Read FICTION books online

Reading books fiction Have you ever thought about what fiction is? Probably, such a question may seem surprising: and so everything is clear. Every person throughout his life has to repeatedly create the works he needs for specific purposes - statements, autobiographies, dictations - using not gypsum or clay, not musical notes, not paints, but just a word. At the same time, almost every person will be very surprised if he is told that he thereby created a work of fiction, which is very different from visual art, music and sculpture making. However, everyone understands that a student's essay or dictation is fundamentally different from novels, short stories, news that are created by professional writers. In the works of professionals there is the most important difference - excogitation. But, oddly enough, in a school literature course, you don’t realize the full power of fiction. So using our website in your free time discover fiction for yourself.



Fiction genre suitable for people of all ages. Everyone will find something interesting for themselves. Our electronic library is always at your service. Reading online free books without registration. Nowadays ebooks are convenient and efficient. After all, don’t forget: literature exists and develops largely thanks to readers.
The genre of fiction is interesting to read not only by the process of cognition and the desire to empathize with the fate of the hero, this genre is interesting for the ability to rethink one's own life. Of course the reader may accept the author's point of view or disagree with them, but the reader should understand that the author has done a great job and deserves respect. Take a closer look at genre fiction in all its manifestations in our elibrary.



Read books online » Fiction » Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (best ereader under 100 TXT) 📖

Book online «Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (best ereader under 100 TXT) 📖». Author Charles Dickens



1 ... 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 ... 94
Go to page:
just

then, when Wemmick anticipated me.

“I know your engagements,” said he, “and I know you are out of

sorts, Mr. Pip. But if you could oblige me, I should take it as a

kindness. It ain’t a long walk, and it’s an early one. Say it might

occupy you (including breakfast on the walk) from eight to twelve.

Couldn’t you stretch a point and manage it?”

He had done so much for me at various times, that this was very

little to do for him. I said I could manage it,—would manage it,—

and he was so very much pleased by my acquiescence, that I was

pleased too. At his particular request, I appointed to call for him

at the Castle at half past eight on Monday morning, and so we

parted for the time.

Punctual to my appointment, I rang at the Castle gate on the Monday

morning, and was received by Wemmick himself, who struck me as

looking tighter than usual, and having a sleeker hat on. Within,

there were two glasses of rum and milk prepared, and two biscuits.

The Aged must have been stirring with the lark, for, glancing into

the perspective of his bedroom, I observed that his bed was empty.

When we had fortified ourselves with the rum and milk and biscuits,

and were going out for the walk with that training preparation on

us, I was considerably surprised to see Wemmick take up a

fishing-rod, and put it over his shoulder. “Why, we are not going

fishing!” said I. “No,” returned Wemmick, “but I like to walk with

one.”

I thought this odd; however, I said nothing, and we set off. We

went towards Camberwell Green, and when we were thereabouts,

Wemmick said suddenly,—

“Halloa! Here’s a church!”

There was nothing very surprising in that; but again, I was rather

surprised, when he said, as if he were animated by a brilliant

idea,—

“Let’s go in!”

We went in, Wemmick leaving his fishing-rod in the porch, and

looked all round. In the mean time, Wemmick was diving into his

coat-pockets, and getting something out of paper there.

“Halloa!” said he. “Here’s a couple of pair of gloves! Let’s put

‘em on!”

As the gloves were white kid gloves, and as the post-office was

widened to its utmost extent, I now began to have my strong

suspicions. They were strengthened into certainty when I beheld the

Aged enter at a side door, escorting a lady.

“Halloa!” said Wemmick. “Here’s Miss Skiffins! Let’s have a

wedding.”

That discreet damsel was attired as usual, except that she was now

engaged in substituting for her green kid gloves a pair of white.

The Aged was likewise occupied in preparing a similar sacrifice for

the altar of Hymen. The old gentleman, however, experienced so much

difficulty in getting his gloves on, that Wemmick found it

necessary to put him with his back against a pillar, and then to

get behind the pillar himself and pull away at them, while I for my

part held the old gentleman round the waist, that he might present

and equal and safe resistance. By dint of this ingenious scheme,

his gloves were got on to perfection.

The clerk and clergyman then appearing, we were ranged in order at

those fatal rails. True to his notion of seeming to do it all

without preparation, I heard Wemmick say to himself, as he took

something out of his waistcoat-pocket before the service began,

“Halloa! Here’s a ring!”

I acted in the capacity of backer, or best-man, to the bridegroom;

while a little limp pew-opener in a soft bonnet like a baby’s, made

a feint of being the bosom friend of Miss Skiffins. The

responsibility of giving the lady away devolved upon the Aged,

which led to the clergyman’s being unintentionally scandalized, and

it happened thus. When he said, “Who giveth this woman to be

married to this man?” the old gentlemen, not in the least knowing

what point of the ceremony we had arrived at, stood most amiably

beaming at the ten commandments. Upon which, the clergyman said

again, “WHO giveth this woman to be married to this man?” The old

gentleman being still in a state of most estimable unconsciousness,

the bridegroom cried out in his accustomed voice, “Now Aged P. you

know; who giveth?” To which the Aged replied with great briskness,

before saying that he gave, “All right, John, all right, my boy!”

And the clergyman came to so gloomy a pause upon it, that I had

doubts for the moment whether we should get completely married that

day.

It was completely done, however, and when we were going out of

church Wemmick took the cover off the font, and put his white

gloves in it, and put the cover on again. Mrs. Wemmick, more heedful

of the future, put her white gloves in her pocket and assumed her

green. “Now, Mr. Pip,” said Wemmick, triumphantly shouldering the

fishing-rod as we came out, “let me ask you whether anybody would

suppose this to be a wedding-party!”

