Sir Abraham declared that he couldn’t exactly say in so many words that Mr Harding was legally entitled to, etc., etc., etc., and ended in expressing a strong opinion that it would be madness to raise any further question on the matter, as the suit was to be – nay, was, abandoned.
Mr Harding, seated in his chair, began to play a slow tune on an imaginary violoncello.
‘Nay, my dear sir,’ continued the attorney-general, ‘there is no further ground for any question; I don’t see that you have the power of raising it.’
‘I can resign,’ said Mr Harding, slowly playing away with his right hand, as though the bow were beneath the chair in which he was sitting.
‘What! throw it up altogether?’ said the attorney-general, gazing with utter astonishment at his client.
‘Did you see those articles in the Jupiter?’ said Mr Harding, piteously, appealing to the sympathy of the lawyer.
Sir Abraham said he had seen them. This poor little clergyman, cowed into such an act of extreme weakness by a newspaper article, was to Sir Abraham so contemptible an object, that he hardly knew how to talk to him as to a rational being.
‘Hadn’t you better wait,’ said he, ‘till Dr Grantly is in town with you? Wouldn’t it be better to postpone any serious step till you can consult with him?’
Mr Harding declared vehemently that he could not wait, and Sir Abraham began seriously to doubt his sanity.
‘Of course,’ said the latter, ‘if you have private means sufficient for your wants, and if this –’
‘I haven’t a sixpence, Sir Abraham,’ said the warden.
‘God bless me! Why, Mr Harding, how do you mean to live?’
Mr Harding proceeded to explain to the man of law that he meant to keep his precentorship – that was eighty pounds a year; and, also, that he meant to fall back upon his own little living of Crabtree, which was another eighty pounds. That, to be sure, the duties of the two were hardly compatible; but perhaps he might effect an exchange. And then, recollecting that the attorney-general would hardly care to hear how the service of a cathedral church is divided among the minor canons, stopped short in his explanations.
Sir Abraham listened in pitying wonder. ‘I really think, Mr Harding, you had better wait for the archdeacon. This is a most serious step: one for which, in my opinion, there is not the slightest necessity; and, as you have done me the honour of asking my advice, I must implore you to do nothing without the approval of your friends. A man is never the best judge of his own position.’
‘A man is the best judge of what he feels himself. I’d sooner beg my bread till my death than read such another article as those two that have appeared, and feel, as I do, that the writer has truth on his side.’
‘Have you not a daughter, Mr Harding – an unmarried daughter?’
‘I have,’ said he, now standing also, but still playing away on his fiddle with his hand behind his back. ‘I have, Sir Abraham; and she and I are completely agreed on this subject.’
‘Pray excuse me, Mr Harding, if what I say seems impertinent: but surely it is you that should be prudent on her behalf. She is young, and does not know the meaning of living on an income of a hundred and fifty pounds a year. On her account give up this idea. Believe me, it is sheer Quixotism.’2
The warden walked away to the window, and then back to his chair; and then, irresolute what to say, took another turn to the window. The attorney-general was really extremely patient, but he was beginning to think that the interview had been long enough.
‘But if this income be not justly mine, what if she and I have both to beg?’ said the warden at last, sharply, and in a voice so different from that he had hitherto used, that Sir Abraham was startled. ‘If so, it would be better to beg.’
‘My dear sir, nobody now questions its justness.’
