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Hello and welcome to Storytime for Grown Ups. I'm Faith Moore and this season we're reading David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. Each episode I'll read a few chapters from the book, pausing from time to time to give brief explanations so it's easier to follow along. It's like an audiobook with built in notes. So brew a pot of tea, find a cozy chair and settle in. It's story time. Hello there. Welcome back. This episode is another pre recorded episode. It's the first of three episodes that I had to record in advance because. Because I am away. As I told you before, I am visiting some family and so I wanted to make sure that we didn't have any breaks in the action and that you got all the chapters at the right times and that every Monday and Thursday you got an episode. So this is how I had to do it. I'm sorry that I had to go away again so soon after we had those other two pre recorded episodes. But once I am back after these three, then I will be with you all the way until the end of the book, which is really coming up. You guys, we have less than 10 chapters to go, so when I get back we will really be in the final stretch. And so I wouldn't leave you for that. But I did have to go away. I do have to do some traveling. So I wanted to make sure that you got these episodes. And I also had to record these a little bit out of order in order to make sure that you got all of them before I went away. I had to record the this one, for example, before I recorded the previous two, if that makes any sense. So I think I got everything together. I promise I'm not going to do any spoilers. I definitely didn't do that. But if I repeat myself in this episode from anything that I said in the previous two episodes, it's because I did this one first. But I, I think I'm going to be okay. I, I've planned it out and I kind of have some notes and things. So I think I got it right. But just please do bear with me if there's are any repeats or things like that because I just, I really wanted to make sure that you got the episodes on time because we're really coming down to the end of it here and I know that you would be waiting and waiting if I had to skip some of the dates. So that's why I did this the way that I did it. And I really appreciate your patience. You know, normally we don't read a book in the summer and this is why. It's because I'm home with my kids and I'm traveling and summer is a very different thing for me than the rest of the year. But I just love this book so much that I just couldn't bear not reading it to you. And that's why we've been reading it and that's why it's gone into the summer like this and we're not doing summer session and all of that. So thank you. Thank you for bearing with me as I do my summer life and keep reading this wonderful book with you. And I really, I really have enjoyed this so much. It's so much fun to read this book. I am really glad, at least I don't know how you feel, but I am really glad that I decided to read this book with you because it's been such a joy to experience it with you. And I'm sad that for the next three episodes I'm not going to get to experience it in real time alongside you. But I am looking forward to getting your letters while I'm away and checking in with you about how you're feeling about these various chapters that are coming up. So please do keep getting in touch and I'll circle back around to anything that I don't happen to cover and we'll talk about all of that when I get back. And then we will stride boldly forth into the end of this book together. I will be back with you for the rest of the book. So that's what's coming up. That's what's going on. So without further ado, let us get into this episode. Last time we read chapter 54, today we're reading chapter 55. So let's just remind ourselves of what happened last time. And then I'll talk a little bit about chapter 54 as best I can without your comments. And then, then we'll keep reading. So here is the recap. Okay, so where we left off. David tells us that at first he didn't feel the full force of his grief for Dora, partly because there was so much else going on. But he tells us that eventually he became so grief stricken that he felt his life was over. But before this, a plan is arranged for him to go abroad. But first they have to deal with the fallout from Uriah's forgeries and thefts. So Agnes and David and Miss Betsy go to Canterbury, where they meet up with Traddles and the Macawers. The Micawbers say that they are still planning to go to Australia, but that Mr. Macawer has several debts to pay off. Ms. Betsy promises to help with that. Mrs. Macawer says that she's going to try to get her family to acknowledge Mr. Macabre before they leave, but Mr. Macawer says it's fine, he doesn't care whether they do or not. Then the Macabre go out so that the rest of them can discuss how they plan to help them. Traddle says that Mr. Macawer has kept very detailed records of all of Uriah's crimes and that has helped him to figure out where all the money is. Mr. Wakefield has gotten a bit better since Uriah left and was able to help a bit with that as well. She traddles explains that Mr. Wakefield is not in debt and could close his firm without owing anything, but if he did that, he'd have no additional money to live off of. So Traddles suggests that he keep the firm open and take advice from his friends so that he doesn't fall into trouble again. Agnes says that she will take on the financial responsibility for them and will rent out their house and open a school to make ends meet. Traddles then explains that he has located 5,000 of Ms. Betsy's £8,000, but doesn't know what happened to the other 3,000. Ms. Betsy explained that 1,000 of it went to paying for David's articles and the other two she secretly kept but didn't tell anyone about because she wanted David to have to learn how to live in adversity and she feels he bore it incredibly well. Traddles explains that Uriah made Mr. Wakefield think that he'd stolen Ms. Betsy's money and he wrote her a letter of apology which she burnt in his presence, saying she wouldn't speak of it so as not to harm him or Agnes. Miss Betsy asks how Traddles was able to get all the money back and Traddles explains that Mr. McCawber's records were so thorough that Uriah couldn't deny any of his crimes. Traddles also says that Uriah expressed that he was motivated not so much by greed, but by his hatred of David. Uriah and his mother have apparently left Canterbury. Another problem though, is that Mr. Macawer gave Uriah several IOUs which equal over £100, and if he can't pay them, he will be arrested. Miss Betsy and Agnes agree to help him pay those off and to give him money to start his life in Australia. David and Traddles suggest introducing him to Mr. Peggy and having Mr. Peggy Peggety dole out the money to Mr. McCover so that he doesn't spend it all in one place. Then Traddles moves on to Ms. Betsy's husband and explains that Uriah could