He drank again, and became more ferocious. I saw by his tilting ofthe bottle that there was no great quantity left in it. Idistinctly understood that he was working himself up with itscontents, to make an end of me. I knew that every drop it held, wasa drop of my life. I knew that when I was changed into a part ofthe vapour that had crept towards me but a little while before,like my own warning ghost, he would do as he had done in mysister's case - make all haste to the town, and be seen slouchingabout there, drinking at the ale-houses. My rapid mind pursued himto the town, made a picture of the street with him in it, andcontrasted its lights and life with the lonely marsh and the whitevapour creeping over it, into which I should have dissolved.

It was not only that I could have summed up years and years andyears while he said a dozen words, but that what he did saypresented pictures to me, and not mere words. In the excited andexalted state of my brain, I could not think of a place withoutseeing it, or of persons without seeing them. It is impossible toover-state the vividness of these images, and yet I was so intent,all the time, upon him himself - who would not be intent on thetiger crouching to spring! - that I knew of the slightest action ofhis fingers.

When he had drunk this second time, he rose from the bench on whichhe sat, and pushed the table aside. Then, he took up the candle,and shading it with his murderous hand so as to throw its light onme, stood before me, looking at me and enjoying the sight.

"Wolf, I'll tell you something more. It was Old Orlick as youtumbled over on your stairs that night."

I saw the staircase with its extinguished lamps. I saw the shadowsof the heavy stair-rails, thrown by the watchman's lantern on thewall. I saw the rooms that I was never to see again; here, a doorhalf open; there, a door closed; all the articles of furniturearound.

"And why was Old Orlick there? I'll tell you something more, wolf.You and her have pretty well hunted me out of this country, so faras getting a easy living in it goes, and I've took up with newcompanions, and new masters. Some of 'em writes my letters when Iwants 'em wrote - do you mind? - writes my letters, wolf! Theywrites fifty hands; they're not like sneaking you, as writes butone. I've had a firm mind and a firm will to have your life, sinceyou was down here at your sister's burying. I han't seen a way toget you safe, and I've looked arter you to know your ins and outs.For, says Old Orlick to himself, 'Somehow or another I'll havehim!' What! When I looks for you, I finds your uncle Provis, eh?"

Mill Pond Bank, and Chinks's Basin, and the Old Green CopperRope-Walk, all so clear and plain! Provis in his rooms, the signalwhose use was over, pretty Clara, the good motherly woman, old BillBarley on his back, all drifting by, as on the swift stream of mylife fast running out to sea!

"You with a uncle too! Why, I know'd you at Gargery's when you wasso small a wolf that I could have took your weazen betwixt thisfinger and thumb and chucked you away dead (as I'd thoughts o'doing, odd times, when I see you loitering amongst the pollards ona Sunday), and you hadn't found no uncles then. No, not you! Butwhen Old Orlick come for to hear that your uncle Provis hadmostlike wore the leg-iron wot Old Orlick had picked up, filedasunder, on these meshes ever so many year ago, and wot he kep byhim till he dropped your sister with it, like a bullock, as hemeans to drop you - hey? - when he come for to hear that - hey?--"

In his savage taunting, he flared the candle so close at me, that Iturned my face aside, to save it from the flame.

"Ah!" he cried, laughing, after doing it again, "the burnt childdreads the fire! Old Orlick knowed you was burnt, Old Orlick knowedyou was smuggling your uncle Provis away, Old Orlick's a match foryou and know'd you'd come to-night! Now I'll tell you somethingmore, wolf, and this ends it. There's them that's as good a matchfor your uncle Provis as Old Orlick has been for you. Let him 'warethem, when he's lost his nevvy! Let him 'ware them, when no mancan't find a rag of his dear relation's clothes, nor yet a bone ofhis body. There's them that can't and that won't have Magwitch -yes, I know the name! - alive in the same land with them, andthat's had such sure information of him when he was alive inanother land, as that he couldn't and shouldn't leave it unbeknownand put them in danger. P'raps it's them that writes fifty hands,and that's not like sneaking you as writes but one. 'WareCompeyson, Magwitch, and the gallows!"