‘Yes, Sir Abraham, one does question it – the most important of all witnesses against me – I question it myself. My God knows whether or no I love my daughter; but I would sooner that she and I should both beg, than that she should live in comfort on money which is truly the property of the poor. It may seem strange to you, Sir Abraham, it is strange to myself, that I should have been ten years in that happy home, and not have thought of these things, till they were so roughly dinned into my ears. I cannot boast of my conscience, when it required the violence of a public newspaper to awaken it; but, now that it is awake, I must obey it. When I came here I did not know that the suit was withdrawn by Mr Bold, and my object was to beg you to abandon my defence. As there is no action, there can be no defence; but it is, at any rate, as well that you should know that, from tomorrow, I shall cease to be the warden of the hospital. My friends and I differ on this subject, Sir Abraham, and that adds much to my sorrow: but it cannot be helped.’ And, as he finished what he had to say, he played up such a tune as never before had graced the chambers of any attorney-general. He was standing up, gallantly fronting Sir Abraham, and his right arm passed with bold and rapid sweeps before him, as though he were embracing some huge instrument, which allowed him to stand thus erect; and with the fingers of his left hand he stopped, with preternatural velocity, a multitude of strings, which ranged from the top of his collar to the bottom of the lappet of his coat. Sir Abraham listened and looked in wonder. As he had never before seen Mr Harding, the meaning of these wild gesticulations was lost upon him; but he perceived that the gentleman who had a few minutes since been so subdued as to be unable to speak without hesitation, was now impassioned – nay, almost violent.
‘You’ll sleep on this, Mr Harding, and tomorrow –’
‘I have done more than sleep on it,’ said the warden; ‘I have laid awake upon it, and that night after night. I found I could not sleep upon it; now I hope to do so.’
The attorney-general had no answer to make to this; so he expressed a quiet hope that whatever settlement was finally made would be satisfactory; and Mr Harding withdrew, thanking the great man for his kind attention.
Mr Harding was sufficiently satisfied with the interview to feel a glow of comfort as he descended into the small old square of Lincoln’s Inn. It was a calm, bright, beautiful night, and by the light of the moon, even the chapel of Lincoln’s Inn, and the sombre row of chambers, which surround the quadrangle, looked well. He stood still a moment to collect his thoughts; and reflect on what he had done, and was about to do. He knew that the attorney-general regarded him as little better than a fool, but that he did not mind; he and the attorney-general had not much in common between them; he knew also that others, whom he did care about, would think so too; but Eleanor, he was sure, would exult in what he had done, and the bishop, he trusted, would sympathize with him.
In the meantime he had to meet the archdeacon, and so he walked slowly down Chancery Lane and along Fleet Street, feeling sure that his work for the night was not yet over. When he reached the hotel he rang the bell quietly, and with a palpitating heart; he almost longed to escape round the corner, and delay the coming storm by a further walk round St Paul’s Churchyard, but he heard the slow creaking shoes of the old waiter approaching, and he stood his ground manfully.
CHAPTER 18
The Warden is Very Obstinate
‘DR GRANTLY is here, sir,’ greeted his ears before the door was well open, ‘and Mrs Grantly; they have a sitting-room above, and are waiting up for you.’
There was something in the tone of the man’s voice which seemed to indicate that even he looked upon the warden as a runaway schoolboy, just recaptured by his guardian, and that he pitied the culprit, though he could not but be horrified at the crime.
The warden endeavoured to appear unconcerned, as he said, ‘Oh, indeed! I’ll go upstairs at once’; but he failed signally: there was, perhaps, a ray of comfort in the presence of his married daughter; that is to say, of comparative comfort, seeing that his son-in-law was there: but how much would he have preferred that they should both have been safe at Plumstead Episcopi! However, upstairs he went, the waiter slowly precedin
g him; and on the door being opened the archdeacon was discovered standing in the middle of the room, erect, indeed, as usual, but oh! how sorrowful! and on a dingy sofa behind him reclined his patient wife.
‘Papa, I thought you were never coming back,’ said the lady; ‘it’s twelve o’clock.’
‘Yes, my dear,’ said the warden. ‘The attorney-general named ten for my meeting; to be sure ten is late, but what could I do, you know? Great men will have their own way.’
And he gave his daughter a kiss, and shook hands with the doctor, and again tried to look unconcerned.
‘And you have absolutely been with the attorney-general?’ asked the archdeacon.
Mr Harding signified that he had.
‘Good heavens, how unfortunate!’ And the archdeacon raised his huge hands in the manner in which his friends are so accustomed to see him express disapprobation and astonishment. ‘What will Sir Abraham think of it? Did you not know that it is not customary for clients to go direct to their counsel?’
‘Isn’t it!’ asked the warden, innocently. ‘Well, at any rate, I’ve done it now. Sir Abraham didn’t seem to think it so very strange.’
