The Personal History of David Copperfield

“We are not likely to remain alone much longer,” said Agnes, “and while I have an opportunity, let me earnestly entreat you, Trotwood, to be friendly to Uriah. Don’t repel him. Don’t resent (as I think you have a general disposition to do) what may be uncongenial to you in him. He may not deserve it, for we know no certain ill of him. In any case, think first of papa and me!”

Agnes had no time to say more, for the room-door opened, and Mrs. Waterbrook, who was a large lady – or who wore a large dress: I don’t exactly know which, for I don’t know which was dress and which was lady – came sailing in. I had a dim recollection of having seen her at the theatre, as if I had seen her in a pale magic lantern; but she appeared to remember me perfectly, and still to suspect me of being in a state of intoxication.

Finding by degrees, however, that I was sober, and (I hope) that I was a modest young gentleman, Mrs. Waterbrook softened towards me considerably, and inquired, firstly, if I went much into the parks, and secondly, if I went much into society. On my replying to both these questions in the negative, it occurred to me that I fell again in her good opinion; but she concealed the fact gracefully, and invited me to dinner next day. I accepted the invitation, and took my leave; making a call on Uriah in the office as I went out, and leaving a card for him in his absence.

When I went to dinner next day, and, on the street-door being opened, plunged into a vapour-bath of haunch of mutton, I divined that I was not the only guest; for I immediately identified the ticket-porter in disguise, assisting the family servant, and waiting at the foot of the stairs to carry up my name. He looked, to the best of his ability, when he asked me for it confidentially, as if he had never seen me before; but well did I know him, and well did he know me. Conscience made cowards of us both.

I found Mr. Waterbrook to be a middle-aged gentleman, with a short throat, and a good deal of shirt-collar, who only wanted a black nose to be the portrait of a pug-dog. He told me he was happy to have the honour of making my acquaintance; and when I had paid my homage to Mrs. Waterbrook, presented me, with much ceremony, to a very awful lady in a black velvet dress, and a great black velvet hat, whom I remember as looking like a near relation of Hamlet’s – say his aunt.

Mrs. Henry Spiker was this lady’s name; and her husband was there too: so cold a man, that his head, instead of being grey, seemed to be sprinkled with hoar-frost. Immense deference was shown to the Henry Spikers, male and female; which Agnes told me was on account of Mr. Henry Spiker being solicitor to something or to somebody, I forget what or which, remotely connected with the Treasury.

I found Uriah Heep among the company, in a suit of black, and in deep humility. He told me, when I shook hands with him, that he was proud to be noticed by me, and that he really felt obliged to me for my condescension. I could have wished he had been less obliged to me, for he hovered about me in his gratitude all the rest of the evening; and whenever I said a word to Agnes, was sure, with his shadowless eyes and cadaverous face, to be looking gauntly down upon us from behind.

There were other guests – all iced for the occasion, as it struck me, like the wine. But, there was one who attracted my attention before he came in, on account of my hearing him announced as Mr. Traddles! My mind flew back to Salem House; and could it be Tommy, I thought, who used to draw the skeletons!

I looked for Mr. Traddles with unusual interest. He was a sober, steady-looking young man of retiring manners, with a comic head of hair, and eyes that were rather wide open; and he got into an obscure corner so soon, that I had some difficulty in making him out. At length I had a good view of him, and either my vision deceived me, or it was the old unfortunate Tommy.

I made my way to Mr. Waterbrook, and said, that I believed I had the pleasure of seeing an old schoolfellow there.

“Indeed?” said Mr. Waterbrook, surprised. “You are too young to have been at school with Mr. Henry Spiker?”

“Oh, I don’t mean him!” I returned. “I mean the gentleman named Traddles.”

“Oh! Aye, aye! Indeed!” said my host, with much diminished interest. “Possibly.”

“If it’s really the same person,” said I, glancing towards him, “it was at a place called Salem House where we were together, and he was an excellent fellow.”

“Oh yes. Traddles is a good fellow,” returned my host, nodding his head with an air of toleration. “Traddles is quite a good fellow.”

“It’s a curious coincidence,” said I.

“It is really,” returned my host, “quite a coincidence, that Traddles should be here at all: as Traddles was only invited this morning, when the place at table, intended to be occupied by Mrs. Henry Spiker’s brother, became vacant, in consequence of his indisposition. A very gentlemanly man, Mrs. Henry Spiker’s brother, Mr. Copperfield.”

