Bleak House - Charles Dickens (read this if txt) 📗

CHAPTER XLVII

Jo’s Will

 

As Allan Woodcourt and Jo proceed along the streets where the high

church spires and the distances are so near and clear in the

morning light that the city itself seems renewed by rest, Allan

revolves in his mind how and where he shall bestow his companion.

“It surely is a strange fact,” he considers, “that in the heart of

a civilized world this creature in human form should be more

difficult to dispose of than an unowned dog.” But it is none the

less a fact because of its strangeness, and the difficulty remains.

 

At first he looks behind him often to assure himself that Jo is

still really following. But look where he will, he still beholds

him close to the opposite houses, making his way with his wary hand

from brick to brick and from door to door, and often, as he creeps

along, glancing over at him watchfully. Soon satisfied that the

last thing in his thoughts is to give him the slip, Allan goes on,

considering with a less divided attention what he shall do.

 

A breakfast-stall at a street-corner suggests the first thing to be

done. He stops there, looks round, and beckons Jo. Jo crosses and

comes halting and shuffling up, slowly scooping the knuckles of his

right hand round and round in the hollowed palm of his left,

kneading dirt with a natural pestle and mortar. What is a dainty

repast to Jo is then set before him, and he begins to gulp the

coffee and to gnaw the bread and butter, looking anxiously about

him in all directions as he eats and drinks, like a scared animal.

 

But he is so sick and miserable that even hunger has abandoned him.

“I thought I was amost a-starvin, sir,” says Jo, soon putting down

his food, “but I don’t know nothink—not even that. I don’t care

for eating wittles nor yet for drinking on ‘em.” And Jo stands

shivering and looking at the breakfast wonderingly.

 

Allan Woodcourt lays his hand upon his pulse and on his chest.

“Draw breath, Jo!” “It draws,” says Jo, “as heavy as a cart.” He

might add, “And rattles like it,” but he only mutters, “I’m a-moving on, sir.”

 

Allan looks about for an apothecary’s shop. There is none at hand,

but a tavern does as well or better. He obtains a little measure

of wine and gives the lad a portion of it very carefully. He

begins to revive almost as soon as it passes his lips. “We may

repeat that dose, Jo,” observes Allan after watching him with his

attentive face. “So! Now we will take five minutes’ rest, and

then go on again.”

 

Leaving the boy sitting on the bench of the breakfast-stall, with

his back against an iron railing, Allan Woodcourt paces up and down

in the early sunshine, casting an occasional look towards him

without appearing to watch him. It requires no discernment to

perceive that he is warmed and refreshed. If a face so shaded can

brighten, his face brightens somewhat; and by little and little he

eats the slice of bread he had so hopelessly laid down. Observant

of these signs of improvement, Allan engages him in conversation

and elicits to his no small wonder the adventure of the lady in the

veil, with all its consequences. Jo slowly munches as he slowly

tells it. When he has finished his story and his bread, they go on

again.

 

Intending to refer his difficulty in finding a temporary place of

refuge for the boy to his old patient, zealous little Miss Flite,

Allan leads the way to the court where he and Jo first foregathered.

But all is changed at the rag and bottle shop; Miss Flite no longer

lodges there; it is shut up; and a hard-featured female, much

obscured by dust, whose age is a problem, but who is indeed no other

than the interesting Judy, is tart and spare in her replies. These

sufficing, however, to inform the visitor that Miss Flite and her

birds are domiciled with a Mrs. Blinder, in Bell Yard, he repairs to

that neighbouring place, where Miss Flite (who rises early that she

may be punctual at the divan of justice held by her excellent friend

the Chancellor) comes running downstairs with tears of welcome and

with open arms.

 

“My dear physician!” cries Miss Flite. “My meritorious,

distinguished, honourable officer!” She uses some odd expressions,

but is as cordial and full of heart as sanity itself can be—more so

than it often is. Allan, very patient with her, waits until she has

no more raptures to express, then points out Jo, trembling in a

doorway, and tells her how he comes there.

 

“Where can I lodge him hereabouts for the present? Now, you have a

fund of knowledge and good sense and can advise me.”

