‘Which do you please to mean, sir – the Town or the House? I beg your pardon for asking, but they both go by the same name in these parts.’
He spoke with a timid gentleness of tone, an ingratiatory smile, and an anxious courtesy of manner, all distressingly suggestive of his being accustomed to receive rough answers in exchange for his own politeness, from the persons whom he habitually addressed.
‘I was not aware that both the House and the Town went by the same name,’ said Midwinter: ‘I meant the House.’ He instinctively conquered his own shyness as he answered in those words; speaking with a cordiality of manner which was very rare with him in his intercourse with strangers.
The man of miserable-respectability seemed to feel the warm return of his own politeness gratefully: he brightened and took a little courage. His lean forefinger pointed eagerly to the right road. ‘That way, sir,’ he said, ‘and when you come to two roads next, please take the left one of the two. I am sorry I have business the other way – I mean in the town. I should have been happy to go with you, and show you. Fine summer weather, sir, for walking? You can’t miss your way if you keep to the left. Oh, don’t mention it! I’m afraid I have detained you, sir. I wish you a pleasant walk back, and – good morning.’
By the time he had made an end of speaking (under an impression apparently that the more he talked the more polite he would be) he had lost his courage again. He darted away down his own road, as if Midwinter’s attempts to thank him, involved a series of trials too terrible to confront. In two minutes more, his black retreating figure had lessened in the distance till it looked again, what it had once looked already, a moving blot on the brilliant white surface of the sun-brightened road.
The man ran strangely in Midwinter’s thoughts while he took his way back to the house. He was at a loss to account for it. It never occurred to him that he might have been insensibly reminded of himself, when he saw the plain traces of past misfortune and present nervous suffering in the poor wretch’s face. He blindly resented his own perverse interest in this chance foot-passenger on the high road, as he had resented all else that had happened to him since the beginning of the day. ‘Have I made another unlucky discovery?’ he asked himself impatiently. ‘Shall I see this man again, I wonder? who can he be?’
Time was to answer both those questions before many days more had passed over the inquirer’s head.
Allan had not returned when Midwinter reached the house. Nothing had happened but the arrival of a message of apology from the cottage. ‘Major Milroy’s compliments, and he was sorry that Mrs Milroy’s illness would prevent his receiving Mr Armadale that day.’ It was plain that Mrs Milroy’s occasional fits of suffering (or of ill-temper) created no mere transitory disturbance of the tranquillity of the household. Drawing this natural inference, after what he had himself heard at the cottage nearly three hours since, Midwinter withdrew into the library to wait patiently among the books until his friend came back.
It was past six o’clock, when the well-known hearty voice was heard again in the hall. Allan burst into the library, in a state of irrepressible excitement, and pushed Midwinter back unceremoniously into the chair from which he was just rising, before he could utter a word.
‘Here’s a riddle for you, old boy!’ cried Allan. ‘Why am I like the resident manager of the Augean stable, before Hercules was called in to sweep the litter out? Because I have had my place to keep up, and I’ve gone and made an infernal mess of it! Why don’t you laugh? By George, he doesn’t see the point! Let’s try again. Why am I like the resident manager?—’
‘For God’s sake, Allan, be serious for a moment!’ interposed Midwinter. ‘You don’t know how anxious I am to hear if you have recovered the good opinion of your neighbours.’
‘That’s just what the riddle was intended to tell you!’ rejoined Allan. ‘But if you will have it in so many words, my own impression is that you would have done better not to disturb me under that tree in the park. I’ve been calculating it to a nicety, and I beg to inform you that I have sunk exactly three degrees lower in the estimation of the resident gentry since I had the pleasure of seeing you last.’
‘You will have your joke out,’ said Midwinter, bitterly. ‘Well, if I can’t laugh, I can wait.’
