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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/39215-0.txt b/39215-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..78eda51 --- /dev/null +++ b/39215-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9658 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of The New Rector, by Stanley J. Weyman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: The New Rector + +Author: Stanley J. Weyman + +Release Date: March 20, 2012 [eBook #39215] +[Most recently updated: June 14, 2021] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Charles Bowen + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR *** + + + + +THE NEW RECTOR + +BY +STANLEY J. WEYMAN + +NEW YORK + +AMERICAN PUBLISHERS CORPORATION + +310-318 Sixth Avenue + +Copyright 1891, +BY +UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY. + +_All rights reserved_ + + +Contents + + CHAPTER I. “LE ROI EST MORT!” + CHAPTER II. “VIVE LE ROI!” + CHAPTER III. AN AWKWARD MEETING. + CHAPTER IV. BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS. + CHAPTER V. “REGINALD LINDO, 1850.” + CHAPTER VI. THE BONAMYS AT HOME. + CHAPTER VII. THE HAMMONDS’ DINNER PARTY. + CHAPTER VIII. TWO SURPRISES. + CHAPTER IX. TOWN TALK. + CHAPTER X. OUT WITH THE SHEEP. + CHAPTER XI. THE DOCTOR SPEAKS. + CHAPTER XII. THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL. + CHAPTER XIII. LAURA’S PROVISO. + CHAPTER XIV. THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD. + CHAPTER XV. THE BAZAAR. + CHAPTER XVI. “LORD DYNMORE IS HERE.” + CHAPTER XVII. THE LAWYER AT HOME. + CHAPTER XVIII. A FRIEND IN NEED. + CHAPTER XIX. THE DAY AFTER. + CHAPTER XX. A SUDDEN CALL. + CHAPTER XXI. IN PROFUNDIS. + CHAPTER XXII. THE RECTOR’S DECISION. + CHAPTER XXIII. THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS. + CHAPTER XXIV. THE CUP AT THE LIP. + CHAPTER XXV. HUMBLE PIE. + CHAPTER XXVI. LOOSE ENDS. + + + + + +THE NEW RECTOR. + + + + +CHAPTER I. +“LE ROI EST MORT!” + + +The king was dead. But not at once, not until after some short +breathing-space, such as was pleasant enough to those whose only +concern with the succession lay in the shouting, could the cry of “Long +live the king!” be raised. For a few days there was no rector of +Claversham. The living was during this time in abeyance, or in the +clouds, or in the lap of the law, or in any strange and inscrutable +place you choose to name. It may have been in the prescience of the +patron, and, if so, no locality could be more vague, the whereabouts of +Lord Dynmore himself, to say nothing of his prescience, being as +uncertain as possible. Messrs. Gearns & Baker, his solicitors and +agents, should have known as much upon this point as any one; yet it +was their habit to tell one inquirer that his lordship was in the +Cordilleras, and another that he was on the slopes of the Andes, and +another that he was at the forty-ninth parallel—quite +indifferently—these places being all one to Messrs. Gearns & Baker, +whose walk in life had lain for so many years about Lincoln’s Inn +Fields that Clare Market had come to be their ideal of an uncivilized +country. + +And more, if the whereabouts of Lord Dynmore could only be told in +words rather far-sounding than definite, there was room for a doubt +whether his prescience existed at all. For, according to his friends, +there never was a man whose memory was so notably eccentric—not weak, +but eccentric. And if his memory was impeccable, his prescience— But we +grow wide of the mark. The question being merely where the living of +Claversham was during the days which immediately followed Mr. +Williams’s death, let it be said at once that we do not know. + +Mr. Williams was the late incumbent. He had been rector of the little +Warwickshire town for nearly forty years; and although his people were +ready enough to busy themselves with the question of his successor, he +did not lack honor in his death. His had been a placid life, such as +suited an indolent and easy-going man. “Let me sit upon one chair and +put up my feet on another, and there I am,” he was once heard to say; +and the town repeated the remark and chuckled over it. There were some +who would have had the parish move more quickly, and who talked with a +sneer of the old port-wine kind of parson. But if he had done little +good, he had done less evil. He was kindly and open-handed, and he had +not an enemy in the parish. He was regretted as much as such a man +should be. Besides, people did not die commonly in Claversham. It was +but once a year, or twice at the most, that any one who was any one +passed away. And so, when the event did occur the most was made of it +in an old-fashioned way. When Mr. Williams passed for the last time +into his churchyard, there was no window which did not, by shutter or +blind, mark its respect for him, not a tongue which wagged foul of his +memory. And then the shutters were taken down and the blinds pulled up, +and every one, from Mr. Clode, the curate, to the old people at +Bourne’s Almhouses, who, having no affairs of their own, had the more +time to discuss their neighbors’, asked, “Who is to be the new rector?” + +On the day of the funeral two of these old pensioners watched the +curate’s tall form as he came gravely along the opposite side of the +street, to fall in at the door of his lodgings with two ladies, one +elderly, one young, who were passing so opportunely that it really +seemed as if they might have been waiting for him. He and the elder +lady—she was so plump of figure, so healthy of eye and cheek, and was +dressed besides with such a comfortable richness that it did one good +to look at her—began to talk in a subdued, decorous fashion, while the +girl listened. He was telling them of the funeral, how well the +archdeacon had read the service, and what a crowd of Dissenters had +been present, and so on: and at last he came to the important question. + +“I hear, Mrs. Hammond,” he said, “that the living will be given to Mr. +Herbert of Easthope, whom you know, I think? To me? Oh, no, I have not, +and never had, any expectation of it. Please do not,” he added, with a +slight smile and a shake of the head, “mention such a thing again. +Leave me in my content.” + +“But why should you not have it?” said the young lady, with a pleasant +persistence. “Every one in the parish would be glad if you were +appointed. Could we not do something or say something—get up a petition +or anything? Lord Dynmore ought, of course, to give it to you. I think +some one should tell him what are the wishes of the parish. I do +indeed!” + +She was a very pretty young lady, with bright brown eyes and hair and +rather arch features, and the gentleman she was addressing had long +found her face pleasant to look upon; but at this moment it really +seemed to him as the face of an angel. Yet he only answered with a kind +of depressed gratitude. “Thank you, Miss Hammond,” he said. “If good +wishes could procure me the living, I should have an excellent reason +for hoping. But as things are, it is not for me.” + +“Pooh! pooh!” said Mrs. Hammond cheerily, “who knows?” And then, after +a few more words, they went on their way, and he turned into his rooms. + +The old women were still watching. “I don’t well know who’ll get it, +Peggy,” said one, “but I be pretty sure of this, as he won’t! It isn’t +his sort as gets ’em. It’s the lord’s friends, bless you!” + +So it appeared that she and Mr. Clode were of one mind on the matter. +But was that really Mr. Clode’s opinion? It was when the crow opened +its beak that it dropped the piece of cheese; and so to this day the +wise man has no chance or expectation of this or that until he gets it. +And if a patron or a patron’s solicitor has for some days had under his +paperweight a letter written in a hand that bears a strange likeness to +the wise man’s—a letter setting forth the latter’s claims and +wisdom—what of that? That is a private matter, of course. + +Be that as it may, there was scarcely a person in Claversham who did +not give some time that evening, and on subsequent evenings too, to the +interesting question who was to be the new rector. The rector was a big +factor in the town-life. Girls wondered whether he would be young, and +hoped he would dance. Their mothers were sanguine that he would be +unmarried, and their fathers that he would play whist. And one +questioned whether he would buy Mr. Williams’s stock of port, and +another whether he would dine late. And some trusted that he would let +things be, and some hoped that he would cleanse the stables. And only +one thing was certain and sure and immutably fixed—that, whoever he +was, he would not be able to please everybody. + +Nay, the ripple of excitement spread far beyond Claversham. Not only at +the archdeacon’s at Kingsford Carbonel, five miles away among the +orchards and hopyards, was there much speculation upon the matter, but +even at the Homfrays’, of Holberton, ten miles out beyond the Baer +Hills, there was talk about it, and bets were made across the +billiard-table. And in more distant vicarages and curacies, where the +patron was in some degree known, there were flutterings of heart and +anxious searchings of the “Guardian” and Crockford. Those who seemed to +have some chance of the living grew despondent, and those who had none +talked the thing over with their wives after the children had gone to +bed, until they persuaded themselves that they would die at Claversham +Rectory. Middle-aged men who had been at college with Lord Dynmore +remembered that they had on one occasion rowed in the same boat with +him; and young men who had danced with his niece thought secretly that, +dear little woman as Emily or Annie was, they might have done better. +And a hundred and eleven letters, written by people who knew less than +Messrs. Gearns & Baker of the Andes, seeing that they did not know that +Lord Dynmore was there or thereabouts, were received at Dynmore Park +and forwarded to London, and duly made up into a large parcel with +other correspondence by Messrs. Gearns & Baker, and so were despatched +to the forty-ninth parallel—or thereabouts. + + + + +CHAPTER II. +“VIVE LE ROI!” + + +It was at the beginning of the second week in October that Mr. Williams +died; and, the weather in those parts being peculiarly fine and bright +for the time of year, men stood about in the churchyard with bare +heads, and caught no colds. And it continued so for some days after the +funeral. But not everywhere. Upon a morning, some three perhaps after +the ceremony at Claversham, a young gentleman sat down to his +breakfast, only a hundred and fifty miles away, under such different +conditions—a bitter east wind, a dense fog, and a general murkiness of +atmosphere—that one might have supposed his not over-plentiful meal to +be laid in another planet. + +The air in the room—a meagrely furnished, much littered room, was +yellow and choking, and the candles burned dimly in the midst of yellow +halos. The fire seemed to be smouldering, and the owner of the room had +to pay some attention to it before he sat down and found a letter lying +beside his plate. He glanced at it doubtfully. “I do not know the +handwriting,” he muttered, “and it is not a subscription, for they +never come in an east wind. I am afraid it is a bill.” + +The letter was addressed to the Rev. Reginald Lindo, St. Barnabas +Mission House, 383 East India Dock Road, London, E. After scrutinizing +it for a moment, he pulled a candle toward him and tore open the +envelope. + +He read the letter slowly, his teacup at his lips, and, though he was +alone, his face grew crimson. When he had finished it he turned back +and read it again, and then flung it down and, starting up, began to +walk the room. “What a boy I am!” he muttered. “But it is almost +incredible. Upon my honor it is almost incredible!” + +He was still at the height of his excitement, now sitting down to take +a mouthful of breakfast and now leaping up to pace the room, when his +housekeeper entered and said that a woman from Tamplin’s Rents wanted +to see him. + +“What does she want, Mrs. Baxter?” he asked. + +“Husband is dying, sir,” the old lady replied briefly. + +“Do you know her at all?” + +“No, sir. She is as poor a piece as I have ever seen. She says that she +could not have come out, for want of clothes, if it had not been for +the fog. And they are not particular here, as I know—the hussies!” + +“Say that I shall be ready to go with her in less than five minutes,” +the young clergyman answered. “And here! Give her some tea, Mrs. +Baxter. The pot is half full.” + +He bustled about; but nevertheless the message and the business he was +now upon had sobered him, and as he buttoned up the letter in his +breast-pocket, his face was grave. He was a tall young man, fair, with +regular features, and curling hair cut rather short. His eyes were blue +and pleasantly bold; and in his every action and in his whole carriage +there was a great appearance of confidence and self-possession. Taking +a book and a small case from a side-table, he put on his overcoat and +went out. A moment, and the dense fog swallowed him up, and with him +the tattered bundle of rags, which had a husband, and very likely had +nothing else in the world of her own. Tamplin’s Rents not affecting us, +we may skip a few hours, and then go westward with him as far as the +Temple, which in the East India Dock Road is considered very far west +indeed by those who have ever heard of it. + +Here he sought a dingy staircase in Fig-tree Court, and, mounting to +the second floor, stopped before a door which was adorned by about a +dozen names, painted in white on a black ground. He knocked loudly, +and, a small boy answering his summons with great alacrity and +importance, our friend asked for Mr. Smith, and was promptly ushered +into a room about nine feet square, in which, at a table covered with +papers and open books, sat a small, dark-complexioned man, very keen +and eager in appearance, who looked up with an air of annoyance. + +“Who is it, Fred?” he said impatiently, moving one of the candles, +which the fog still rendered necessary, although it was high noon. “I +am engaged at present.” + +“Mr. Lindo to see you, sir,” the boy announced, with a formality very +funny in a groom of the chambers about four feet high. + +The little man’s countenance instantly changed, and he jumped up +grinning. “Is it you, old boy?” he said. “Sit down, old fellow! I +thought it might be my own solicitor, and it is well to be prepared, +you know.” + +“But you are not really busy?” said the visitor, looking at him +doubtfully. + +“Well, I am and I am not,” replied Mr. Smith; and, deftly tipping aside +the books, he disclosed some slips of manuscript. “It is an article for +the ‘Cornhill,’” he continued; “but whether it will ever appear there +is another matter. You have come to lunch, of course? And now, what is +your news?” + +He was so quick and eager that he reminded people who saw him for the +first time of a rat. When they came to know him better, they found that +a stauncher friend than Jack Smith was not to be found in the Temple. +With this he had the reputation of being a clever, clear-headed man, +and his sound common-sense was almost a proverb. Observing that Lindo +did not answer him, he