or even Barchester close was better than the world at large.
They were most irregular in their hours. The father was generally the earliest in the breakfast-parlour, and Charlotte would soon follow and give him his coffee, but the others breakfasted anywhere, anyhow, and at any time. On the morning after the archdeacon’s futile visit to the palace, Dr. Stanhope came downstairs with an ominously dark look about his eyebrows; his white locks were rougher than usual, and he breathed thickly and loudly as he took his seat in his armchair. He had open letters in his hand, and when Charlotte came into the room, he was still reading them. She went up and kissed him as was her wont, but he hardly noticed her as she did so, and she knew at once that something was the matter.
“What’s the meaning of that?” said he, throwing over the table a letter with a Milan postmark. Charlotte was a little frightened as she took it up, but her mind was relieved when she saw that it was merely the bill of their Italian milliner. The sum total was certainly large, but not so large as to create an important row.
“It’s for our clothes, Papa, for six months before we came here. The three of us can’t dress for nothing, you know.”
“Nothing, indeed!” said he, looking at the figures which, in Milanese denominations, were certainly monstrous.
“The man should have sent it to me,” said Charlotte.
“I wish he had with all my heart — if you would have paid it. I see enough in it to know that three quarters of it are for Madeline.”
“She has little else to amuse her, sir,” said Charlotte with true good nature.
“And I suppose he has nothing else to amuse him,” said the doctor, throwing over another letter to his daughter. It was from some member of the family of Sidonia, and politely requested the father to pay a small trifle of £700, being the amount of a bill discounted in favour of Mr. Ethelbert Stanhope and now overdue for a period of nine months.
Charlotte read the letter, slowly folded it up, and put it under the edge of the tea-tray.
“I suppose he has nothing to amuse him but discounting bills with Jews. Does he think I’ll pay that?”
“I am sure he thinks no such thing,” said she.
“And who does he think will pay it?”
“As far as honesty goes I suppose it won’t much matter if it is never paid,” said she. “I dare say he got very little of it.”
“I suppose it won’t much matter either,” said the father, “if he goes to prison and rots there. It seems to me that that’s the other alternative.”
Dr. Stanhope spoke of the custom of his youth. But his daughter, though she had lived so long abroad, was much more completely versed in the ways of the English world. “If the man arrests him,” said she, “he must go through the court.”
It is thus, thou great family of Sidonia — it is thus that we Gentiles treat thee, when, in our extremest need, thou and thine have aided us with mountains of gold as big as lions — and occasionally with wine-warrants and orders for dozens of dressing-cases.
“What, and become an insolvent?” said the doctor.
“He’s that already,” said Charlotte, wishing always to get over a difficulty.
“What a condition,” said the doctor, “for the son of a clergyman of the Church of England.”
“I don’t see why clergymen’s sons should pay their debts more than other young men,” said Charlotte.
“He’s had as much from me since he left school as is held sufficient for the eldest son of many a nobleman,” said the angry father.
“Well, sir,” said Charlotte, “give him another chance.”
“What!” said the doctor, “do you mean that I am to pay that Jew?”
“Oh, no! I wouldn’t pay him, he must take his chance; and if the worst comes to the worst, Bertie must go abroad. But I want you to be civil to Bertie and let him remain here as long as we stop. He has a plan in his head that may put him on his feet after all.”
“Has he any plan for following up his profession?”
“Oh, he’ll do that too, but that must follow. He’s thinking of getting married.”
Just at that moment the door opened, and Bertie came in whistling. The doctor immediately devoted himself to his egg and allowed Bertie to whistle himself round to his sister’s side without noticing him.
Charlotte gave a sign to him with her eye, first glancing at her father, and then at the letter, the corner of which peeped out from under the tea-tray. Bertie saw and understood, and with the quiet motion of a cat he abstracted the letter and made himself acquainted with its contents. The doctor, however, had seen him, deep as he appeared to be mersed in his egg-shell, and said in his harshest voice, “Well, sir, do you know that gentleman?”
“Yes, sir,” said Bertie. “I have a sort of acquaintance with him, but none that can justify him in troubling you. If you will allow me, sir, I will answer this.”
“At any rate I shan’t,” said the father, and then he added, after a pause, “Is it true, sir, that you owe the man £700?”
“Well,” said Bertie, “I think I should be inclined to dispute the amount, if I were in a condition to pay him such of it as I really do owe him.”
“Has he your bill for £700?” said the father, speaking very loudly and very angrily.
“Well, I believe he has,” said Bertie, “but all the money I ever got from him was £150.”
“And what became of the £550?”
“Why, sir, the commission was £100 or so, and I took the remainder in paving-stones and rocking-horses.”
“Paving-stones and rocking-horses!” said the doctor. “Where are they?”
“Oh, sir, I suppose they are in London somewhere — but I’ll inquire if you wish for them.”
“He’s an idiot,” said the doctor, “and it’s sheer folly to waste more money on him. Nothing can save him from ruin,” and so saying, the unhappy father walked out of the room.
“Would the governor like to have the paving-stones?” said Bertie to his sister.
“I’ll tell you what,” said she. “If you don’t take care, you will find yourself loose upon the world without even a house over your head; you don’t know him as well as I do. He’s very angry.”
Bertie stroked his big beard, sipped his tea, chatted over his misfortunes in a half-comic, half-serious tone, and ended by promising his sister that he would do his very best to make himself agreeable to the Widow Bold. Then Charlotte followed her father to his own room, softened down his wrath, and persuaded him to say nothing more about the Jew bill discounter, at any rate for a few weeks. He even went so far as to say he would pay the £700, or at any rate settle the bill, if he saw a certainty of his son’s securing for himself anything like a decent provision in life. Nothing was said openly between them about poor Eleanor, but the father and the daughter understood each other.
They all met together in the drawing-room at nine o’clock, in perfect good humour with each other, and about that hour Mrs. Bold was announced. She had never been in the house before, though she had of course called, and now she felt it strange to find herself there in her usual evening dress, entering the drawing-room of these strangers in this friendly, unceremonious way, as though she had known them all her life. But in three minutes they made her at home. Charlotte tripped downstairs and took her bonnet from her, and Bertie came to relieve her from her shawl, and the signora smiled on her as she could smile when she chose to be gracious, and the old doctor shook hands with her in a kind benedictory manner that went to her heart at once and made her feel that he must be a good man.
She had