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

CHAPTER LXV

Beginning the World

 

The term had commenced, and my guardian found an intimation from

Mr. Kenge that the cause would come on in two days. As I had

sufficient hopes of the will to be in a flutter about it, Allan and

I agreed to go down to the court that morning. Richard was

extremely agitated and was so weak and low, though his illness was

still of the mind, that my dear girl indeed had sore occasion to be

supported. But she looked forward—a very little way now—to the

help that was to come to her, and never drooped.

 

It was at Westminster that the cause was to come on. It had come

on there, I dare say, a hundred times before, but I could not

divest myself of an idea that it MIGHT lead to some result now. We

left home directly after breakfast to be at Westminster Hall in

good time and walked down there through the lively streets—so

happily and strangely it seemed!—together.

 

As we were going along, planning what we should do for Richard and

Ada, I heard somebody calling “Esther! My dear Esther! Esther!”

And there was Caddy Jellyby, with her head out of the window of a

little carriage which she hired now to go about in to her pupils

(she had so many), as if she wanted to embrace me at a hundred

yards’ distance. I had written her a note to tell her of all that

my guardian had done, but had not had a moment to go and see her.

Of course we turned back, and the affectionate girl was in that

state of rapture, and was so overjoyed to talk about the night when

she brought me the flowers, and was so determined to squeeze my

face (bonnet and all) between her hands, and go on in a wild manner

altogether, calling me all kinds of precious names, and telling

Allan I had done I don’t know what for her, that I was just obliged

to get into the little carriage and calm her down by letting her

say and do exactly what she liked. Allan, standing at the window,

was as pleased as Caddy; and I was as pleased as either of them;

and I wonder that I got away as I did, rather than that I came off

laughing, and red, and anything but tidy, and looking after Caddy,

who looked after us out of the coach-window as long as she could

see us.

 

This made us some quarter of an hour late, and when we came to

Westminster Hall we found that the day’s business was begun. Worse

than that, we found such an unusual crowd in the Court of Chancery

that it was full to the door, and we could neither see nor hear

what was passing within. It appeared to be something droll, for

occasionally there was a laugh and a cry of “Silence!” It appeared

to be something interesting, for every one was pushing and striving

to get nearer. It appeared to be something that made the

professional gentlemen very merry, for there were several young

counsellors in wigs and whiskers on the outside of the crowd, and

when one of them told the others about it, they put their hands in

their pockets, and quite doubled themselves up with laughter, and

went stamping about the pavement of the Hall.

 

We asked a gentleman by us if he knew what cause was on. He told

us Jarndyce and Jarndyce. We asked him if he knew what was doing

in it. He said really, no he did not, nobody ever did, but as well

as he could make out, it was over. Over for the day? we asked him.

No, he said, over for good.

 

Over for good!

 

When we heard this unaccountable answer, we looked at one another

quite lost in amazement. Could it be possible that the will had

set things right at last and that Richard and Ada were going to be

rich? It seemed too good to be true. Alas it was!

 

Our suspense was short, for a break-up soon took place in the

crowd, and the people came streaming out looking flushed and hot

and bringing a quantity of bad air with them. Still they were all

exceedingly amused and were more like people coming out from a

farce or a juggler than from a court of justice. We stood aside,

watching for any countenance we knew, and presently great bundles

of paper began to be carried out—bundles in bags, bundles too

large to be got into any bags, immense masses of papers of all

shapes and no shapes, which the bearers staggered under, and threw

down for the time being, anyhow, on the Hall pavement, while they

went back to bring out more. Even these clerks were laughing. We

glanced at the papers, and seeing Jarndyce and Jarndyce everywhere,

asked an official-looking person who was standing in the midst of

them whether the cause was over. Yes, he said, it was all up with

it at last, and burst out laughing too.

 

At this juncture we perceived Mr. Kenge coming out of court with an

affable dignity upon him, listening to Mr. Vholes, who was

deferential and carried his own bag. Mr. Vholes was the first to

see us. “Here is Miss Summerson, sir,” he said. “And Mr.

Woodcourt.”

 

“Oh, indeed! Yes. Truly!” said Mr. Kenge, raising his hat to me

with polished politeness. “How do you do? Glad to see you. Mr.

Jarndyce is not here?”

 

No. He never came there, I reminded him.

 

“Really,” returned Mr. Kenge, “it is as well that he is NOT here

to-day, for his—shall I say, in my good friend’s absence, his

indomitable singularity of opinion?—might have been strengthened,

perhaps; not reasonably, but might have been strengthened.”

 

“Pray what has been done to-day?” asked Allan.

 

“I beg your pardon?” said Mr. Kenge with excessive urbanity.

 

“What has been done to-day?”

 

“What has been done,” repeated Mr. Kenge. “Quite so. Yes. Why,

not much has been done; not much. We have been checked—brought up

suddenly, I would say—upon the—shall I term it threshold?”

 

“Is this will considered a genuine document, sir?” said Allan.

“Will you tell us that?”

 

“Most certainly, if I could,” said Mr. Kenge; “but we have not gone

into that, we have not gone into that.”

 

“We have not gone into that,” repeated Mr. Vholes as if his low

inward voice were an echo.

 

“You are to reflect, Mr. Woodcourt,” observed Mr. Kenge, using his

silver trowel persuasively and smoothingly, “that this has been a

great cause, that this has been a protracted cause, that this has

been a complex cause. Jarndyce and Jarndyce has been termed, not

inaptly, a monument of Chancery practice.”

 

“And patience has sat upon it a long time,” said Allan.

 

“Very well indeed, sir,” returned Mr. Kenge with a certain

condeseending laugh he had. “Very well! You are further to

reflect, Mr. Woodcourt,” becoming dignified almost to severity,

“that on the numerous difficulties, contingencies, masterly

fictions, and forms of procedure in this great cause, there has

been expended study, ability, eloquence, knowledge, intellect, Mr.

Woodcourt, high intellect. For many years, the—a—I would say the

flower of the bar, and the—a—I would presume to add, the matured

autumnal fruits of the woolsack—have been lavished upon Jarndyce

and Jarndyce. If the public have the benefit, and if the country

have the adornment, of this great grasp, it must be paid for in

money or money’s worth, sir.”

 

“Mr. Kenge,” said Allan, appearing enlightened all in a moment.

“Excuse me, our time presses. Do I understand that the whole

estate is found to have been absorbed in costs?”

 

“Hem! I believe so,” returned Mr. Kenge. “Mr. Vholes, what do YOU

say?”

 

“I believe so,” said Mr. Vholes.

 

“And that thus the suit lapses and melts away?”

 

“Probably,” returned Mr. Kenge. “Mr. Vholes?”

 

“Probably,” said Mr. Vholes.

 

“My dearest life,” whispered Allan, “this will break Richard’s

heart!”

 

There was such a shock of apprehension in his face, and he knew

Richard so perfectly, and I too had seen so much of his gradual

decay, that what my dear girl had said to me in the fullness of her

foreboding love sounded like a knell in my ears.

 

“In