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Show r - - i CONDENSED CLASSICS j BLEAK HOUSE ! ! i J By CHARLES DICKENS Condensation by ? I Wilder Dwlnht Culnt '$ Llltfiu did uot Uv 10 tve an uld j tunn, mi ld nii-v1' la m'konrd la our j tluic. Wheji tha end rnmc on the n- ntuK of Ibr nlutb of June. XsTll. he huil Uved only four luoutliN beyond his r.-tli Ifnr. The new uf hla denth una re- reined Ha a unl ersul onlmttlty fb.roiie.h- ) Mit the eUUUed world. The l.oudeu ' Times, In auK'ltn thnt the ouly tU- liuK reaflnK place for the retunlun uf j tuca a utan nua tn Abbey. In wiil.li I the moat ltlnatrloiia b.ariLli'iuuea Krr I tnlj. ilrt'krrii "Sfutefiuien. men of fielence, phllim- j ttarxiolst. the neknowlediied bfncfaclom 1 ot their rnce. mlgrat a-tait nnnr, find J ret not leave tho void r.hlch t ill be j mused by the death ot lMt-kens . . . j II nwrvfr pre eminent la nt.11 Ion, nMltty ; or puMIc Bervteea, they will not have i bevn. like our irrent and eeniul novellNt. t the Intimate of every huaholtl. ln- ! deed, aueh a position, la attained not rven by one nun In an B(re." Dl.'keus hud left inatruetlon that he be bnrled privately, without pre! ioum j pnblli announcement of time or plnee. ind wlthont monnment or niemorlnl. He had preferred to lie In the kui:i)I rraveyarU under Rochester eaMle wnlli yr la the little eharcnea of Cobbam or y- !horst but all tneae were found to he Sosed. The demand that he be placed moci K KuKlnnd's srreat dead la et-ulnater et-ulnater Abbey, united In by all Hir-iand Hir-iand from the dean of the abbey to the humbleat elttxen, finally prevailed. It Koa arranged that there ahould be ouVy inch ceremonial aa would be eonalatent frith the Injunction for privacy. And in the moralax; of Tuesday, the 1-lth of lune, all vraa carried out with the koovrleil&e of thoae only who by rlRht tiliht aaalaf at the burlnL The Inscription upon the atone 1ft t Charles Dlckena, Born Kebrunry the Seventh, lSli Died June the Mnth. IJ.70. Near him Ilea David Gnrrlck. and facing; the trrave and on lta left and r!t:at are monumcnta of Chaucer, - Shakeapeare and lrydeu. Dlckena' laat apoken words were. I'ea. on the aground. In reply to hla llater-Ln-law. when he was stricken at '.-he laat. ahe having exclaimed, -Home ud lie down." Of hla own life and work bo once aid, "I rest my claim to the remembrance remem-brance of any country on my published forks." aa a reason why be dctlred 10 laudatory Inscription over bis Brave. THE celebrated case of Jamdyce Jam-dyce and Jamdyce had droned Its way through the dusty, musty mus-ty chancery court In London fur how many years only a few bewigged and fazzy banisters knew before I, Esther Summerson, came to feel something of Its deadening touch. This scarecrow scare-crow of a suit had become so complicated com-plicated that no man alive knew what It meant. It was once about an old Jamdyce will, but was dos only a jnestion of costs and they were eating ap the original property every day.' People were dragged Into It whether they woold or no. More than one tragedy trag-edy It had occasioned- I was told that Tom Jamdyce, a despairing suitor, had said one day of chancery: "It's being be-ing roasted at a slow fire; it's being stung to death by single bees ; It's being be-ing drowned by drops; It's going mad by grains." And then he went and shot himself. Eut chancery brought me many strange experiences, some bitter sorrows and a great happiness. My childhood knew no mother. My earliest recollection was of a kindly woman who called herself my godmother. god-mother. Once I had asked her about my real mother, and she had replied : "Tour mother, Esther, Is your disgrace, dis-grace, and you were hers." When my godmother died I was told by Kenge and Carboy, great London lawyers, law-yers, that a gBardJan hud been appointed ap-pointed for me and that his name wa John Jamdyce; that he had been asked to receive Into his home a v.ard of the chancery court, a young lady, and that I was to be her companion com-panion and was to go to Bleak House, down in Hertfordshire, to live. Then first I met my beautiful darling, Ada Clare, and her handsome distant cousin, IUchard Caratone (also a ward In the terrible chancery), a gay, unstable un-stable boy whose love Ada soon returned re-turned alas for In the end they were married and Richard, chasing the will 0' the wisp of Jamdyce and Jamdyce. passed out of the world forever. Through my guardian, a kindly, bearty gentleman nearer sixty than fifty, perhaps, I met many people of low and high degree. Of the latter were Sir Leicester Dedlock, and my Lady Dedlock, great personages In rank and fashion, with a fine town-house town-house In London and superb country estate, Cbesney Wold, ofT In Lincolnshire. Lincoln-shire. Sir Leicester had married for love, rumor had It, a bit beneath him. But my lady showed no Blgns of that She was prond, cold, haughty, they said, with beauty still not yet In Its autumn. Sir Leicester, twenty yeara older, waa a man of worthy presence, pres-ence, ceremonlooB and stately. He had supreme faith in two things: the British aristocracy and Lady Dedlock. My lady was In Jamdyce and Jamdyce Jam-dyce through somo almost forgotten ancestor. One afternoon In her London Lon-don mansion Mr. Tulklnghcra, the family lawyer, was with her in connection con-nection with the case. Mr. Tulklng-horn, Tulklng-horn, I came to know, was a rusty, silent man, the butler of the legal cellars of the Dedlocks; grown rich out of aristocratic marriage scttle-nents scttle-nents and aristocratic wills; an oyster of the ohl school whom