‘Since you do ask me about it, I suppose there’s no harm in saying that I believe him to be a very poor man.’
‘Not the least harm in the world, but just the reverse. Whatever may come of this, my wish is that the truth should be told scrupulously on all sides; the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.’
‘Magna est veritas,’ said Miss Dunstable. ‘The Bishop of Bar-chester taught me as much Latin as that at Chaldicotes; and he did add some more, but there was a long word, and I forgot it.’
‘The bishop was quite right, my dear, I’m sure. But if you go to your Latin, I’m lost. As we were just now saying, my brother’s pecuniary affairs are in a very bad state. He has a beautiful property of his own, which has been in the family for I can’t say how many centuries – long before the Conquest, I know.’
‘I wonder what my ancestors were then?’
‘It does not much signify to any of us,’ said Mrs Harold Smith, with a moral shake of her head, ‘what our ancestors were; but it’s a sad thing to see an old property go to ruin.’
‘Yes, indeed; we none of us like to see our property going to ruin, whether it be old or new. I have some of that sort of feeling already, although mine was only made the other day out of an apothecary’s shop.’
‘God forbid that I should ever help you to ruin it,’ said Mrs Harold Smith. ‘I should be sorry to be the means of your losing a ten-pound note.’
‘Magna est veritas, as the dear bishop said,’ exclaimed Miss Dunstable. ‘Let us have the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, as we agreed just now.’
Mrs Harold Smith did begin to find that the task before her was difficult. There was a hardness about Miss Dunstable when matters of business were concerned on which it seemed almost impossible to make any impression. It was not that she had evinced any determination to refuse the tender of Mr Sowerby’s hand; but she was so painfully resolute not to have dust thrown in her eyes! Mrs Harold Smith had commenced with a mind fixed upon avoiding what she called humbug; but this sort of humbug had become so prominent a part of her usual rhetoric, that she found it very hard to abandon it.
‘And that’s what I wish,’ said she. ‘Of course my chief object is to secure my brother’s happiness.’
‘That’s very unkind to poor Mr Harold Smith.’
‘Well, well, well – you know what I mean.’
‘Yes, I think I do know what you mean. Your brother is a gentleman of good family, but of no means.’
‘Not quite so bad as that.’
‘Of embarrassed means, then, or anything that you will; whereas I am a lady of no family, but of sufficient wealth. You think that if you brought us together and made a match of it, it would be a very good thing for – for whom?’ said Miss Dunstable.
‘Yes, exactly,’ said Mrs Harold Smith.
‘For which of us? Remember the bishop now and his nice little bit of Latin.’
‘For Nathaniel then,’ said Mrs Harold Smith, boldly. ‘It would be a very good thing for him.’ And a slight smile came across her face as she said it. ‘Now that’s honest, or the mischief is in it.’
‘Yes, that’s honest enough. And did he send you here to tell me this?’
‘Well, he did that, and something else.’
‘And now let’s have the something else. The really important part, I have no doubt, has been spoken.’
‘No, by no means, by no means all of it. But you are so hard on one, my dear, with your running after honesty, that one is not able to tell the real facts as they are. You make one speak in such a bald, naked way.’
‘Ah, you think that anything naked must be indecent; even truth.’
‘I think it is more proper-looking, and better suited, too, for the world’s work, when it goes about with some sort of a garment on it. We are so used to a leaven of falsehood in all we hear and say, now-a-days, that nothing is more likely to deceive us than the absolute truth. If a shopkeeper told me that his wares were simply middling, of course, I should think that they were not worth a farthing. But all that has nothing to do with my poor brother. Well, what was I saying?’
‘You were going to tell me how well he would use me, no doubt.’
‘Something of that kind.’
‘That he wouldn’t beat me; or spend all my money if I managed to have it tied up out of his power; or look down on me with contempt because my father was an apothecary! Was not that what you were going to say?’