I murmured an assent, which was full of feeling, considering that I knew nothing at all about him; and I inquired what Mr. Traddles was by profession.

“Traddles,” returned Mr. Waterbrook, “is a young man reading for the bar. Yes. He is quite a good fellow – nobody’s enemy but his own.”

“Is he his own enemy?” said I, sorry to hear this.

“Well,” returned Mr. Waterbrook, pursing up his mouth, and playing with his watch-chain, in a comfortable, prosperous sort of way. “I should say he was one of those men who stand in their own light. Yes, I should say he would never, for example, be worth five hundred pound. Traddles was recommended to me, by a professional friend. Oh yes. Yes. He has a kind of talent, for drawing briefs, and stating a case in writing, plainly. I am able to throw something in Traddles’s way, in the course of the year; something – for him – considerable. Oh yes. Yes.”

I was much impressed by the extremely comfortable and satisfied manner, in which Mr. Waterbrook delivered himself of this little word “Yes,” every now and then. There was wonderful expression in it. It completely conveyed the idea of a man who had been born, not to say with a silver spoon, but with a scaling-ladder, and had gone on mounting all the heights of life one after another, until now he looked, from the top of the fortifications, with the eye of a philosopher and a patron, on the people down in the trenches.

My reflections on this theme were still in progress when dinner was announced. Mr. Waterbrook went down with Hamlet’s aunt. Mr. Henry Spiker took Mrs. Waterbrook. Agnes, whom I should have liked to take myself, was given to a simpering fellow with weak legs. Uriah, Traddles, and I, as the junior part of the company, went down last, how we could. I was not so vexed at losing Agnes as I might have been since it gave me an opportunity of making myself known to Traddles on the stairs, who greeted me with great fervor: while Uriah writhed with such obtrusive satisfaction and self-abasement, that I could gladly have pitched him over the bannisters.

Traddles and I were separated at table, being billeted in two remote corners: he in the glare of a red velvet lady; I, in the gloom of Hamlet’s aunt. The dinner was very long, and the conversation was about the Aristocracy – and Blood. Mrs. Waterbrook repeatedly told us, that if she had a weakness, it was Blood.

It occurred to me several times that we should have got on better, if we had not been quite so genteel. We were so exceedingly genteel, that our scope was very limited. A Mr. and Mrs. Gulpidge were of the party, who had something to do at second-hand (at least, Mr. Gulpidge had) with the law business of the Bank; and what with the Bank, and what with the Treasury, we were as exclusive as the Court Circular. To mend the matter, Hamlet’s aunt had the family failing of indulging in soliloquy, and held forth in a desultory manner, by herself, on every topic that was introduced. These were few enough, to be sure; but as we always fell back upon Blood, she had as wide a field for abstract speculation as her nephew himself.

We might have been a party of Ogres, the conversation assumed such a sanguine complexion.

“I confess I am of Mrs. Waterbrook’s opinion,” said Mr. Waterbrook, with his wine-glass at his eye. “Other things are all very well in their way, but give me Blood!”

“Oh! There is nothing,” observed Hamlet’s aunt, “so satisfactory to one! There is nothing that is so much one’s beau-ideal of – of all that sort of thing, speaking generally. There are some low minds (not many, I am happy to believe, but there are some) that would prefer to do what I should call bow down before idols. Positively Idols! Before services, intellect, and so on. But these are intangible points. Blood is not so. We see Blood in a nose, and we know it. We meet with it in a chin, and we say, ‘There it is! That’s Blood!’ It is an actual matter of fact. We point it out. It admits of no doubt.”

The simpering fellow with the weak legs, who had taken Agnes down, stated the question more decisively yet, I thought.

“Oh, you know, deuce take it,” said this gentleman, looking round the board with an imbecile smile, “we can’t forego Blood, you know. We must have Blood, you know. Some young fellows, you know, may be a little behind their station, perhaps, in point of education and behaviour, and may go a little wrong, you know, and get themselves and other people into a variety of fixes – and all that – but deuce take it, it’s delightful to reflect that they’ve got Blood in ’em! Myself, I’d rather at any time be knocked down by a man who had got Blood in him, than I’d be picked up by a man who hadn’t!”

