Dickens, Charles – The Uncommercial Traveller

fiercely through his eye-glass.

The waiter put down our tureen on a remote side-table, and went to

see what was amiss in this new direction.

‘This is not right, you know, waiter. Look here! here’s

yesterday’s sherry, one and eightpence, and here we are again, two

shillings. And what does sixpence mean?’

So far from knowing what sixpence meant, the waiter protested that

he didn’t know what anything meant. He wiped the perspiration from

his clammy brow, and said it was impossible to do it, – not

particularising what, – and the kitchen was so far off.

‘Take the bill to the bar, and get it altered,’ said Mr.

Indignation Cocker, so to call him.

The waiter took it, looked intensely at it, didn’t seem to like the

idea of taking it to the bar, and submitted, as a new light upon

the case, that perhaps sixpence meant sixpence.

‘I tell you again,’ said Mr. Indignation Cocker, ‘here’s

yesterday’s sherry – can’t you see it? – one and eightpence, and

here we are again, two shillings. What do you make of one and

eightpence and two shillings?’

Totally unable to make anything of one and eightpence and two

shillings, the waiter went out to try if anybody else could; merely

casting a helpless backward glance at Bullfinch, in acknowledgement

of his pathetic entreaties for our soup-tureen. After a pause,

during which Mr. Indignation Cocker read a newspaper and coughed

defiant coughs, Bullfinch arose to get the tureen, when the waiter

reappeared and brought it, – dropping Mr. Indignation Cocker’s

altered bill on Mr. Indignation Cocker’s table as he came along.

‘It’s quite impossible to do it, gentlemen,’ murmured the waiter;

‘and the kitchen is so far off.’

‘Well, you don’t keep the house; it’s not your fault, we suppose.

Bring some sherry.’

‘Waiter!’ from Mr. Indignation Cocker, with a new and burning sense

of injury upon him.

Page 210

Dickens, Charles – The Uncommercial Traveller

The waiter, arrested on his way to our sherry, stopped short, and

came back to see what was wrong now.

‘Will you look here? This is worse than before. DO you

understand? Here’s yesterday’s sherry, one and eightpence, and

here we are again two shillings. And what the devil does ninepence

mean?’

This new portent utterly confounded the waiter. He wrung his

napkin, and mutely appealed to the ceiling.

‘Waiter, fetch that sherry,’ says Bullfinch, in open wrath and

revolt.

‘I want to know,’ persisted Mr. Indignation Cocker, ‘the meaning of

ninepence. I want to know the meaning of sherry one and eightpence

yesterday, and of here we are again two shillings. Send somebody.’

The distracted waiter got out of the room on pretext of sending

somebody, and by that means got our wine. But the instant he

appeared with our decanter, Mr. Indignation Cocker descended on him

again.

‘Waiter!’

‘You will now have the goodness to attend to our dinner, waiter,’

said Bullfinch, sternly.

‘I am very sorry, but it’s quite impossible to do it, gentlemen,’

pleaded the waiter; ‘and the kitchen – ‘

‘Waiter!’ said Mr. Indignation Cocker.

‘ – Is,’ resumed the waiter, ‘so far off, that – ‘

‘Waiter!’ persisted Mr. Indignation Cocker, ‘send somebody.’

We were not without our fears that the waiter rushed out to hang

himself; and we were much relieved by his fetching somebody, – in

graceful, flowing skirts and with a waist, – who very soon settled

Mr. Indignation Cocker’s business.

‘Oh!’ said Mr. Cocker, with his fire surprisingly quenched by this

apparition; ‘I wished to ask about this bill of mine, because it

appears to me that there’s a little mistake here. Let me show you.

Here’s yesterday’s sherry one and eightpence, and here we are again

two shillings. And how do you explain ninepence?’

However it was explained, in tones too soft to be overheard. Mr.

Cocker was heard to say nothing more than ‘Ah-h-h! Indeed; thank

you! Yes,’ and shortly afterwards went out, a milder man.

The lonely traveller with the stomach-ache had all this time

suffered severely, drawing up a leg now and then, and sipping hot

brandy-and-water with grated ginger in it. When we tasted our

(very) mock-turtle soup, and were instantly seized with symptoms of

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