He flared the candle at me again, smoking my face and hair, and foran instant blinding me, and turned his powerful back as he replacedthe light on the table. I had thought a prayer, and had been withJoe and Biddy and Herbert, before he turned towards me again.

There was a clear space of a few feet between the table and theopposite wall. Within this space, he now slouched backwards andforwards. His great strength seemed to sit stronger upon him thanever before, as he did this with his hands hanging loose and heavyat his sides, and with his eyes scowling at me. I had no grain ofhope left. Wild as my inward hurry was, and wonderful the force ofthe pictures that rushed by me instead of thoughts, I could yetclearly understand that unless he had resolved that I was within afew moments of surely perishing out of all human knowledge, hewould never have told me what he had told.

Of a sudden, he stopped, took the cork out of his bottle, andtossed it away. Light as it was, I heard it fall like a plummet. Heswallowed slowly, tilting up the bottle by little and little, andnow he looked at me no more. The last few drops of liquor he pouredinto the palm of his hand, and licked up. Then, with a sudden hurryof violence and swearing horribly, he threw the bottle from him,and stooped; and I saw in his hand a stone-hammer with a long heavyhandle.

The resolution I had made did not desert me, for, without utteringone vain word of appeal to him, I shouted out with all my might,and struggled with all my might. It was only my head and my legsthat I could move, but to that extent I struggled with all theforce, until then unknown, that was within me. In the same instantI heard responsive shouts, saw figures and a gleam of light dash inat the door, heard voices and tumult, and saw Orlick emerge from astruggle of men, as if it were tumbling water, clear the table at aleap, and fly out into the night.

After a blank, I found that I was lying unbound, on the floor, inthe same place, with my head on some one's knee. My eyes were fixedon the ladder against the wall, when I came to myself - had openedon it before my mind saw it - and thus as I recoveredconsciousness, I knew that I was in the place where I had lost it.

Too indifferent at first, even to look round and ascertain whosupported me, I was lying looking at the ladder, when there camebetween me and it, a face. The face of Trabb's boy!

"I think he's all right!" said Trabb's boy, in a sober voice; "butain't he just pale though!"

At these words, the face of him who supported me looked over intomine, and I saw my supporter to be--

"Herbert! Great Heaven!"

"Softly," said Herbert. "Gently, Handel. Don't be too eager."

"And our old comrade, Startop!" I cried, as he too bent over me.

"Remember what he is going to assist us in," said Herbert, "and becalm."

The allusion made me spring up; though I dropped again from thepain in my arm. "The time has not gone by, Herbert, has it? Whatnight is to-night? How long have I been here?" For, I had a strangeand strong misgiving that I had been lying there a long time - aday and a night - two days and nights - more.

"The time has not gone by. It is still Monday night."

"Thank God!"

"And you have all to-morrow, Tuesday, to rest in," said Herbert."But you can't help groaning, my dear Handel. What hurt have yougot? Can you stand?"

"Yes, yes," said I, "I can walk. I have no hurt but in thisthrobbing arm."

They laid it bare, and did what they could. It was violentlyswollen and inflamed, and I could scarcely endure to have ittouched. But, they tore up their handkerchiefs to make freshbandages, and carefully replaced it in the sling, until we couldget to the town and obtain some cooling lotion to put upon it. In alittle while we had shut the door of the dark and emptysluice-house, and were passing through the quarry on our way back.Trabb's boy - Trabb's overgrown young man now - went before us witha lantern, which was the light I had seen come in at the door. But,the moon was a good two hours higher than when I had last seen thesky, and the night though rainy was much lighter. The white vapourof the kiln was passing from us as we went by, and, as I hadthought a prayer before, I thought a thanksgiving now.

