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I cant, upon my life. Theres nothing I should like better, but I must remain with these two fellows. We are all three off together to-morrow morning. Then bring them here to dinner, I returned. Do you think they would come? Oh! they would come fast enough, said Steerforth; but we should inconvenience you. You had better come and dine with us somewhere. I would not by any means consent to this, for it occurred to me that I really ought to have a little house- warming, and that there never could be a better opportunity. I had a new pride in my rooms after his approval of them, and burned with a desire to develop their utmost resources. I therefore made him promise positively in the names of his two friends, and we appointed six oclock as the dinner-hour. When he was gone, I rang for Mrs. Crupp, and acquainted her with my desperate design. Mrs. Crupp said, in the first place, of course it was well known she couldnt be expected to wait, but she knew a handy young man, who she thought could be prevailed upon to do it, and whose terms would be five shillings, and what I pleased. I said, certainly we would have him. Next, Mrs. Crupp said it was clear she couldnt be in two places at once (which I felt to be reasonable), and that a young gal stationed in the pantry with a bed-room candle, there never to desist from washing plates, would be indispensable. I said, what would be the expense of this young female, and Mrs. Crupp said she supposed eighteen- pence would neither make me nor break me. I said I supposed not; and that was settled. Then Mrs. Crupp said, Now about the dinner. It was a remarkable instance of want of forethought on the part of the ironmonger who had made Mrs. Crupps kitchen fire-place, that it was capable of cooking nothing but chops and mashed potatoes. As to a fish-kittle, Mrs. Crupp said, well! would I only come and look at the range? She couldnt say fairer than that. Would I come and look at it? As I should not have been much the wiser if I had looked at it, I declined, and said, Never mind fish. But Mrs. Crupp said, Dont say that; oysters was in, and why not them? So that was settled. Mrs. Crupp then said what she would recommend would be this. A pair of hot roast fowlsfrom the pastrycooks; a dish of stewed beef, with vegetablesfrom the pastrycooks; two little corner things, as a raised pie and a dish of kidneysfrom the pastrycooks; a tart, and (if I liked) a shape of jellyfrom the pastrycooks. This, Mrs. Crupp said, would leave her at full liberty to concentrate her mind on the potatoes, and to serve up the cheese and celery as she could wish to see it done. I acted on Mrs. Crupps opinion, and gave the order at the pastrycooks myself. Walking along the Strand, afterwards, and observing a hard mottled substance in the window of a ham and beef shop, which resembled marble, but was labelled Mock Turtle, I went in and bought a slab of it, which I have since seen reason to believe would have sufficed for fifteen people. This preparation, Mrs. Crupp, after some difficulty, consented to warm up; and it shrank so much in a liquid state, that we found it what Steerforth called rather a tight fit for four. These preparations happily completed, I bought a little dessert in Covent Garden Market, and gave a rather extensive order at a retail wine-merchants in that vicinity. When I came home in the afternoon, and saw the bottles drawn up in a square on the pantry-floor, they looked so numerous (though there were two missing, which made Mrs. Crupp very uncomfortable), that I was absolutely frightened at them. One of Steerforths friends was named Grainger, and the other Markham. They were both very gay and lively fellows; Grainger, something older than Steerforth; Markham, youthful-looking, and I should say not more than twenty. I observed that the latter always spoke of himself indefinitely, as a man, and seldom or never in the first person singular. A man might get on very well here, Mr. Copperfield, said Markhammeaning himself. Its not a bad situation, said I, and the rooms are really commodious. |
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