nobody could open. "Who copied thill?" crlerl my hul Impulsively, nil alio eiuiKht "tcht l some handwriting on u lcgul document before her. "Why do you ask?" 0. uorl the keen lawyer, struck by her animation and unusual tone. "Anything "Any-thing to vary this ilctCKtiihlo monotony," monot-ony," she returned, then fainted. With Mr. Tulkttinhoru to wonder at anything wuh to Investigate It. Why had my lady nsked about that handwriting? hand-writing? Why had sho fainted? IVr-hups IVr-hups Snagbby, tho law stationer, who had had those papers copied, could enlighten en-lighten him. Ye. Sniigsby knew. It was the work of a gloomy, poverty, stricken recluse culling Iitiuuclf Nemo and lodging over one vlllaluoun K rooks' rug innl bottle shop. Thither they go and up Into the squalid chamber. cham-ber. Nemo Is lying on his wretched bed, his eyes staring, his body motionless. motion-less. "Hod save us, ho Is dead !" exclaimed ex-claimed Mr. Tulklnghoru. 1 heard of tho Impiest through Mr. Cupp.v, a shrewd young law clerk who had made hopeless oili-lovo to mo. The only witness who nceiiuM to have known tho dead man was Jo. a forlorn hoy crossing swiM'tuir, and ho knew little lit-tle except '"1" wos S"M to me, V wos." l'u.t Mr. Tulkln.thiirn docketed Jo f.ir further u-e meantime: "I have seen the man wluwc hanihvrithi;; attracted your attention," he wrote 1. ady IVtilovk. And ti nfter. on 11 visit to Chesney Wold: "1 found him dead," he tells my lady face to fce. . And whether each evermore WHtehe.; and suspects the oilu-r; what cai h would give to know how much the nth. er knows ail lids is hidden for a time In their own hearts. The faithful Mr. Guppy, whom 1 could never encourage because well, because there was Dr. Allun Wood-court, Wood-court, for one thing gave me the news of Jo's arrest for loitering, ami of the strange story he told In explanation of money found on him. They took hi:n to Snagsby's, and this was Jo'i tale: "They're vols left, Mr. Snags-by, Snags-by, out of a sov'riug as wos give me by a lady In a wale as said she was a servant, and as come to my crossin" one night and asked to l showed thU 'ere 'ouse and the 'ouse wot him as yea give the wrltin' to died at, and the berrln' ground wot he's berried in. And I done It." And cow why did Suagsl y hurry oft to grim old Tulkinghorn with this odd tale? And why did Mr. Tulklnghorn at once call in Bucket, a great London Lon-don detective, to go and fetch Jo? And was there any dark Import to the bit of melodrama In the lawyer's ofliee where the waif was shown a veiled woman dressed as a servant? "If 'er, an' it ain't "er," he had said, gazing gaz-ing raptly at the figure. "I know ttie wale an' the bunuit an' the gownd; but It ain't 'er 'and. nor yet 'er rings, nor yet 'er wolce. It's 'er, an' it ain't 'er." "There ain't a doubt." Buc-ket had whispered to Mr. Tulklnghorn "that It was- the other one with tliii one's dress on." Meantime I hud had my first glimpse of the celebrated Lady Dedlock. Mj guardian had taken us all down to Lincolnshire to visit a friend, and It was In the little parish church I saw her. Shall I ever forget the rapid beating at my heart occasioned by the look I met as I stood up? !nftU i ever forget the manner In which those handsome, proud eyes seemed to spring out of their languor and to hold mine? And. very strangely, there wa something quickened within me, associated asso-ciated with the lonely days at my god mother's. I was soon to know whit this meant, and, curiously enough through Mr. Guppy. My Impossible suitor. It seemed, had noted a resemblance between niysli and Lady Dedlock. Ila had leirul by chance that my name wua not Es ther Summerson, but Esther Hawdoa. Hoping to help me, straight to Lady Dedlock be weot with his news. She received him haughtily, but when he informed her that he had found that his cherished Exther waa Esther Haw don : "My God," had burst ttrrowgh her Icy reserve. Life went on for a while with charming grace ami pleasantness at Bleak House. Then the darkness of a terrible disease encompnssd me, and when I had recovered my faea was so sadly changed that I hardly knew myself. my-self. To recuperate my guardian took me down to Lincolnshire, near Che-ney Che-ney Wold. And there I mot Lady Dedlock Ded-lock again. I wn resting on a bench m the beautiful wood near tho great mansion one day when she came and sat down on the seat beside me. Suddenly she caught me to her breast, kissed mo, fell down on her knees and cried tn me: "Oh, my child, my. child; I am your unhappy and wicked mother. Oh, try to forgive me, I had thought you dead in infancy. My cruel sister told me so." Then I felt a burst of gratltnde, through all my tumult of emotion, that I was so changed that 1 could never disgrace her by any trace of likeness. But at once I knew that our secret was not safe. My mother told me of the cold and crafty Tulkhnghom, already al-ready suspicions of her and ready to charge her with the truth. "Oould you not trust him?" I had asked. "1 shall never try," she replied. "The dark road I have trodden for so many years will end where it wilt I follow it alone to the end, wherever the end be," Soon I knew that the merciless Tulklnghorn wag hot on the scent. Journeying down to Chesney Wold, he told my mother that he knew everything every-thing and would hold her in his ghastly ghast-ly grtp, awaiting his own time for revealing re-vealing the story to Sir Leicester. Nor did the pitiless solictor give her much time of grace. When the Dedlocks returned re-turned to their stately Londsn housa ?-e sought my lady and declared ta |