wimick, said I, I want to ask your opinion.

I'm very desirous to serve a friend.

Wimick tightened his post office and shook his head as if his opinion were dead against any fatal weakness of that sort.

This friend I pursued is trying to get on in commercial life, but has no money and finds it difficult and disheartening to make a beginning now I want somehow to help him to a beginning.

With money down, said Wimick, in a drier tone than any sawdust.

With some money down, I replied, for an uneasy remembrance shot across me with that symmetrical bundle of papers at home, with some money down, and perhaps some anticipation of my expectations.

Mr.

Pip, said Wimick, I should like just to run over with you on my fingers, if you please, the names of the various bridges up as high as Chelsea Reach.

Let's see.

There's London one, Southwark, two, Blackfriers, three, waterloo, four, westminster five, vox hall six.

It checked off each bridge in its turn with the handle of his safe key on the palm of his hand.

There's as many as six you see to choose from.

I don't understand you said I.

Choose your bridge, Mr.

Pip, returned Wimick, and take a walk upon your bridge, and pitch your money into the Thames over the center arch of your bridge, and you know the end of it.

Serve a friend with it, and you may know the end of it too, but it's a less pleasant and profitable end.

I could have posted a newspaper in his mouth, he made it so wide after saying this.

That is very discouraging, said I.

Meant to be so, said Wimick.

Then it is your opinion, I inquired with some little indignation, that a man should never invest portable property in a friend?

Said Wimick.

Certainly he should not, unless he wants to get rid of the friend, and then it becomes a question how much portable property it may be worth to get rid of him.

And that, said I, is your deliberate opinion, Mr.

Wimick, that he returned?

Is my deliberate opinion in this office.

Ah, said I, pressing him, for I thought I saw him near a loophole here.

But would that be your opinion at Walworth, Mr.

Pip?

He replied with gravity, walworth is one place, and this office is another, much as the aged is one person and Mr.

Jaggers is another, they must not be confounded together.

My Walworth sentiments must be taken at Walworth.

None but my official sentiments can be taken in this office.

Very well said.

I much relieved.

Then I shall look you up at Walworth.

You may depend upon it.

Mr.

Pip.

He returned.

You will be welcome there in a private and personal capacity.

We had held this conversation in a low voice, while knowing my guardian's ears to be the sharpest of the sharp, and he now appeared in his doorway, towing his hands.

Wimick got on his great coat and stood by to snuff out the candles.

We all three went into the street together, and from the doorstep Wimick turned his way and Mr.

Jaggers and I turned ours.

I could not help wishing more than once that evening that Mr.

Jaggers had had an aged in Gerard Street or a Stinger or something, or a somebody to unbend his brows a little.

It was an uncomfortable consideration on a 21st birthday that coming of age at all seemed hardly worthwhile in such a guarded and suspicious world as he made of it.

He was a thousand times better informed and cleverer than Wimick, and yet I would not a thousand times rather have had Wimick to dinner.

Mr.

Jaggers made not me alone intensely melancholy.

Because after he was gone, Herbert said of himself, with his eyes fixed on the fire, that he thought he must have committed a felony and forgotten the details of it.

He felt so dejected and guilty.

Thank you for joining Bite at a Time Books today while we read a bite of one of your favorite classics.

Again, my name is Brie Carlyle, and I hope you come back tomorrow for the next bite of Great Expectations.

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