‘My dear fellow, I’m not joking; I really mean what I say. You shall hear what happened – you shall have a report in full of my first visit. It will do, I can promise you, as a sample for all the rest. Mind this, in the first place, I’ve gone wrong, with the best possible intentions. When I started for these visits, I own I was angry with that old brute of a lawyer, and I certainly had a notion of carrying things with a high hand. But it wore off somehow on the road; and the first family I called on, I went in as I tell you with the best possible intentions. Oh dear, dear! there was the same spick-and-span reception room for me to wait in, with the neat conservatory beyond, which I saw again and again and again at every other house I went to afterwards. There was the same choice selection of books for me to look at – a religious book, a book about the Duke of Wellington, a book about sporting, and a book about nothing in particular, beautifully illustrated with pictures. Down came papa with his nice white hair, and mamma with her nice lace cap; down came young Mister with the pink face and the straw-coloured whiskers, and young Miss with the plump cheeks and the large petticoats. Don’t suppose there was the least unfriendliness on my side; I always began with them in the same way – I insisted on shaking hands all round. That staggered them to begin with. When I came to the sore subject next – the subject of the public reception – I give you my word of honour I took the greatest possible pains with my apologies. It hadn’t the slightest effect; they let my apologies in at one ear and out at the other, and then waited to hear more. Some men would have been disheartened: I tried another way with them; I addressed myself to the master of the house, and put it pleasantly next. “The fact is,” I said, “I wanted to escape the speechifying – my getting up, you know, and telling you to your face, you’re the best of men, and I beg to propose your health; and you’re getting up, and telling me to my face, I’m the best of men, and you beg to thank me; and so on, man after man, praising each other and pestering each other all round the table.” That’s how I put it, in an easy, light-handed, convincing sort of way. Do you think any of them took it in the same friendly spirit? Not one! It’s my belief they had got their speeches ready for the reception, with the flags and the flowers, and that they’re secretly angry with me for stopping their open mouths just as they were ready to begin. Anyway, whenever we came to the matter of the speechifying (whether they touched it first or I), down I fell in their estimation the first of those three steps I told you of just now. Don’t suppose I made no efforts to get up again! I made desperate efforts. I found they were all anxious to know what sort of life I had led before I came in for the Thorpe-Ambrose property, and I did my best to satisfy them. And what came of that, do you think? Hang me, if I didn’t disappoint them for the second time! When they found out that I had actually never been to Eton or Harrow, or Oxford or Cambridge, they were quite dumb with astonishment. I fancy they thought me a sort of outlaw. At any rate, they all froze up again – and down I fell the second step in their estimation. Never mind! I wasn’t to be beaten; I had promised you to do my best, and I did it. I tried cheerful small-talk about the neighbourhood next. The women said nothing in particular; the men, to my unutterable astonishment, all began to condole with me. I shouldn’t be able to find a pack of hounds, they said, within twenty miles of my house; and they thought it only right to prepare me for the disgracefully careless manner in which the Thorpe-Ambrose covers had been preserved. I let them go on condoling with me, and then what do you think I did? I put my foot in it again. “Oh, don’t take that to heart!” I said; “I don’t care two straws about hunting or shooting, either. When I meet with a bird in my walk, I can’t for the life of me feel eager to kill it – I rather like to see the bird flying about and enjoying itself
.” You should have seen their faces! They had thought me a sort of outlaw before; now they evidently thought me mad. Dead silence fell upon them all; and down I tumbled the third step in the general estimation. It was just the same at the next house, and the next, and the next. The devil possessed us all, I think. It would come out, now in one way and now in another, that I couldn’t make speeches – that I had been brought up without a university education – and that I could enjoy a ride on horseback without galloping after a wretched stinking fox or a poor distracted little hare. Those three unlucky defects of mine are not excused, it seems, in a country gentleman (especially when he has dodged a public reception to begin with). I think I got on best, upon the whole, with the wives and daughters. The women and I always fell, sooner or later, on the subject of Mrs Blanchard and her niece. We invariably agreed that they had done wisely in going to Florence; and the only reason we had to give for our opinion was – that we thought their minds would be benefited after their sad bereavement, by the contemplation of the masterpieces of Italian Art. Every one of the ladies – I solemnly declare it – at every house I went to, came sooner or later to Mrs and Miss Blanchard’s bereavement, and the masterpieces of Italian Art. What we should have done without that bright idea to help us, I really don’t know. The one pleasant thing at any of the visits was when we all shook our heads together, and declared that the masterpieces would console them. As for the rest of it, there’s only one thing more to be said. What I might be in other places I don’t know – I’m the wrong man in the wrong place here. Let me muddle on for the future in my own way, with my own few friends; and ask me anything else in the world, as long as you don’t ask me to make any more calls on my neighbours.’
