on the other. It was a noble dish of fish that
the housekeeper had put on table, and we had
a joint of equally choice mutton afterwards, and
then an equally choice bird. Sauces, wines,
all the accessories we wanted, and all of the
best, were given out by our host from his
dumb-waiter; and when they had made the
circuit of the table, he always put them back
again. Similarly, he dealt us clean plates and
knives and forks, for each course, and dropped
those just disused into two baskets on the
ground by his chair. No other attendant than
the housekeeper appeared. She set on every
dish; and I always saw in her face, a face rising
out of the caldron. Years afterwards, I made
a dreadful likeness of that woman, by causing
a face that had no other natural resemblance
to it than it derived from flowing hair, to pass
behind a bowl of flaming spirits in a dark
room.

Induced to take particular notice of the housekeeper,
both by her own striking appearance
and by Wemmick's preparation, I observed that
whenever she was in the room, she kept her
eyes attentively on my guardian, and that she
would remove her hands from any dish she put
before him, hesitatingly, as if she dreaded his
calling her back, and wanted him to speak when
she was nigh, if he had anything to say. I
fancied that I could detect in his manner a
consciousness of this, and a purpose of always
holding her in suspense.

Dinner went off gaily, and, although my
guardian seemed to follow rather than originate
subjects, I knew that he wrenched the weakest
part of our dispositions out of us. For
myself, I found that I was expressing my
tendency to lavish expenditure, and to patronise
Herbert, and to boast of my great prospects,
before I quite knew that I had opened my lips.
It was so with all of us, but with no one more
than Drummle: the development of whose
inclination to gird in a grudging and suspicious
way at the rest, was screwed out of him before
the fish, was taken off.

It was not then, but when we had got to the
cheese, that our conversation turned upon our
rowing feats, and that Drummle was rallied for
coming up behind of a night in that slow amphibious
way of his. Drummle upon this, informed
our host that he much preferred our room to
our company, and that as to skill he was more
than our master, and that as to strength he
could scatter us like chaff. By some invisible
agency, my guardian wound him up to a pitch
little short of ferocity about this trifle; and he
fell to baring and spanning his arm to show how
muscular it was, and we all fell to baring and
spanning our arms in a ridiculous manner.

Now, the housekeeper was at that time clearing
the table; my guardian, taking no heed of
her, but with the side of his face turned from
her, was leaning back in his chair biting the side
of his forefinger and showing an interest in
Drummle, that, to me, was quite inexplicable.
Suddenly, he clapped his large hand on the
housekeeper's, like a trap, as she stretched it across
the table. So suddenly and smartly did he do this,
that we all stopped in our foolish contention.

"If you talk of strength," said Mr. Jaggers,
"I'll show you a wrist. Molly, let them see
your wrist."

Her entrapped hand was on the table, but she
had already put. her other hand behind her waist.

"Master" she said, in a low voice, with her
eyes attentively and entreatingly fixed upon him.
"Don't!"

" I'll show you a wrist," repeated Mr.
Jaggers, with an immovable determination to
show it. " Molly, let them see your wrist."

"Master," she again murmured. " Please!"

"Molly," said Mr. Jaggers, not looking at
her, but obstinately looking at the opposite
side of the room; " let them see both your
wrists. Show them. Come!"

He took his hand from hers, and turned
that wrist up on the table. She brought her
other hand from behind her, and held the two
out side by side. The last wrist was much
disfigured—deeply scarred and scarred across
and across. When she held her hands out, she
took her eyes from Mr. Jaggers, and turned
them watchfully on every one of the rest of us
in succession.

"There's power here," said Mr. Jaggers,
coolly tracing out the sinews with his
forefinger. "Very few men have the power of
wrist that this woman has. It's remarkable
what mere force of grip there is in these
hands. I have had occasion to notice many
hands; but I never saw stronger in that
respect, man's or woman's, than these."

While he said these words in a leisurely critical
style, she continued to look at every one of us in
regular succession as we sat. The moment he
ceased, she looked at him again. " That'll do,
Molly," said Mr. Jaggers, giving her a slight
nod; " you have been admired, and can go."
She withdrew her hands and went out of the
room, and Mr. Jaggers, putting the decanters
on from his dumb-waiter, filled his glass and
passed round the wine.

"At half-past nine, gentlemen," said he, " we
must break up. Pray make the best use of your
time. I am glad to see you all. Mr. Drummle,
I drink to you."

If his object in singling out Drummle were to
bring him out still more, it perfectly succeeded.
In a sulky triumph, Drummle showed his morose
depreciation of the rest of us, in a more and more
offensive degree until he became downright
intolerable. Through all his stages, Mr. Jaggers
followed him with the same strange interest.
He actually seemed to serve as a zest to Mr.
Jaggers's wine.

ln our boyish want of discretion I dare say
we took too much to drink, and I know we
talked too much. We became particularly hot
upon some boorish sneer of Drummle's, to
the effect that we were too free with our money.
It led to my remarking, with more zeal than
discretion, that it came with a bad grace from
him, to whom Startop had lent money in my
presence, but a week or so before.