follow through on his threat to harm him in some way. But Miss Betsy says not to worry about that. They ask the macabre's back in and tell them their plan, which sounds great to them, except that Mr. Macawer is arrested when he tries to go out because of the IOUs. Ms. Betsy pays them and Mr. Macawer is happy again. When David and Ms. Betsy are back home, Ms. Betsy takes David to a hospital and reveals that her husband has just died. They go to his funeral together and when they get back they find a letter from Mr. Macawer saying all is lost. He's been arrested again, but with a postscript saying actually it's fine. Traddles has paid his debts. All right, so no questions. Unfortunately, I always miss your questions. I miss them so much. But I'm going to soldier on and do the very best I can. So here we are basically in the aftermath of Dora's death, right? And here again is another kind of ending. We've had so many now and this has been another. And something new will presumably start David afterwards. But he's in a kind of like a holding pattern now, a place in which his grief hasn't quite hit him yet, which I think is really relatable. It takes a long time for grief like true grief like this to really set in and it can be years before you feel like you've got made your way through it and you're on the other side. And for all we may have felt that Dora wasn't the right wife for David. David loved Dora and couldn't imagine another wife than her. He knew that something was missing in his marriage, that there was some kind of partnership of mind and purpose that they didn't have. But he believed that that was something that wasn't even really possible on earth. And so even though we have thought for a while now that he might have had that with Agnes had he chosen to marry her, David has never had that thought and he still hasn't had it and he may never have it. So for him, his beloved wife, the person that he thought he was going to spend his life with, his beloved wife has died. And he's devastated. It really does climb close the door for him on the life that he thought he was going to be living, the future he imagined for himself. When he looked forward to the years ahead. But at first he doesn't realize it right, he tells us. He gives us this kind of foreshadowing that there will come a great agony of grief in which he thinks his life is over. He says, I came to think that the future was walled up before me, that the energy and action of my life were at an end, that I never could find any refuge. But in the grave, I came to think. So, I say, but not in the first shock of my grief. Okay, so here in the beginning, directly after Dora's death, he actually thinks that he's handling things pretty well, he says, as it was, an interval occurred before I fully knew my own distress, an interval in which I even supposed that its sharpest pangs were past, and when my mind could soothe itself by resting on all that was most innocent and beautiful in the tender story that was closed for forever. So he's in shock, essentially. There's a wave of grief that's like, cresting above him, but it hasn't broken yet, and so he doesn't know it's there. So he's able to go about in these first days, kind of continuing to attend to other things and to think about other people. And that's relatable, too, I think. You know, grief sort of operates on its own timeline. And as he always does in times of trouble and distress, David's mind goes immediately to. To Agnes. Now, my guess is that if I wasn't away for this episode and hadn't had to record it before I got all of your reactions, my guess is that I would have gotten some letters about how David can finally marry Agnes now, and how he's clearly turning to her in his grief and all of this. And I totally get that. It is what we want for David. It's what we've wanted for ages now. But I still think that David still isn't thinking about that at all. I mean, he is turning toward Agnes. He's relying on her. She is still a kind of angel in his life. And it's hard for us not to be, like, screaming into the book that she would make a great second wife or whatever. But that is not where David is with this, which makes sense, actually. His wife just died. It would be pretty cold to turn right around and marry Agnes. And it would imply that he'd been in love with Agnes while he was still married to Dora, and we know that he wasn't. And he doesn't seem to be in love with her now. He's relying on her, but. But not in any sort of a romantic way. And all along we have also had the question of whether Agnes was in love with David, and I think the jury is still out on that. She hasn't really given much indication that she does want to marry David. And in fact, she is now apparently putting forward the idea that he should go abroad for, like, a change of scene so that he can deal with his grief, which would be sort of odd if she was in love with him. And now if she was seeing the opportunity of actually being with him, why would she send him away? And. And actually she seems to be sort of preparing to set herself up as a kind of like spinster school marm sort of person. Right. Because Mr. Wakefield is better now that he's out from under Uriah's thumb, but he's still a kind of broken man and he can't make enough money for them to keep living on, even though it turns out he's not in debt. So that's good. But Agnes is going to have to do something and she says she's going to open a school. And she seems excited about this and not really to be pining for David or anything. She says, I am not afraid. Dear Trotwood, I am certain of success. So many people know me here and think kindly of me that I am certain. Don't mistrust me. Our wants are not many. If I rent the dear old house and keep a school, I shall be useful. Okay, so the question is, is she just putting a brave face on it because she's learned kind of long ago that David doesn't love her, or is she actually just as oblivious to the idea of them getting together as David is? We just don't know. And right now, at least, she seems to be being for David what she always is for David, which is his angel. She's there in the background, quietly doing him good. You know, he says, when it was first proposed that I should go abroad, or how it came to be agreed among us that I was to seek the restoration of my peace and change and travel, I do not even now distinctly know the spirit of Agnes. So pervaded all we thought and said and did in that time of sorrow, that I assume I may refer the project to her influence. But her influence was so quiet that I know no more. Okay? And this image of Agnes as an angel, it shows up here again. Listen to what David says. It's kind of a long quote, but it's important, he says. And now, indeed, I began to think that in My old association of her with the stained glass window in the church, a prophetic foreshadowing of what she would be to me in the calamity that was to happen in the fullness of time, had found a way into my mind in all that sorrow, from the moment