‘I was going to tell you that you might be more happy as Mrs Sowerby of Chaldicotes than you can be as Miss Dunstable –’
‘Of Mount Lebanon. And had Mr Sowerby no other message to send? – nothing about love, or anything of that sort? I should like, you know, to understand what his feelings are before I take such a leap.’
‘I do believe he has as true a regard for you as any man of his age ever does have –’
‘For any woman of mine. That is not putting it in a very devoted way certainly; but I am glad to see that you remember the bishop’s maxim.’
‘What would you have me say? If I told you that he was dying for love, you would say, I was trying to cheat you; and now because I don’t tell you so, you say that he is wanting in devotion. I must say you are hard to please.’
‘Perhaps I am, and very unreasonable into the bargain. I ought to ask no questions of the kind when your brother proposes to do me so much honour. As for my expecting the love of a man who condescends to wish to be my husband, that, of course, would be monstrous. What right can I have to think that any man should love me? It ought to be enough for me to know that as I am rich, I can get a husband? What business can such as I have to inquire whether the gentleman who would so honour me really would like my company, or would only deign to put up with my presence in his household?’
‘Now, my dear Miss Dunstable –’
‘Of course I am not such an ass as to expect that any gentleman should love me; and I feel that I ought to be obliged to your brother for sparing me the string of complimentary declarations which are usual on such occasions. He, at any rate, is not tedious – or rather you on his behalf; for no doubt his own time is so occupied with his parliamentary duties that he cannot attend to this little matter himself. I do feel grateful to him; and perhaps nothing more will be necessary than to give him a schedule of the property, and name an early day for putting him in possession.’
Mrs Smith did feel that she was rather badly used. This Miss Dunstable, in their mutual confidences, had so often ridiculed the love-making grimaces of her mercenary suitors, had spoken so fiercely against those who had persecuted her, not because they had desired her money, but on account of their ill-judgment in thinking her to be a fool, that Mrs Smith had a right to expect that the method she had adopted for opening the negotiation would be taken in a better spirit. Could it be possible, after all, thought Mrs Smith to herself, that Miss Dunstable was like other women, and that she did like to have men kneeling at her feet? Could it be the case that she had advised her brother badly, and that it would have been better for him to have gone about his work in the old-fashioned way? ‘They are very hard to manage,’ said Mrs Harold Smith to herself, thinking of her own sex.
‘He was coming here himself,’ said she, ‘but I advised him not to do so.’
‘That was so kind of you.’
‘I thought that I could explain to you more openly and more freely, what his intentions really are.’
‘Oh! I have no doubt that they are honourable,’ said Miss Dunstable. ‘He does not want to deceive me in that way, I am quite sure.’
It was impossible to help laughing, and Mrs Harold Smith did laugh. ‘Upon my word, you would provoke a saint,’ said she.
‘I am not likely to get into any such company by the alliance that you are now suggesting to me. There are not many saints usually at Chaldicotes, I believe; – always excepting my dear bishop and his wife.’
‘But, my dear, what am I to say to Nathaniel?’
‘Tell h
im, of course, how much obliged to him I am.’
‘Do listen to me one moment. I daresay that I have done wrong to speak to you in such a bold, unromantic way.’
‘Not at all. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. That’s what we agreed upon. But one’s first efforts in any line are always apt to be a little uncouth.’
‘I will send Nathaniel to you himself.’
‘No, do not do so. Why torment either him or me? I do like your brother; in a certain way I like him much. But no earthly consideration would induce me to marry him. Is it not so glaringly plain that he would marry me for my money only, that you have not even dared to suggest any other reason?’
‘Of course it would have been nonsense to say that he had no regard whatever towards your money.’
‘Of course it would – absolute nonsense. He is a poor man with a good position, and he wants to marry me because I have got that which he wants. But, my dear, I do not want that which he has got, and therefore the bargain would not be a fair one.’
‘But he would do his very best to make you happy.’
