The Solitary House (With Bonus Novels Bleak House and the Woman in White)

by Lynn Shepherd

  “To the Old Street Road,” said I; “where I have a few words to say to the solicitor’s clerk, who was sent to meet me at the coach-office on the very day when I came to London, and first saw you, my dear. Now I think of it, the gentleman who brought us to your house.”

  “Then, indeed, I seem to be naturally the person to go with you,” returned Caddy.

  To the Old Street Road we went, and there inquired at Mrs. Guppy’s residence for Mrs. Guppy. Mrs. Guppy, occupying the parlours, and having indeed been visibly in danger of cracking herself like a nut in the front-parlour door by peeping out before she was asked for, immediately presented herself, and requested us to walk in. She was an old lady in a large cap, with rather a red nose and rather an unsteady eye, but smiling all over. Her close little sitting-room was prepared for a visit; and there was a portrait of her son in it, which, I had almost written here, was more like than life: it insisted upon him with such obstinacy, and was so determined not to let him off.

  Not only was the portrait there, but we found the original there too. He was dressed in a great many colours, and was discovered at a table reading law-papers with his forefinger to his forehead.

  “Miss Summerson,” said Mr. Guppy, rising, “this is indeed an Oasis. Mother, will you be so good as to put a chair for the other lady, and get out of the gangway.”

  Mrs. Guppy, whose incessant smiling gave her quite a waggish appearance, did as her son requested; and then sat down in a corner, holding her pocket-handkerchief to her chest, like a fomentation, with both hands.

  I presented Caddy, and Mr. Guppy said that any friend of mine was more than welcome. I then proceeded to the object of my visit.

  “I took the liberty of sending you a note, sir,” said I.

  Mr. Guppy acknowledged the receipt by taking it out of his breast-pocket, putting it to his lips, and returning it to his pocket with a bow. Mr. Guppy’s mother was so diverted that she rolled her head as she smiled, and made a silent appeal to Caddy with her elbow.

  “Could I speak to you alone for a moment?” said I.

  Anything like the jocoseness of Mr. Guppy’s mother just now, I think I never saw. She made no sound of laughter; but she rolled her head, and shook it, and put her handkerchief to her mouth, and appealed to Caddy with her elbow, and her hand, and her shoulder, and was so unspeakably entertained altogether that it was with some difficulty she could marshal Caddy through the little folding-door into her bedroom adjoining.

  “Miss Summerson,” said Mr. Guppy, “you will excuse the waywardness of a parent ever mindful of a son’s ’appiness. My mother, though highly exasperating to the feelings, is actuated by maternal dictates.”

  I could hardly have believed that anybody could in a moment have turned so red, or changed so much, as Mr. Guppy did when I now put up my veil.

  “I asked the favour of seeing you for a few moments here,” said I, “in preference to calling at Mr. Kenge’s, because, remembering what you said on an occasion when you spoke to me in confidence, I feared I might otherwise cause you some embarrassment, Mr. Guppy.”

  I caused him embarrassment enough as it was, I am sure. I never saw such faltering, such confusion, such amazement and apprehension.

  “Miss Summerson,” stammered Mr. Guppy, “I—I—beg your pardon, but in our profession—we—we—find it necessary to be explicit. You have referred to an occasion, miss, when I—when I did myself the honour of making a declaration which—”

  Something seemed to rise in his throat that he could not possibly swallow. He put his hand there, coughed, made faces, tried again to swallow it, coughed again, made faces again, looked all round the room, and fluttered his papers.

  “A kind of giddy sensation has come upon me, miss,” he explained, “which rather knocks me over. I—er—a little subject to this sort of thing—er—By George!”

  I gave him a little time to recover. He consumed it in putting his hand to his forehead and taking it away again, and in backing his chair into the corner behind him.

  “My intention was to remark, miss,” said Mr. Guppy,—“dear me—something bronchial, I think—hem!—to remark that you was so good on that occasion as to repel and repudiate that declaration. You—you wouldn’t perhaps object to admit that? Though no witnesses are present, it might be a satisfaction to—to your mind—if you was to put in that admission.”

