Chapter-3
The post-dinner supper was being served at Manor Farm when the host Mr. Wardle noticeed Miss Racheal’s—the spinster aunt’s—absence and Mr. Pickwick noticed Mr. Jingle’s absence. Not one to be inconvenienced in regard to his supper, Mr. Wardle urged the Pickwickians to sit down and join him and his family for supper while ordering fat boy Joe to go out end find Miss Rachael and Mr. Jingle.
Mr. Wardle, his family, and the Pickwickians were about to start on their supper when they’re interrupted by a noise from the kitchen. Presently, fat boy Joe entered the dining room to inform Mr. Wardle of unbelievable news. Despite fat boy Joe’s best efforts to detain them, Miss Rachael had run off with Mr. Jingle in a post-chaise. At this news, Mr. Tupman, who had unwittingly lent Mr. Jingle ten pounds, lamented his loss of the ten pounds and cursed Mr. Jingle, compelling Mr. Pickwick to think Mr. Tupman had gone mad. As for Mr. Wardle, he was so angry that he suspected fat boy Joe of having colluded with Mr. Jingle and tried to beat him only to be restrained by Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Winkle.
By and by, at the behest of the ladies of Manor Farm who were afraid that if allowed to go alone Mr. Wardle would kill someone, Mr. Pickwick joined Mr. Wardle who had ordered a gig to be made ready so that he might give chase to the fugitives. In no time, Mr. Wardle and Mr. Pickwick arrived at the Blue Lion in Muggleton. There Mr. Wardle ordered a post-chaise to be got ready.
It was just past midnight when Mr. Wardle and Mr. Pickwick were on the road in the post-chaise which was being operated by three Blue Lion post-boys. The moon was full and Mr. Pickwick thought this was a good sign, but Mr. Wardle argued that the light of the moon would be to the advantage of the fugitives. Luckily for the pursuers, however, Mr. Wardle informed Mr. Pickwick that the moon would be obscured by the clouds sooner rather than later.
Presently, they arrived at a roadside house where they inquired its resident, an old man, whether he noticed a post-chaise pass by earlier in the night. Alas, what information the old man had to offer proved to be useless. They pressed on, and they arrived at the end of the first stage of their journey. There they acquired fresh horses and a new coach.
They were on the road again as the moon became obscured as Mr. Wardle had predicted. The wind picked up and it began to rain when they came across fellow travellers who had good news. It wasn’t too long ago when the fellow travellers passed a post-chaise that conveyed passengers the descriptions of which left no doubt as to their identities. They were indeed Mr. Jingle and Miss Rachael.
Spurred on to maximum speed, Mr. Wardle and Mr. Pickwick’s post-chaise accelerated despite the wind, the rain, and the mud. By and by, they espied a post-chaise ahead of them. It was undoubtedly the post-chaise conveying Mr. Jingle and Miss Rachael what with Mr. Jingle’s visibility as he hung out of the window urging his drivers to go faster. Suddenly, disaster beset Mr. Wardle’s and Mr. Pickwick’s post-chaise as one of its wheels was knocked loose by a bump in the road, causing their post chaise to flip over and crash.
Cheeky to the last, Mr. Jingle, who had been mocking Mr. Wardle’s threats the whole way, stopped to make sure that no one was hurt before moving on to London. No one was hurt. Sending a couple of the post-boys ahead to London on their horses to fetch another post chaise, Mr. Wardle and Mr. Pickwick decided to make their way to London on foot.
In an out of the way inn, in London, called the White Hart, Mr. Samuel Weller was cleaning a pair of boots numbered eleven when a chambermaid asked him to put those boots down to see to the cleaning of boots which were numbered twenty-two. However, arguing that the boots numbered eleven had priority, Sam continued cleaning the boots numbered eleven when the landlady ordered Sam to clean the boots and shoes numbered seventeen.