‘I am so much obliged to him; but, you see, I am very happy as I am. What should I gain?’
‘A companion whom you confess that you like.’
‘Ah! but I don’t know that I should like too much, even of such a companion as your brother. No, my dear – it won’t do. Believe me when I tell you, once for all, that it won’t do.’
‘Do you mean, then, Miss Dunstable, that you’ll never marry?’
‘To-morrow – if I met any one that I fancied, and he would have me. But I rather think that any that I may fancy won’t have me. In the first place, if I marry any one, the man must be quite indifferent to money.’
‘Then you’ll not find him in this world, my dear.’
‘Very possibly not,’ said Miss Dunstable.
All that was further said upon the subject need not be here repeated. Mrs Harold Smith did not give up her cause quite at once, although Miss Dunstable had spoken so plainly. She tried to explain how eligible would be her friend’s situation as mistress of Chaldicotes, when Chaldicotes should owe no penny to any man: and went so far as to hint that the master of Chaldicotes, if relieved of his embarrassments and known as a rich man, might in all probability be found worthy of a peerage when the gods should return to Olympus. Mr Harold Smith, as a cabinet minister, would, of course, do his best. But it was all of no use. ‘It’s not my destiny,’ said Miss Dunstable, ‘and therefore do not press it any longer.’
‘But we shall not quarrel,’ said Mrs Harold Smith, almost tenderly.
‘Oh, no – why should we quarrel?’
‘And you won’t look glum at my brother?’
‘Why should I look glum at him? But, Mrs Smith, I’ll do more than not looking glum at him. I do like you, and I do like your brother, and if I can in any moderate way assist him in his difficulties, let him tell me so.’
Soon after this, Mrs Harold Smith went her way. Of course, she declared in a very strong manner that her brother could not think of accepting from Miss Dunstable any such pecuniary assistance as that offered – and, to give her her due, such was the feeling of her mind at the moment; but as she went to meet her brother and gave him an account of this interview, it did occur to her that possibly Miss Dunstable might be a better creditor than the Duke of Omnium for the Chaldicotes property.
[9]
CHAPTER 25
Non-Impulsive
IT cannot be held as astonishing, that that last decision on the part of the giants in the matter of the two bishoprics should have disgusted Archdeacon Grantly. He was a politician, but not a politician as they were. As is the case with all exoteric men, his political eyes saw a short way only, and his political aspirations were as limited. When his friends came into office, that Bishop Bill, which as the original product of his enemies had been regarded by him as being so pernicious – for was it not about to be made law in order that other Proudies and such like might be hoisted up into high places and large incomes, to the terrible detriment of the Church? – that Bishop Bill, I say, in the hands of his friends, had appeared to him to be a means of almost national salvation. And then, how great had been the good fortune of the giants in this matter! Had they been the originators of such a measure they would not have had a chance of success; but now – now that the two bishops were falling into their mouths out of the weak hands of the gods, was not their success ensured? So Dr Grantly had girded up his loins and marched up to the fight, almost regretting that the triumph would be so easy. The subsequent failure was very trying to his temper as a party man.
It always strikes me that the supporters of the Titans are in this respect much to be pitied. The giants themselves, those who are actually handling Pelion and breaking their shins over the lower rocks of Ossa, are always advancing in some sort towards the councils of Olympus. Their highest policy is to snatch some ray from heaven. Why else put Pelion on Ossa, unless it be that a furtive hand, making its way through Jove’s windows, may pluck forth a thunderbolt or two, or some article less destructive, but of manufacture equally divine? And in this consists the wisdom of the higher giants – that, in spite of their mundane antecedents, theories, and predilections, they can see that articles of divine manufacture are necessary. But then they never carry their supporters with them. Their whole army is an army of martyrs.1 ‘For twenty years I have stuck to them, and see how they have treated me!’ Is not that always the plaint of an old giant-slave? ‘I have been true to my party all my life, and where am I now?’ he says. Where, indeed, my friend? Looking about you, you begin to learn that you cannot describe your whereabouts. I do not marvel at that. No one finds himself planted at last in so terribly foul a morass, as he would fain stand still for ever on dry ground.
