in his pink coat.
“My dear fellow, Fothergill tells me that you have some hesitation about going to Gatherum Castle.”
“Well, I did decline, certainly. You know I am not a man of pleasure, as you are. I have some duties to attend to.”
“Gammon!” said Mr. Sowerby; and as he said it, he looked with a kind of derisive smile into the clergyman’s face.
“It is easy enough to say that, Sowerby; and perhaps I have no right to expect that you should understand me.”
“Ah, but I do understand you; and I say it is gammon. I would be the last man in the world to ridicule your scruples about duty, if this hesitation on your part arose from any such scruple. But answer me honestly, do you not know that such is not the case?”
“I know nothing of the kind.”
“Ah, but I think you do. If you persist in refusing this invitation will it not be because you are afraid of making Lady Lufton angry? I do not know what there can be in that woman that she is able to hold both you and Lufton in leading-strings.” Robarts, of course, denied the charge, and protested that he was not to be taken back to his own parsonage by any fear of Lady Lufton. But though he made such protest with warmth, he knew that he did so ineffectually. Sowerby only smiled, and said that the proof of the pudding was in the eating.
“What is the good of a man keeping a curate if it be not to save him from that sort of drudgery?” he asked.
“Drudgery! If I were a drudge how could I be here to-day?”
“Well, Robarts, look here. I am speaking now, perhaps, with more of the energy of an old friend than circumstances fully warrant; but I am an older man than you, and as I have a regard for you I do not like to see you throw up a good game when it is in your hands.”
“Oh, as far as that goes, Sowerby, I need hardly tell you that I appreciate your kindness.”
“If you are content,” continued the man of the world, “to live at Framley all your life, and to warm yourself in the sunshine of the dowager there, why, in such case, it may perhaps be useless for you to extend the circle of your friends; but if you have higher ideas than these, you will be very wrong to omit the present opportunity of going to the duke’s. I never knew the duke go so much out of his way to be civil to a clergyman as he has done in this instance.”
“I am sure I am very much obliged to him.”
“The fact is, that you may, if you please, make yourself popular in the county; but you cannot do it by obeying all Lady Lufton’s behests. She is a dear old woman, I am sure.”
“She is, Sowerby; and you would say so, if you knew her.”
“I don’t doubt it; but it would not do for you or me to live exactly according to her ideas. Now, here, in this case, the bishop of the diocese is to be one of the party, and he has, I believe, already expressed a wish that you should be another.”
“He asked me if I were going.”
“Exactly; and Archdeacon Grantly will be there.”
“Will he?” asked Mark. Now, that would be a great point gained, for Archdeacon Grantly was a close friend of Lady Lufton.
“So I understand from Fothergill. Indeed, it will be very wrong of you not to go, and I tell you so plainly; and what is more, when you talk about your duty—you having a curate as you have—why, it is gammon.” These last words he spoke looking back over his shoulder as he stood up in his stirrups, for he had caught the eye of the huntsman, who was surrounded by his bounds, and was now trotting on to join him. During a great portion of the day, Mark found himself riding by the side of Mrs. Proudie, as that lady leaned back in her carriage. And Mrs. Proudie smiled on him graciously, though her daughter would not do so. Mrs. Proudie was fond of having an attendant clergyman; and as it was evident that Mr. Robarts lived among nice people—titled dowagers, members of Parliament, and people of that sort—she was quite willing to install him as a sort of honorary chaplain pro tem.
“I’ll tell you what we have settled, Mrs. Harold Smith and I,” said Mrs. Proudie to him. “This lecture at Barchester will be so late on Saturday evening, that you had all better come and dine with us.” Mark bowed and thanked her, and declared that he should be very happy to make one of such a party. Even Lady Lufton could not object to this, although she was not especially fond of Mrs. Proudie.
“And then they are to sleep at the hotel. It will really be too late for ladies to think of going back so far at this time of the year. I told Mrs. Harold Smith, and Miss Dunstable, too, that we could manage to make room at any rate for them. But they will not leave the other ladies; so they go to the hotel for that night. But, Mr. Robarts, the bishop will never allow you to stay at the inn, so of course you will take a bed at the palace.”
It immediately occurred to Mark that as the lecture was to be given on Saturday evening, the next morning would be Sunday; and, on that Sunday, he would have to preach at Chaldicotes. “I thought they were all going to return the same night,” said he.
“Well, they did intend it; but you see Mrs. Smith is afraid.”
“I should have to get back here on the Sunday morning, Mrs. Proudie.”
“Ah, yes, that is bad—very bad indeed. No one dislikes any interference with the Sabbath more than I do. Indeed, if I am particular about anything it is about that. But some works are works of necessity, Mr. Robarts; are they not? Now you must necessarily be back at Chaldicotes on Sunday morning!” And so the matter was settled. Mrs. Proudie was very firm in general in the matter of Sabbath-day observances; but when she had to deal with such persons as Mrs. Harold Smith, it was expedient that she should give way a little. “You can start as soon as it’s daylight, you know, if you like it, Mr. Robarts,” said Mrs. Proudie.
There was not much to boast of as to the hunting, but it was a very pleasant day for the ladies. The men rode up and down the grass roads through the chase, sometimes in the greatest possible hurry as though they never could go quick enough; and then the coachmen would drive very fast also, though they did not know why, for a fast pace of movement is another of those contagious diseases. And then again the sportsmen would move at an undertaker’s pace, when the fox had traversed and the hounds would be at a loss to know which was the hunt and which was the heel; and then the carriage also would go slowly, and the ladies would stand up and talk. And then the time for lunch came; and altogether the day went by pleasantly enough.
“And so that’s hunting, is it?” said Miss Dunstable.
“Yes, that’s hunting,” said Mr. Sowerby.
“I did not see any gentleman do anything that I could not do myself, except there was one young man slipped off into the mud; and I shouldn’t like that.”
“But there was no breaking of bones, was there, my dear?” said Mrs. Harold Smith.
“And nobody caught any foxes,” said Miss Dunstable. “The fact is, Mrs. Smith, that I don’t think much more of their sport than I do of their business. I shall take to hunting a pack of hounds myself after this.”
“Do, my dear, and I’ll be your whipper-in. I wonder whether Mrs. Proudie would join us.”
“I shall be writing to the duke tonight,” said Mr. Fothergill to Mark, as they were all riding up to the stableyard together. “You will let me tell his grace that you will accept his invitation—will you not?”
“Upon my word, the duke is very kind,” said Mark.
“He is very anxious to know you, I can assure you,” said Fothergill. What could a young flattered fool of a parson do, but say that he would go? Mark did say that he would go; and in the course of the evening his friend Mr. Sowerby congratulated him, and the bishop joked with him and said that he knew that he would not give up good company so soon; and Miss Dunstable said she would make him her chaplain as soon as Parliament would allow quack doctors to have such articles—an allusion which Mark did not understand, till he learned