repeated, “Is anything amiss, old fellow?” + +“Well, not quite amiss,” Lindo answered, his face flushing a little. +“But the fact is”—taking the letter from the breast-pocket—“that I have +had the offer of a living, Jack.” + +Smith leaped up and clapped his friend on the shoulder. “By Jove! old +man,” he exclaimed heartily, “I am glad of it! Right glad of it! You +must have had enough of that slumming. But I hope it is a better living +than mine,” he continued, with a comical glance round the tiny room. +“Let us have a look! What is it? Two hundred and a house?” + +Lindo handed the letter to him. It was written from Lincoln’s Inn +Fields, and was dated the preceding day. It ran thus: + +“Dear Sir:—We are instructed by our client, the Right Honorable the +Earl of Dynmore, to invite your acceptance of the living of Claversham +in the county of Warwick, vacant by the death on the 15th instant of +the Rev. John Williams, the late incumbent. The living, of which his +lordship is the patron, is a town rectory, of the approximate value of +810_l_ per annum and a house. Our client is travelling in the United +States, but we have the requisite authorities to proceed in due form +and without delay, which in this matter is prejudicial. We beg to have +the pleasure of receiving your acceptance at as early a date as +possible, + +“And remain, dear Sir, + +“Your obedient servants, + +“Gearns & Baker. + +“To the Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A.” + +The barrister read this letter with even greater surprise than seemed +natural, and, when he had done, looked at his companion with wondering +eyes. “Claversham!” he ejaculated. “Why, I know it well!” + +“Do you? I have never heard you mention it.” + +“I knew old Williams!” Jack continued, still in amaze. “Knew him well, +and heard of his death, but little thought you were likely to succeed +him. My dear fellow, it is a wonderful piece of good fortune! +Wonderful! I shake you by the hand! I congratulate you heartily! But +how did you come to know the high and mighty earl? Unbosom yourself, my +dear boy!” + +“I do not know him—do not know him from Adam!” replied the young +clergyman gravely. + +“You don’t mean it?” + +“I do. I have never seen him in my life.” + +Jack Smith whistled. “Are you sure it is not a hoax?” he said, with a +serious face. + +“I think not,” the rector-elect replied. “Perhaps I have given you a +wrong impression. I have had nothing to do with the earl; but my uncle +was his tutor.” + +“Oh!” said Smith slowly, “that makes all the difference. What uncle?” + +“You have heard me speak of him. He was vicar of St. Gabriel’s, +Aldgate. He died about a year ago—last October, I think. Lord Dynmore +and he were good friends, and my uncle used often to stay at his place +in Scotland. I suppose my name must have come up some time when they +were talking.” + +“Likely enough,” assented the lawyer. “But for the earl to remember it, +he must be one in a hundred!” + +“It is certainly very good of him,” Lindo replied, his cheek flushing. +“If it had been a small country living, and my uncle had been alive to +jog his elbow, I should not have been so much surprised.” + +“And you are just twenty-five!” Jack Smith observed, leaning back in +his chair, and eyeing his friend with undisguised and whimsical +admiration. “You will be the youngest rector in the Clergy List, I +should think! And Claversham! By Jove, what a berth!” + +A queer expression of annoyance for a moment showed itself in Lindo’s +face. “I say, Jack, stow that!” he said gently, and with a little +shamefacedness. “I mean,” he continued, smoothing down the nap on his +hat, “that I do not want to look at it altogether in that way, and I do +not want others to regard it so.” + +“As a berth, you mean?” Jack said gravely, but with a twinkle in his +eyes. + +“Well, from the loaves and fishes point of view,” Lindo commenced, +beginning to walk up and down the room. “I do not think an officer, +when he gets promotion, looks only at the increase in his pay. Of +course I am glad that it is a good living, and that I shall have a +house, and a good position, and all that. But I declare to you, Jack, +believe me or not as you like, that if I did not feel that I could do +the work as I hope, please God, to do it, I would not take it up—I +would not, indeed. As it is, I feel the responsibility. I have been +thinking about it as I walked down here, and upon my honor for a while +I thought I ought to decline it.” + +“I would not do that!” said Gallio, dismissing the twinkle from his +eye, and really respecting his old friend, perhaps, a little more than +before. “You are not the man, I think, to shun either work or +responsibility. Did I tell you,” he continued in a different tone, +“that I had an uncle at Claversham?” + +“No,” said Lindo, surprised in his turn. + +“Yes, and I think he is one of your church wardens. His name is Bonamy, +and he is a solicitor. His London agent is my only client,” Jack said +jerkily. + +“And he is one of the church wardens! Well, that is strange—and jolly!” + +“Umph! Don’t you be too sure of that!” retorted the barrister sharply. +“He is a—well, he has been very good to me, and he is my uncle, and I +am not going to say anything against him. But I am not quite sure that +I should like him for my church warden. _Your_ church warden! Why, it +is like a fairy tale, old fellow!” + +And so it seemed to Lindo when, an hour later, the small boy, with the +same portentous gravity of face, let him out and bade him good-day. As +the young parson started eastward, along Fleet Street first, he looked +at the moving things round him with new eyes, from a new standpoint, +with a new curiosity. The passers-by were the same, but he was changed. +He had lunched, and perhaps the material view of his position was +uppermost, for those in the crowd who specially observed the tall young +clergyman noticed in his bearing an air of calm importance and a strong +sense of personal dignity, which led him to shun collisions, and even +to avoid jostling his fellows, with peculiar care. The truth was that +he had all the while before his eyes, as he walked, an announcement +which was destined to appear in the “Guardian” of the following week: + +“The Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A., St. Barnabas’ Mission, London, to be +Rector of Claversham. Patron, the Earl of Dynmore.” + + + + +CHAPTER III. +AN AWKWARD MEETING. + + +A fortnight after this paragraph in the “Guardian” had filled +Claversham with astonishment and Mr. Clode with a modest thankfulness +that he was spared the burden of office, a little dark man—Jack Smith, +in fact—drove briskly into Paddington Station, and, disregarding the +offers of the porters, who stand waiting on the hither side of the +journey like Charon by the Styx, and see at a glance who has the +obolus, sprang from the hansom without assistance, and bustled on to +the platform. + +Here he looked up and down as if he expected to meet some one, and +then, glancing at the clock, found that he had a quarter of an hour to +spare. He made at once for the bookstall, and, with a lavishness which +would have surprised some of his friends, bought “Punch,” a little +volume by Howells, the “Standard,” and finally, though he blushed as he +asked for it, the “Queen.” He had just gathered his purchases together +and was paying for them, when a high-pitched voice at his elbow made +him start. “Why, Jack! what in the world are you buying all those +papers for?” The speaker was a girl about thirteen years old, who in +the hubbub had stolen unnoticed to his side. + +“Hullo, Daintry,” he answered. “Why did you not say that you were here +before? I have been looking for you. Where is Kate? Oh, yes, I see +her,” as a young lady turning over books at the farther end of the +stall acknowledged his presence by a laughing nod. “You are here in +good time,” he went on, while the younger girl affectionately slipped +her arm through his. + +“Yes,” she said. “Your mother started us early. And so you have come to +see us off, after all, Jack?” + +“Just so,” he answered drily. “Let us go to Kate.” + +They did so, the young lady meeting them halfway. “How kind of you to +be here, Jack!” she said. “As you have come, will you look us out a +comfortable compartment? That is the train over there. And please to +put this, and this, and Daintry’s parcel in the corners for us.” + +This and this were a cloak and a shawl, and a few little matters in +brown paper. In order to possess himself of them, Jack handed Kate the +papers he was carrying. + +“Are they for me?” she said, gratefully indeed, but with a placid +gratitude which was not perhaps what the donor wanted. “Oh, thank you. +And this too? What is it?” + +“‘Their Wedding Journey,’” said Jack, with a shy twinkle in his eyes. + +“Is it pretty?” she answered dubiously. “It sounds silly; but you are +supposed to be a judge. I think I should like ‘A Chance Acquaintance’ +better, though.” + +Of course the little book was changed, and Jack winced. But he had not +time to think much about it, for he had to bustle away through the +rising babel to secure seats for them in an empty compartment of the +Oxford train, and see their luggage labelled and put in. This done, he +hurried back, and pointed out to them the places he had taken. “Oh, +dear, they are in a through carriage,” Kate said, stopping short and +eyeing the board over the door. + +“Yes,” he answered. “I thought that that was what you wanted.” + +“No, I would rather go in another carriage, and change. We shall get to +Claversham soon enough without travelling with Claversham people.” + +“Indeed we shall,” Daintry chimed in. “Let us go and find seats, and +Jack will bring the things after us.” + +He assented meekly—very meekly for sharp Jack Smith—and presently came +along with his arms full of parcels, to find them ensconced in the +nearer seats of a compartment, which contained also one gentleman who +was already deep in the “Times.” Jack, standing at the open door, could +not see his face, for it was hidden by the newspaper, but he could see +that his legs wore a youthful and reckless air; and he raised his +eyebrows interrogatively. “Pooh!” whispered Daintry in answer. “How +stupid you are! It is all right. I can see he is a clergyman by his +boots!” + +Jack smiled at this assurance, and, putting in the things he was +holding, shut the door and stood outside, looking first at the platform +about him, on which all was flurry and confusion, and then at the +interior of the carriage, which seemed in comparison peaceful and +homelike. “I think I will come with you to Westbourne Park,” he said +suddenly. + +“Nonsense, Jack!” Kate replied, with crushing decision. “We shall be +there in five minutes, and you will have all the trouble of returning +for nothing.” + +He acquiesced meekly—poor Jack! “Well,” he said, with a new effort at +cheerfulness, “you will soon be at home, girls. Remember me to the +governor. I am afraid you will be rather dull at first. You will have +one scrap of excitement, however.” + +“What is that?” said Kate, very much as if she were prepared to +depreciate it before she knew what it was. + +“The new rector!” + +“He will make very little difference to us!” the girl answered, with an +accent almost of scorn. “Papa said in his letter that he thought it was +a great pity a local man had not been appointed—some one who knew the +place and the old ways. You say he is clever and nice; but either way +it will not affect us much.” + +No one noticed that the “Times” newspaper in the far corner of the +compartment rustled suspiciously, and that the clerical boots became +agitated on a sudden, as though their wearer meditated a move; and, in +ignorance of this, “I expect I shall hate him!” said Daintry calmly. + +“Come, you must not do that,” Jack remonstrated “You must remember that +he is not only a very good fellow, but a great friend of mine.” + +“Then we ought indeed to spare him!” Kate said frankly, “for you have +been very good to us and made our visit delightful.” + +His face flushed with pleasure even at those simple words of praise. +“And you will write and tell me,” he continued eagerly, “that you have +reached your journey’s end safely.” + +“One of us will,” was the answer. “Daintry,” Kate went on calmly, “will +you remind me to write to Jack to-morrow evening?” + +His face fell sadly. So little would have made him happy. He looked +down and kicked the step of the carriage, and made his tiny moan to +himself before he spoke again. “Good-bye,” he said then. “They are +coming to look at your tickets. You are due out in one minute. +Good-bye, Daintry.” + +“Good-bye, Jack. Come and see us soon,” she cried earnestly, as she +released his hand. + +“Good-bye, Kate.” Alas! Kate’s cheek did not show the slightest +consciousness that his clasp was more than cousinly. She uttered her +“Good-bye, Jack, and thank you so much,” very kindly, but her color +never varied by the quarter of a tone, and her grasp was as firm and as +devoid of shyness as his own. + +He had not much time to be miserable, however, then, for, the +ticket-collector coming to the window, Jack had to fall back, and in +doing so made a discovery. Kate, hunting for her ticket in one of those +mysterious places in which ladies will put tickets, heard him utter an +exclamation, and asked, “What is it, Jack?” + +To her surprise, the collector having by this time disappeared, he +stretched out his hand through the window to some one beyond her. “Why, +Lindo!” he cried, “is that you? I had not a notion of your identity. Of +course you are going down to take possession.” + +Kate, trembling already with a horrible presentiment, turned her head. +Yes, it was the clergyman in the corner who answered Jack’s greeting +and rose to shake hands with him, the train being already in motion. “I +did not recognize your voice out there,” he said, looking rather hot. + +“No? And I did not know you were going down to-day,” Jack answered, +walking beside the train. “Let me introduce you to my cousins, Miss +Bonamy and Daintry. I am sorry that I did not see you before. Good luck +to you! Good-bye, Kate!” + +The train was moving faster and faster, and Jack was soon left behind +on the platform gazing pathetically at the black tunnel which had +swallowed it up. In the carriage there was silence, and in the heart of +one at least of the passengers the most horrible vexation. Kate could +have bitten out her tongue. She was conscious that the clergyman had +bowed in acknowledgment of Jack’s introduction and had muttered +something. But then he had sunk back in his corner, his face wearing, +as it seemed to her, a frown of scornful annoyance. Even if nothing +awkward had been said, she would still have shunned, for a certain +reason, such a meeting as this with a new clergyman who did not yet +know Claversham. But now she had aggravated the matter by her +heedlessness. So she sat angry, and yet ashamed, with her lips pressed +together and her eyes fixed upon the opposite cushion. + +For the Rev. Reginald, he had been by no means indifferent to the +criticisms he had unfortunately overheard. Always possessed of a fairly +good opinion of himself, he had lately been raising his standard to the +rectorial height; and, being very human, he had come to think himself +something of a personage. If