mistress was not well enough to attend prayers and that she would breakfast in her own room. Here she was visited by her father, and declared to him her intention of returning immediately to Barchester. He was hardly surprised by the announcement. All the household seemed to be aware that something had gone wrong. Everyone walked about with subdued feet, and people’s shoes seemed to creak more than usual. There was a look of conscious intelligence on the faces of the women, and the men attempted, but in vain, to converse as though nothing were the matter. All this had weighed heavily on the heart of Mr. Harding, and when Eleanor told him that her immediate return to Barchester was a necessity, he merely sighed piteously and said that he would be ready to accompany her.
But here she objected strenuously. She had a great wish, she said, to go alone; a great desire that it might be seen that her father was not implicated in her quarrel with Dr. Grantly. To this at last he gave way; but not a word passed between them about Mr. Slope—not a word was said, not a question asked as to the serious interview on the preceding evening. There was, indeed, very little confidence between them, though neither of them knew why it should be so. Eleanor once asked him whether he would not call upon the bishop, but he answered rather tartly that he did not know—he did not think he should, but he could not say just at present. And so they parted. Each was miserably anxious for some show of affection, for some return of confidence, for some sign of the feeling that usually bound them together. But none was given. The father could not bring himself to question his daughter about her supposed lover, and the daughter would not sully her mouth by repeating the odious word with which Dr. Grantly had roused her wrath. And so they parted.
There was some trouble in arranging the method of Eleanor’s return. She begged her father to send for a postchaise, but when Mrs. Grantly heard of this, she objected strongly. If Eleanor would go away in dudgeon with the archdeacon, why should she let all the servants and all the neighbourhood know that she had done so? So at last Eleanor consented to make use of the Plumstead carriage, and as the archdeacon had gone out immediately after breakfast and was not to return till dinnertime, she also consented to postpone her journey till after lunch, and to join the family at that time. As to the subject of the quarrel not a word was said by anyone. The affair of the carriage was arranged by Mr. Harding, who acted as Mercury between the two ladies; they, when they met, kissed each other very lovingly and then sat down each to her crochet work as though nothing was amiss in all the world.
Chapter XXX.
Another Love Scene
But there was another visitor at the rectory whose feelings in this unfortunate matter must be somewhat strictly analysed. Mr. Arabin had heard from his friend of the probability of Eleanor’s marriage with Mr. Slope with amazement, but not with incredulity. It has been said that he was not in love with Eleanor, and up to this period this certainly had been true. But as soon as he heard that she loved someone else, he began to be very fond of her himself. He did not make up his mind that he wished to have her for his wife; he had never thought of her, and did not now think of her, in connexion with himself; but he experienced an inward, indefinable feeling of deep regret, a gnawing sorrow, an unconquerable depression of spirits, and also a species of self-abasement that he—he, Mr. Arabin—had not done something to prevent that other he, that vile he whom he so thoroughly despised, from carrying off this sweet prize.
Whatever man may have reached the age of forty unmarried without knowing something of such feelings must have been very successful or else very cold-hearted.
Mr. Arabin had never thought of trimming the sails of his bark so that he might sail as convoy to this rich argosy. He had seen that Mrs. Bold was beautiful, but he had not dreamt of making her beauty his own. He knew that Mrs. Bold was rich, but he had had no more idea of appropriating her wealth than that of Dr. Grantly. He had discovered that Mrs. Bold was intelligent, warm-hearted, agreeable, sensible, all in fact that a man could wish his wife to be; but the higher were her attractions, the greater her claims to consideration, the less had he imagined that he might possibly become the possessor of them. Such had been his instinct rather than his thoughts, so humble and so diffident. Now his diffidence was to be rewarded by his seeing this woman, whose beauty was to his eyes perfect, whose wealth was such as to have deterred him from thinking of her, whose widowhood would have silenced him had he not been so deterred, by his seeing her become the prey of—Obadiah Slope!
On the morning of Mrs. Bold’s departure he got on his horse to ride over to St. Ewold’s. As he rode he kept muttering to himself a line from Van Artevelde,
How little flattering is woman’s love.
And then he strove to recall his mind and to think of other affairs—his parish, his college, his creed—but his thoughts would revert to Mr. Slope and the Flemish chieftain.
When we think upon it,
How little flattering is woman’s love,
Given commonly to whosoe’er is nearest
And propped with most advantage.
It was not that Mrs. Bold should marry anyone but him—he had not put himself forward as a suitor—but that she should marry Mr. Slope; and so he repeated over again—
Outward grace
Nor inward light is needful—day by day
Men wanting both are mated with the best
And loftiest of God’s feminine creation,
Whose love takes no distinction but of gender,
And ridicules the very name of choice.
And so he went on, troubled much in his mind.
He had but an uneasy ride of it that morning, and little good did he do at St. Ewold’s.
The necessary alterations in his house were being fast completed, and he walked through the rooms, and went up and down the stairs, and rambled through the garden, but he could not wake himself to much interest about them. He stood still at every window to look out and think upon Mr. Slope. At almost every window he had before stood and chatted with Eleanor. She and Mrs. Grantly had been there continually; and while Mrs. Grantly had been giving orders, and seeing that orders had been complied with, he and Eleanor had conversed on all things appertaining to a clergyman’s profession. He thought how often he had laid down the law to her and how sweetly she had borne with his somewhat dictatorial decrees. He remembered her listening intelligence, her gentle but quick replies, her interest in all that concerned the church, in all that concerned him; and then he struck his riding-whip against the window-sill and declared to himself that it was impossible that Eleanor Bold should marry Mr. Slope.
And yet he did not really believe, as he should have done, that it was impossible. He should have known her well enough to feel that it was truly impossible. He should have been aware that Eleanor had that within her which would surely protect her from such degradation. But he, like so many others, was deficient in confidence in woman. He said to himself over and over again that it was impossible that Eleanor Bold should become Mrs. Slope, and yet he believed that she would do so. And so he rambled about, and could do and think of nothing. He was thoroughly uncomfortable, thoroughly ill at ease, cross with himself and everybody else, and feeding in his heart on animosity towards Mr. Slope. This was not as it should be, as he knew and felt, but he could not help himself. In truth Mr. Arabin was now in love with Mrs. Bold, though ignorant of the fact himself. He was in love and, though forty years old, was in love without being aware of it. He fumed and fretted and did not know what was the matter, as a youth might do at one-and-twenty. And so having done no good at St. Ewold’s, he rode back much earlier than was usual with him, instigated by some inward, unacknowledged hope that he might see Mrs. Bold before she left.
Eleanor had not passed a pleasant morning. She was irritated with everyone, and not least with herself. She felt that she had been hardly used, but she felt also that she had not played her own cards well. She should have held herself so far above suspicion as to have received her sister’s