  “There can be no doubt,” said I, “that I declined your proposal without any reservation or qualification whatever, Mr. Guppy.”

  “Thank you, miss,” he returned, measuring the table with his troubled hands. “So far that’s satisfactory, and it does you credit. Er—this is certainly bronchial!—must be in the tubes—er—you wouldn’t perhaps be offended if I was to mention—not that it’s necessary, for your own good sense or any person’s sense must show ’em that—if I was to mention that such declaration on my part was final, and there terminated?”

  “I quite understand that,” said I.

  “Perhaps—er—it may not be worth the form, but it might be a satisfaction to your mind—perhaps you wouldn’t object to admit that, miss?” said Mr. Guppy.

  “I admit it most fully and freely,” said I.

  “Thank you,” returned Mr. Guppy. “Very honourable, I am sure. I regret that my arrangements in life, combined with circumstances over which I have no control, will put it out of my power ever to fall back upon that offer, or to renew it in any shape or form whatever; but it will ever be a retrospect entwined—er—with friendship’s bowers.” Mr. Guppy’s bronchitis came to his relief, and stopped his measurement of the table.

  “I may now perhaps mention what I wished to say to you?” I began.

  “I shall be honoured, I am sure,” said Mr. Guppy. “I am so persuaded that your own good sense and right feeling, miss, will—will keep you as square as possible—that I can have nothing but pleasure, I am sure, in hearing any observations you may wish to offer.”

  “You were so good as to imply, on that occasion—”

  “Excuse me, miss,” said Mr. Guppy, “but we had better not travel out of the record into implication. I cannot admit that I implied anything.”

  “You said on that occasion,” I recommenced, “that you might possibly have the means of advancing my interests, and promoting my fortunes, by making discoveries of which I should be the subject. I presume that you founded that belief upon your general knowledge of my being an orphan girl, indebted for everything to the benevolence of Mr. Jarndyce. Now, the beginning and the end of what I have come to beg of you is, Mr. Guppy, that you will have the kindness to relinquish all idea of so serving me. I have thought of this sometimes, and I have thought of it most lately—since I have been ill. At length I have decided, in case you should at any time recall that purpose, and act upon it in any way, to come to you, and assure you that you are altogether mistaken. You could make no discovery in reference to me that would do me the least service, or give me the least pleasure. I am acquainted with my personal history; and I have it in my power to assure you that you never can advance my welfare by such means. You may, perhaps, have abandoned this project a long time. If so, excuse my giving you unnecessary trouble. If not, I entreat you, on the assurance I have given you, henceforth to lay it aside. I beg you to do this, for my peace.”

  “I am bound to confess,” said Mr. Guppy, “that you express yourself, miss, with that good sense and right feeling for which I gave you credit. Nothing can be more satisfactory than such right feeling, and if I mistook any intentions on your part just now, I am prepared to tender a full apology. I should wish to be understood, miss, as hereby offering that apology—limiting it, as your own good sense and right feeling will point out the necessity of, to the present proceedings.”

  I must say for Mr. Guppy that the snuffling manner he had had upon him improved very much. He seemed truly glad to be able to do something I asked, and he looked ashamed.

  “If you will allow me to finish what I have to say at once, so that I may have no o
ccasion to resume,” I went on, seeing him about to speak, “you will do me a kindness, sir. I come to you as privately as possible, because you announced this impression of yours to me in a confidence which I have really wished to respect—and which I always have respected, as you remember. I have mentioned my illness. There really is no reason why I should hesitate to say that I know very well that any little delicacy I might have had in making a request to you, is quite removed. Therefore I make the entreaty I have now preferred; and I hope you will have sufficient consideration for me, to accede to it.”

  I must do Mr. Guppy the further justice of saying that he had looked more and more ashamed, and that he looked most ashamed, and very earnest, when he now replied with a burning face:

  “Upon my word and honour, upon my life, upon my soul, Miss Summerson, as I am a living man, I’ll act according to your wish! I’ll never go another step in opposition to it. I’ll take my oath to it, if it will be any satisfaction to you. In what I promise at this present time touching the matters now in question,” continued Mr. Guppy, rapidly, as if he were repeating a familiar form of words, “I speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so—”

  “I am quite satisfied,” said I, rising at this point, “and I thank you very much. Caddy, my dear, I am ready!”

