“By no means,” said Mr. Spenlow. “But I have some experience of Mr. Jorkins, Copperfield. I wish it were otherwise, for I should be happy to meet your views in any respect. I cannot have the least objection to your mentioning it to Mr. Jorkins, Copperfield, if you think it worth while.”
Availing myself of this permission, which was given with a warm shake of the hand, I sat thinking about Dora, and looking at the sunlight stealing from the chimney-pots down the wall of the opposite house, until Mr. Jorkins came. I then went up to Mr. Jorkins’s room, and evidently astonished Mr. Jorkins very much by making my appearance there.
“Come in, Mr. Copperfield,” said Mr. Jorkins. “Come in!”
I went in, and sat down; and stated my case to Mr. Jorkins pretty much as I had stated it to Mr. Spenlow. Mr. Jorkins was not by any means the awful creature one might have expected, but a large, mild, smooth-faced man of sixty, who took so much snuff that there was a tradition in the Commons that he lived principally on that stimulant, having little room in his system for any other article of diet.
“You have mentioned this to Mr. Spenlow, I suppose?” said Mr. Jorkins; when he had heard me, very restlessly, to an end.
I answered Yes, and told him that Mr. Spenlow had introduced his name.
“He said I should object?” asked Mr. Jorkins.
I was obliged to admit that Mr. Spenlow had considered it probable.
“I am sorry to say, Mr. Copperfield, I can’t advance your object,” said Mr. Jorkins, nervously. “The fact is—but I have an appointment at the Bank, if you’ll have the goodness to excuse me.”
With that he rose in a great hurry, and was going out of the room, when I made bold to say that I feared, then, there was no way of arranging the matter?