- end_line
- 1949
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T07:57:55.409Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 1860
- text
- “I certainly cannot inform you. I know nothing about him. Formerly I
employed him as a copyist; but he has done nothing for me now for some
time past.”
“I shall settle him, then—good morning, sir.”
Several days passed, and I heard nothing more; and, though I often felt
a charitable prompting to call at the place and see poor Bartleby, yet
a certain squeamishness, of I know not what, withheld me.
All is over with him, by this time, thought I, at last, when, through
another week, no further intelligence reached me. But, coming to my
room the day after, I found several persons waiting at my door in a
high state of nervous excitement.
“That’s the man—here he comes,” cried the foremost one, whom I
recognized as the lawyer who had previously called upon me alone.
“You must take him away, sir, at once,” cried a portly person among
them, advancing upon me, and whom I knew to be the landlord of No. ——
Wall street. “These gentlemen, my tenants, cannot stand it any longer;
Mr. B——,” pointing to the lawyer, “has turned him out of his room, and
he now persists in haunting the building generally, sitting upon the
banisters of the stairs by day, and sleeping in the entry by night.
Everybody is concerned; clients are leaving the offices; some fears are
entertained of a mob; something you must do, and that without delay.”
Aghast at this torrent, I fell back before it, and would fain have
locked myself in my new quarters. In vain I persisted that Bartleby was
nothing to me—no more than to any one else. In vain—I was the last
person known to have anything to do with him, and they held me to the
terrible account. Fearful, then, of being exposed in the papers (as one
person present obscurely threatened), I considered the matter, and, at
length, said, that if the lawyer would give me a confidential interview
with the scrivener, in his (the lawyer’s) own room, I would, that
afternoon, strive my best to rid them of the nuisance they complained
of.
Going up stairs to my old haunt, there was Bartleby silently sitting
upon the banister at the landing.
“What are you doing here, Bartleby?” said I.
“Sitting upon the banister,” he mildly replied.
I motioned him into the lawyer’s room, who then left us.
“Bartleby” said I, “are you aware that you are the cause of great
tribulation to me, by persisting in occupying the entry after being
dismissed from the office?”
No answer.
“Now one of two things must take place. Either you must do something,
or something must be done to you. Now what sort of business would you
like to engage in? Would you like to re-engage in copying for some
one?”
“No; I would prefer not to make any change.”
“Would you like a clerkship in a dry-goods store?”
“There is too much confinement about that. No, I would not like a
clerkship; but I am not particular.”
“Too much confinement,” I cried, “why you keep yourself confined all
the time!”
“I would prefer not to take a clerkship,” he rejoined, as if to settle
that little item at once.
“How would a bar-tender’s business suit you? There is no trying of the
eye-sight in that.”
“I would not like it at all; though, as I said before, I am not
particular.”
His unwonted wordiness inspirited me. I returned to the charge.
“Well, then, would you like to travel through the country collecting
bills for the merchants? That would improve your health.”
“No, I would prefer to be doing something else.”
“How, then, would going as a companion to Europe, to entertain some
young gentleman with your conversation—how would that suit you?”
“Not at all. It does not strike me that there is anything definite
about that. I like to be stationary. But I am not particular.”
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