Jack Smith had introduced him under the +same circumstances to his aunt, there is no saying how far the +acquaintance would have progressed or how long the new incumbent might +have fretted and fumed. But presently he stole a look at Kate Bonamy +and melted. + +He saw a girl, slightly above the middle height, graceful and rounded +of figure, with a grave stateliness of carriage which oddly became her. +Her complexion was rather pale, but it was clear and healthy, and there +was even a freckle here and a freckle there which I never heard a man +say that he would have had elsewhere. If her face was a trifle long, +with a nose a little aquiline and curving lips too wide, yet it was a +fair and dainty face, such as Englishmen love. The brown hair, which +strayed on to the broad white brow and hung in a heavy loop upon her +neck, had a natural waviness—the sole beauty on which she prided +herself. For she could not see her eyes as others saw them—big gray +eyes that from under long lashes looked out upon you, full of such +purity and truth that men meeting their gaze straightway felt a desire +to be better men and went away and tried—for half an hour. Such was +Kate outwardly. Inwardly she had faults of course, and perhaps pride +and a little temper were two of them. + +The rector was still admiring her askance, surprised to find that Jack +Smith, who was not very handsome himself, had such a cousin, when +Daintry roused him abruptly. For some moments she had been gazing at +him, as at some unknown specimen, with no attempt to hide her interest. +Now she said suddenly, “You are the new rector?” + +He answered stiffly that he was; being a good deal taken aback at being +challenged in this way. Remonstrance, however, was out of the question, +and Daintry for the moment said no more, though her gaze lost none of +its embarrassing directness. + +But presently she began again. “I should think the dogs would like +you,” she said deliberately, and much as if he had not been there to +hear; “you look as if they would.” + +Silence again. The rector smiled fatuously. What was a beneficed +clergyman, whose dignity was young and tender, to do, subjected to the +criticism of unknown dogs? He tried to divert his thoughts by +considering the pretty sage-green frock and the gray fur cape and hat +to match which the elder girl was wearing. Doubtless she was taking the +latest fashions down to Claversham, and fur capes and hats, +indefinitely and mysteriously multiplying, would listen to him on +Sundays from all the nearest pews. And Daintry was silent so long that +he thought he had done with her. But no. “Do you think that you will +like Claversham?” she asked, with an air of serious curiosity. + +“I trust I shall,” he said, a flush rising to his cheek. + +She took a moment to consider the answer conscientiously, and, thinking +badly of it, remarked gravely, “I don’t think you will.” + +This was unbearable. The clergyman, full of a nervous dread lest the +next question should be, “Do you think that they will like you at +Claversham?” made a great show of resuming his newspaper. Kate, +possessed by the same fear, shot an imploring glance at Daintry; but, +seeing that the latter had only eyes for the stranger, hoped +desperately for the best. + +Which was very bad. “It must be jolly,” remarked the unconscious +tormentor, “to have eight hundred pounds a year, and be a rector!” + +“Daintry!” Kate cried in horror. + +“Why, what is the matter?” asked Daintry, turning suddenly to her +sister with wide-open eyes. Her look of aggrieved astonishment at once +overcame Lindo’s gravity, and he laughed aloud. He was not without a +charming sense, still novel enough to be pleasing, that Daintry was +right. It was jolly to be a rector and have eight hundred a year! + +That laugh came in happily. It seemed to sweep away the cobwebs of +embarrassment which had lain so thickly about two of the party. Lindo +began to talk pleasantly, pointing out this or that reach of the river, +and Kate, meeting his cheery eyes, put aside a faint idea of +apologizing which had been in her head, and replied frankly. He told +them tales of summer voyages between lock and lock, and of long days +idly spent in the Wargrave marshes; and, as the identification of +Mapledurham and Pangbourne and Wittenham and Goring rendered it +necessary that they should all cross and recross the carriage, they +were soon on excellent terms with one another, or would have been if +the rector had not still detected in Kate’s manner a slight stiffness +for which he could not account. It puzzled him also to observe that, +though they were ready, Daintry more particularly, to discuss the +amusements of London and the goodness of cousin Jack, they both grew +reticent when the conversation turned toward Claversham and its +affairs. + +At Oxford he got out to go to the bookstall. + +“Jack was right,” said Daintry, looking after him. “He _is_ nice.” + +“Yes,” her sister allowed, rising and sitting down again in a restless +fashion. “But I wish we had not fallen in with him, all the same.” + +“It cannot be helped now,” said Daintry, who was evidently prepared to +accept the event with philosophy. + +Not so her sister. “We might go into another carriage,” she suggested. + +“That would be rude,” said Daintry calmly. + +The question was decided for them by the young clergyman’s return. He +came along the platform, an animated look in his face. “Miss Bonamy,” +he said, stopping at the open door with his hand extended, “there is +some one in the refreshment-room whom I think that you would like to +see. Mr. Gladstone is there, talking to the Duke of Westminster, and +they are both eating buns like common mortals. Will you come and take a +peep at them?” + +“I don’t think that we have time,” she objected. + +“There is sure to be time,” Daintry cried. “Now, Kate, come!” And she +was down upon the platform in a moment. + +“The train is not due out for five minutes yet,” Lindo said, as he +piloted them through the crowd to the doorway. “There, on the left by +the fireplace,” he added. + +Kate glanced, and turned away satisfied. Not so Daintry. With rapt +attention in her face, she strayed nearer and nearer to the great men, +her eyes growing larger with each step. + +“She will be talking to them next,” said Kate, in a fidget. + +“Perhaps asking him if he likes Downing Street,” Lindo suggested slyly. +“There, she is coming now,” he added, as Miss Daintry turned and came +to them at last. + +“I wanted to make sure,” she said simply, seeing Kate’s impatience, +“that I should know them again. That was all.” + +“Quite so; I hope you have succeeded,” Kate answered drily. “But, if we +are not quick, we shall miss our train.” And she led the way back with +more speed than dignity. + +“There is plenty of time—plenty of time,” Lindo answered, following +them. He could not bear to see her pushing her way through the mixed +crowd, and accepting so easily a footing of equality with it. He was +one of those men to whom their womenkind are sacred. He took his time, +therefore, and followed at his ease; only to see, when he emerged from +the press, a long stretch of empty platform, three porters, and the +tail of a departing train. “Good gracious!” he stammered, with dismay +in his face. “What does it mean?” + +“It means,” Kate said, in an accent of sharp annoyance—she did not +intend to spare him—“that you have made us miss our train, Mr. Lindo. +And there is not another which reaches Claversham today!” + + + + +CHAPTER IV. +BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS. + + +“There! That was your fault!” said Daintry, turning from the departing +train. + +The young rector could not deny it. He would have given anything for at +least the appearance of being undisturbed; but the blood came into his +cheek, and in his attempt to maintain his dignity he only succeeded in +looking angry as well as confused and taken aback. He had certainly +made a mess of his escort duty. What in the world had led him to go out +of his way to make a fool of himself? he wondered. And with these +Claversham people! + +“There may be a special train to-day,” Kate suggested suddenly. She had +got over her first vexation, and perhaps repented that she had betrayed +it so openly. “Or we may be allowed to go on by a luggage-train, Mr. +Lindo. Will you kindly see?” + +He snatched at the relief which her proposal held out to him, and went +away to inquire. But almost at once he was back again. “It is most +vexatious!” he said loudly. “It is only three o’clock, and yet there is +no way of getting to Claversham to-night! I am very sorry, but I never +dreamed the company managed things so badly. Never!” + +“No,” said Kate drily. + +He winced and looked at her sharply, his vanity hurt again. But then he +found that he could not keep it up. No doubt it was a ridiculous +position for a beneficed clergyman, on his way to undertake the work of +his life, to be delayed at a station with two girls; but, after all, +for a young man to be angry with a young woman who is also pretty—well, +the task is difficult. “I am afraid,” he said shyly, and yet with a +kind of frankness, “that I have brought you into trouble, Miss Bonamy. +As your sister says, it was my fault. Is it a matter of great +consequence that you should reach home tonight?” + +“I am afraid that my father will be vexed,” she answered. + +“You must telegraph to him,” he rejoined. “I am afraid that is all I +can suggest. And that done, you will have only one thing to +consider—whether we shall stay the night here or go on to Birmingham.” + +Kate looked at him, her gray eyes very doubtful, and did not at once +answer. He had clearly made up his mind to join his fortunes to theirs, +while she, on her side, had reasons for shrinking from intimacy with +him. But he seemed to consider it so much a matter of course that they +should remain together and travel together, that she scarcely saw how +to put things on a different footing. She knew, too, that she would get +no help from Daintry, who already regarded their detention in the light +of a capital joke. + +“What are you going to do yourself, Mr. Lindo?” she said at last, her +manner rather chilling. + +He opened his eyes and smiled. “You discard me, then?” he said. “You +have lost all faith in me, Miss Bonamy? Well, I deserve it after the +scrape into which I have led you.” + +“I did not mean that,” she answered. “I wished to know if you had made +any plans.” + +“Yes,” he replied—“to make amends, if you will let me take command of +the party. We will stay in Oxford, and I will show you round the +colleges.” + +“No?” exclaimed Daintry. “Will you? How jolly! And then?” + +“We will dine at the Mitre,” he answered, smiling, “if Miss Bonamy will +permit me to manage everything. And then, if you leave here at +nine-thirty to-morrow you will be at Claversham soon after twelve. Will +that suit you?” + +Daintry’s face answered sufficiently for her. As for Kate, she was in a +difficulty. She knew little of hotels: yet they must stop somewhere, +and no doubt Mr. Lindo would take a great deal of trouble off her +hands. But would it be proper to do as he proposed? She really did not +know—only that it sounded odd. That it would not be wise she knew. She +could answer that question at once. But how could she explain, and how +tell him to go his way and leave them? And, after all, to see Oxford +would be delightful; and he really was very pleasant, very different +from the men she knew at home. + +“You are very good,” she said at length, with a grateful sigh—“if we +have no choice but between Oxford and Birmingham.” + +“And no choice of guides at all,” he said, smiling, “you will take me.” + +“Yes,” she answered, looking away primly. + +Her reserve, however, did not last. Once through the station gates, +that free holiday feeling which we have all experienced on being set +down in an unknown town, with no duty before us save to explore it, +soon possessed her; while he wished nothing better than to play the +showman—a part we love. The day was fine and bright, though cold. She +had eyes for beauty and a soul for the past, and soon forgot herself; +and he, piloting the sisters through Magdalen Walks, now strewn with +leaves, or displaying with pride the staircase of Christ Church, the +quaint library of Merton, or the ancient front of John’s, forgot +himself also, and especially his new-born dignity, in which he had +lived rather too much, perhaps, during the last three weeks. He showed +himself in his true colors—the colors known to his intimate friends—and +was so bright and cheery that Kate found herself talking to him in +utter forgetfulness of his position and theirs. The girl frankly sighed +when darkness fell and they had to go into the house, their curiosity +still unsated. + +She thought it was all over. But, lo! there was a cheery fire awaiting +them in the “house” room (he had looked in for a few minutes on their +first arrival and given his orders), and before it a little table laid +for three was sparkling with plate and glass. Nay, there were two cups +of tea ready on a side-table, for it wanted an hour yet of dinnertime. +Altogether, as Daintry naïvely told him, “even Jack could not have made +it nicer for us.” + +“Jack is a favorite of yours?” he said, laughing. + +“I should think so!” Daintry answered, in wonder. “There is no one like +Jack.” + +“After that I shall take myself off,” he replied. “I really want to +call on a friend, Miss Bonamy. But if I may join you at dinner——” + +“Oh, do!” she said impulsively. Then, more shyly, she added, “We shall +be very glad if you will, Mr. Lindo.” + +He felt singularly pleased with himself as he turned the windy corner +of the Broad. It was pleasant to be in Oxford again, a beneficed +clergyman. Pleasant to have such a future to look forward to, such a +holiday moment to enjoy. Pleasant to anticipate the cheery meal and the +girl’s smile, half shy, half grateful. And Kate?