never to be forgotten when she stood before me with her upraised hand, she was like a sacred presence in my lonely house. When the angel of death alighted there, my child wife fell asleep. They told me so when I could bear to hear it on her bosom. With a smile from my swoon, I first awoke to a consciousness of her compassionate tears, her words of hope and peace, her gentle face bending down as from a purer region nearer heaven over my undisciplined heart and softening its pain. And, I mean, that's really beautiful writing, isn't it? It's just gorgeous. And it paints Agnes as this almost more than human person who's always there, always watching, always knowing just what to do and what to say. That description, it almost makes it seem like Agnes was the angel that came down from heaven to escort Dora Holmes. She's celestial and pure and almost too good. But remember, this is David's view of her. She is a human being and she does have thoughts and desires and fears. It's only that David sees her this way and has always seen her this way because he loves her intensely. The question remains, though, is it romantic love and does Agnes reciprocate? And I think those are still open questions. But I think another thing that's really beautiful in all of this is that even though David is grieving and he's told us that the full extent of his grief is still to come, he is now at a point in his life where he's surrounded by good, kind, upstanding people who love him. Agnes, Miss Betsy, Traddles, Mr. Dick, Mr. Wakefield, Dr. Strong, Mrs. Strong, the Macawards. All these people are good people who want only good for David. And when we compare them to the people of David's youth, like Mr. Murdstone and Ms. Murdstone and Steerforth and Uriah, when we compare his life now to his life, then he's actually found his way through the uncertainties and the hardships of his youth. And he's emerged on the other side a good man surrounded by good people who has made a success of himself through hard work and dedication. And he's grieving, but he has a beautiful support network around him to buoy him up. And I think it's important Important to take stock of that and for us to take stock of that since we've been following him all this way and we are coming to the end of this journey with him, or at least beginning the end of this journey. So because David's grief hasn't fully hit him yet, he's able to participate in the aftermath of Mr. Macabre's revelations about Uriah. So I want to just touch on a few important things that we learned about in this last chapter. The first is about Mr. Macabre himself. I do want to just mention here, and I mentioned it in the chapter, chapter as well. And I don't usually do any kind of commentary in the chapter, but I did mention it. I'm not going to dwell on it here, but I wanted to just mention the anti Semitism that popped up in this chapter which Dickens has Mr. Macawber voicing. It probably goes without saying, but I'm gonna say it anyway, that I hate anti Semitism in all its forms and I will stand against it and have stood against it at every opportunity. And I would never read a book on here that was an anti Semitic book, meaning a book that promoted anti Semitism as a good thing. But it is the unfortunate fact that anti Semitism has existed since there were Jews and that Dickens himself held some anti Semitic views. He did soften on this later and he reformed his ideas. But if you go digging, you can find some pretty awful things that he said and it's hideous. And I hate that that's true. But it is true. And many works of literature from the past have within them, just as a matter of course, views which we find abhorrent today. And I don't think it makes sense to toss out those books unless, as I say, they are actually promoting abhorrent views. So I just wanted to make clear where I stand on that. But I won't dwell on it because his comment is actually a sort of throwaway line and not relevant to the plot and therefore it's not relevant to our discussion today. But I didn't want to just let it stand without saying very clearly that I oppose it. But anyway, the Macabre's are going to Australia, right? Just like Emily. They need a do over. They can't continue on the way that they've been going. They owe too much. There are too many people who won't do business with them. They are just going to keep taking out loans and spending more than they earn in all of this. And of course also, as we found in this chapter, very humorously, Mr. Macabre keeps being arrested because of all these IOUs that he gave to Uriah. And so even though Miss Betsy and David and everyone will pay those off and will help him as. As a way of paying him back for his help, this can't go on. They need a new start. So they're going to join Emily and Mr. Peggotty and Mrs. Gummage and head to Australia. But of course, the question that I think we all have about this is won't they just keep taking out loans and spending more than they earn in Australia? They're not leaving, like themselves behind, Right. Their problems are the kind of problems that you take with you wherever you go. So it remains to be seen whether this fresh start will actually be a fresh start for them or if they will just continue being themselves, but just kind of very far away. And so far, they seem to be very much still themselves. I mean, it's hilarious the way that they are preparing for this move. Here's what Mr. Macawer says. My eldest daughter attends at five every morning in a neighboring establishment to acquire the process, if process, it may be called, of milking cows. My younger children are instructed to observe as closely as circumstances were will permit the habits of the pigs and poultry maintained in the poorer parts of this city. A pursuit from which they have on two occasions been brought home within an inch of being run over. I have myself directed some attention during the past week to the art of baking. And my son Wilkins has issued forth with a walking stick and driven cattle, when permitted by the rugged hirelings who had them in charge to render any voluntary service in that direction, which I regret to say for the credit of our nature, was not often he being generally warned with imprecations to desist. Okay, so that's really funny, right? And it's not at all practical. And it's sort of a very Macawber way to go about this. They think they're gonna just show up and suddenly be prosperous farmers, right? And Mrs. Macawer, who has always kind of seemed like the more practical of the two of them, she's actually always been pretty delusional herself because she always thinks that Mr. Macawer is going to become like the highest ranking member of whatever profession he chooses, even though he's totally unqualified and does nothing to become qualified. And she shows how delusional she is in this chapter by only kind of just now realizing why her own family haven't been willing to interact with Mr. Macabre. Here's what she Says I cannot help thinking that there are members of my