"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 extra-parochial; 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 of 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 XXXIX
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-binn 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 whitewashed 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.