Realizing that the boots and shoes numbered seventeen belonged to a well-paying gentleman and lady, Sam saw to the cleaning of the boots and shoes numbered seventeen and delivered them instantly to their owners who happened to be Mr. Jingle and Miss Rachael Wardle. When Mr. Jingle asked about the location of Doctors’ Commons, not only did Sam provide its location but also he related an anecdote which informed Mr. Jingle that a marriage licence could be easily obtained therefrom. Subsequently, assuring the spinster-aunt that he would be back shortly with their marriage licence, Mr. Jingle left for the Doctors’ Commons.
Sam was cleaning some implements belonging to a farmer when he was interrupted by a thin, little man who was accompanied by two plump gentlemen. The little man wanted to know the identities of the lodgers who were currently staying at the White Hart. When one of the plump gentlemen promised to compensate handsomely for the information, Sam obliged and described the inn’s current lodgers in the only way he knew how, by the peculiarities of their respective clothing. Thus when he described one lodger, who was with a lady, by a pair of muddy Wellingtons, the two plump gentlemen, who were no other than Mr. Wardle and Mr. Pickwick, conferred with the thin man, who happened to be Mr. Wardle’s attorney, that the man owning the Wellingtons was the man that they sought.
Presently, Sam led Mr. Wardle, Mr. Pickwick, and Mr. Wardle’s attorney, who was named Mr. Perker, to the room where they might found the owner of the Wellingtons. Sam was then dismissed, and the three men entered the room. There, as they anticipated, they found Mr. Jingle and Miss Rachael Wardle. Berating Mr. Jingle, Mr. Wardle orders a coached to be got ready with which to convey Miss Rachael back to Manor Farm. Mr. Jingle, however, argued that Miss Rachael could do what she wanted, and Miss Rachael averred that she would stay with Mr. Jingle. To Mr. Wardle’s chagrin, Mr. Perker counseled him that the law was on Mr. Jingle and Miss Rachael’s side. Nonetheless, Mr. Perker assured Mr. Wardle that there was way to settle the matter, and to that end he procured a private meeting with Mr. Jingle.
Alone with Mr. Jingle, Mr. Perker had made Mr. Jingle admit that he was solely motivated by Miss Rachel’s private fortune in wooing her. Subsequently, Mr. Perker and Mr. Jingle haggled over a sum of money that Mr. Jingle would be satisfied with in return for abandoning his intention of marrying Miss Rachael. The figure, as it turned out was a little too high to Perker’s liking, but Mr. Wardle approved the figure. Consequently, Mr. Jingle took the money and left, and Mr. Wardle and Mr. Pickwick escorted the despondent Miss Rachael back to Manor Farm.
Refreshed after a good night’s sleep at Dingley Dell, Mr. Pickwick greeted his fellow Pickwickians whom he had not seen for two whole days on account of the Mr. JingleèkMiss Rachael affair. However, to Mr. Pickwick’s consternation, Mr. Snodgrass and Mr. Winkle informed Mr. Pickwick that on account of the Mr. JingleèkMiss Rachael affair, Mr. Tupman had decided to drop out of Mr. Pickwick’s endeavour to revitalize the art of travelling. A sealed letter from Mr. Tupman confirmed Mr. Snodgrass and Mr. Winkle’s claim. Mr. Pickwick was undaunted, however, and he decided to go found Mr. Tupman at the location indicated in the sealed letter. Ergo the Pickwickians bade their Dingley Dell hosts a fond farewell and made their way to the Leather Bottle, Cobham, Kent.
At Leather Bottle, Cobham, Kent, the Pickwickians found Mr. Tupman who seemed none the less worse for the trauma he claimed to have endured at the hands of Mr. Jingle and Miss Rachael. Indeed, a private conference with Mr. Pickwick persuaded Mr. Tupman to rejoin the Pickwickians in their endeavour to revitalize the art of travelling.
Thus, with gladdened hearts, Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Tupman were on their way to join Mr. Snodgrass and Mr. Winkle, when Mr. Pickwick made a momentous discovery on the road by a cottage. What he found was a stone with an inscription which Mr. Pickwick believed had an invaluable archaeological value. He was so sure of this that he bought it for ten shillings from the labouring man who was the resident of the cottage and who was presumably the de facto owner of the stone. Subsequently, the Pickwickians decided to head for London where Mr. Pickwick would speak of the stone before the Pickwick Club and where the stone would be submitted to experts for analysis.