family who have been apprehensive that Mr. Macawber would solicit them for their names. I do not mean to be conferred in baptism upon our children, but to be inscribed on bills of exceptions, exchange and negotiated in the money market. And I mean like duh, Right. Okay. So again, the Macabre's are taking on this new situation in a very macabre like way. But, and this is really important, I think Mr. Macabre has saved the day. He has vanquished Uriah Heap when he could have turned everything to his own advantage and used what he had on Uriah to blackmail Uriah for money. So again, Mr. Macawber is a good man, he's a moral man. He just can't seem to keep any money in his pocket. I think Traddles sums him up really well when he says, here's a quote. Although he would appear not to have worked to any good account for himself, he is a most untiring man when he works for other people. Right. So will the Macabre's be successful in Australia? We don't know. But I think for their service to David And Agnes and Ms. Betsy and Mr. Wickfield, I think we have to wish them well and hope that they will be successful there. Which brings me to Miss Betsy. I've said this so many times, but you guys, I just love Miss Betsy. She keeps revealing new things about herself and every new thing she reveals makes me love her even more. I mean, the fact that she blamed her financial troubles on herself to save Mr. Wickfield was amazing. But now it turns out that she actually had some money laid by but wanted David to have to learn how to make his own way in the world. And so David is who he is because of Miss Betsy. That was true before we learned about this money thing, but it's even more true now. David grew into the good, upstanding, hard working man he is now because of Miss Betsy. So the fact that Traddles was able to reclaim all her money and she's rich again, it's a wonderful reward I think. Because the other thing that we learn about Miss Betsy in this chapter is that when Mr. Wakefield thought that he had cheated her and was going to turn himself in, or he was apologizing or whatever, she refused to let him do it and swore to keep the secret for Mr. Whitfield's sake, but really also for Agnes's sake. But she doesn't want any credit. She did it because it was right and she didn't want anyone to know. She says, I paid him a visit early one morning, called for a candle, burnt the letter and told him if he ever could write me and himself to do it, and if he couldn't, to keep his own counsel for his daughter's sake. If anybody speaks to me, I'll leave the house. I mean, gosh, I just love her. And the last thing that we learn about Miss Betsy in this chapter is that her husband is now dead and she paid for a proper burial for him. And she grieves for him, even though he was nothing but, like, truly awful to her, which, again, it speaks to her kindness and her sentimentality, even though she says she has none. But the upshot of the husband's death is that he won't bother her anymore, which I think is a very, very good thing. And again, she deserves every good thing that can come to her. The other person that I think it makes sense to just highlight for a second is Traddles. I mean, obviously, David is our main character. It's his life that we've been tracking. But we have known Traddles since boyhood, too, and he always seemed like a nice person, but not necessarily a very impressive person. But the more we've gotten to know him, the more impressive he's become. He's been a steadfast and loyal friend to David. He works tirelessly to make enough money so that he can marry Sophie. He's kind to Mr. Dick, and now he has actually proven himself to be a bit of a hero. It's Traddles who has taken over and sorted out the various financial entanglements that Uriah got Mr. Wakefield into. He's taken Uriah to task. It was Mr. Macawer that did the initial work and grappled with his motives and chose morality over money. But it's Traddles who actually used the evidence that Mr. Macawer provided and took Uriah down. So I think Traddles deserves a lot of credit here, and I, for one, would like to give him, like, a standing ovation or whatever the podcast equivalent of that is. So consider that done. Because Uriah, it seems, is well and truly vanquished. Or at least he has kind of slunk off into the night with his mother and good riddance to bad rubbish. Traddles sums him up very nicely, I think he says he is such an incarnate hypocrite that whatever object he pursues, he must pursue crookedly. It's his only compensation for the outward restraints he puts upon himself, always creeping along the ground to some small end or other. He will always magnify every object in the way and consequently will hate and suspect everybody that comes in the most innocent manner between him and it. So wherever Uriah is going now, and whatever he's gonna do, it won't be any good, that's for sure. But it also seems pretty clear that he won't be bothering us again. That Mr. Wickfield and Agnes are finally free of him, that Mr. Micawber is free of him, and that he can't hurt them anymore, which is a wonderful, wonderful thing. And it's always great to see a villain like Uriah go down. But where does that leave us? Right here we are. David is grieving, but he doesn't know the full extent of it yet. So that seems like something that's coming. The macabre's are going to Australia with Emily and everyone. Things really are kind of starting to wrap up here. And really what's happening, it seems to me, is that all of the plot threads are getting kind of wrapped up and falling away and leaving behind only David. Only David's life is left to figure out what to do with now that he is alone in it in a sense. I mean, he has his friends and his family, but he has no partner to share his life with. And what will he do now? Well, there is only one way to find out and that of course is to keep reading. So let's do that. But please don't forget to keep writing to me. I know I'm away. I will be away for the next two episodes as well. But do write in. And you know, if there are things that people have brought up a lot that I didn't mention, I will definitely come back around to those things. And so please do send me your thoughts and ideas about this chapter and all the chapters to come. And I will be back with you in pre recorded form for the next two episodes and then again with you in real time. And I cannot wait to be there and to finish this book with you all. All right, let's get started with chapter 55 of David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. It's story time. Chapter 55, Tempest. I now approach an event in my life so indelible, so awful, so bound by an infinite variety of ties to all that has preceded it in these pages, that from the beginning of my narrative I have seen it growing larger and larger as I advanced like a great tower in a plane and throwing its forecast shadow even on the incidents of my Childish days. For years after it occurred, I dreamed of it often. I have started up so vividly