—she remained before +the fire, saying little because Daintry’s tongue gave few openings, but +thinking a good deal. Once she did speak. “It won’t last,” she said +pettishly. + +“Why, Kate? Do you think he will be different at Claversham?” Daintry +protested. + +“Of course he will!” She spoke with a little scorn in her voice, and +that sort of decision which we use when we wish to crush down our own +unwarranted hopes. + +“But he is nice,” Daintry persisted. “You do think so, Kate, don’t +you?” + +“Oh, yes, he is very nice,” she said drily. “But he will be in the +Hammond set at home, and we shall see nothing of him.” + +But presently he was back, and Kate found it impossible to resist the +charm. He ladled the soup and dispensed the mutton-chops with a gaiety +and boyish glee which were really the stored-up effervescence of weeks, +the ebullition of the long-repressed delight which he took in his +promotion. He learned casually that the girls had been in London for +more than a month staying with Jack’s mother in Bayswater, and that +they were very sorry to be upon their road home. + +“And yet,” he said—this was toward the end of dinner—“I have been told +that your town is a very picturesque one. But I fancy that we never +appreciate our home as we do a place strange to us.” + +“Very likely that is so,” Kate answered quietly. And then a little +pause ensued, such as he had observed several times before, and come to +connect with any mention of Claversham. The girls’ tongues would run on +frankly and pleasantly enough about their London visit, or Mr. +Gladstone; but let him bring the talk round to his parish and its +people, and forthwith something of reserve seemed to come between him +and them until the conversation strayed afield again. + +After the others had finished, he still toyed with his meal, partly in +lazy enjoyment of the time, partly as an excuse for staying with them. +They were sitting in a momentary silence, when a boy passed the window +chanting a ditty at the top of his voice. The doggrel came clearly to +their ears—— + + Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, + +Birds in the wilderness, birds in the wilderness; + +Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, + +Samuel asking for more. + + +As the sound passed on the young man looked up, a mischievous twinkle +in his eyes, and met their eyes, and all three burst into a merry peal +of laughter. They were the birds in the wilderness, sitting there in +the circle of light, in the strange room in the strange town, almost as +intimate as if they had known one another for years, or had been a week +at sea together. + +But Kate, having acknowledged by that pleasant outburst her sense of +the oddity of the position, rose from the table, and the rector had to +say good-night, explaining at the same time that he should not travel +with them next morning, but intended to go on by a later train, as his +friend wished to see more of him. Nevertheless, he said he should be up +to breakfast with them and should see them off. And in this resolution +he persisted, notwithstanding Kate’s protest, which perhaps was not +very violent. + +Notwithstanding, he was a little late next morning. When he came down +he found them already seated in the coffee-room. There were others +breakfasting here and there in the room, chiefly upon toast-racks and +newspapers, and he did not at once observe that the gentleman standing +with his back set negligently against the mantelpiece was talking to +Kate. Arrived at the table, however, he saw that it was so; and the +cheery greeting on his lips faded into a commonplace “Good-morning, +Miss Bonamy.” He took no apparent notice of the stranger as he added, +“I am afraid I am rather late.” + +The intruder, a short dark-whiskered man between thirty and forty, +seemed to the full as much surprised by the clergyman’s appearance as +Lindo was by his, and as little able to hide the feeling as Kate +herself to control the color which rose in her cheeks. She gave Mr. +Lindo his tea in silence, and then with an obvious effort introduced +the two men. “This is Dr. Gregg of Claversham—Mr. Lindo,” she said. + +Lindo rose and shook hands. “Mr. Lindo the younger, I presume?” said +the doctor, with a bow and a swagger intended to show that he was quite +at his ease. + +“The only one, I am afraid,” replied the rector, smiling. Though he by +no means liked the look of the man. + +“Did I rightly catch your name?” was the answer—“‘Mr. Lindo?’” + +“Yes,” said the rector again, opening his eyes. + +“But—you are not—you do not mean to say that you are the new rector?” +pronounced the dark man abruptly, and with a kind of aggressiveness +which seemed his most striking quality—“the rector of Claversham, I +mean?” + +“I believe so,” said Lindo quietly. “You want some more water, do you +not, Miss Bonamy?” he continued. “Let me ring the bell.” He rose and +crossed the room to do so. The truth was, he hated the newcomer +already. His first sentence had been enough. His manner was not the +manner of the men with whom Lindo had mixed, and the rector felt almost +angry with Kate for introducing Gregg—-albeit his parishioner—to him, +and quite angry with her for suffering the doctor to address her with +the familiarity he seemed to affect. + +And Kate, her eyes downcast, knew by instinct how it was with him, and +what he was thinking. “I have been telling Dr. Gregg,” she said +hurriedly, when he returned, “how we missed our train yesterday.” + +“Rather how I missed it for you,” Lindo answered gravely, much engaged +apparently with his breakfast. + +“Ah, yes, it was very funny!” fired off the doctor, watching each +mouthful they ate. Daintry had finished, and was sitting back in her +chair kicking the leg of the table monotonously; not in the best of +tempers apparently. “Very funny indeed!” the doctor continued. “An +accident, I hope?” with a little sniggling laugh. + +“Yes!” said the rector, looking up at him with a black brow and +steadfast eyes—“it was an accident.” + +Gregg was a little cowed by the look, and in a moment, with a muttered +word or two, fidgeted himself away, cursing the general +superciliousness of parsons and the quiet airs of this one in +particular. He was a little dog-in-the-mangerish man, ill-bred, and, +like most ill-bred men, resentful of breeding in others. The fact that +he had a sneaking liking for Kate did not tend to lessen his disgustful +wonder how the Bonamy girls and the new rector came to be travelling +together—which, indeed, to any Claversham person would have seemed a +portent. But, then, Lindo did not know that. + +The objectionable item removed, and the temptation to remark upon him +overcome, Lindo soon recovered his good temper, and rattled away so +pleasantly that the train time seemed to all of them to come very +quickly. “There,” he said, as he handed the last of Kate’s books into +the railway-carriage, “now I have done something to make amends for my +fault, I trust. One thing more I can do. When you get home you need not +spare me. You can put it all on my shoulders, Miss Bonamy.” + +“Thank you,” Kate answered demurely. + +“You are going to do so, I see,” he said, laughing. “I fear my +character will reach Claversham before me.” + +“I do not think we shall spread it very widely,” she answered in a +peculiar tone, which he naturally misunderstood. + +The train was already in motion then, and he shook hands with her as he +walked beside it. “Goodbye,” he said. And then he added in a lower +tone—he was such a very young rector—“I hope to see very much of you in +the future, Miss Bonamy.” + +Kate sank back in her seat, her cheek a shade warmer. And in a moment +he was alone upon the platform. + + + + +CHAPTER V. +“REGINALD LINDO, 1850.” + + +Long before the later train by which the rector came on arrived at the +Claversham station, the Rev. Stephen Clode was waiting on the platform. +The curate was a tall, dark man, somewhat over thirty, with a strong +rugged face and a bush of stiff black hair standing up from his +forehead. He had been at Claversham three years, enjoying all the +importance which old Mr. Williams’s long illness naturally gave to his +curate and _locum tenens_; and, though the town was agreed that his +chagrin at having a new rector set over his head was great, it must be +admitted that he concealed it with admirable skill. More than one +letter had passed between him and the new incumbent, and, in securing +for the latter Mr. Williams’s good old-fashioned furniture, and in +other ways, he had made himself very useful to Lindo. But the two had +not met, and consequently the curate viewed the approaching train with +lively, though secret, curiosity. + +It came, the bell rang, the porter cried, “Claversham! Claversham!” and +the curate walked down it, past the carriage-windows, looking for the +man he had come to meet. Half-a-dozen people stepped out, and for a +moment there was a mimic tumult on the little platform; but nowhere +amid it all could Clode see any one like the new rector. “He has missed +another train!” he muttered to himself in contemptuous wonder; and he +was already casting a last look round him before turning on his heel, +when a tall, fair young man, in a clerical overcoat, who had been one +of the first to alight, stepped up to him. “Am I speaking to Mr. +Clode?” said the stranger pleasantly. And he lifted his hat. + +“Certainly,” the curate answered. “I am Mr. Clode. But I fear I have +not the——” + +“No, I know,” replied the other, smiling, and at the same time holding +out his hand. “Though, indeed, I hoped that you might have been here on +purpose to meet me. My name is Lindo.” + +The curate uttered an exclamation of surprise; and, hastily returning +the proffered grip, fixed his black eyes curiously on his new friend. +“Mr. Lindo did not mention that you were with him,” he answered in a +tone of some embarrassment. “But, there, let me see to your luggage. Is +it all here?” + +“Yes, I think so,” Lindo answered, tapping one article after another +with his umbrella, and giving the stationmaster a pleasant “Good-day!” +“Is there an omnibus or anything?” + +“Yes,” Clode said; “it will be all right. They know where to take it. +You will walk up with me, perhaps. It is about a quarter of a mile to +the rectory.” + +The new comer assented gladly, and the two passed out of the station +together. Lindo let his eye travel up the wide steep street before him, +until it rested on the noble tower which crowned the little hill and +looked down now, as it had looked down for five centuries, on the red +roofs clustering about it. His tower! His church! Even his companion +did not remark, so slight was the action, that, as he passed out of the +station and looked up, he lifted his hat for a second. + +“And where is your father?” Clode asked. “Was he delayed by business? +Or perhaps,” he added, dubiously scanning him, “you are Mr. Lindo’s +brother?” + +“I _am_ Mr. Lindo!” said our friend, turning in astonishment and +looking at his companion. + +“The rector?” + +“Yes.” + +It was the curate’s turn to stare now, and he did so—his face flushing +darkly and his eyes wide opened for once. He even seemed for a moment +to be stricken dumb with surprise and emotion. “Indeed!” he said at +last, in a half stifled voice which he vainly strove to control. +“Indeed! I beg your pardon. I had thought—I don’t know why—I mean that +I had expected to see an older man.” + +“I am sorry you are disappointed,” the rector replied, smiling +ruefully. “I am beginning to think I am rather young, for you are not +the first to-day who has made that mistake.” + +The curate did not answer, and the two walked on in silence, feeling +somewhat awkward. Clode, indeed, was raging inwardly. By one thing and +another he had been led to expect a man past middle life, and the only +Clergy List in the parish, being three years old and containing the +name of Lindo’s uncle only, had confirmed him in the error. He had +never conceived the idea that the man set over his head would be a +fledgling, scarcely a year in priest’s orders, or he would have gone +elsewhere. He would never have stayed to be at the beck and call of +such a puppy as this! He felt now that he had been entrapped, and he +chafed inwardly to such an extent that he did not dare to speak. To +have this young fellow, six or seven years his junior, set over him +would humiliate him in the eyes of all those before whom he had long +played a different part! + +In a minor degree Lindo was also vexed—not only because he was +sufficiently sensitive to enter into the other’s feelings, but also +because he foresaw trouble ahead. It was annoying, too, to be received +at each new _rencontre_ as a surprise—as the reverse of all that had +been expected and all that had been, as he feared, hoped. + +“You will find the rectory a very comfortable house,” said the curate +at last, his mind fully made up now that he would leave at the earliest +possible date. “Warm and old-fashioned. Rough-cast outside. Many of the +rooms are panelled.” + +“It looks out on the churchyard, I believe,” replied the rector, with +the same labored politeness. + +“Yes, it stands high. The view from the windows at the back is +pleasant. The front is perhaps a little gloomy—in winter at least.” + +Near the top of the street a quaint, narrow flight of steps conducted +them to the churchyard—an airy, elevated place, surrounded on three +sides by the church and houses, but open on the fourth, where a +terraced walk, running along the summit of the old town wall, admitted +the southern sun and afforded a wide view of plain and hill. The two +men crossed the churchyard, the new rector looking about him with +curiosity and a little awe, his companion marching straight onward, his +strongly-marked face set ominously. He would go! He would go at the +earliest possible minute! he was thinking. + +It did not affect him nor alter his resolution that in the wooden porch +of the old rectory the new rector turned to him and shyly, yet with +real feeling, besought his help and advice in the work before him. The +young clergyman, commonly so self-confident, was moved, and moved +deeply, by the evening light and his strange and solemn surroundings. +Stephen Clode’s answer was in the affirmative—it could hardly have been +other; and it was spoken becomingly, if a little coldly, in view of the +rector’s advances; but, even while the curate spoke it, he was +considering how he might best escape from Claversham. Still his Yea, +yea, comforted his companion and lightened his momentary apprehensions. + +Nor was the curate, when he had recovered from the first shock of +surprise and disgust, so foolish as to betray his feelings by wanton +churlishness. He parted from his companion at the door, leaving him to +the welcome of Mrs. Baker, the rector’s London housekeeper, who had +come down two days before; but at the same time he consented readily to +return at half-past six and share his dinner, and gave him in the +course of the meal all the information in his power. Left to himself, +the rector went over the house under Mrs. Baker’s guidance, and, as he +trod the polished floors, could not but feel some access of +self-importance. The panelled hall, with its wide oak staircase, fed +this, and the spacious sombrely-furnished library, with its books and +busts, its antique clock and one good engraving, and its lofty windows +opening upon the garden. So, in a less degree, did the long +oak-panelled dining-room and a smaller sitting-room which looked to the +front and the churchyard; and the drawing-room, which was situated over +the library, and seemed the larger because Mr. Williams had furnished +it but scantily and lived in it less. Then there were six or seven +bedrooms, and in the garden a stone basin and fountain. Altogether, +when the rector descended after washing his hands, and stood on the +library hearth-rug looking about him, he would have been more than +human if he had not, with a feeling of thankfulness, entertained also +some faint sense of self-congratulation and personal desert. Nor, +probably, would Mr. Clode have been human if, coming in and finding the +younger man standing on that hearth-rug, and betraying in his face and +attitude something of his thoughts, he on his part had not felt a +degree of envy and antagonism. The man was so prosperous, so +self-contented, so conscious of his own merit and success. + +But the curate was too wise to betray this feeling; and, laying himself +out to be pleasant, he had, before the little meal was over, so far +ingratiated himself with his entertainer that the rector was greatly +surprised when he presently learned that Clode had not been to a +university. “You astonish me,” he said, “for you have so completely the +manner of a ’varsity-man!” + +The observation was a little too gracious, a little wanting in tact, +but it would not have hurt the curate had he not been at the moment in +a state of irritation. As it was, Clode treasured it up, and never got +rid of the feeling that the Oxford man looked down upon him because he +had been only at Wells; whereas Lindo, with some prejudices and +sufficiently prone to judge his fellows, had far too high an opinion of +himself to be bound by such distinctions, but was just as likely to +make a friend of a ploughboy, if he liked him, as of a Christchurch +man. After that speech, however, the curate was more than ever resolved +to go, and go quickly. + +But, when dinner was over and he was about to take his leave, he +happened to pick up, as he moved about the room, a small prayer-book +which Lindo had just unpacked, and which was lying on the +writing-table. Clode idly looked into it as he talked, and, seeing on +the flyleaf “Reginald Lindo, 1850,” took occasion, when he had done +with the subject in hand, to discuss it. “Surely,” he said, holding it +up, “you did not possess this in 1850, Mr. Lindo!” + +“Hardly,” Lindo answered, laughing. “I was not born until ’54.” + +“Then who?” + +“It was my uncle’s,” the rector explained. “I was his god-son, and his +name was mine also.” + +“Is he alive, may I ask?” the curate pursued, looking at the title-page +as if he saw something curious there—though, indeed, what he saw was +not new to him; only from it he had suddenly deduced a thought. + +“No, he died about a year ago—nearly a year ago, I think,” Lindo +answered carelessly, and without the least suspicion. “He was always +particularly kind to me, and I use that book a good deal. I must have +it rebound.” + +“Yes,” Clode said mechanically; “it wants rebinding if you value it.” + +“I shall have it done. And a lot of these books,” the rector continued, +looking at old Mr. Williams’s shelves, “want their clothes renewing. I +shall have them all looked to, I think.” He had a pleasant sense that +this was in his power. The cost of the furniture and library had made a +hole in his not very large private means; but that mattered little now. +Eight hundred a year, paid quarterly, will bind a book or two. + +Had the curate been attending, he would have read Lindo’s thoughts with +ease. But Clode was pursuing a train of reflections of his own, and so +was spared this pang. “Your uncle was an old man, I suppose,” he said. +“I think I observed in the Clergy List that he had been in orders about +forty years.” + +“Not quite so long as that,” Lindo replied. “He was sixty-four when he +died. He had been Lord Dynmore’s private tutor you know, though they +were almost of an age.” + +“Indeed,” the curate rejoined, still with that thoughtful look on his +face. “You knew Lord Dynmore through him, I suppose, then, Mr. Lindo?” + +“Well, I got the living through him, if that what you mean,” Lindo said +frankly. “But I do not think that I ever met Lord Dynmore. Certainly I +should not know him from Adam.” + +“Ah!” said the curate, “ah! indeed!” He smiled as he gazed into the +fire, and stroked his chin. In the other’s place, he thought, he would +have been more reticent. He would not have disclaimed, though he might +not have claimed, acquaintance with Lord Dynmore. He would have left +the thing shadowy, to be defined by others as they pleased. Thinking +thus, he got up somewhat abruptly, and wished Lindo good-night. A cool +observer, indeed, might have noticed—but the rector did not—a change in +his manner as he did so—a little accession of familiarity, which did +seem not far removed from a delicate kind of contempt. The change was +subtle, but one thing was certain. Stephen Clode had no longer any +intention of leaving Claversham in a hurry. That resolve was gone. + +Once out of the house, he passed quickly from the churchyard by a +narrow lane leading to an irregular open space quaintly called “The Top +of the Town.” Here were his own lodgings, on the first-floor over a +stationer’s; but he did not enter them. Instead, he strode on toward +the farther and darker side of the square, where were no buildings, but +a belt of tall trees stood up, gaunt and rustling in the night wind +above a line of wall. Through the trees the lights of a large house +were visible. He walked up the avenue which led to the door and, +ringing loudly, was at once admitted. + +The sound of the bell came to the ears of two ladies who had been for +some time placidly expecting it. They were seated in a small but +charming room filled with soft, shaded light and warmth and color, an +open piano and dainty pictures and china, and a well-littered +writing-table all contributing to the air of accustomed luxury which +pervaded it. The elder lady—that Mrs. Hammond whom we saw talking to +the curate on the day of the old rector’s funeral—looked up expectantly +as Mr. Clode entered, and, extending to him a podgy white hand covered +with rings, began to chide him in a rich full voice for being so late. +“I have been dying,” she said cheerfully, “to hear what is the fate +before us, Mr. Clode. What is he like?” + +“Well,” he answered, taking with a word of thanks the cup of tea which +Laura offered him, “I have one surprise in store for you. He is +comparatively young.” + +“Sixty?” said Mrs. Hammond interrogatively. + +“Forty?” said Laura, raising her eyebrows. + +“No,” Clode replied, smiling and stirring his tea, “you must guess +again. He is twenty-six.” + +“Twenty-six! You are joking,” exclaimed the elder lady. While Laura +opened her eyes very wide, but said nothing yet. + +“No,” said the curate. “He told me himself that he was not born until +1854.” + +The two ladies were loud in their surprise then, while for a moment the +curate sipped his tea in silence. The brass kettle hissed and bubbled +on the hob. The tea-set twinkled cheerfully on the wicker table, and +faint scents of flowers and fabrics filled the room with an atmosphere +which he had long come to associate with Laura. It was Laura Hammond, +indeed, who had introduced him to this new world. The son of an +accountant living in a small Lincolnshire town, he owed his clerical +profession to his mother’s ardent wish that he should rise in the +world. His father was not wealthy, and, before he came as curate to +Claversham, Mr. Clode had had no experience of society. Then, +alighting: on a sudden in the midst of much such a small town as his +native place, he found himself astonishingly transmogrified into a +person of social importance. He found every door open to him, and among +them the Hammonds’, who were admitted to be the first people in the +town. He fell in easily enough with the “new learning,” but the central +figure in the novel pleasant world of refinement continued throughout +to be Laura Hammond. + +Much petting had somewhat spoiled him, and it annoyed him now, as he +sat sipping his tea, to observe that the ladies were far from +displeased with his tidings. “If he is a young man, he is sure not to +be evangelical,” said Mrs. Hammond decisively. “That is well. That is a +comfort, at any rate.” + +“He will play tennis, I dare say,” said Laura. + +“And Mr. Bonamy will be kept in some order now,” Mrs. Hammond +continued. “Not that I am blaming you, Mr. Clode,” she added +graciously—indeed, the curate was a great favorite with her, “but in +your position you could do nothing with a man so impracticable.” + +“He really will be an acquisition,” cried Laura gleefully, her brown +eyes shining in the firelight. And she made her tiny lace handkerchief +into a ball and flung it up—and did not catch it, for, with all her +talk of lawn-tennis, she was no great player. Her _rôle_ lay rather in +the drawing-room. She was as fond of comfort as a cat, and loved the +fire with the love of a dog, and was, in a word, pre-eminently +feminine, delighting to surround herself with all such things as tended +to set off this side of her nature. “But now,” she continued briskly, +when the curate had recovered her handkerchief for her, “tell me what +you think of him. Is he nice?” + +“Certainly; I should say so,” the curate answered, smiling. + +But, though he smiled, he became silent again. He was reflecting, with +well-hidden bitterness, that Lindo would not only override him in the +parish, but would be his rival in the particular inner clique which he +affected—perhaps his rival with Laura. The thought awoke the worst +nature of the man. Up to this time, though he had not been true, though +he had kept back at Claversham details of his past history which a +frank man would have avowed, though in the process of assimilating +himself to his new surroundings he had been over-pliant, he had not +been guilty of any baseness which had seemed to him a baseness, which +had outraged his own conscience. But, as he reflected on the wrong +which this young stranger was threatening to do him, he felt himself +capable of much. + +“Mrs. Hammond,” he said suddenly, “may I ask if you have destroyed Lord +Dynmore’s letter which you showed me last week?” + +“Destroyed Lord Dynmore’s letter!” Laura answered, speaking for her +mother in a tone of comic surprise. “Do you think, sir, that we get +peers’ autographs every day of the week?” + +“No,” Mrs. Hammond said, waving aside her daughter’s flippancy and +speaking with some stateliness. “It is not destroyed, though such +things are not so rare with us as Laura pretends. But why do you ask?” + +“Because the rector was not sure when Lord Dynmore meant to return to +England,” Clode explained readily. “And I thought he mentioned the date +in his letter to you, Mrs. Hammond.” + +“I do not think so,” said Mrs. Hammond. + +“Might I look?” + +“Of course,” was the answer. “Will you find it, Laura? I think it is +under the malachite weight in the other room.” + +It was, sitting there in solitary majesty. Laura opened it, and took +the liberty of glancing through it first. Then she gave it to him. +“There, you unbelieving man,” she said, “you can look. But he does not +say a word about his return.” + +The curate read rapidly until he came to one sentence, and on this his +eye dwelt a moment. “I hear with regret,” it ran, “that poor Williams +is not long for this world. When he goes I shall send you an old friend +of mine. I trust he will become an old friend of yours also.” Clode +barely glanced at the rest of the letter, but, as he handed it back, he +informed himself that it was dated in America two days before Mr. +Williams’s death. + +“No,” he admitted, “I was wrong. I thought he had said when he would +return.” + +“And you are satisfied?” said Laura. + +“Perfectly,” he answered. “Perfectly!” with a little unnecessary +emphasis. + +He lingered long enough to give them a personal description of the +new-comer—speaking always of him in words of praise—and then he took +his leave. As his hand met Laura’s, his face flushed ever so slightly +and his dark eyes glowed; and the girl, as she turned away, smiled +furtively, knowing well, though he had never spoken, that she was the +cause of this. So she was, but in part only. At that moment the curate +saw something besides Laura—he saw across a narrow strait of trouble +the fairer land of preferment, his footing on which once gained he +might pretend to her and to many other pleasant things at present +beyond his reach. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. +THE BONAMYS AT HOME. + + +Lindo made his first exploration of the neighborhood, not on the day +after his arrival, which was taken up with his induction by the +archdeacon and with other matters, but on the day after that. He chose +to avoid the streets, in which he felt somewhat shy, so polite were the +attentions and so curious the glances of his parishioners; and he +selected instead a lane which, starting from the churchyard, seemed to +plunge at once into the country. It was a pleasant lane. It lay deep +sunk in a cutting through the sandstone rock—a cutting first formed, +perhaps, when the great stones for the building of the church were +dragged up that way. He paused halfway down the slope to look about him +curiously, and was still standing when some one came round the corner +before him. It was Kate Bonamy. He saw the girl’s cheek—she was +alone—flush ever so slightly as their eyes met; and he noticed, too, +that to all appearance she would have passed him with a bow had he not +placed himself in her way. “Come,” he said, laughing frankly as he held +out his hand, “you must not cut me, Miss Bonamy! Let me tell you, you +have quite the aspect of an old friend, for until now I have not seen +one face since I came here that was not absolutely new to me.” + +“It must feel strange, no doubt,” she murmured. + +“It is. _I_ feel strange!” he replied. “I want you to tell me where +this road goes to, if you please. I am so strange, I do not even know +that.” + +“Kingsford Carbonel,” she answered briefly. + +“Ah! The archdeacon lives there, does he not?” + +“Yes.” + +“And the distance, please, is——?” + +“Three miles.” + +“Thank you,” he said. “Really you are as concise as a mile-stone, Miss +Bonamy. And now let me remind you,” he continued—there was an air of “I +am going on this moment” about her, which provoked him to detain her +the longer—“that you have not yet asked me what I think of Claversham.” + +“I would rather ask you in a month’s time,” Kate answered quietly, +holding out her hand to take leave. “Though it is already reported in +the town that you will only stay a year, Mr. Lindo.” + +“I shall only stay a year!” the rector repeated in astonishment. + +“Certainly,” she answered, smiling, and relapsing for a moment into the +pleasant frankness of that day at Oxford—“only a year; your days are +already numbered.” + +“What do you mean?” he said point-blank. + +“Have you never heard the old tradition that as many times as a +clergyman sounds the bell at his induction, so many years will he +remain in the living? And the report in Claversham is that you rang it +only once.” + +“You did not hear it yourself?” he said, catching her eyes suddenly, a +lurking smile in his own. + +Her color rose faintly. “I am not sure,” she said. Then, meeting his +eyes boldly, she added in a different tone, “Yes, I did hear it.” + +“Only once?” + +She nodded. + +“Oh, that is sad,” he answered. “Well, the tradition is new to me. If I +had known it,” he added, laughing, “I should have tolled the bell at +least fifty times. Clode should have instructed me; but I suppose he +thought I knew. I remember now that the archdeacon did say something +afterward, but I did not understand the reference. You know the +archdeacon, Miss Bonamy, I suppose?” + +“No,” said Kate, growing stiff again. + +“Do you not? Well, at any rate you can tell me where Mrs. Hammond +lives. She has kindly asked me to dine with her on Tuesday. I put my +acceptance in my pocket, and thought I would deliver it myself when I +came back from my walk.” + +“Mrs. Hammond lives at the Town House,” Kate answered. “It is the large +house among the trees by the top of the town. You cannot mistake it.” + +“Shall I have the pleasure of meeting you there?” he asked, holding out +his hand at last. + +“No; I do not know Mrs. Hammond,” Miss Bonamy said with decision. +“Good-day, Mr. Lindo.” And