‘This is pleasant, Sam,’ said Mr. Pickwick; ‘I shouldn’t lose an hour in seeing him; I shall not be able to get one wink of sleep to–night, I know, unless I have the satisfaction of reflecting that I have confided this matter to a professional man.’
‘Here’s an old ‘ooman comin’ upstairs, sir,’ replied Mr. Weller; ‘p’raps she knows where we can find somebody. Hollo, old lady, vere’s Mr. Perker’s people?’
‘Mr. Perker’s people,’ said a thin, miserable–looking old woman, stopping to recover breath after the ascent of the staircase—‘Mr. Perker’s people’s gone, and I’m a–goin’ to do the office out.’ ‘Are you Mr. Perker’s servant?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick.
‘I am Mr. Perker’s laundress,’ replied the woman.
‘Ah,’ said Mr. Pickwick, half aside to Sam, ‘it’s a curious circumstance, Sam, that they call the old women in these inns, laundresses. I wonder what’s that for?’
‘‘Cos they has a mortal awersion to washing anythin’, I suppose, Sir,’ replied Mr. Weller.
‘I shouldn’t wonder,’ said Mr. Pickwick, looking at the old woman, whose appearance, as well as the condition of the office, which she had by this time opened, indicated a rooted antipathy to the application of soap and water; ‘do you know where I can find Mr. Perker, my good woman?’
‘No, I don’t,’ replied the old woman gruffly; ‘he’s out o’ town now.’
‘That’s unfortunate,’ said Mr. Pickwick; ‘where’s his clerk? Do you know?’
‘Yes, I know where he is, but he won’t thank me for telling you,’ replied the laundress.
‘I have very particular business with him,’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘Won’t it do in the morning?’ said the woman.
‘Not so well,’ replied Mr. Pickwick.
‘Well,’ said the old woman, ‘if it was anything very particular, I was to say where he was, so I suppose there’s no harm in telling. If you just go to the Magpie and Stump, and ask at the bar for Mr. Lowten, they’ll show you in to him, and he’s Mr. Perker’s clerk.’
With this direction, and having been furthermore informed that the hostelry in question was situated in a court, happy in the double advantage of being in the vicinity of Clare Market, and closely approximating to the back of New Inn, Mr. Pickwick and Sam descended the rickety staircase in safety, and issued forth in quest of the Magpie and Stump.
This favoured tavern, sacred to the evening orgies of Mr. Lowten and his companions, was what ordinary people would designate a public–house. That the landlord was a man of money–making turn was sufficiently testified by the fact of a small bulkhead beneath the tap–room window, in size and shape not unlike a sedan–chair, being underlet to a mender of shoes: and that he was a being of a philanthropic mind was evident from the protection he afforded to a pieman, who vended his delicacies without fear of interruption, on the very door–step. In the lower windows, which were decorated with curtains of a saffron hue, dangled two or three printed cards, bearing reference to Devonshire cider and Dantzic spruce, while a large blackboard, announcing in white letters to an enlightened public, that there were 500,000 barrels of double stout in the cellars of the establishment, left the mind in a state of not unpleasing doubt and uncertainty as to the precise direction in the bowels of the earth, in which this mighty cavern might be supposed to extend. When we add that the weather–beaten signboard bore the half–obliterated semblance of a magpie intently eyeing a crooked streak of brown paint, which the neighbours had been taught from infancy to consider as the ‘stump,’ we have said all that need be said of the exterior of the edifice.
On Mr. Pickwick’s presenting himself at the bar, an elderly female emerged from behind the screen therein, and presented herself before him.
‘Is Mr. Lowten here, ma’am?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick.
‘Yes, he is, Sir,’ replied the landlady. ‘Here, Charley, show the gentleman in to Mr. Lowten.’
‘The gen’l’m’n can’t go in just now,’ said a shambling pot–boy, with a red head, ‘cos’ Mr. Lowten’s a–singin’ a comic song, and he’ll put him out. He’ll be done directly, Sir.’
The red–headed pot–boy had scarcely finished speaking, when a most unanimous hammering of tables, and jingling of glasses, announced that the song had that instant terminated; and Mr. Pickwick, after desiring Sam to solace himself in the tap, suffered himself to be conducted into the presence of Mr. Lowten.
At the announcement of ‘A gentleman to speak to you, Sir,’ a puffy–faced young man, who filled the chair at the head of the table, looked with some surprise in the direction from whence the voice proceeded; and the surprise seemed to be by no means diminished, when his eyes rested on an individual whom he had never seen before.
‘I beg your pardon, Sir,’ said Mr. Pickwick, ‘and I am very sorry to disturb the other gentlemen, too, but I come on very particular business; and if you will suffer me to detain you at this end of the room for five minutes, I shall be very much obliged to you.’
The puffy–faced young man rose, and drawing a chair close to Mr. Pickwick in an obscure corner of the room, listened attentively to his tale of woe.
‘Ah,‘he said, when Mr. Pickwick had concluded, ‘Dodson and Fogg—sharp practice theirs—capital men of business, Dodson and Fogg, sir.’
Mr. Pickwick admitted the sharp practice of Dodson and Fogg, and Lowten resumed. ‘Perker ain’t in town, and he won’t be, neither, before the end of next week; but if you want the action defended, and will leave the copy with me, I can do all that’s needful till he comes back.’
‘That’s exactly what I came here for,’ said Mr. Pickwick, handing over the document. ‘If anything particular occurs, you can write to me at the post–office, Ipswich.’
‘That’s all right,’ replied Mr. Perker’s clerk; and then seeing Mr. Pickwick’s eye wandering curiously towards the table, he added, ‘will you join us, for half an hour or so? We are capital company here to–night. There’s Samkin and Green’s managing–clerk, and Smithers and Price’s chancery, and Pimkin and Thomas’s out o’ doors—sings a capital song, he does—and Jack Bamber, and ever so many more. You’re come out of the country, I suppose. Would you like to join us?’
Mr. Pickwick could not resist so tempting an opportunity of studying human nature. He suffered himself to be led to the table, where, after having been introduced to the company in due form, he was accommodated with a seat near the chairman and called for a glass of his favourite beverage.
A profound silence, quite contrary to Mr. Pickwick’s expectation, succeeded. ‘You don’t find this sort of thing disagreeable, I hope, sir?’ said his right hand neighbour, a gentleman in a checked shirt and Mosaic studs, with a cigar in his mouth.
‘Not in the least,’ replied Mr. Pickwick; ‘I like it very much, although I am no smoker myself.’
‘I should be very sorry to say I wasn’t,’ interposed another gentleman on the opposite side of the table. ‘It’s board and lodgings to me, is smoke.’
Mr. Pickwick glanced at the speaker, and thought that if it were washing too, it would be all the better.
Here there was another pause. Mr. Pickwick was a stranger, and his coming had evidently cast a damp upon the party.
‘Mr. Grundy’s going to oblige the company with a song,’ said the chairman.
‘No, he ain’t,’ said Mr. Grundy.
‘Why not?’ said the chairman.
‘Because he can’t,’ said Mr. Grundy. ‘You had better say he won’t,’ replied the chairman.
‘Well,