This sentiment, as compressing the general question into a nutshell, gave the utmost satisfaction, and brought the gentleman into great notice until the ladies retired. After that, I observed that Mr. Gulpidge and Mr. Henry Spiker, who had hitherto been very distant, entered into a defensive alliance against us, the common enemy, and exchanged a mysterious dialogue across the table for our defeat and overthrow.

“That affair of the first bond for four thousand five hundred pounds has not taken the course that was expected, Gulpidge,” said Mr. Henry Spiker.

“Do you mean the D. of A.’s?” said Mr. Spiker.

“The C. of B.’s?” said Mr. Gulpidge.

Mr. Spiker raised his eye-brows, and looked much concerned.

“When the question was referred to Lord – I needn’t name him,” said Mr. Gulpidge, checking himself —

“I understand,” said Mr. Spiker, “N.”

Mr. Gulpidge darkly nodded – “was referred to him, his answer was, ‘Money, or no release.’”

“Lord bless my soul!” cried Mr. Spiker.

“‘Money, or no release,’” repeated Mr. Gulpidge firmly. “The next in reversion – you understand me?”

“K.” said Mr. Spiker, with an ominous look.

“ – K. then positively refused to sign. He was attended at Newmarket for that purpose, and he point-blank refused to do it.”

Mr. Spiker was so interested, that he became quite stony.

“So the matter rests at this hour,” said Mr. Gulpidge, throwing himself back in his chair. “Our friend Waterbrook will excuse me if I forbear to explain myself generally, on account of the magnitude of the interests involved.”

Mr. Waterbrook was only too happy, as it appeared to me, to have such interests, and such names, even hinted at, across his table. He assumed an expression of gloomy intelligence (though I am persuaded he knew no more about the discussion than I did), and highly approved of the discretion that had been observed. Mr. Spiker, after the receipt of such a confidence, naturally desired to favor his friend with a confidence of his own; therefore the foregoing dialogue was succeeded by another, in which it was Mr. Gulpidge’s turn to be surprised, and that by another in which the surprise came round to Mr. Spiker’s turn again, and so on, turn and turn about. All this time we, the outsiders, remained oppressed by the tremendous interests involved in the conversation; and our host regarded us with pride, as the victims of a salutary awe and astonishment.

I was very glad indeed to get up-stairs to Agnes, and to talk with her in a corner, and to introduce Traddles to her, who was shy, but agreeable, and the same good-natured creature still. As he was obliged to leave early, on account of going away next morning for a month, I had not nearly so much conversation with him as I could have wished; but we exchanged addresses, and promised ourselves the pleasure of another meeting when he should come back to town. He was greatly interested to hear that I knew Steerforth, and spoke of him with such warmth that I made him tell Agnes what he thought of him. But Agnes only looked at me the while, and very slightly shook her head when only I observed her.

As she was not among people with whom I believed she could be very much at home, I was almost glad to hear that she was going away within a few days, though I was sorry at the prospect of parting from her again so soon. This caused me to remain until all the company were gone. Conversing with her, and hearing her sing, was such a delightful reminder to me of my happy life in the grave old house she had made so beautiful, that I could have remained there half the night; but, having no excuse for staying any longer, when the lights of Mr. Waterbrook’s society were all snuffed out, I took my leave very much against my inclination. I felt then, more than ever, that she was my better Angel; and if I thought of her sweet face and placid smile, as though they had shone on me from some removed being, like an Angel, I hope I thought no harm.

I have said that the company were all gone; but I ought to have excepted Uriah, whom I don’t include in that denomination, and who had never ceased to hover near us. He was close behind me when I went down-stairs. He was close beside me, when I walked away from the house, slowly fitting his long skeleton fingers into the still longer fingers of a great Guy Fawkes pair of gloves.

It was in no disposition for Uriah’s company, but in remembrance of the entreaty Agnes had made to me, that I asked him if he would come home to my rooms, and have some coffee.

“Oh, really, Master Copperfield,” he rejoined, – “I beg your pardon, Mister Copperfield, but the other comes so natural, – I don’t like that you should put a constraint upon yourself to ask a numble person like me to your ouse.”

“There is no constraint in the case,” said I. “Will you come?”

“I should like to, very much,” replied Uriah, with a writhe.

“Well, then, come along!” said I.

I could not help being rather short with him, but he appeared not to mind it. We went the nearest way, without conversing much upon the road; and he was so humble in respect of those scarecrow gloves, that he was still putting them on, and seemed to have made no advance in that labour, when we got to my place.