she was gone; rather abruptly at last. + +“That is odd—very odd,” Lindo reflected as, continuing his walk, he +turned to admire her graceful figure and the pretty carriage of her +head. “I fancied that in these small towns every one knew every one. +What sort of people are the Hammonds, I wonder? New, rich, and vulgar +perhaps. It may be, and that would account for it. Yet Clode spoke +highly of them.” + +Something which he did not understand in the girl’s manner continued to +pique the young man’s curiosity after he had parted from her, and led +him to dwell more intently upon her than upon the scenery, novel as +this was to him. She had shown herself at one moment so frank, and at +another so stiff and constrained, that it was equally impossible to +ascribe the one attitude to shyness or the other to a naturally candid +manner. The rector considered the question so long, and found it so +puzzling—and interesting—that on his return to town he had come to one +conclusion only—that it was his immediate duty to call upon his church +wardens. He had made the acquaintance of Mr. Harper, his own warden, at +his induction. It remained therefore to call upon Mr. Bonamy, the +peoples’ warden. When he had taken his lunch, it seemed to him that +there was no time like the present. + +He had no difficulty in finding Mr. Bonamy’s house, which stood in the +middle of the town, about halfway down Bridge Street. It was a +substantial, respectable residence of brick, not detached nor withdrawn +from the roadway. It had nothing aristocratic in its appearance, and +was known by a number. Its eleven windows, of which the three lowest +rejoiced in mohair blinds, were sombre, its doorway was heavy. In a +word, it was a respectable middle-class house in a dull street in a +country town—a house suggestive of early dinners and set teas. The +rector felt chilled by its very appearance; but he knocked, and +presently a maid-servant opened the door about a foot. “Is Mr. Bonamy +at home?” he said. + +“No, sir,” the girl drawled, holding the door as if she feared he might +attempt to enter by force, “he is not.” + +“Ah, I am sorry I have missed him,” said the clergyman, handling his +card-case. “Do you know at what time he is likely to return?” + +“No, sir, I don’t,” replied the girl, who was all eyes for the strange +rector; “but I expect Miss Kate does. Will you walk up-stairs, sir? and +I will tell her.” + +“Perhaps I had better,” he answered, pocketing his card-case. +Accordingly he walked in, and followed the servant to the drawing-room, +where she poked the sinking fire and induced a sickly blaze. + +Left to himself—for Kate was not there—he looked round curiously, and +as he looked the sense of disappointment which he had felt at sight of +the house grew upon him. It was a cold, uncomfortable room. It had a +set, formal look, which was not quaintness, nor harmony, and which was +strange to the Londoner. It was so neat: every article in it had a +place, and was in its place, and apparently never had been out of its +place. There was a vase of chrysanthemums on the large centre table, +but the rector thought they must be wax, they were so prim. There were +other wax flowers—which he hated. He almost shivered as he looked at +the four walls. He felt obliged to sit upright on his chair, and to +place his hat exactly in the middle of a square of the carpet, and to +ponder over the question of what the maid had done with the poker. For +she had certainly not stirred the fire with the bright and shining +thing which lay in evidence in the fender. + +He was in the act of rising cautiously with the intention of solving +this mystery, when the door opened and the elder sister came in, +Daintry following her. “My father is not in, Mr. Lindo,” Kate said, +advancing to meet him, and shaking hands with him. + +“No; so I learned down-stairs,” he answered. “But I——” + +The girl—she had scarcely turned from him—cut him short with an +exclamation of dismay. “Oh, Daintry, you naughty girl!” she cried. “You +have brought Snorum up.” + +“Well,” said Daintry simply—a large white dog, half bull-dog, half +terrier, with red-rimmed eyes and projecting teeth, had crept in at her +heels—“he followed me.” + +“You know papa would be so angry if he found him here.” + +“But I only want him to see Mr. Lindo. You are unkind, Kate! You know +he never gets a chance of seeing a stranger.” + +“You want to know if he likes me?” the rector said, laughing. + +“That is it,” she answered, nodding. + +But Kate, though she laughed, was inexorable. She bundled the big dog +out. “Do you know, she has two more like that, Mr. Lindo?” she said, +apologetically. + +“Snip and Snap,” said Daintry. “But they are not like that. They are +smaller. Jack gave me Snorum, and Snip and Snap are Snorum’s sons.” + +“It is quite a genealogy,” the rector said, smiling. + +“Yes, and Jack was the Genesis. Genesis means beginning, you know,” +Daintry explained. + +“Daintry, you must go down-stairs if you talk nonsense,” Kate said +imperatively. She was looking, the young man thought, prettier than +ever in a gray and blue plaid frock and the neatest of collars and +cuffs. As for Daintry, she shrugged her shoulders under the rebuke, and +lolled in one of the stiff-backed chairs, her attitude much like that +of a vine clinging to a telegraph-post. + +Her wilfulness had one happy effect, however. The rector in his +amusement forgot the chill formality of the room and the dull +respectability of the house’s exterior. For half an hour he talked on +without a thought of the gentleman whom he had come to see. Some +inkling of the circumstances of the case which had entered his head +before the sisters’ appearance faded again, and in gazing on the pure +animated faces of the two girls he quickly lost sight of the evidences +of lack of taste which appeared in their surroundings. If Kate, on her +side, forgot for a moment certain chilling realities and surrendered +herself to the pleasure of the moment, it must be remembered that +hitherto—in Claversham, at least—her experience of men had been +confined to Dr. Gregg and his fellows, and also that none of us, even +the wisest and proudest, are always on guard. + +Mr. Bonamy not appearing, Reginald left at last, perfectly assured that +the half-hour he had just spent was the pleasantest he had spent in +Claversham. He went out of the house in a gentle glow of enthusiasm. +The picture of Kate Bonamy, trim and neat, with her hair in a bright +knot, and laughter softening her eyes, remained with him, and he walked +half-way down the street lost in a delightful reverie. + +He was aroused by the approach of a tall, elderly man who had just +turned the corner before him, and was now advancing along the pavement +with long, rapid strides. The stranger, who seemed about sixty, wore a +wide-skirted black coat, and had a tall silk hat, from under which the +gray hairs straggled thinly, set far back on his head. His figure was +spare, his face sallow, his features prominent. His mouth was peevish, +his eyes sharp and saturnine. As he walked he kept one hand in his +trousers’-pocket, the other swung by his side. The rector looked at him +a moment in doubt, and then stopped him. “Mr. Bonamy, I am sure?” he +said, holding out his hand. + +“Yes, I am,” replied the other, fixing him with a penetrating glance. +“And you, sir?” + +“May I introduce myself? I have just called at your house, and, +unluckily, failed to find you at home. I am Mr. Lindo.” + +“Oh, the new rector!” said Mr. Bonamy, putting out a cold hand, while +the chill glitter of his eye lost none of its steeliness. + +“Yes, and I am glad to have intercepted you,” Lindo continued, with a +little color in his cheek, and speaking quickly under the influence of +his late enthusiasm, which as yet was proof against the lawyer’s +reserve. “For I have been extremely anxious to make your acquaintance, +and, indeed, to say something particular to you, Mr. Bonamy.” + +The elder man bowed to hide a smile. “As church warden, I presume?” he +said smoothly. + +“Yes, and—and generally. I am quite aware, Mr. Bonamy,” continued the +rash young man in a fervor of frankness, “that you were not disposed to +look upon my appointment—the appointment of a complete stranger, I +mean—with favor.” + +“May I ask who told you that?” said Bonamy abruptly. + +The young clergyman colored. “Well, I—perhaps you will excuse me saying +how I learned it,” he answered, beginning to see that he would have +done better to be more reticent. There is no mistake which youth more +often makes than that of arousing sleeping dogs, and trying to explain +things which a wiser man would pass over in silence. Mr. Bonamy had his +own reasons for regarding the parson with suspicion, and had no mind to +be addressed in the indulgent vein. Nor was he propitiated when Lindo +added, “I learned your feeling, if I may say so, by an accident.” + +“Then I think you should have kept knowledge so gained to yourself!” +the lawyer retorted. + +The rector started and turned crimson under the reproof. His dignity +was new and tender, and the other’s tone was offensive in the last +degree. Yet the young man tried to control himself, and for the moment +succeeded. “Possibly,” he said, with some stiffness. “My only motive in +mentioning the latter, however, was this, that I hope in a short time, +by appealing to you for your hearty co-operation, to overcome any +prejudices you may have entertained.” + +“My prejudices are rather strong,” the lawyer answered grimly. “You are +quite at liberty to try, however, Mr. Lindo. But I may as well warn you +of one thing now, as frankness seems to be in fashion. I have just been +told that you are meditating considerable changes in our church here. +Now, I must tell you this, that I object to anything new—anything new, +and not only to new incumbents!” with a smile which somewhat softened +his last words. + +“But who informed you,” cried the rector in angry surprise, “that I +meditated changes, Mr. Bonamy?” + +“Ah!” the lawyer answered in his dryest and thinnest voice. “That is +just what I cannot tell you. Let us say that I learned it—by accident, +Mr. Lindo!” And his sharp eyes twinkled. + +“It is not true, however!” the rector exclaimed. + +“Is it not? Well,” with a slight cough, “I am glad to hear it!” + +Mr. Bonamy’s tone as he made this admission, however, was such that it +only irritated Lindo the more. “You mean that you do not believe me!” +he cried, speaking so fiercely that Clowes the bookseller, who had been +watching the interview from his shop-door, was able to repeat the words +to a dozen people afterward. “I can assure you that it is so. I am not +thinking of making any changes whatever—unless you consider the mere +removal of the sheep from the churchyard a change!” + +“I do. A great change,” replied the church warden with grimness. + +“But surely you do not object to it!” Lindo exclaimed in astonishment. +“Every one must agree that in these days, and in town churchyards at +any rate, the presence of sheep is unseemly.” + +“I do not agree to that at all!” Mr. Bonamy answered calmly. “Neither +did Mr. Williams, the late rector, who had had long experience, act as +if he were of that mind.” + +The present rector threw up his hands in disgust—in disgust and wonder. +Remember, he was very young. The thing seemed to him so clear that he +was assured the other was arguing for the sake of argument—a thing we +all hate in other people—and he lost patience. “I do not think you mean +what you say, Mr. Bonamy,” he blurted out at last. He was much +discomposed, yet he made an attempt to assume an air of severity which +did not sit well upon him at the moment. + +Mr. Bonamy grinned. “That you will see when you turn out the sheep, Mr. +Lindo,” he said. “For the present I think I will bid you good evening.” +and taking off his hat gravely—to the rector the gravity seemed +ironical—he went his way. + +Men take these things differently. To the lawyer there was nothing +disturbing in such a passage of arms as this. He was never so +happy—Claversham knew it well—as in and after a quarrel. “Master Lindo +thought to twist me round his finger, did he?” he muttered to himself +as he stopped on his own doorstep and thrust the key into the lock. “He +has found out his mistake now. We will have nothing new here—nothing +new while John Bonamy is warden, at any rate, my lad! It is well, +however,” continued Mr. Bonamy with a backward glance, “that Clode gave +me a hint in time. Set a beggar on horseback and he will ride—we know +whither!” And the lawyer went in and slammed the door behind him. + +Meanwhile, what is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the +gander. The younger man turned away, at the moment, indeed, in a white +heat, full of wrath at the other’s unreasonableness, folly, +churlishness. But the comfortable warmth which this engendered passed +away quickly—alas! much too quickly—and long before Lindo reached the +rectory, though the walk through the gray streets, where the shops were +just being lighted, did not take him two minutes, a chill depression +had taken its place. This was a fine beginning! This was a happy augury +of his future administration of the parish! To have begun by +quarrelling with his church warden—could anything have been worse? And +the check had come so suddenly, so unexpectedly, and at a time when he +had been on such good terms with himself, that he felt it the more +sorely. He went into the house with his head bent, and was not best +pleased to find Stephen Clode inquiring after him in the hall. He would +rather have been alone. + +The curate, as he came forward, did not fail to note that something was +amiss, and a gleam of intelligence flashed for an instant across his +dark face. “Come into the study,” said the rector curtly. Since Clode +was here, and could not be avoided, he felt it would be a relief to +tell him all. And he did so, the curate listening and making no remark +whatever, so that the rector presently looked at him in surprise. “What +do you think of it?” he said, some impatience in his one. “It is +unfortunate, is it not?” + +“Well, I don’t know,” the curate answered, leaning forward in his +chair, with his elbows on his knees and his eyes cast down upon the hat +which he was slowly revolving between his hands. “I am not astonished, +you know. What can you expect from a pig but a grunt?” + +The rector got up, and, leaning his arm on the mantel-shelf, felt, if +the truth be told, rather uncomfortable. “I do not understand you,” he +said at length. + +“It is what I should have expected from Bonamy. That is all.” + +“Then you must think him a very ill-conditioned man!” Lindo retorted +warmly, scarcely knowing whether the annoyance he felt was a +reminiscence of his late conflict or caused by his companion’s manner. + +“Well, again, what else can you expect?” Clode replied sagely, looking +up and shrugging his shoulders. “You know all about him, I suppose?” + +“I know nothing,” said the rector, frowning slightly. + +“He is not a gentleman, you know,” the curate answered, still looking +up and speaking with languid indolence as if what he said must be known +to everyone. “You have heard his history?” + +“No, I have not.” + +“He was an office-boy with Adams & Rooke, the old solicitors here, +swept out the