 

Miss Flite, mighty proud of the compliment, sets herself to

consider; but it is long before a bright thought occurs to her.

Mrs. Blinder is entirely let, and she herself occupies poor

Gridley’s room. “Gridley!” exclaims Miss Flite, clapping her hands

after a twentieth repetition of this remark. “Gridley! To be

sure! Of course! My dear physician! General George will help us

out.”

 

It is hopeless to ask for any information about General George, and

would be, though Miss Flite had not already run upstairs to put on

her pinched bonnet and her poor little shawl and to arm herself

with her reticule of documents. But as she informs her physician

in her disjointed manner on coming down in full array that General

George, whom she often calls upon, knows her dear Fitz Jarndyce and

takes a great interest in all connected with her, Allan is induced

to think that they may be in the right way. So he tells Jo, for

his encouragement, that this walking about will soon be over now;

and they repair to the general’s. Fortunately it is not far.

 

From the exterior of George’s Shooting Gallery, and the long entry,

and the bare perspective beyond it, Allan Woodcourt augurs well.

He also descries promise in the figure of Mr. George himself,

striding towards them in his morning exercise with his pipe in his

mouth, no stock on, and his muscular arms, developed by broadsword

and dumbbell, weightily asserting themselves through his light

shirt-sleeves.

 

“Your servant, sir,” says Mr. George with a military salute. Good-humouredly smiling all over his broad forehead up into his crisp

hair, he then defers to Miss Flite, as, with great stateliness, and

at some length, she performs the courtly ceremony of presentation.

He winds it up with another “Your servant, sir!” and another

salute.

 

“Excuse me, sir. A sailor, I believe?” says Mr. George.

 

“I am proud to find I have the air of one,” returns Allan; “but I

am only a sea-going doctor.”

 

“Indeed, sir! I should have thought you was a regular blue-jacket

myself.”

 

Allan hopes Mr. George will forgive his intrusion the more readily

on that account, and particularly that he will not lay aside his

pipe, which, in his politeness, he has testified some intention of

doing. “You are very good, sir,” returns the trooper. “As I know

by experience that it’s not disagreeable to Miss Flite, and since

it’s equally agreeable to yourself—” and finishes the sentence by

putting it between his lips again. Allan proceeds to tell him all

he knows about Jo, unto which the trooper listens with a grave

face.

 

“And that’s the lad, sir, is it?” he inquires, looking along the

entry to where Jo stands staring up at the great letters on the

whitewashed front, which have no meaning in his eyes.

 

“That’s he,” says Allan. “And, Mr. George, I am in this difficulty

about him. I am unwilling to place him in a hospital, even if I

could procure him immediate admission, because I foresee that he

would not stay there many hours if he could be so much as got

there. The same objection applies to a workhouse, supposing I had

the patience to be evaded and shirked, and handed about from post

to pillar in trying to get him into one, which is a system that I

don’t take kindly to.”

 

“No man does, sir,” returns Mr. George.

 

“I am convinced that he would not remain in either place, because

he is possessed by an extraordinary terror of this person who

ordered him to keep out of the way; in his ignorance, he believes

this person to be everywhere, and cognizant of everything.”

 

“I ask your pardon, sir,” says Mr. George. “But you have not

mentioned that party’s name. Is it a secret, sir?”

 

“The boy makes it one. But his name is Bucket.”

 

“Bucket the detective, sir?”

 

“The same man.”

 

“The man is known to me, sir,” returns the trooper after blowing

out a cloud of smoke and squaring his chest, “and the boy is so far

correct that he undoubtedly is a—rum customer.” Mr. George smokes

with a profound meaning after this and surveys Miss Flite in

silence.

 

“Now, I wish Mr. Jarndyce and Miss Summerson at least to know that

this Jo, who tells so strange a story, has reappeared, and to have

it in their power to speak with him if they should desire to do so.

Therefore I want to get him, for the present moment, into any poor

lodging kept by decent people where he would be admitted. Decent

people and Jo, Mr. George,” says Allan, following the direction of

the trooper’s eyes along the entry, “have not been much acquainted,

as you see. Hence the difficulty. Do you happen to know