impressed by it. That its fury has yet seemed raging in my quiet room in the still night. I dream of it sometimes, though at lengthened and uncertain intervals. To this hour I have an association between it and a stormy wind. Or the lightest mention of a seashore as strong as any of which my mind is conscious. As plainly as I behold what happened, I will try to write it down. I do not recall it, but see it done. For it happens again before me. Okay. Meaning that this thing that happened is so vivid in his memory. That it's not so much a memory he's recalling. As something he's witnessing again as he tells it to us. The time drawing on rapidly for the sailing of the immigrant ship. My good old nurse, almost broken hearted for me when we first met, came up to London. I was constantly with her and her brother and the micawbers, they being very much together. But Emily I never saw. One evening, when the time was close at hand I was alone with Peggotty and her brother. Our conversation turned on Ham. She described to us how tenderly he had taken leave of her. And how manfully and quietly he had borne himself. Most of all of late, when she believed he was most tired. It was a subject of which the affectionate creature never tired. And our interest in hearing the many examples which she who was so much with him had to relate. Was equal to hers in relating them. My aunt and I were at the time vacating the two cottages at Highgate. I intending to go abroad and she to return to her house at Dover. We had a temporary lodging in Covent Garden. As I walked home to it after this evening's conversation. Reflecting on what had passed between Ham and myself when I was last at Yarmouth. I wavered in the original purpose I had formed of leaving a letter for Emily when I should take leave of her uncle on board the ship. And thought it would be better to write to her now. She might desire, I thought, after receiving my communication to send some parting word by me to her unhappy lover. I ought to give her the opportunity. I therefore sat down in my room before going to bed and wrote to her. I told her that I had seen him and that he had requested me to tell her what I have already written in its place in these sheets. I faithfully repeated it. Remember, he told David to tell Emily that not only does he forgive her but he wants her not to worry about him and not to think about him being in any kind of Trouble or distress I had no need to enlarge upon it if I had had the right. Its deep fidelity and goodness were not to be adorned by me or any man. I left it out to be sent round in the morning with a line to Mr. Peggotty requesting him to give it to her and went to bed at daybreak. Awake I was weaker than I knew then and not falling asleep until the sun was up, lay late and unrefreshed. Next day I was roused by the silent presence of my aunt at my bedside. I felt it in my sleep as I suppose we all do feel such things. Trot, my dear, she said when I opened my eyes. I couldn't make up my mind to disturb you. Mr. Peggotty is here. Shall he come up? I replied yes. And he soon appeared. Master Davie, he said when we had shaken hands. I give Em' ly your letter, sir. And she writ this here and begged me fur to ask you to read it and if you see no hurt in it to be so kind as to take charge on it. Have you read it? Said I. He nodded sorrowfully. I opened it and read as I have got your message. Okay, so she's writing to Ham here. Oh, what can I write to thank you for your good and blessed kindness to me? I have put the words close to my heart. I shall keep them till I die. They are sharp thorns but they are such comfort. I have prayed over them. Oh, I have prayed so much. When I find what you are and what uncle is, I think what God must be and can cry to him. Goodbye forever now, my dear, my friend. Goodbye forever in this world. In another world, if I am forgiven I may wake a child and come to you all. Thanks and blessings. Farewell evermore. This blotted with tears was the letter. May I tell her as you don't see no hurt in it and as you'll be so kind as to take charge on it. Master Davie, said Mr. Peggotty when I had read it. Unquestionably, said I, but I am thinking. Yes, Master Davie, I am thinking, said I, that I'll go down again to Yarmouth. There's time and to spare for me to go and come back before the ship sails. My mind is constantly running on him in his solitude. To put this letter of her writing in his hand at this time and to enable you to tell her in the moment of parting that he has got it will be a kindness to both of them. I solemnly accept his commission, dear good fellow, and cannot discharge it too completely. The journey is nothing to me. I am restless and shall be better in motion. I'll go down tonight. Though he anxiously endeavored to dissuade me, I saw that he was of my mind. And this, if I had required to be confirmed in my intention, would have had the effect. He went round to the coach office at my request and took the box seat for me on the mail. In the evening I started by that conveyance down the road I had traversed under so many vicissitudes. Don't you think that. I asked the coachman in the first stage out of London. A very remarkable sky. I don't remember to have seen one like it. Nor I not equal to it, he replied. That's wind, sir. There'll be mischief done at sea, I expect. Before long. It was a murky confusion here and there blotted with a color like the color of the smoke from damp fuel of flying clouds tossed up into most remarkable heaps, suggesting greater heights in the clouds than there were depths, depths below them to the bottom of the deepest hollows in the earth through which the wild moon seemed to plunge headlong as if in a dread disturbance of the laws of nature. She had lost her way and were frightened. There had been a wind all day, and it was rising then with an extraordinary great sound. In another hour it had much increased and the sky was more overcast and blue, hard. But as the night advanced, the clouds closing in and densely overspreading the whole sky. Then very dark, it came on to blow harder and harder. It still increased until our horses could scarcely face the wind. Many times in the dark part of the night. It was then, late in September, when the nights were not short. The leaders, meaning the lead horses, turned about or came to a dead stop. And we were often in serious apprehension that the coach would be blown over. Sweeping gusts of rain came up before this storm like showers of steel. And at those times when there was any shelter of trees or lee walls to be got, we were fain to stop, meaning we had to stop in a sheer impossibility of continuing the struggle. When the day broke, it blew harder and harder. I had been in Yarmouth when the seamen said it blew great guns, but I had never known the like of this or anything approaching to it. We came to Ipswich very late, having had to fight every inch of ground since we were 10 miles out of London and found a cluster of people in the market place who had risen from