With that characteristic request, Allan’s report of his exploring expedition among the resident gentry came to a close. For a moment Midwinter remained silent. He had allowed Allan to run on from first to last without uttering a word on his side. The disastrous result of the visits – coming after what had happened earlier in the day; and threatening Allan, as it did, with exclusion from all local sympathies at the very outset of his local career – had broken down Midwinter’s power of resisting the stealthily-depressing influence of his own superstition. It was with an effort that he now looked up at Allan; it was with an effort that he roused himself to answer.
‘It shall be as you wish,’ he said, quietly. ‘I am sorry for what has happened – but I am not the less obliged to you, Allan, for having done what I asked you.’
His head sank on his breast; and the fatalist resignation which had once already quieted him on board the Wreck, now quieted him again. ‘What must be, will be,’ he thought once more. ‘What have I to do with the future, and what has he?’
‘Cheer up!’ said Allan. ‘Your affairs are in a thriving condition at any rate. I paid one pleasant visit in the town, which I haven’t told you of yet. I’ve seen Pedgift, and Pedgift’s son, who helps him in the office. They’re the two jolliest lawyers I ever met with in my life – and what’s more, they can produce the very man you want to teach you the steward’s business.’
Midwinter looked up quickly. Distrust of Allan’s discovery was plainly written in his face already; but he said nothing.
‘I thought of you,’ Allan proceeded, ‘as soon as the two Pedgifts and I had had a glass of wine all round to drink to our friendly connection. The finest sherry I ever tasted in my life; I’ve ordered some of the same – but that’s not the question just now. In two words I told these worthy fellows your difficulty, and in two seconds old Pedgift understood all about it. “I have got the man in my office,” he said, “and before the audit-day comes, I’ll place him with the greatest pleasure at your friend’s disposal.”’2
At this last announcement, Midwinter’s distrust found its expression in words. He questioned Allan unsparingly. The man’s name, it appeared, was Bashwood. He had been some time (how long, Allan could not remember) in Mr Pedgift’s service. He had been previously steward to a Norfolk gentleman (name forgotten) in the westward district of the county. He had lost the steward’s place, through some domestic trouble, in connection with his son, the precise nature of which Allan was not able to specify. Pedgift vouched for him, and Pedgift would send him to Thorpe-Ambrose two or three days before the rent-day dinner. He could not be spared, for office reasons, before that time. There was no need to fidget about it; Pedgift laughed at the idea of there being any difficulty with the tenants. Two or three days’ work over the steward’s books with a man to help Midwinter who practically understood that sort of thing, would put him all right for the audit; and the other business would keep till afterwards.
‘Have you seen this Mr Bashwood yourself, Allan?’ asked Midwinter, still obstinately on his guard.
‘No,’ replied Allan; ‘he was out – out with the bag, as young Pedgift called it. They tell me he’s a decent elderly man. A little broken by his troubles, and a little apt to be nervous and confused in his manner with strangers; but thoroughly competent and thoroughly to be depended on – those are Pedgift’s own words.’
Midwinter paused and considered a little, with a new interest in the subject. The strange man whom he had just heard described, and the strange man of whom he had asked his way where the three roads met, were remarkably like each other. Was this another link in the fast-lengthening chain of events? Midwinter grew doubly determined to be careful, as the bare doubt that it might be so passed through his mind.