Dr Grantly was disgusted; and although he was himself too true and thorough in all his feelings, to be able to say aloud that any giant was wrong, still he had a sad feeling within his heart that the world was sinking from under him. He was still sufficiently exoteric to think that a good stand-up fight in a good cause was a good thing. No doubt he did wish to be Bishop of Westminster, and was anxious to compass that preferment by any means that might appear to him to be fair. And why not? But this was not the end of his aspirations. He wished that the giants might prevail in everything, in bishoprics as in all other matters; and he could not understand that they should give way on the very first appearance of a skirmish. In his open talk he was loud against many a god; but in his heart of hearts he was bitter enough against both Porphyrion and Orion.
‘My dear doctor, it would not do; – not in this session; it would not indeed.’ So had spoken to him a half-fledged, but especially esoteric young monster-cub at the Treasury, who considered himself as up to all the dodges of his party, and regarded the army of martyrs who supported it as a rather heavy, but very useful collection of fogeys. Dr Grantly had not cared to discuss the matter with the half-fledged monster-cub. The best licked of all the monsters, the giant most like a god of them all, had said a word or two to him; and he also had said a word or two to that giant. Porphyrion had told him that the Bishop Bill would not do; and he, in return, speaking with warm face, and blood in his cheeks, had told Porphyrion, that he saw no reason why the bill should not do. The courteous giant had smiled as he shook his ponderous head, and then the archdeacon had left him, unconsciously shaking some dust from his shoes,2 as he paced the passages of the Treasury Chambers for the last time. As he walked back to his lodgings in Mount Street, many thoughts, not altogether bad in their nature, passed through his mind. Why should he trouble himself about a bishopric? Was he not well as he was, in his rectory down at Plumstead? Might it not be ill for him at his age to transplant himself into new soil, to engage in new duties, and live among new people? Was he not useful at Barchester, and respected also; and might it not be possible, that up there at Westminster, he might be regarded merely as a tool with which other men could work? He had not quite liked th
e tone of that specially esoteric young monster-cub, who had clearly regarded him as a distinguished fogey from the army of martyrs. He would take his wife back to Barsetshire, and there live contented with the good things which Providence had given him.
Those high political grapes had become sour, my sneering friends will say. Well? Is it not a good thing that grapes should become sour which hang out of reach? Is he not wise who can regard all grapes as sour which are manifestly too high for his hand? Those grapes of the Treasury bench, for which gods and giants fight, suffering so much when they are forced to abstain from eating, and so much more when they do eat, – those grapes are very sour to me. I am sure that they are indigestible, and that those who eat them undergo all the ills which the Revalenta Arabica3 is prepared to cure. And so it was now with the archdeacon. He thought of the strain which would have been put on his conscience had he come up there to sit in London as Bishop of Westminster; and in this frame of mind he walked home to his wife.
During the first few moments of his interview with her all his regrets had come back upon him. Indeed, it would have hardly suited for him then to have preached this new doctrine of rural contentment. The wife of his bosom, whom he so fully trusted – had so fully loved – wished for grapes that hung high upon the wall, and he knew that it was past his power to teach her at the moment to drop her ambition. Any teaching that he might effect in that way, must come by degrees. But before many minutes were over he had told her of her fate and of his own decision. ‘So we had better go back to Plumstead,’ he said; and she had not dissented.
‘I am sorry for poor Griselda’s sake,’ Mrs Grantly had remarked later in the evening, when they were again together.
‘But I thought she was to remain with Lady Lufton.’
‘Well; so she will, for a little time. There is no one with whom I would so soon trust her out of my own care as with Lady Lufton. She is all that one can desire.’
‘Exactly; and as far as Griselda is concerned, I cannot say that I think she is to be pitied.’
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