their beds in the night fearful of falling chimneys. Some of these congregating about the inn yard while we changed horses, told us of great sheets of lead having been ripped off a high church tower and flung into a by street which they then blocked up. Others had to tell of country people coming in from neighboring villages who had seen great trees lying torn out of the earth and whole ricks scattered about the roads and fields. Still there was no abatement in the storm, but it blew harder as we struggled on, nearer and nearer to the sea from which this mighty wind was blowing. Dead on shore, its force became more and more terrific. Long before we saw the sea, its spray was on our lips and showered salt rain upon us. The water was out over miles and miles of the flat country adjacent to Yarmouth, and every sheet and puddle lashed its banks and had its stress of little breakers setting heavily towards us. When we came within sight of the sea, the waves on the horizon, caught at intervals above the rolling abyss, were like glimpses of another shore with towers and buildings. When at last we got into the town, the people came out to their doors all aslant and with streaming hair, making a wonder of the mail that had had come through such a night. I put up at the old inn and went down to look at the sea, staggering along the street, which was strewn with sand and seaweed and with flying blotches of sea foam, afraid of falling slates and tiles and holding by people I met at angry corners. Coming near the beach, I saw not only the boatmen but half the people of the town lurking behind buildings, some now and then braving the fury of the storm to look away to see sea and blown sheer out of their course in trying to get zigzag back. Joining these groups, I found bewailing women whose husbands were away in herring or oyster boats, which there was too much reason to think might have foundered before they could run in anywhere for safety. Grizzled old sailors were among the people, shaking their heads as they looked from water to sky and muttering to one another. Ship owners excited and uneasy, children huddling together and peering into older faces. Even stout mariners, disturbed and anxious, leveling their glasses at the sea from behind places of shelter, as if they were surveying an enemy. The tremendous sea itself. When I could find sufficient pause to look at it in the agitation of the blinding wind, the flying stones and sand and the awful noise confounded me. As the high watery walls came rolling in and at their highest tumbled into surf, they looked as if the least would engulf the town. As the receding waves swept back with a hoarse roar, it seemed to scoop out deep caves in the beach, as if its purpose were to undermine the earth. When some white headed billows thundered on and dashed themselves to pieces before they reached the land, every fragment of the late whole seemed possessed by the full might of its its wrath rushing to be gathered to the composition of another monster. Undulating hills were changed to valleys. Undulating valleys, with the solitary storm burrs sometimes skimming through them, were lifted up to hills. Masses of water shivered and shook the beach with a booming sound. Every shape tumultuously rolled on as soon as made to change its shape and place and beat another shape and place away. The ideal shore on the horizon, with its towers and buildings rose and fell. The clouds fell fast and thick. I seemed to see a rending and upheaving of all nature. Not finding Ham among the people whom this memorable wind, for it is still remembered down there as the greatest ever known to blow upon that coast had brought together, I made my way to his house. It was shut, and as no one answered to my knocking, I went by back ways and by lanes to the yard where he worked. I learned there that he had gone to Lowestoft to meet some sudden exigency of ship repairing in which his skill was required, but that he would be back to morrow morning in good time I went back to the inn, and when I had washed and dressed and tried to sleep, but in vain. It was five o' clock in the afternoon. I had not sat five minutes by the coffee room fire when the waiter, coming to stirrett as an excuse for talking, told me that two colliers had gone down with all hands a few miles away, and that some other ships had been seen labouring hard in the roads and trying in great distress to keep off shore. Mercy on them and on all poor sailors, said he, if we had another night like the last. Meaning they're now getting word of the storm, sinking ships and other ships that are in danger of crashing into the shore. I was very much depressed in spirits very solitary, and felt an uneasiness in Ham's not being there, disproportionate to the occasion. I was seriously affected, without knowing how much by late events. Meaning he's feeling his grief for Dora more strongly than he realizes. And my long exposure to the fierce wind had confused me. There was that jumble in my thoughts and recollections that I had lost the clear arrangement of time and distance. Thus, if I had gone out into the town, I should not have been surprised, I think, to encounter some one who I knew must be then in London, so to speak. There was in these respects a curious inattention in my mind. Yet it was busy, too, with all the remembrances. The place naturally awakened, and they were particularly distinct and vivid in this state. The waiter's dismal intelligence about the ships immediately connected itself itself, without any effort of my volition, with my uneasiness about Ham, I was persuaded that I had an apprehension of his returning from Lowestoft by sea and being lost. This grew so strong with me that I resolved to go back to the yard before I took my dinner and ask the boat builder if he thought his attempting to return by sea at all likely. If he gave me the least reason to think so, I would go over to Lowestoft and prevent it by bringing him with me. Me. I hastily ordered my dinner and went back to the yard. I was none too soon, for the boat builder, with a lantern in his hand was locking the yard gate. He quite laughed when I asked him the question and said there was no fear. No man in his senses or out of them would put off in such a gale of wind, least of all Ham Peggotty, who had been born to seafaring. So sensible of this beforehand that I had really felt ashamed of doing what I was nevertheless in impelled to do. I went back to the inn. If such a wind could rise, I think it was rising. The howl and roar, the rattling of the doors and windows, the rumbling in the chimneys, the apparent rocking of the very house that sheltered me, and the prodigious tumult of the sea were more fearful than in the morning. But there was now a great darkness besides, and that invested the storm with new terrors, real and fanciful. I could not eat. I could not sit still. I could not continue steadfast to anything. Something within me, faintly answering to the storm without, tossed up the depths of my memory and