Entreating Herbert to tell me how he had come to my rescue - whichat first he had flatly refused to do, but had insisted on myremaining quiet - I learnt that I had in my hurry dropped theletter, open, in our chambers, where he, coming home to bring withhim Startop whom he had met in the street on his way to me, foundit, very soon after I was gone. Its tone made him uneasy, and themore so because of the inconsistency between it and the hastyletter I had left for him. His uneasiness increasing instead ofsubsiding after a quarter of an hour's consideration, he set offfor the coach-office, with Startop, who volunteered his company, tomake inquiry when the next coach went down. Finding that theafternoon coach was gone, and finding that his uneasiness grew intopositive alarm, as obstacles came in his way, he resolved to followin a post-chaise. So, he and Startop arrived at the Blue Boar,fully expecting there to find me, or tidings of me; but, findingneither, went on to Miss Havisham's, where they lost me. Hereuponthey went back to the hotel (doubtless at about the time when I washearing the popular local version of my own story), to refreshthemselves and to get some one to guide them out upon the marshes.Among the loungers under the Boar's archway, happened to be Trabb'sboy - true to his ancient habit of happening to be everywhere wherehe had no business - and Trabb's boy had seen me passing from MissHavisham's in the direction of my dining-place. Thus, Trabb's boybecame their guide, and with him they went out to the sluice-house:though by the town way to the marshes, which I had avoided. Now, asthey went along, Herbert reflected, that I might, after all, havebeen brought there on some genuine and serviceable errand tendingto Provis's safety, and, bethinking himself that in that caseinterruption must be mischievous, left his guide and Startop on theedge of the quarry, and went on by himself, and stole round thehouse two or three times, endeavouring to ascertain whether all wasright within. As he could hear nothing but indistinct sounds of onedeep rough voice (this was while my mind was so busy), he even atlast began to doubt whether I was there, when suddenly I cried outloudly, and he answered the cries, and rushed in, closely followedby the other two.

When I told Herbert what had passed within the house, he was forour immediately going before a magistrate in the town, late atnight as it was, and getting out a warrant. But, I had alreadyconsidered that such a course, by detaining us there, or binding usto come back, might be fatal to Provis. There was no gainsayingthis difficulty, and we relinquished all thoughts of pursuingOrlick at that time. For the present, under the circumstances, wedeemed it prudent to make rather light of the matter to Trabb'sboy; who I am convinced would have been much affected bydisappointment, if he had known that his intervention saved me fromthe limekiln. Not that Trabb's boy was of a malignant nature, butthat he had too much spare vivacity, and that it was in hisconstitution to want variety and excitement at anybody's expense.When we parted, I presented him with two guineas (which seemed tomeet his views), and told him that I was sorry ever to have had anill opinion of him (which made no impression on him at all).

Wednesday being so close upon us, we determined to go back toLondon that night, three in the post-chaise; the rather, as weshould then be clear away, before the night's adventure began to betalked of. Herbert got a large bottle of stuff for my arm, and bydint of having this stuff dropped over it all the night through, Iwas just able to bear its pain on the journey. It was daylight whenwe reached the Temple, and I went at once to bed, and lay in bedall day.

My terror, as I lay there, of falling ill and being unfitted fortomorrow, was so besetting, that I wonder it did not disable me ofitself. It would have done so, pretty surely, in conjunction withthe mental wear and tear I had suffered, but for the unnaturalstrain upon me that to-morrow was. So anxiously looked forward to,charged with such consequences, its results so impenetrably hiddenthough so near.

No precaution could have been more obvious than our refraining fromcommunication with him that day; yet this again increased myrestlessness. I started at every footstep and every sound,believing that he was discovered and taken, and this was themessenger to tell me so. I persuaded myself that I knew he wastaken; that there was something more upon my mind than a fear or apresentiment; that the fact had occurred, and I had a mysteriousknowledge of it. As the day wore on and no ill news came, as theday closed in and darkness fell, my overshadowing dread of beingdisabled by illness before to-morrow morning, altogether masteredme. My burning arm throbbed, and my burning head throbbed, and Ifancied I was beginning to wander. I counted up to high numbers, tomake sure of myself, and repeated passages that I knew in prose andverse. It happened sometimes that in the mere escape of a fatiguedmind, I dozed for some moments or forgot; then I would say tomyself with a start, "Now it has come, and I am turning delirious!"

Title: Great Expectations
Author: Charles Dickens
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