David Copperfield, Charles Dickens [best historical fiction books of all time TXT] 📗

“The name was Mr. Copperfield’s choice,” returned my mother. “When he bought the house, he liked to think that there were rooks about it.”

The evening wind made such a disturbance just now, among some tall old elm-trees at the bottom of the garden, that neither my mother nor Miss Betsey could forbear glancing that way. As the elms bent to one another, like giants who were whispering secrets, and after a few seconds of such repose, fell into a violent flurry, tossing their wild arms about, as if their late confidences were really too wicked for their peace of mind, some weatherbeaten ragged old rooks’-nests, burdening their higher branches, swung like wrecks upon a stormy sea.

“Where are the birds?” asked Miss Betsey.

“The⁠—?” My mother had been thinking of something else.

“The rooks⁠—what has become of them?” asked Miss Betsey.

“There have not been any since we have lived here,” said my mother. “We thought⁠—Mr. Copperfield thought⁠—it was quite a large rookery; but the nests were very old ones, and the birds have deserted them a long while.”

“David Copperfield all over!” cried Miss Betsey. “David Copperfield from head to foot! Calls a house a rookery when there’s not a rook near it, and takes the birds on trust, because he sees the nests!”

“Mr. Copperfield,” returned my mother, “is dead, and if you dare to speak unkindly of him to me⁠—”

My poor dear mother, I suppose, had some momentary intention of committing an assault and battery upon my aunt, who could easily have settled her with one hand, even if my mother had been in far better training for such an encounter than she was that evening. But it passed with the action of rising from her chair; and she sat down again very meekly, and fainted.

When she came to herself, or when Miss Betsey had restored her, whichever it was, she found the latter standing at the window. The twilight was by this time shading down into darkness; and dimly as they saw each other, they could not have done that without the aid of the fire.

“Well?” said Miss Betsey, coming back to her chair, as if she had only been taking a casual look at the prospect; “and when do you expect⁠—”

“I am all in a tremble,” faltered my mother. “I don’t know what’s the matter. I shall die, I am sure!”

“No, no, no,” said Miss Betsey. “Have some tea.”

“Oh dear me, dear me, do you think it will do me any good?” cried my mother in a helpless manner.

“Of course it will,” said Miss Betsey. “It’s nothing but fancy. What do you call your girl?”

“I don’t know that it will be a girl, yet, ma’am,” said my mother innocently.

“Bless the Baby!” exclaimed Miss Betsey, unconsciously quoting the second sentiment of the pincushion in the drawer upstairs, but applying it to my mother instead of me, “I don’t mean that. I mean your servant-girl.”

“Peggotty,” said my mother.

“Peggotty!” repeated Miss Betsey, with some indignation. “Do you mean to say, child, that any human being has gone into a Christian church, and got herself named Peggotty?”

“It’s her surname,” said my mother, faintly. “Mr. Copperfield called her by it, because her Christian name was the same as mine.”

“Here! Peggotty!” cried Miss Betsey, opening the parlour door. “Tea. Your mistress is a little unwell. Don’t dawdle.”

Having issued this mandate with as much potentiality as if she had been a recognized authority in the house ever since it had been a house, and having looked out to confront the amazed Peggotty coming along the passage with a candle at the sound of a strange voice, Miss Betsey shut the door again, and sat down as before: with her feet on the fender, the skirt of her dress tucked up, and her hands folded on one knee.

“You were speaking about its being a girl,” said Miss Betsey. “I have no doubt it will be a girl. I have a presentiment that it must be a girl. Now child, from the moment of the birth of this girl⁠—”

“Perhaps boy,” my mother took the liberty of putting in.

“I tell you I have a presentiment that it must be a girl,” returned Miss Betsey. “Don’t contradict. From the moment of this girl’s birth, child, I intend to be her friend. I intend to be her godmother, and I beg you’ll call her Betsey Trotwood Copperfield. There must be no mistakes in life with this Betsey Trotwood. There must be no trifling with her affections, poor dear. She must be well brought up, and well guarded from reposing any foolish confidences where they are not deserved. I must make that my care.”

There was a twitch of Miss Betsey’s head, after each of these sentences, as if her own old wrongs were working within her, and she repressed any plainer reference to them by strong constraint. So my mother suspected, at least, as she observed her by the low glimmer of the fire: too much scared by Miss Betsey, too uneasy in herself, and too subdued and bewildered altogether, to observe anything very clearly, or to know what to say.

“And was David good to you, child?” asked Miss Betsey, when she had been silent for a little while, and these motions of her head had gradually ceased. “Were you comfortable together?”

“We were very happy,” said my mother. “Mr. Copperfield was only too good to me.”

“What, he spoilt you, I suppose?” returned Miss Betsey.

“For being quite alone and dependent on myself in this rough world again, yes, I fear he did indeed,” sobbed my mother.

“Well! Don’t cry!” said Miss Betsey. “You were not equally matched, child⁠—if any two people can be equally matched⁠—and so I asked the question. You were an orphan, weren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“And a governess?”

“I was nursery-governess in a family where Mr. Copperfield came to visit. Mr. Copperfield was very kind to me, and took a great deal of notice of me, and paid me a good deal of attention, and at last proposed to me. And I accepted him. And so we were married,” said