made a tumult in them. Yet in all the hurry of my thoughts wild running with the thundering sea, the storm and my uneasiness regarding Ham were always in the foreground. My dinner went away almost untasted, and I tried to refresh myself with a glass or two of wine. In vain. I fell into a dull slumber before the fire without losing my consciousness, either of the uproar out of doors or of the place in which I was both became overshadowed by a new and indefinable horror. And when I awoke, or rather when I shook off the lethargy that bound me in my chair, my whole frame thrilled with objectless and unintelligible fear, I walked to and fro, tried to read an old gazetteer listened to the awful noises, looked at faces, scenes, and figures in the fire. At length the steady ticking of the undisturbed clock on the wall tormented me to that degree that I resolved to go to bed. It was reassuring on such a night to be told that some of the inn servants had agreed together to sit up until morning. I went to bed exceedingly weary and heavy, but on my lying down all such sensations vanished as if by magic, and I was broad awake with every sense refined. For hours I lay there listening to the wind and water, imagining now that I heard shrieks out at sea, now that I distinctly heard the firing of signal guns and now the fall of houses in the town. I got up several times and looked out, but could see nothing except the reflection in the window panes of the faint candle I had left burning and of my own haggard face looking in at me from the black void. At length my restlessness attained to such a pitch that I hurried on my clothes and went downstairs. In the large kitchen, where I dimly saw bacon and ropes of onions hanging from the beams, the watchers were clustered together in various attitudes about a table purposely moved away from the great chimney and brought near the door. A pretty girl who had her ears stopped with her apron and her eyes upon the door screamed when I appeared, supposing me to be a spirit. But the others had more presence of mind and were glad of an addition to their company. One man, referring to the topic they had been discussing, asked me whether I thought the souls of the collier crews who had gone down were out in the storm. I remained there, I dare say, two hours. Once I opened the yard gate and looked into the empty street. The sand, the seaweed and the flakes of foam were driving by, and I was obliged to call for assistance before I could shut the gate again and make it fast against the wind. There was a dark gloom in my solitary chamber when I at length returned to it. But I was tired now, and getting into bed again, fell off a tower and down a precipice into the depths of sleep. I have an impression that for a long time, though I dreamed of being elsewhere and in a variety of scenes, it was always blowing in my dream. At length I lost that feeble hold upon reality and was engaged with two dear friends, but who they were I don't know. At the siege of some town in a roar of cannonadings. The thunder of the cannon was so loud and incessant that I could not hear something I much desired to hear until I made A great exertion and awoke. It was broad day, 8 or 9 o', clock, the storm raging in lieu of the batteries, and someone knocking and calling at my door. What is the matter? I cried. A wreck close by. I sprung out of bed and asked, what wreck? A schooner from Spain or Portugal, laden with fruit and wine. Make haste, sir, if you want to see her. It's thought down on the beach she'll go to paces every moment. The excited voice went clamoring along the staircase, and I wrapped myself in my clothes as quickly as I could and ran into the street. Numbers of people were there before me, all running in one direction to the beach. I ran the same way, outstripping a good many, and soon came facing the wild sea. Sea. The wind might by this time have lulled a little, though not more sensibly, than if the cannonading I had dreamed of had been diminished by the silencing of half a dozen guns out of hundreds. But the sea, having upon it the additional agitation of the whole night, was infinitely more terrific than when I had seen it last. Every appearance it had then presented bore the expression of being swelled, and the height to which the breakers rose, and looking over one another, bore one another down and rolled in in interminable hosts, was most appalling. In the difficulty of hearing anything but wind and waves. And in the crowd and the unspeakable confusion and my first breathless efforts to stand against the weather, I was so confused that I looked out to sea for the wreck and saw nothing but the foaming heads of the great waves. A half dressed boatman standing next me pointed with his bare arm a tattooed arrow on it, pointing in the same direction to the left. Then, oh, great heaven. I saw it close in upon us. One mast was broken short off six or eight feet from the deck, and lay over the side, entangled in a maze of sail and rigging and all that ruin. As the ship rolled and beat, which she did without a moment's pause, and with a violence quite inconceivable, beat the side as if it would stave it in. Some efforts were even then being made to cut this portion of the wreck away. For as the ship, which was broadside on, turned towards us in her rolling, I plainly decried her people at work with axes, especially one active figure with long curling hair, conspicuous among the rest. But a great cry, which was audible even above the wind and water rose from the shore at this moment the sea, sweeping over the rolling wreck, made a clean breach and carried men, spars, casks, planks, Bulwarks, heaps of such toys into the boiling surge. Okay, so the ship has been wrecked, but it's still a ways away from the shore, and its mast and rigging is pulling it down and damaging things further. And the men on the ship are trying to. To cut that away. But the sea is surging up and carrying the men off into the water. The second mast was yet standing. With the rags of a rent sail and a wild confusion of broken cordage flapping to and fro. The ship had struck once, the same boatman hoarsely said in my ear, and then lifted in and struck again. I understood him to add that she was parting amidships, and I could readily suppose so, for the rolling and beating were too tremendous for any human work to suffer long. As he spoke, there was another great cry of pity. From the beach. Four men arose with the wreck out of the deep, clinging to the rigging of the remaining mast, uppermost the active figure with the curling hair. There was a bell on board. And as the ship rolled and dashed like a desperate creature driven mad, now showing us the whole sweep of her deck as she turned on her beam ends towards the shore, now nothing but her keel as she sprung wildly over and turned towards the sea, the bell rang, and its sound, the knell of those unhappy men, was borne towards us on the wind. Again we lost her, and again she rose. Two men were gone. The agony on the shore