At the end of Chapter 38 Pip tells the story of an Eastern Sultan who is crushed to death by a heavy slab of stone that he has had quarried. This is a metaphor for Pip discovering that Estella has chosen Drummel to be her victim/husband.

The weather in this chapter is stormy and dark. The land has become a thick mud soup and this mirrors Pip’s inability to find work for himself or do anything even though he is now 23. The storm foreshadows that troubled times are ahead.

Pip receives a visitor in the middle of the night. Pip’s initial reaction to his visitor is to be agitated that his night has been interrupted. He also feels put out because the man seems to recognise him yet Pip does not recognise the man.

Pip quickly realizes that the visitor is actually the convict from the graveyard all those years ago.

The man has returned to England to see Pip and see the gentleman he has made.

Pip is upset and disgusted by the visitor by the end of the chapter.

Pip’s physical expectations have not changed as he still has the convict’s fortune. However, Pip feelings right now is that because the money comes from the convict it is some how no longer great. He only thought it was great because Miss Havisham was the one giving him it.

Suspense is added to this section of the novel as we are told by the convict that he shouldn’t be in the country and that to be caught in Britain would mean execution for him. Pip starts to hear things in the night that he thinks are people hunting for the convict.