office, and brought the coal, and so forth. He had his +wits about him, and old Adams gave him his articles, and finally took +him into partnership. Then the old men died off and it all came to him. +He is well off, and has power of a sort in the town; but, of course,” +the curate added, getting up lazily and yawning—“well, people like the +Hammonds do not visit with him.” + +There was silence in the room for a full minute. The rector had left +the fireplace and, with his back to the speaker, was raising the +lamp-wick. “Why did you not tell me this before?” he said at length, +his voice hard. + +“I did not see why I should prejudice you against the man before you +saw him,” replied the curate, with much reason. “Besides, I really was +not sure whether you knew his history or not. I am afraid I did not +give much thought to the matter.” + +“Umph!” + + + + +CHAPTER VII. +THE HAMMONDS’ DINNER PARTY. + + +The new top, the new book, the bride—the first joy in the possession of +each one of these fades, not gradually, but at a leap, as day fades in +the tropics. A chip in the wood, the turning of the last page, the +first selfish word, and the thing is done; ecstasy becomes sober +satisfaction. It was so with the rector. The first glamour of his good +fortune, of his new toy, died abruptly with that evening—with the +quarrel with his church warden, and the discovery of the cause of that +constraint which he had remarked in Kate Bonamy’s manner from the +first. + +He was a conscientious man, and the failure of his good resolutions, +his aspirations to be the perfect parish priest, fretted him. Moreover, +he had to think of the future. He soon learned that Mr. Bonamy might +not be a gentleman, and was indeed reputed to be a stubborn, +queer-tempered curmudgeon; but he learned also that he had great +influence in the town, though, except in the way of business, he +associated with few, and that he, Reginald Lindo, would have to reckon +with him on that footing. The certainty of this and of the bad +beginning he had made naturally depressed the young man, his customary +good opinion of himself not coming to his aid at once. And, besides, he +carried about with him—sometimes it came between him and his book, +sometimes he saw it framed by the autumn landscape—the picture of +Kate’s pure proud face. At such moments he felt himself humiliated by +the slights cast upon her. The Hammonds did not think her fit company +for them! The Hammonds! + +Not that he knew the Hammonds yet, or many others, the days which +intervened between his induction and the dinner at the Town House being +somewhat lonely days, during which he was much thrown back upon +himself, and only felt by slow degrees the soothing influence of the +routine work of his position. Of his curate, and of him only, he +naturally saw much, and found it small comfort to learn from the +Reverend Stephen that the fracas with Mr. Bonamy had not escaped the +attention of the town, but was being made the subject of comment by +many who were delighted to have so novel a subject as the new rector +and his probable conduct. + +He was sitting at breakfast a few days later—on the morning of the +Hammonds’ party—when Mrs. Baker announced an early visitor. “No, he is +not a gentleman, sir,” she said, “though he has on a black coat. A +stranger to the town, I think, but he will not say what he wants, +except to see you.” + +“I will come to him in the study,” replied her master. + +The housekeeper, however, going out, and taking a second glance at the +caller, did not show him into the study, but instead, gave him a seat +in the hall on the farther side from the coatstand. There the rector, +when he came out, found him—a pale fat-faced man, dressed neatly and +decorously, though his clothes were threadbare. He took him into the +study, and asked him his business. “But first sit down,” the rector +added pleasantly, desiring to set the man at his ease. + +The stranger sat down gingerly on the edge of a chair. For a moment +there was a pause of seeming embarrassment, and then, “I am +body-servant, sir,” he said abruptly, passing his tongue across his +lips, and looking up furtively to learn the effect of his announcement, +“to the Earl of Dynmore.” + +“Indeed!” the rector replied, with a slight start. “Has Lord Dynmore +returned to England, then?” + +Again the man looked up slyly. “No, sir,” he answered with +deliberation, “I cannot say that he has, sir.” + +“You have brought some letter or message from him, perhaps?” the +clergyman hazarded. The stranger seemed to have a difficulty in telling +his own story. + +“No, sir, if you will pardon me, I have come about myself, sir,” the +man explained, speaking a little more freely. “I am in a little bit of +trouble, and I think you would help me, sir, if you heard the story.” + +“I am quite willing to hear the story,” said the rector gravely. +Looking more closely at the man, he saw that his neatness was only on +the surface. His white cravat was creased, and his wrists displayed no +linen. An air of seediness marked him in the full light of the windows, +and, pale as his face was, it wore here and there a delicate flush. +Perhaps the man’s admission that he was in trouble helped the rector to +see this. + +“Well, sir, it was this way,” the servant began. “I was not very well +out there, sir, and his lordship—he is an independent kind of +man—thought he would be better by himself. So he gave me my +passage-money and board wages for three months, and told me to come +home and take a holiday until he returned to England. So far it was all +right, sir.” + +“Yes?” said the rector. + +“But on board the boat—I am not excusing what I did, sir; but there are +others have done worse,” continued the man, with another of his sudden +upward glances—“I was led to play cards with a set of sharpers, and—and +the end of it was that I landed at Liverpool yesterday without a +halfpenny.” + +“That was bad.” + +“Yes, it was, sir. I do not know that I ever felt so bad in my life,” +replied the servant earnestly. “And now you know my position, sir. +There are several people in the town—but they have no means to help +me—who can tell you I am his lordship’s valet, and my name Charles +Felton.” + +“You want help, I suppose?” + +“I have not a halfpenny, sir! I want something to live on until his +lordship comes back.” + +His tone changed as he said this, growing hard and almost defiant. The +rector noted the alteration, and did not like it. “But why come to me?” +he said, more coldly than he had yet spoken. “Why do you not go to Lord +Dynmore’s steward, or agent, or his solicitor, my man?” + +“They would tell of me,” was the curt answer. “And likely enough I +should lose my place.” + +“Still, why come to me?” Lindo persisted—chiefly to learn what was in +the man’s mind, for he had already determined what he would do. + +“Because you are rector of Claversham, sir,” the applicant retorted at +last. And he rose suddenly and confronted the parson with an unpleasant +smile on his pale face—“which is in my lord’s gift, as you know, sir,” +he continued, in a tone rude and almost savage—a tone which +considerably puzzled his companion, who was not conscious of having +said anything offensive to the man. “I came here, sir, expecting to +meet an older gentleman, a gentleman of your name, a gentleman known to +me, and I find you—and I see you, do you see, where I expected to find +him.” + +“You mean my uncle, I suppose?” said Lindo. + +“Well, sir, you know best,” was the odd reply, and the man’s look was +as odd as his words. “But that is how the case stands; and, seeing it +stands so, I hope you will help me, sir. I do hope, on every account, +sir, that you will see your way to help me.” + +The rector looked at the speaker with a slight frown, liking neither +the man nor his behavior. But he had already made up his mind to help +him, if only in gratitude to his patron, whose retainer he was; and +this, though the earl would never know of the act, nor possibly approve +of it. The man had at least had the frankness to own the folly which +had brought him to these straits, and Lindo was inclined to set down +the oddity of his present manner to the fear and anxiety of a +respectable servant on the verge of disgrace. “Yes,” he said coldly, +after a moment’s thought, “I am willing to help you. Of course I shall +expect you to repay me if and when you are able, Felton.” + +“I will do that,” replied the man rather cavalierly. + +“You might have added, ‘and thank you, sir,’” the rector said, with a +keen glance of reproof. He turned, as he spoke, to a small cupboard +constructed between the bookshelves near the fireplace, and, opening +it, took out a cash-box. + +The man colored under his reproach, and muttered some apology, +resuming, as by habit, the tone of respect which seemed natural to him. +All the same he watched the clergyman’s movements with great closeness, +and appraised, even before it was placed in his hand, the sum which +Lindo took from a compartment set apart apparently for gold. “I will +allow you ten shillings a week—on loan, of course,” Lindo said after a +moment’s thought. “You can keep yourself on that, I suppose? And, +besides, I will advance you a sovereign to supply yourself with +anything of which you have pressing need. That should be ample. There +are three half sovereigns.” + +This time the man did thank him with an appearance of heartiness. But +before he had said much the study door opened, and Stephen Clode came +in, his hat in his hand. “Oh, I beg your pardon,” the curate said, +taking in at a glance the open cash-box and the stranger’s outstretched +hand, and preparing to withdraw. “I thought you were alone.” + +“Come in, come in!” said the rector, closing the money-box hastily, and +with some embarrassment, for he was not altogether sure that he had not +done a foolish and quixotic thing. “Our friend here is going. You can +send me your address, Felton. Good-day.” + +The man thanked him and, taking up his hat, went. “Some one out of +luck?” said Clode. + +“Yes.” + +“I did not much like his looks,” the curate remarked. “He is not a +townsman, or I should know him.” The rector felt that his discretion +was assailed, and hastened to defend himself. “He is respectable +enough,” he said carelessly. “As a fact, he is Lord Dynmore’s valet.” + +“But has Lord Dynmore come back?” the curate exclaimed, his hand +arrested in the act of taking down a book from a high shelf, and his +head turning quickly. If he expected to learn anything, however, from +his superior’s demeanor he was disappointed. Lindo was busy locking the +cupboard, and had his back to him. + +“No, he has not come back,” Reginald explained, “but he has sent the +man home, and the foolish fellow lost his money on the boat coming +over, and wants an advance until his master’s return.” + +“But why on earth does he come to you for it?” cried the curate, with +undisguised, astonishment. + +The rector shrugged his shoulders. “Oh, I do not know,” he said, a +trifle of irritation in his manners. “He did, and there is an end of +it. Is there any news?” + +Mr. Clode seemed to find a difficulty in at once changing the direction +of his thoughts. But he did so with an effort, and, after a pause, +answered, “No, I think not. There is a good deal of interest felt in +the question of the sheep out there, I fancy—whether you will take your +course or comply with Mr. Bonamy’s whim.” + +“I do not know myself,” said the young rector, turning and facing the +curate, with his feet apart and his hands thrust deep into his pockets. +“I do not, indeed. It is a serious matter.” + +“It is. Still you have the responsibility,” said the curate with +diffidence, “and, without expressing any view of my own on the subject, +I confess——” + +“Well?” + +“I think if I bore the responsibility, I should feel called upon to do +what I myself thought right in the matter.” + +The younger man shook his head doubtfully. “There is something in +that,” he said; “but, on the other hand, one cannot look on the point +as an essential, and, that being so, perhaps one should prefer peace. +But, there, enough of that now, Clode. I think you said you were not +going to the Hammonds’ this evening?” + +“No, I am not.” + +The rector almost wished he were not. However sociable a man may be, a +few days of solitude and a little temporary depression will render him +averse from society if he be sensitive. Lindo as a man was not very +sensitive; he held too good an opinion of himself. But as rector he +was, and as he walked across to the Town House he anticipated anything +but enjoyment. + +In a few minutes, however—has it not some time or other happened to all +of us?—everything was changed with him. He felt as if he had entered +another world. The air of culture and refinement which surrounded him +from the hall inward, the hearty kindness of Mrs. Hammond, the pretty +rooms, the music and flowers, Laura’s light laughter and pleasant +badinage, all surprised and delighted him. The party might almost have +been a London party, it was so lively. The archdeacon, a red-faced, +cherry, white-haired man, whose acquaintance Lindo had already made, +and his wife, who was a mild image of himself, were of the number, +which was completed by their daughter and four or five county people, +all prepared to welcome and be pleased with the new rector. Lindo, +sprung from gentlefolk himself, had the ordinary experience of society; +but here he found himself treated as a stranger and a dignitary to a +degree of notice and a delicate flattery of which he had not before +tasted the sweets. Perhaps he was the more struck by the taste +displayed in the house, and the wit and liveliness of his new friends, +because he had so little looked for them—because he had insensibly +judged his parish by his experience of Mr. Bonamy, and had come +expecting this house to be as his. + +If, under these circumstances, the young fellow had been unaffected by +the incense offered to him he would have been more than mortal. But he +was not. He began, before he had been in the house an hour, to change, +all unconsciously of course, his standpoint. He began to wonder +especially why he had been so depressed during the last few days, and +why he had troubled himself so much about the opinions of people whose +views no sensible man would regard. + +Perhaps the girl beside him—he took in Laura—contributed as much as +anything to this. It was not only that she was bright and sparkling, in +the luxury of her pearls and evening dress even enchanting, nor only +that the femininity which had enslaved Stephen Clode began to have its +effects on her new neighbor. But Laura had a way while she talked to +him, while her lustrous brown eyes dwelt momentarily on his, of +removing herself and himself to a world apart—a world in which +downrightness seemed more downright and rudeness an outrage. And so, +while her manner gently soothed and flattered her companion, it led him +almost insensibly to—well, to put it in the concrete—to think scorn of +Mr. Bonamy. + +“You have had a misunderstanding,” she said softly, as they stood +together by the piano after dinner, a feathering plant or two fencing +them off in a tiny solitude of their own, “with Mr. Bonamy, have you +not, Mr. Lindo?” + +From anyone else, perhaps from her half an hour before, he