Great Expectations - Charles Dickens - Chapter eight

After a night in Mr Pumblecook's house, Pip is taken to Mrs Havisham house after breakfast. Arriving there, they are greeted by a young lady. Pip describes the house as "... was of old brick, and dismal, and had a great many iron bars to it. Some of the windows had been walled up; of those that remained, all the lower were rustily barred. There was a courtyard in front, and that was barred..."

Oddly, the young lady allowed only Pip's entrance, leaving Mr Pumblechook on the outside. Mr Pumblechook says goodbye to Pip saying that would be good if Pip did not disappoint her sister or "... who brought you up by hand ..."

 
Pip outlines the young lady as "... she seemed much older than I, of course, being a girl, and beautiful and self-possessed; and she was as scornful of me as if she had been one-and-twenty, and a queen ...". She is Estella.

Conducted through the house, Pip gets a room where there is an old lady. " ... in an arm-chair, with an elbow resting on the table and her head leaning on that hand, sat the strangest lady I have ever seen, or shall ever see ..." That lady was Mrs Havisham.

Being seen by her, Pip is invited to play. In the first moment, Pip is a little scared, but is comforted by Mrs Havisham, who says that there is no reason to be afraid. After be reluctant in playing cards with Mrs Havisham, Pip calls Estella under the command of Mrs Havisham. All seated at the table they start to play cards. Estella has a look of disdain on Pip and he knows that. Mrs Havisham asks Pip why he is so patient with Estella although she only diminishing him and says bad things about him.
This is an interesting passage from the book:
‘She says many hard things about you, but you say anything of her. What do you think of her?’
‘I don’t like to say,’ I stammered.
‘Tell me in my ear,’ said Miss Havisham, bending down.
‘I think she is very proud,’ I replied, in a whisper.
‘Anything else?’
‘I think she is very pretty.’
‘Anything else?’
‘I think she is very insulting.’ (She was looking at me then with a look of supreme aversion.)
‘Anything else?’
‘I think I should like to go home.’
‘And never see her again, though she is so pretty?’
‘I am not sure that I shouldn’t like to see her again, but I should like to go home now.’
‘You shall go soon,’ said Miss Havisham, aloud. ‘Play the game out.’

So, Pip goes out with the promise to return after six days. When in the courtyard, Pip decides to explore the limits of the land. Pip has some strange views about a woman hanged ,and he believes that Mrs Havisham is the woman in his views. Frightened, he leaves the house and heads to his home.

In the way, he starts to think about everything that happened.
"I went along, on all I had seen, and deeply revolving that I was a common labouring-boy; that my hands were coarse; that my boots were thick; that I had fallen into a despicable habit of calling knaves Jacks; that I was much more ignorant than I had considered myself last night, and generally that I was in a low-lived bad way". 

See you on Chapter nine.