The archdeacon gave a sigh that would have moved a man-of-war.
‘But, papa, what did you say to Sir Abraham?’ asked the lady.
‘I asked him, my dear, to explain John Hiram’s will to me. He couldn’t explain it in the only way which would have satisfied me, and so I resigned the wardenship.’
‘Resigned it!’ said the archdeacon, in a solemn voice, sad and low, but yet sufficiently audible; a sort of whisper that Macready1 would have envied, and the galleries have applauded with a couple of rounds. ‘Resigned it! Good heavens!’ and the dignitary of the Church sank back horrified into a horse-hair armchair.
‘At least I told Sir Abraham that I would resign; and of course I must now do so.’
‘Not at all,’ said the archdeacon, catching a ray of hope. ‘Nothing that you say in such a way to your own counsel can be in any way binding on you; of course you were there to ask his advice. I’m sure, Sir Abraham did not advise any such step.’
Mr Harding could not say that he had.
‘I am sure he disadvised you from it,’ continued the reverend cross-examiner.
Mr Harding could not deny this.
‘I’m sure Sir Abraham must have advised you to consult your friends.’
To this proposition also Mr Harding was obliged to assent.
‘Then your threat of resignation amounts to nothing, and we are just where we were before.’
Mr Harding was now standing on the rug, moving uneasily from one foot to the other. He made no distinct answer to the archdeacon’s last proposition, for his mind was chiefly engaged on thinking how he could escape to bed. That his resignation was a thing finally fixed on, a fact all but completed, was not in his mind a matter of any doubt; he knew his own weakness; he knew how prone he was to be led; but he was not weak enough to give way now, to go back from the position to which his conscience had driven him, after having purposely come to London to declare his determination: he did not in the least doubt his resolution, but he greatly doubted his power of defending it against his son-in-law.
‘You must be very tired, Susan,’ said he: ‘wouldn’t you like to go to bed?’
But Susan didn’t want to go till her husband went – she had an idea that her papa might be bullied if she were away: she wasn’t tired at all, or at least she said so.
The archdeacon was pacing the room, expressing, by certain noddles of his head, his opinion of the utter fatuity of his father-in-law.
‘Why,’ at last he said – and angels might have blushed at the rebuke expressed in his tone and emphasis – ‘why did you go off from Barchester so suddenly? Why did you take such a step without giving us notice, after what had passed at the palace?’
The warden hung his head, and made no reply: he could not condescend to say that he had not intended to give his son-in-law the slip; and as he had not the courage to avow it, he said nothing.
‘Papa has been too much for you,’ said the lady.
The archdeacon took another turn, and again ejaculated, ‘Good heavens!’ this time in a very low whisper, but still audible.
‘I think I’ll go to bed,’ said the warden, taking up a side candle.
‘At any rate you’ll promise me to take no further step without consultation,’ said the archdeacon. Mr Harding made no answer, but slowly proceeded to light his candle. ‘Of course,’ continued the other, ‘such a declaration as that you made to Sir Abraham means nothing. Come, warden, promise me this. The whole affair, you see, is already settled, and that with very little trouble or expense. Bold has been compelled to abandon his action, and all you have to do is to remain quiet at the hospital.’ Mr Harding still made no reply, but looked meekly into his son-in-law’s face. The archdeacon thought he knew his father-in-law, but he was mistaken; he thought that he had already talked over a vacillating man to resign his promise. ‘Come,’ said he, ‘promise Susan to give up this idea of resigning the wardenship.’
The warden looked at his daughter, thinking probably at the moment that if Eleanor were contented with him, he need not so much regard his other child, and said, ‘I am sure Susan will not ask me to break my word, or to do what I know to be wrong.’
‘Papa,’ said she, ‘it would be madness in you to throw up your preferment. What are you to live on?’
‘God, that feeds the young ravens,2 will take care of me also,’ said Mr Harding, with a smile, as though afraid of giving offence by making his reference to scripture too solemn.