I led him up the dark stairs, to prevent his knocking his head against anything, and really his damp cold hand felt so like a frog in mine, that I was tempted to drop it and run away. Agnes and hospitality prevailed, however, and I conducted him to my fireside. When I lighted my candles, he fell into meek transports with the room that was revealed to him; and when I heated the coffee in an unassuming block-tin vessel, in which Mrs. Crupp delighted to prepare it (chiefly, I believe, because it was not intended for the purpose, being a shaving-pot, and because there was a patent invention of great price mouldering away in the pantry), he professed so much emotion, that I could joyfully have scalded him.

“Oh, really, Master Copperfield, – I mean Mister Copperfield,” said Uriah, “to see you waiting upon me is what I never could have expected! But, one way and another, so many things happen to me which I never could have expected, I am sure, in my umble station, that it seems to rain blessings on my ed. You have heard something, I des-say, of a change in my expectations, Master Copperfield, —I should say, Mister Copperfield?”

As he sat on my sofa, with his long knees drawn up under his coffee-cup, his hat and gloves upon the ground close to him, his spoon going softly round and round, his shadowless red eyes, which looked as if they had scorched their lashes off, turned towards me without looking at me, the disagreeable dints I have formerly described in his nostrils coming and going with his breath, and a snaky undulation pervading his frame from his chin to his boots, I decided in my own mind that I disliked him intensely. It made me very uncomfortable to have him for a guest, for I was young then, and unused to disguise what I so strongly felt.

“You have heard something, I des-say, of a change in my expectations, Master Copperfield, – I should say, Mister Copperfield?” observed Uriah.

“Yes,” said I, “something.”

“Ah! I thought Miss Agnes would know of it!” he quietly returned. “I’m glad to find Miss Agnes knows of it. Oh, thank you, Master – Mister Copperfield!”

I could have thrown my bootjack at him (it lay ready on the rug), for having entrapped me into the disclosure of anything concerning Agnes, however immaterial. But I only drank my coffee.

“What a prophet you have shown yourself, Mister Copperfield!” pursued Uriah. “Dear me, what a prophet you have proved yourself to be! Don’t you remember saying to me once, that perhaps I should be a partner in Mr. Wickfield’s business, and perhaps it might be Wickfield and Heep! You may not recollect it; but when a person is umble, Master Copperfield, a person treasures such things up!”

“I recollect talking about it,” said I, “though I certainly did not think it very likely then.”

“Oh! who would have thought it likely, Mister Copperfield!” returned Uriah, enthusiastically, “I am sure I didn’t myself. I recollect saying with my own lips that I was much too umble. So I considered myself really and truly.”

He sat, with that carved grin on his face, looking at the fire, as I looked at him.

“But the umblest persons, Master Copperfield,” he presently resumed, “may be the instruments of good. I am glad to think I have been the instrument of good to Mr. Wickfield, and that I may be more so. Oh what a worthy man he is, Mister Copperfield, but how imprudent he has been!”

“I am sorry to hear it,” said I. I could not help adding, rather pointedly, “on all accounts.”

“Decidedly so, Mister Copperfield,” replied Uriah. “On all accounts. Miss Agnes’s above all! You don’t remember your own eloquent expressions, Master Copperfield; but I remember how you said one day that everybody must admire her, and how I thanked you for it! You have forgot that, I have no doubt, Master Copperfield?”

“No,” said I, drily.

“Oh how glad I am, you have not!” exclaimed Uriah. “To think that you should be the first to kindle the sparks of ambition in my umble breast, and that you’ve not forgot it! Oh! – Would you excuse me asking for a cup more coffee?”

Something in the emphasis he laid upon the kindling of those sparks, and something in the glance he directed at me as he said it, had made me start as if I had seen him illuminated by a blaze of light. Recalled by his request, preferred in quite another tone of voice, I did the honors of the shaving-pot; but I did them with an unsteadiness of hand, a sudden sense of being no match for him, and a perplexed suspicious anxiety as to what he might be going to say next, which I felt could not escape his observation.

He said nothing at all. He stirred his coffee round and round, he sipped it, he felt his chin softly with his grisly hand, he looked at the fire, he looked about the room, he gasped rather than smiled at me, he writhed and undulated about, in his deferential servility, he stirred and sipped again, but he left the renewal of the conversation to me.

