"Great Expectations"
by Charles Dickens

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     "You had better be apprenticed at once. Would Gargery come here with you, and bring your indentures, do you think?"

     I signified that I had no doubt he would take it as an honor to be asked.

     "Then let him come."

     "At any particular time, Miss Havisham?"

     "There, there! I know nothing about times. Let him come soon, and come along with you."

 

     When I got home at night, and delivered this message for Joe, my sister "went on the Rampage," in a more alarming degree than at any previous period. She asked me and Joe whether we supposed she was door-mats under our feet, and how we dared to use her so, and what company we graciously thought she was fit for? When she had exhausted a torrent of such inquiries, she threw a candlestick at Joe, burst into a loud sobbing, got out the dustpan,--which was always a very bad sign,--put on her coarse apron, and began cleaning up to a terrible extent. Not satisfied with a dry cleaning, she took to a pail and scrubbing-brush, and cleaned us out of house and home, so that we stood shivering in the back-yard. It was ten o'clock at night before we ventured to creep in again, and then she asked Joe why he hadn't married a Negress Slave at once? Joe offered no answer, poor fellow, but stood feeling his whisker and looking dejectedly at me, as if he thought it really might have been a better speculation.

 
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