  Mr. Guppy’s mother returned with Caddy (now making me the recipient of her silent laughter and her nudges), and we took our leave. Mr. Guppy saw us to the door with the air of one who was either imperfectly awake or walking in his sleep; and we left him there, staring.

  But in a minute he came after us down the street without any hat, and with his long hair all blown about, and stopped us, saying fervently:

  “Miss Summerson, upon my honour and soul, you may depend upon me!”

  “I do,” said I, “quite confidently.”

  “I beg your pardon, miss,” said Mr. Guppy, going with one leg and staying with the other, “but this lady being present—your own witness—it might be a satisfaction to your mind (which I should wish to set at rest) if you was to repeat those admissions.”

  “Well, Caddy,” said I, turning to her, “perhaps you will not be surprised when I tell you, my dear, that there never has been any engagement—”

  “No proposal or promise of marriage whatsoever,” suggested Mr. Guppy.

  “No proposal or promise of marriage whatsoever,” said I, “between this gentleman—”

  “William Guppy of Penton Place, Pentonville, in the county of Middlesex,” he murmured.

  “Between this gentleman, Mr. William Guppy of Penton Place, Pentonville, in the county of Middlesex, and myself.”

  “Thank you, miss,” said Mr. Guppy. “Very full—er—excuse me—lady’s name, Christian and surname both?”

  I gave them.

  “Married woman, I believe?” said Mr. Guppy. “Married woman. Thank you. Formerly Caroline Jellyby, spinster, then of Thavies Inn, within the city of London, but extraparochial; now of Newman Street, Oxford Street. Much obliged.”

  He ran home and came running back again.

  “Touching that matter, you know, I really and truly am very sorry that my arrangements in life, combined with circumstances over which I have no control, should prevent a renewal of what was wholly terminated some time back,” said Mr. Guppy to me, forlornly and despondently, “but it couldn’t be. Now could it, you know! I only put it to you.”

  I replied it certainly could not. The subject did not admit to a doubt. He thanked me, and ran to his mother’s again—and back again.

  “It’s very honourable of you, miss, I am sure,” said Mr. Guppy. “If an altar could be erected in the bowers of friendship—but, upon my soul, you may rely upon me in every respect, save and except the tender passion only!”

  The struggle in Mr. Guppy’s breast, and the numerous oscillations it occasioned him between his mother’s door and us, were sufficiently conspicuous in the windy street (particularly as his hair wanted cutting), to make us hurry away. I did so with a lightened heart; but when we last looked back, Mr. Guppy was still oscillating in the same troubled state of mind.

  *

  CHAPTER 39

  ATTORNEY AND CLIENT

  The name of Mr. Vholes, preceded by the legend Ground Floor, is inscribed upon a door-post in Symond’s Inn, Chancery Lane: a little, pale, wall-eyed, woebegone inn, like a large dust-bin of two compartments and a sifter. It looks as if Symond were a sparing man in his way, and constructed his inn of old building materials, which took kindly to the dry rot and to dirt and all things decaying and dismal, and perpetuated Symond’s memory with congenial shabbiness. Quartered in this dingy hatchment commemorative of Symond, are the legal bearings of Mr. Vholes.

  Mr. Vholes’s office, in disposition retiring and in situation retired, is squeezed up in a corner, and blinks at a dead wall. Three feet of knotty-floored dark passage bring the client to Mr. Vholes’s jet black door, in an angle profoundly dark on the brightest midsummer morning, and encumbered by a black bulk-head of cellarage staircase, against which belated civilians generally strike their brows. Mr. Vholes’s chambers are on so small a scale, that one clerk can open the door without getting off his stool, while the other who elbows him at the same desk has equal facilities for poking the fire. A smell as of unwholesome sheep, blending with the smell of must and dust, is referable to the nightly (and often daily) consumption of mutton fat in candles, and to the fretting of parchment forms and skins in greasy drawers. The atmosphere is otherwise stale and close. The place was last painted or white-washed beyond the memory of man, and the two chimneys smoke, and there is a loose outer surface of soot everywhere, and the dull cracked windows in their heavy frames have but one piece of character in them, which is a determination to be always dirty, and always shut, unless coerced. This accounts for the phenomenon of the weaker of the two usually having a bundle of firewood thrust between its jaws in hot weather.