Breakfast had been ordered at a pleasant little tavern, a mile or

so away upon the rising ground beyond the green; and there was a

bagatelle board in the room, in case we should desire to unbend our

minds after the solemnity. It was pleasant to observe that Mrs.

Wemmick no longer unwound Wemmick’s arm when it adapted itself to

her figure, but sat in a high-backed chair against the wall, like a

violoncello in its case, and submitted to be embraced as that

melodious instrument might have done.

We had an excellent breakfast, and when any one declined anything

on table, Wemmick said, “Provided by contract, you know; don’t be

afraid of it!” I drank to the new couple, drank to the Aged, drank

to the Castle, saluted the bride at parting, and made myself as

agreeable as I could.

Wemmick came down to the door with me, and I again shook hands with

him, and wished him joy.

“Thankee!” said Wemmick, rubbing his hands. “She’s such a manager

of fowls, you have no idea. You shall have some eggs, and judge for

yourself. I say, Mr. Pip!” calling me back, and speaking low. “This

is altogether a Walworth sentiment, please.”

“I understand. Not to be mentioned in Little Britain,” said I.

Wemmick nodded. “After what you let out the other day, Mr. Jaggers

may as well not know of it. He might think my brain was softening,

or something of the kind.”

Chapter LVI

He lay in prison very ill, during the whole interval between his

committal for trial and the coming round of the Sessions. He had

broken two ribs, they had wounded one of his lungs, and he breathed

with great pain and difficulty, which increased daily. It was a

consequence of his hurt that he spoke so low as to be scarcely

audible; therefore he spoke very little. But he was ever ready to

listen to me; and it became the first duty of my life to say to

him, and read to him, what I knew he ought to hear.

Being far too ill to remain in the common prison, he was removed,

after the first day or so, into the infirmary. This gave me

opportunities of being with him that I could not otherwise have

had. And but for his illness he would have been put in irons, for

he was regarded as a determined prison-breaker, and I know not what

else.

Although I saw him every day, it was for only a short time; hence,

the regularly recurring spaces of our separation were long enough

to record on his face any slight changes that occurred in his

physical state. I do not recollect that I once saw any change in it

for the better; he wasted, and became slowly weaker and worse, day

by day, from the day when the prison door closed upon him.

The kind of submission or resignation that he showed was that of a

man who was tired out. I sometimes derived an impression, from his

manner or from a whispered word or two which escaped him, that he

pondered over the question whether he might have been a better man

under better circumstances. But he never justified himself by a

hint tending that way, or tried to bend the past out of its eternal

shape.

It happened on two or three occasions in my presence, that his

desperate reputation was alluded to by one or other of the people

in attendance on him. A smile crossed his face then, and he turned

his eyes on me with a trustful look, as if he were confident that I

had seen some small redeeming touch in him, even so long ago as when

I was a little child. As to all the rest, he was humble and

contrite, and I never knew him complain.

When the Sessions came round, Mr. Jaggers caused an application to

be made for the postponement of his trial until the following

Sessions. It was obviously made with the assurance that he could

not live so long, and was refused. The trial came on at once, and,

when he was put to the bar, he was seated in a chair. No objection

was made to my getting close to the dock, on the outside of it, and

holding the hand that he stretched forth to me.

The trial was very short and very clear. Such things as could be

said for him were said,—how he had taken to industrious habits,

and had thriven lawfully and reputably. But nothing could unsay

the fact that he had returned, and was there in presence of the

Judge and Jury. It was impossible to try him for that, and do

otherwise than find him guilty.

At that time, it was the custom (as I learnt from my terrible

experience of that Sessions) to devote a concluding day to the

passing of Sentences, and to make a finishing effect with the

Sentence of Death. But for the indelible picture that my

remembrance now holds before me, I could scarcely believe, even as

I write these words, that I saw two-and-thirty men and women put

before the Judge to receive that sentence together. Foremost among

the two-and-thirty was he; seated, that he might get breath enough

to keep life in him.

The whole scene starts out again in the vivid colors of the

moment, down to the drops of April rain on the windows of the

court, glittering in the rays of April sun. Penned in the dock, as

I again stood outside it at the corner with his hand in mine, were

the two-and-thirty men and women; some defiant, some stricken with

terror, some sobbing and weeping, some covering their faces, some

staring gloomily about. There had been shrieks from among the women

convicts; but they had been stilled,and a hush had succeeded. The

sheriffs with their great chains and nosegays, other civic gewgaws

and monsters, criers, ushers, a great gallery full of people,—a

large theatrical audience,—looked on, as the two-and-thirty and

the Judge were solemnly confronted. Then the Judge addressed them.

Among the wretched creatures before him whom he must single out for

special address was one who almost from his infancy had been an

offender against the laws; who, after repeated imprisonments and

punishments, had been at length sentenced to exile for a term of

years; and who, under circumstances of great violence and daring,

had made his escape and been re-sentenced to exile for life. That

miserable man would seem for a time to have become convinced of his

errors, when far removed from the scenes of his old offences, and

to have lived a peaceable and honest life. But in a fatal moment,

yielding to those propensities and passions, the indulgence of

which had so long rendered him a scourge to society, he had quitted

his haven

1 ... 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 ... 94
Go to page:

Free ebook «Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (best ereader under 100 TXT) 📖» - read online now

Comments (0)

There are no comments yet. You can be the first!
Add a comment