Great Expectations, Chapter 10 summary

What happens

1. Pip asks Biddy for extra teaching, and she agrees despite the disorder and poor materials at the evening school.
2. Sent to fetch Joe, Pip finds him drinking with Mr. Wopsle and a stranger at the Three Jolly Bargemen.
3. The stranger questions Joe about the marshes, escaped convicts, and Pip, then secretly uses Joe’s file to stir his drink.
4. The stranger gives Pip a shilling wrapped in paper, which Mrs. Joe discovers contains two pound notes.
5. Joe cannot find the stranger to return the notes, so Mrs. Joe stores them in a teapot.
6. Pip fears his connection with convicts and wakes screaming from a dream about the file.

In this chapter

What to notice

The familiar tool makes the encounter personal and threatening. Pip understands it as evidence that his secret connection is known.

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