  Mr. Vholes is a very respectable man. He has not a large business, but he is a very respectable man. He is allowed by the greater attorneys who have made good fortunes, or are making them, to be a most respectable man. He never misses a chance in his practice; which is a mark of respectability. He never takes any pleasure; which is another mark of respectability. He is reserved and serious; which is another mark of respectability. His digestion is impaired, which is highly respectable. And he is making hay of the grass which is flesh, for his three daughters. And his father is dependent on him in the Vale of Taunton.

  The one great principle of the English law is, to make business for itself. There is no other principle distinctly, certainly, and consistently maintained through all its narrow turnings. Viewed by this light it becomes a coherent scheme, and not the monstrous maze the laity are apt to think it. Let them but once clearly perceive that its grand principle is to make business for itself at their expense, and surely they will cease to grumble.

  But, not perceiving this quite plainly—only seeing it by halves in a confused way—the laity sometimes suffer in peace and pocket, with a bad grace, and do grumble very much. Then this respectability of Mr. Vholes is brought into powerful play against them. “Repeal this statute, my good sir?” says Mr. Kenge, to a smarting client, “repeal it, my dear sir? Never, with my consent. Alter this law, sir, and what will be the effect of your rash proceeding on a class of practitioners very worthily represented, allow me to say to you, by the opposite attorney in the case, Mr. Vholes? Sir, that class of practitioners would be swept from the face of the earth. Now you cannot afford—I will say, the social system cannot afford—to lose an order of men like Mr. Vholes. Diligent, persevering, steady, acute in business. My dear sir, I understand your present feelings against the existing state of things, which I grant to be a little hard in your case; but I can never raise my voice for the demolition of a class of men like Mr. Vholes.” The respectability of Mr. Vholes has even been cited with crushing effect before Parliamentary committees, as in the following blue minutes of a distinguished attorn
ey’s evidence. “Question (number five hundred and seventeen thousand eight hundred and sixty-nine). If I understand you, these forms of practice indisputably occasion delay? Answer. Yes, some delay. Question. And great expense? Answer. Most assuredly they cannot be gone through for nothing. Question. And unspeakable vexation? Answer. I am not prepared to say that. They have never given me any vexation; quite the contrary. Question. But you think that their abolition would damage a class of practitioners? Answer. I have no doubt of it. Question. Can you instance any type of that class? Answer. Yes. I would unhesitatingly mention Mr. Vholes. He would be ruined. Question. Mr. Vholes is considered, in the profession, a respectable man? Answer.”—which proved fatal to the inquiry for ten years—“Mr. Vholes is considered, in the profession, a most respectable man.”

  So in familiar conversation, private authorities no less disinterested will remark that they don’t know what this age is coming to; that we are plunging down precipices; that now here is something else gone; that these changes are death to people like Vholes: a man of undoubted respectability, with a father in the Vale of Taunton, and three daughters at home. Take a few steps more in this direction, say they, and what is to become of Vholes’s father? Is he to perish? And of Vholes’s daughters? Are they to be shirt-makers, or governesses? As though, Mr. Vholes and his relations being minor cannibal chiefs, and it being proposed to abolish cannibalism, indignant champions were to put the case thus: Make man-eating unlawful, and you starve the Vholeses!

  In a word, Mr. Vholes, with his three daughters and his father in the Vale of Taunton, is continually doing duty, like a piece of timber, to shore up some decayed foundation that has become a pitfall and a nuisance. And with a great many people in a great many instances, the question is never one of a change from Wrong to Right (which is quite an extraneous consideration), but is always one of injury or advantage to that eminently respectable legion, Vholes.