“Money as power” is a dominant theme in these chapters. Pip escorts Estella to Satis House and always, she pays. By not allowing Pip to pay, Estella controls the situation and is beholden to no one. Whoever holds the money, therefore, holds the control. The convict holds the power over Pip because he is the benefactor. His money has provided Pip’s easy life and, prepared for no other profession, Pip has become totally dependent on that money. Pip’s blind pursuit of money to win Estella has also cost him Joe. He has traded Joe for the convict — the guilt and shame nearly crush Pip.
The reader senses a fair bit of hinting and foreshadowing in these chapters, as when Dickens ends Chapter 19 with a tale of ceilings falling in on Pip. Something bad is about to happen. Also, before Magwitch actually reveals that he is Pip’s benefactor, he drops a number hints to give Pip the chance to guess this fact.
The fantasy descriptions of Miss Havisham continue. She has also become the victim of her own madness. Estella tells her and Pip that she is incapable of loving anyone because that has been her training. Miss Havisham never intended for that weapon of revenge to wound her, as well as the young men that Estella rejects. Yet, Estella is being as kind as she is capable of through her openness and honesty. She is dutiful, grateful, generous, and obedient to Miss Havisham but she cannot love her. Miss Havisham is now afraid of her own creation. With Pip, Estella shows her own sense of caring and fairness, a kind of loyalty. She does not use him the way she uses all other men and she continually reinforces her warnings to him. Pip’s constant unhappiness in her presence remains unchanged yet he cannot pull away. He is also sickened watching Miss Havisham’s desperate clinging to Estella. In a moment of insight, he sees his obsession as a dark, sick thing and feels dependent, degraded, controlled, but is unable to pull out of it. He resents Drummle’s seeing Estella and the spider metaphor returns in descriptions of Drummle’s movements around Estella.