increased. Men groaned and clasped their hands. Women shrieked and turned away their faces. Some ran wildly up and down along the beach and crying for help where no help could be. I found myself one of these, frantically imploring a knot of sailors whom I knew not to let those two lost creatures perish before our eyes. They were making out to me in an agitated way. I don't know how, for the little I could hear, I was scarcely composed enough to understand that the lifeboat had been bravely manned an hour ago and could do nothing, and that as no man would be so desperate as to attempt to wade off with a rope and escape, establish a communication with the shore. There was nothing left to try when I noticed that some new sensation moved the people on the beach and saw them part and ham come breaking through them to the front. I ran to him as well as I know to repeat my appeal for help. But, distracted though I was by a sight so new to me and terrible, the determination in his face and his look out to sea, exactly the same look as I remembered in connection with the morning after Emily's flight awoke me to a Knowledge of his danger. Meaning it looks like Ham is going to try to help these people. Without thinking of his own safety. I held him back with both arms and implored the men with whom I had been speaking not to listen to him, not to do murder, not to let him stir from off that sand. Another cry arose on shore, and looking to the wreck, we saw the cruel sail, with blow on blow, beat off the lower of the two men and fly up in triumph round the active figure. Left alone upon the mast. Against such a sight and against such determination as that of the calmly desperate man who was already accustomed to lead half the people present, I might as hopefully have entreated the wind. Master Davie, he said cheerily, grasping me by both hands, if my time is come. Tis come. If it ain't, I'll bide it. Lord above, bless you and bless all, Mates, make me ready. I'm a going off. I was swept away, but not unkindly, to some distance where the people around me made me stay, urging as I confusedly perceived that he was bent on going with help or without, and that I should endanger the precautions for his safety by troubling those with whom they rested. I don't know what I answered or what they rejoined, but I saw hurry on the beach and men running with ropes from a capstan that was there, and penetrating into a circle of figures that hid him from me. Then I saw him standing alone in a seaman's frock and trousers, a rope in his hand or slung to his wrist, another around his body, and several of the best men holding at a little distance to the ladder which he laid out himself slack upon the shore at his feet. The wreck, even to my unpractised eye, was breaking up. I saw that she was parting in the middle, and that the life of the solitary man upon the mast hung by a thread. Still he clung to it. He had a singular red cap on, not like a sailor's cap, but of a fine colour, and as the few yielding planks between him and destruction rolled and bulged, and his anticipative death knell rung, he was seen by all of us to wave it. I saw him do it now, and thought I was going distracted, when his action brought an old remembrance to my mind of a once dear friend. Ham watched the sea standing alone, with the silence of suspended breath behind him and the storm before, until there was a great retiring wave, when, with a backward glance at those who held the rope which was made fast round his body, he dashed in after it, and In a moment was buffeting with the water, rising with the hills, falling with the valleys, lost beneath the foam. Then drawn again to land, they hauled in hastily. He was hurt. I saw blood on his face from where I stood. But he took no thought of that, that he seemed hurriedly to give them some directions for leaving him more free, or so I judged from the motion of his arm, and was gone as before. And now he made for the wreck, rising with the hills, falling with the valleys, lost beneath the rugged foam, borne in towards the shore, borne on towards the ship, striving hard and valiantly. The distance was nothing, but the power of the sea and wind made the strife deadly. At length he neared the wreck. He was so near that with one more of his vigorous strokes he would be clinging to it. When a high green, vast hillside of water moving on shoreward from beyond the ship, he seemed to leap up into it with a mighty bound. And the ship was gone. Some eddying fragments I saw in the sea, as if a mere cask had been broken in. Running to the spot where they were hauling in, consternation was in every face. They drew him to my very feet. Insensible dead, he was carried to the nearest house and no one preventing me now. I remained near him, busy while every means of restoration were tried. But he had been beaten to death by the great wave and his generous heart was stilled forever. Okay, so Ham has been killed by the force of the sea, trying to save the man who was clinging to the shipwreck as I sat beside the bed when hope was abandoned and all was done. A fisherman who had known me when Emily and I were children, and ever since whispered my name at the door. Sir, he said, with tears starting to his weather beaten face, which with his trembling lips was ashy pale, Will you come over yonder? The old remembrance that had been recalled to me was in his look. I asked him, terror stricken, leaning on the arm he held out to support me. Has a body come ashore? He said yes. Do I know it? I asked. Then he answered nothing. But he led me to the shore. And on that part of it where she and I had looked for shells, two children. On that part of it where some lighter fragments of the old boat blown down last night had been scattered by the wind among the ruins of the home he had wronged, I saw him lying with his head upon his arm, as I had often seen him lie at school. Thank you so much for listening. I'd love to know what you thought of the chapters. Is there anything you'd like me to clarify, did something particularly interest you? Please go to my website, faithkmoore.com click on contact and send me your questions and thoughts. Or you can click on the link in the Show Notes to contact me. I'll feature one or two of your entries at the start of the next episode. Speaking of links, don't forget to take a look at the other links in the Show Notes. You can learn more about me, check out our merch store, or become a member of the Storytime for Grown Ups online community. Before I go, I'd like to ask a quick favor. This is an independent podcast. It's produced, recorded and marketed by me, so I need your help. Spread the word about the show by posting about it on social media or texting a link to your friends. Subscribe, tap those five stars and leave a positive review wherever you're listening. If you are able to support the show financially, there's a link in the Show Notes to make a donation. I would really, really appreciate it. Alright everyone, storytime is over. To be continued. Sam.