“So, Mr. Wickfield,” said I, at last, “who is worth five hundred of you – or me;” for my life, I think I could not have helped dividing that part of the sentence with an awkward jerk; “has been imprudent, has he, Mr. Heep?”

“Oh very imprudent indeed, Master Copperfield,” returned Uriah, sighing modestly. “Oh very much so! But I wish you’d call me Uriah, if you please. It’s like old times.”

“Well! Uriah,” said I, bolting it out with some difficulty.

“Thank you!” he returned, with fervor. “Thank you, Master Copperfield! It’s like the blowing of old breezes or the ringing of old bellses to hear you say Uriah. I beg your pardon. Was I making any observation?”

“About Mr. Wickfield,” I suggested.

“Oh! Yes, truly,” said Uriah. “Ah! Great imprudence, Master Copperfield. It’s a topic that I wouldn’t touch upon, to any soul but you. Even to you I can only touch upon it, and no more. If any one else had been in my place during the last few years, by this time he would have had Mr. Wickfield (oh, what a worthy man he is, Master Copperfield, too!) under his thumb. Un – der – his thumb,” said Uriah, very slowly, as he stretched out his cruel-looking hand above my table, and pressed his own thumb down upon it, until it shook, and shook the room.

If I had been obliged to look at him with his splay foot on Mr. Wickfield’s head, I think I could scarcely have hated him more.

“Oh dear, yes, Master Copperfield,” he proceeded, in a soft voice, most remarkably contrasting with the action of his thumb, which did not diminish its hard pressure in the least degree, “there’s no doubt of it. There would have been loss, disgrace, I don’t know what all. Mr. Wickfield knows it. I am the umble instrument of umbly serving him, and he puts me on an eminence I hardly could have hoped to reach. How thankful should I be!” With his face turned towards me, as he finished, but without looking at me, he took his crooked thumb off the spot where he had planted it, and slowly and thoughtfully scraped his lank jaw with it, as if he were shaving himself.

I recollect well how indignantly my heart beat, as I saw his crafty face, with the appropriately red light of the fire upon it, preparing for something else.

“Master Copperfield,” he began – “but am I keeping you up?”

“You are not keeping me up. I generally go to bed late.”

“Thank you, Master Copperfield! I have risen from my umble station since first you used to address me, it is true; but I am umble still. I hope I never shall be otherwise than umble. You will not think the worse of my umbleness, if I make a little confidence to you, Master Copperfield? Will you?”

“Oh, no,” said I, with an effort.

“Thank you!” He took out his pocket-handkerchief, and began wiping the palms of his hands. “Miss Agnes, Master Copperfield – ”

“Well, Uriah?”

“Oh, how pleasant to be called Uriah, spontaneously!” he cried; and gave himself a jerk, like a convulsive fish. “You thought her looking very beautiful to-night, Master Copperfield?”

“I thought her looking as she always does: superior, in all respects, to every one around her,” I returned.

“Oh, thank you! It’s so true!” he cried. “Oh, thank you very much for that!”

“Not at all,” I said, loftily. “There is no reason why you should thank me.”

“Why that, Master Copperfield,” said Uriah, “is, in fact, the confidence that I am going to take the liberty of reposing. Umble as I am,” he wiped his hands harder, and looked at them and at the fire by turns, “umble as my mother is, and lowly as our poor but honest roof has ever been, the image of Miss Agnes (I don’t mind trusting you with my secret, Master Copperfield, for I have always overflowed towards you since the first moment I had the pleasure of beholding you in a poney-shay) has been in my breast for years. Oh, Master Copperfield, with what a pure affection do I love the ground my Agnes walks on!”

I believe I had a delirious idea of seizing the red-hot poker out of the fire, and running him through with it. It went from me with a shock, like a ball fired from a rifle: but the image of Agnes, outraged by so much as a thought of this red-headed animal’s, remained in my mind when I looked at him, sitting all awry as if his mean soul griped his body, and made me giddy. He seemed to swell and grow before my eyes; the room seemed full of the echoes of his voice; and the strange feeling (to which, perhaps, no one is quite a stranger) that all this had occurred before, at some indefinite time, and that I knew what he was going to say next, took possession of me.

A timely observation of the sense of power that there was in his face, did more to bring back to my remembrance the entreaty of Agnes, in its full force, than any effort I could have made. I asked him, with a better appearance of composure than I could have thought possible a minute before, whether he had made his feelings known to Agnes.