However, on the eve of their departure to London, Mr. Pickwick was beset by insomnia. He was at a loss of what to do when he was reminded of the manuscript that was entrusted to him by the Dingley Dell clergyman. Hoping it would help him fall asleep, Mr. Pickwick read the manuscript.
The manuscript was an incomplete memoir of a madman.
Believing and knowing that a streak of madness ran in his family and that he had inherited it, the madman managed to keep his madness a secret from the world at large. And by dint of keeping his madness a secret, the madman amassed a wealth which the world at large coveted, to the madman’s delight. His wealth was especially coveted by a poor family which consisted of an old white-haired man, his three sons, and his daughter. Indeed, the family was so covetous of the madman’s wealth that they forced the only girl in the family to marry the madman even though the girl was in love with another and even though the girl loathed the madman and his wealth.
One night, the madman tried to kill his wife. He failed to kill her, but his madness infected her. Shortly thereafter, in fact on the very next day after the doctors had diagnosed her of having become mad, the madman’s wife died. Subsequently, a brother-in-law visited the madman, and insinuated that the madman was responsible for his sister’s death, never minded that this brother-in-law had become a soldier of some standing on the strength of the madman’s wealth. Enraged, the madman tried to choke his brother-in-law to death only to be prevented from doing so by the house servants who were alerted to the scene by all the noise that ensued. Caught in the act of trying to kill a man, the madman fled and thought he had evaded capture only to wake up one day and found himself chained to a bed of straw.
The manuscript ended here.
The manuscript did the job, and Mr. Pickwick fell soundly asleep. The next day the Pickwickians retired to London. There, Mr. Pickwick successfully pondered over the archaeological significance of the stone with the inscriptions despite Mr. Blotton’s best attempts to discredit Mr. Pickwick.
Having commissioned his landlady’s son to fetch Mr. Tupman, Mr. Winkle, and Mr. Snodgrass, Mr. Pickwick inquired his landlady as to the added cost of having an additional lodger living with Mr. Pickwick in his apartment. Unknown to Mr. Pickwick, his landlady Mrs. Bardell who had, for the longest time, regarded Mr. Pickwick as a potential mate, and misunderstood Mr. Pickwick. She thought that Mr. Pickwick was making her a marriage proposal. Ergo when Mr. Pickwick assured her that sharing his apartment with another would be to the mutual benefit of Mr. Pickwick and Mrs. Bardell, Mrs. Bardell not only consented to Mr. Pickwick’s proposal but also collapsed into his arm where she temporarily lost her consciousness.
Presently, Master Bardell, the landlady’s son, arrived with Mr. Tupman, Mr. Winkle, and Mr. Snodgrass only to find Mr. Pickwick in the most awkward of circumstances, i.e. with the unconscious landlady in his arms. Thinking that Mr. Pickwick had caused his mother harm, Master Bardell attacked Mr. Pickwick who entreated his fellow Pickwickains to restrain the boy. Not only did the Pickwickians manage to restrain Master Bardell but they escorted Mrs. Bardell, who regained her consciousness, to her rooms. By and by, Mr. Pickwick expressed his incredulity at Mrs. Bardell’s behavior. He couldn’t explain what she could make read into his—Mr. Pickwick’s—intention of hiring a personal assistant and having him share Mr. Pickwick’s apartment.
By and by, Samuel Weller, the boot cleaner at the White Hart inn, whom the Pickwickians mentioned of having met upon entering Mr. Pickwick’s apartment, entered the apartment and was heartily welcomed by Mr. Pickwick. When asked what the purpose of his summons was, Mr. Pickwick explained that he would like Samuel Weller to be his personal assistant and explained the terms of the employment. Pleased by the offer, Samuel Weller consented to the offer. Thus the deal was clinched pending Samuel Wellers reference check. As it turned out, Samuel Weller’s reputation proved to be exceptional, and he forthwith joined the Pickwickians who were now on their way to Eatenswill.