‘Pish!’ said the archdeacon, turning away rapidly; ‘if the ravens persisted in refusing the food prepared for them, they wouldn’t be fed.’ A clergyman generally dislikes to be met in argument by any scriptural quotation; he feels as affronted as a doctor does, when recommended by an old woman to take some favourite dose, or as a lawyer when an unprofessional man attempts to put him down by a quibble.
‘I shall have the living of Crabtree,’ modestly suggested the warden.
‘Eighty pounds a year!’ sneered the archdeacon.
‘And the precentorship,’ said the father-in-law.
‘It goes with the wardenship,’ said the son-in-law. Mr Harding was prepared to argue this point, and began to do so, but Dr Grantly stopped him. ‘My dear warden,’ said he, ‘this is all nonsense. Eighty pounds or a hundred and sixty makes very little difference. You can’t live on it – you can’t ruin Eleanor’s prospects for ever. In point of fact, you can’t resign; the bishop wouldn’t accept it; the whole thing is settled. What I now want to do is to prevent any inconvenient tittle-tattle – any more newspaper articles.’
‘That’s what I want, too,’ said the warden.
‘And to prevent that,’ continued the other, ‘we mustn’t let any talk of resignation get abroad.’
‘But I shall resign,’ said the warden, very, very meekly.
‘Good heavens! Susan, my dear, what can I say to him?’
‘But, papa,’ said Mrs Grantly, getting up, and putting her arm through that of her father, ‘what is Eleanor to do if you throw away your income?’
A hot tear stood in each of the warden’s eyes as he looked round upon his married daughter. Why should one sister who was so rich predict poverty for another? some such idea as this was on his mind, but he gave no utterance to it. Then he thought of the pelican feeding its young with blood from its own breast, but he gave no utterance to that either; and then of Eleanor waiting for him at home, waiting to congratulate him on the end of all his trouble.
“Think of Eleanor, papa,’ said Mrs Grantly.
‘I do think of her,’ said her father.
‘And you will not do this rash thing!’ The lady was really moved beyond her usual calm composure.
‘It can never be rash to do right,’ said he. ‘I shall certainly resign this wardenship.’
‘Then, Mr Harding, there is nothing before you but ruin,�
�� said the archdeacon, now moved beyond all endurance. ‘Ruin both for you and Eleanor. How do you mean to pay the monstrous expenses of this action?’
Mrs Grantly suggested that, as the action was abandoned, the costs would not be heavy.
‘Indeed they will, my dear,’ continued he. ‘One cannot have the attorney-general up at twelve o’clock at night for nothing – but of course your father has not thought of this.’
‘I will sell my furniture,’ said the warden.
‘Furniture!’ ejaculated the other, with a most powerful sneer.
‘Come, archdeacon,’ said the lady, ‘we needn’t mind that at present. You know you never expected papa to pay the costs.’
‘Such absurdity is enough to provoke Job,’3 said the archdeacon, marching quickly up and down the room. ‘Your father is like a child. Eight hundred pounds a year! – eight hundred and eighty with the house – with nothing to do. The very place for him. And to throw that up because some scoundrel writes an article in a newspaper! Well – I have done my duty. If he chooses to ruin his child I cannot help it’; and he stood still at the fireplace, and looked at himself in a dingy mirror which stood on the chimneypiece.
There was a pause for about a minute, and then the warden, finding that nothing else was coming, lighted his candle, and quietly said, ‘Good night.’
‘Good night, papa,’ said the lady.
And so the warden retired; but, as he closed the door behind him, he heard the well-known ejaculation – slower, lower, more solemn, more ponderous than ever – ‘Good heavens!’
CHAPTER 19
The Warden Resigns
THE party met the next morning at breakfast; and a very sombre affair it was – very unlike the breakfasts at Plumstead Episcopi.
There were three thin, small, dry bits of bacon, each an inch long, served up under a huge old plated cover; there were four three-cornered bits of dry toast, and four square bits of buttered toast; there was a loaf of bread, and some oily-looking butter; and on the sideboard there were the remains of a cold shoulder of mutton. The archdeacon, however, had not come up from his rectory to St Paul’s Churchyard to enjoy himself, and therefore nothing was said of the scanty fare.
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