‘When Mr Bashwood comes,’ he said, ‘will you let me see him, and speak to him, before anything definite is done?’
‘Of course I will!’ rejoined Allan. He stopped and looked at his watch. ‘And I’ll tell you what I’ll do for you, old boy, in the meantime,’ he added; ‘I’ll introduce you to the prettiest girl in Norfolk! There’s just time to run over to the cottage before dinner. Come along, and be introduced to Miss Milroy.’
‘You can’t introduce me to Miss Milroy to-day,’ replied Midwinter; and he repeated the message of apology which had been brought from the major that afternoon. Allan was surprised and disappointed; but he was not to be foiled in his resolution to advance himself in the good graces of the inhabitants of the cottage. After a little consideration he hit on a means of turning the present adverse circumstances to good account. ‘I’ll show a proper anxiety for Mrs Milroy’s recovery,’ he said gravely. ‘I’ll send her a basket of strawberries, with my best respects, tomorrow morning.’
Nothing more happened to mark the end of that first day in the new house.
The one noticeable event of the next day was another disclosure of Mrs Milroy’s infirmity of temper. Half-an-hour after Allan’s basket of strawberries had been delivered at the cottage, it was returned to him intact (by the hands of the invalid lady’s nurse), with a short and sharp message, shortly and sharply delivered. ‘Mrs Milroy’s compliments, and thanks. Strawberries invariably disagreed with her.’ If this curiously petulant acknowledgment of an act of politeness was intended to irritate Allan, it failed entirely in accomplishing its object. Instead of being offended with the mother, he sympathized with the daughter. ‘Poor little thing,’ was all he said, ‘she must have a hard life of it with such a mother as that!’
He called at the cottage himself later in the day, but Miss Milroy was not to be seen; she was engaged upstairs. The major received his visitor in his working apron – far more deeply immersed in his wonderful clock, and far less readily accessible to outer influences than Allan had seen him at their first interview. His manner was as kind as before; but not a word more could be extracted from him on the subject of his wife, than that Mrs Milroy ‘had not improved since yesterday’.3
The two next days passed quietly and uneventfully. Allan persisted in making his inquiries at the cottage; but all he saw of the major’s daughter was a glimpse of her on one occasion, at a window on the bedroom floor. Nothing more was heard from Mr Pedgift; and Mr Bash-wood’s appearance was still delayed. Midwinter declined to move in the matter un
til time enough had passed to allow of his first hearing from Mr Brock, in answer to the letter which he had addressed to the rector on the night of his arrival at Thorpe-Ambrose. He was unusually silent and quiet, and passed most of his hours in the library among the books. The time wore on wearily. The resident gentry acknowledged Allan’s visit by formally leaving their cards. Nobody came near the house afterwards; the weather was monotonously fine. Allan grew a little restless and dissatisfied. He began to resent Mrs Milroy’s illness; he began to think regretfully of his deserted yacht.
The next day – the twentieth – brought some news with it from the outer world. A message was delivered from Mr Pedgift, announcing that his clerk, Mr Bashwood, would personally present himself at Thorpe-Ambrose on the following day; and a letter in answer to Midwinter was received from Mr Brock.
The letter was dated the 18th, and the news which it contained raised, not Allan’s spirits only, but Midwinter’s as well. On the day on which he wrote, Mr Brock announced that he was about to journey to London; having been summoned thither on business connected with the interests of a sick relative, to whom he stood in the position of trustee. The business completed, he had good hope of finding one or other of his clerical friends in the metropolis who would be able and willing to do duty for him at the rectory; and, in that case, he trusted to travel on from London to Thorpe-Ambrose in a week’s time or less. Under these circumstances, he would leave the majority of the subjects on which Midwinter had written to him to be discussed when they met. But as time might be of importance, in relation to the stewardship of the Thorpe-Ambrose estate, he would say at once that he saw no reason why Midwinter should not apply his mind to learning the steward’s duties, and should not succeed in rendering himself invaluably serviceable in that way to the interests of his friend.
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