would have +resented mention of the matter. Now he did not seem to mind. “Something +of the kind,” he said, laughing. + +“About the sheep in the churchyard, was it not?” she continued. + +“Yes.” + +“Well, will you pardon me saying something?” Resting both her hands on +the raised lid of the piano, she looked up at him, and it must be +confessed that he thought he had never seen eyes so soft and brilliant +before. “It is only this,” she said earnestly. “That I hope you will +not give way to him. He is a wretched, cross-grained, fidgety man and +full of crotchets. You know all about him, of course?” she added, a +slight ring of pride in her voice. + +“I know that he is my church warden,” said the rector, half in +seriousness. + +“Yes!” she replied. “That is just what he is fit for!” + +“You think so?” Lindo retorted, smiling. “Then you really mean that I +should be guided by him? That is it?” + +She looked brightly at him for a moment. “I think you will be guided +only by yourself,” she murmured; and, blushing slightly, she nodded and +left him to go to another guest. + +They were all in the same tale. “He is a rude overbearing man, Mr. +Lindo,” Mrs. Hammond said roundly, even her good nature giving place to +the _odium theologicum_. “And I cannot imagine why Mr. Williams put up +with him so long.” + +“No indeed,” said the archdeacon’s wife, complacently smoothing down +her skirt. “But that is the worst of a town parish. You have this sort +of people.” + +Mrs. Hammond looked for the moment as if she would have liked to deny +it. But under the circumstances this was impossible. “I am afraid we +have,” she admitted gloomily. “I hope Mr. Lindo will know how to deal +with him.” + +“I think the archdeacon would,” said the other lady, shaking her head +sagely. + +But, naturally enough, the archdeacon was more guarded in his +expressions. “It is about removing the sheep from the churchyard, is it +not?” he said, when he and Lindo happened to be left standing together +and the subject came up. “They have been there a long time, you know.” + +“That is true, I suppose,” the rector answered. “But,” he continued +rather warmly—“you do not approve of their presence there, archdeacon?” + +“No, certainly not.” + +“Nor do I. And, thinking the removal right, and the responsibility +resting upon me, ought I not to undertake it?” + +“Possibly,” replied the older man. “But pardon me making a suggestion. +Is not the thing of so little importance that you may, with a good +conscience, prefer quiet to the trouble of raising it?” + +“If the matter were to end there, I think so,” replied the new rector, +with perhaps too strong an assumption of wisdom in his tone. “But what +if this be only a test case?—if to give way here means to encourage +further trespass on my right of judgment? The affair would bear a +different aspect then, would it not?” + +“Oh, no doubt. No doubt it would.” + +And that was all the archdeacon, who was a cautious man and knew Mr. +Bonamy, would say. But it will be observed that the rector had both +altered his standpoint and done another thing which most people find +easy enough. He had discovered an answer to his own arguments. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. +TWO SURPRISES. + + +On the evening of the Hammonds’ party, Mr. Clode sat alone in his room, +trying to compose himself to work. His lamp burned brightly, and his +tea kettle—he had already sent down his frugal dinner an hour or +more—murmured pleasantly on the hob. But for some reason Mr. Clode +could do no work. He was restless, gloomy, ill-satisfied. The +suspicions which had been aroused in his breast on the evening of the +rector’s arrival had received, up to to-day at least, no confirmation; +but they had grown, as suspicions will, feeding on themselves, and with +them had grown the jealousy which had fostered them into being. The +curate saw himself already overshadowed by his superior, socially and +in the parish; and this evening felt this the more keenly that, as he +sat in his little room, he could picture perfectly the gay scene at the +Town House, where, for nearly two years, not a party had taken place +without his presence, no festivity had been arranged without his +co-operation. The omission to invite him to-night, however natural it +might seem to others, had for him a tremendous significance; so that +from a jealousy that was general he leapt at once to a jealousy more +particular, and conjured up a picture of Laura—with whose disposition +he was not unacquainted—smiling on the stranger, and weaving about him +the same charming net which had caught his own feet. + +At this thought Clode sprang up with a passionate gesture and began to +walk to and fro, his brow dark. He felt sure that Lindo had no right to +his cure, but he knew also that the cure was a freehold, and that to +oust the rector from it something more than a mere mistake would have +to be shown. If the rector should turn out to be very incompetent, if +he should fall on evil times in the parish, then indeed he might find +his seat untenable when the mistake should be discovered; and with an +eye to this the curate had already dropped a word here and there—as, +for instance, that word which had reached Mr. Bonamy. But Clode was not +satisfied with that now. Was there no shorter, no simpler course +possible? There was one. The rector might be shown to have been aware +of the error when he took advantage of it. In that case his appointment +would be vitiated, and he might be compelled to forego it. + +Naturally enough, the curate had scarcely formulated this to himself +before he became convinced—in his present state of envy and +suspicion—of the rector’s guilt. But how was he to prove it? As he +walked up and down the room, chafing and hot-eyed, he thought of a way +in which proof might be secured. The letters which had passed between +Lindo and Lord Dynmore’s agents in regard to the presentation, must +surely contain some word, some expression sufficient to have apprised +the young man of the truth—that the living was intended not for him but +for his uncle. A look at those letters, if they were in existence, +might give Stephen Clode, mere curate though he was, the whip-hand of +his rector! + +He had another plan in his mind, of which more presently, and probably +he would have pursued the idea which has just been mentioned no farther +if his eye had not chanced to light at the moment on a small key +hanging upon a nail by the fireplace. Clode looked at the key, and his +face flushed. He stood thinking and apparently hesitating, the lamp +throwing his features into strong relief, while a man might count +twenty. Then he sat down with an angry exclamation and plunged into his +work. But in less than a minute he lifted his head. His glance wandered +again to the key; and, getting up suddenly, he took it down, put on his +hat, and went out. + +His lodgings were over the stationer’s shop, but he could go in and out +through a private passage. He saw, as he passed, however; that there +was a light in the shop, and he opened the side door. “I am going to +the rectory to consult a book, Mrs. Wafer,” he said, seeing his +landlady dusting the counter. “You can leave my lamp alight. I shall +want nothing more to-night, thank you.” + +She bade him good-night, and he closed the door again and rushed into +the street. Crossing the top of the town, he had to pass the Market +Hall, where he spoke to the one policeman on night duty; and here he +saw that it was five minutes to ten, and hastened his steps, in the +fear that the rector’s household might have retired. “He will not be +home himself until eleven, at the earliest,” the curate muttered as he +turned rapidly into the churchyard, which was very dark, the night +being moonless. “I have a clear hour. It was well that I looked in late +the other night.” + +But, whatever his design, it received a sudden check. The rectory was +closed! The front of the house stood up dark and shapeless as the great +church which towered in front of it. The servants had gone to bed, and, +as they slept at the back, he would have found it difficult to arouse +them, had it suited his plans to do so. As it was, he did not dream of +such a thing, and with a slight shiver—for the night was cold, and now +that his project no longer excited him he felt it so, and felt too the +influence of the night wind soughing in sad fashion through the yews—he +was turning away, when something arrested his attention, and he paused. + +The something he had seen, or fancied he had seen, was a momentary +glimmer of light shining through the fanlight over the door. It could +not affect him, for, if the servants had really closed the house for +the night, even if they had not all gone to bed, he could scarcely go +in. And yet some impulse led him to step softly into the porch and +grope for the knocker. + +His hand lit instead on the iron-studded surface of the old oak door, +and, to his surprise, he felt it move slightly under his touch. He +pushed, and the door slid slowly and silently open, disclosing the +dusky outline of the hall, faintly illuminated by a thin shaft of light +which proceeded apparently from the study, the door of which was a +trifle ajar. + +The sight recalled to the curate’s mind the errand on which he had +come, and he stole across the hall on tiptoe, listening with all his +ears. He heard nothing, however, and presently he stood on the mat at +the study door intercepting the light. Then he did hear the dull +footsteps of some one moving in the room, and suddenly it occurred to +him that the rector had stepped home to fetch something—a song, music, +or a book possibly—and was now within searching for it. That would +explain all. + +The curate was seized with panic at the thought, and, fearful of being +discovered in his present position—for though he might have done all he +had done in perfect innocence, conscience made a coward of him—he crept +across the hall again and passed out into the churchyard. There he +stood in the darkness, waiting and watching, expecting the rector to +bustle out each minute. + +But five minutes passed, and even ten, as it seemed to the curate in +his impatience, and no one came out, nor did the situation alter. Then +he made up his mind that the person moving in the study could not be +the owner of the house, and he went in again and, crossing the hall, +flung the study door wide open and entered. + +There was a ringing sound as of coins falling on the floor, and a man +who had been kneeling low over something sprang to his feet and gazed +with wide, horror-stricken eyes at the intruder. A moment only the man +looked, and then he fell again on his knees. “Oh, mercy! mercy!” he +cried, almost grovelling before the curate. “Don’t give me up! I have +never been took! I have never been in jail or in trouble in my life! I +did not know what I was doing, sir! I swear I did not! Don’t give me +up!” + +This cry, which was low and yet piercing, ended in hysterical sobbing. +On the table by his side stood a single candle, and by its light Clode +saw that the little cupboard among the books was open. The curate +started at the sight, and the words which he had been about to utter to +the shrinking wretch begging for mercy on the floor before him died +away in his husky throat. His eyes, however, burned with a gloomy rage, +and when he recovered himself his voice was pitiless. “You scoundrel!” +he said, in the low rich tone which had been so much admired in the +church when he first came to Claversham, “what are you doing here? Get +up and speak!” And he made as if he would spurn the creature with his +foot. + +“I am a respectable man,” the rogue whined. “I am—that is I was, I +mean, sir—don’t be hard on me—Lord Dynmore’s own valet. I will tell you +all, sir.” + +“I know you!” rejoined Clode, looking harshly at him. “You were here +this morning. And Mr. Lindo gave you money.” + +“He did, sir. I confess it. I am a——” + +“You are an ungrateful scoundrel!” Stephen Clode answered, cutting the +man short. “That is what you are! And in a few days you will be a +convicted felon, with the broad-arrow on your clothes, my man!” + +To hear his worst anticipations thus put into words was too much for +the poor wretch. He fell on his knees, feebly crying for mercy, mercy! +“You are a minister of the gospel. Give me this one more chance, sir!” +he prayed. + +“Stop that noise!” growled the curate fiercely, his dark face rendered +more rugged by the light and shadow cast by the single candle. “Be +silent! do you hear? and get up and speak like a man, if you can. Tell +me all—how you came here, and what you came for, and perhaps I may let +you escape. But the truth, mind, the truth!” he added truculently. + +The knave was too thoroughly terrified to think of anything else. “Lord +Dynmore dismissed me,” he muttered, his breath coming quickly. “He +missed some money in Chicago, and he gave me enough to carry me home, +and bade me go to the devil! I landed in Liverpool without a +shilling—sir, it is God’s truth—and I remembered the gentleman Lord +Dynmore had just put in the living here. I had known him, and he had +given me half a sovereign more than once. And I thought I would come to +him. So I pawned my clothes, and came on.” + +“Yes, yes!” exclaimed the curate, leaning forward, with fierce +impatience in his tone. “And then?” + +“Sir?” + +“Well? When you came here? What happened? Go on, fool!” He could +scarcely control himself. + +“I found a stranger,” whimpered the man—“another Mr. Lindo. He had got +in here somehow.” + +“Well? But there,” added the curate with a sudden change of manner, +“how do you know that Lord Dynmore meant to put the clergyman you used +to know in here?” + +“Because I heard him read a letter from his agents about it,” the +fellow replied at once. “And from what his lordship said I knew it was +his old pal—his old friend, sir, I mean, begging your pardon humbly, +sir.” + +“And when did you learn,” said the curate more quickly, “that the +gentleman here was not your Mr. Lindo?” + +“I heard in the town that he was a young man. And, putting one thing +and another together, and keeping a still tongue myself, I thought he +would serve me as well as the other, and I called——” + +“What did you say?” + +“Not much, sir,” answered the valet, a twinkle of cunning in his eye. +“The less said the sooner mended. But he understood, and he promised to +give me ten shillings a week.” + +“To hold your tongue?” + +“Well, so I took it, sir.” + +The curate drew a long breath. This was what he had expected. It was to +information which might be drawn from this man that his second scheme +had referred. And here was the man at his service, bound by a craven +fear to do his bidding—bound to tell all he knew. “But why,” Clode +asked suspiciously, a thought striking him, “if what you say be true, +are you here now—doing this, my man?” + +“I was tempted, sir,” the servant answered, his tone abject again. “I +confess it truly, sir. I saw the money in the box here this morning, +sir, and I thought that my ten shillings a week would not last long, +and a little capital would set me up comfortably. And then the devil +put it into my head that the young gentleman would not persecute me, +even if he caught me.” + +“You did not think of me catching you?” said the curate grimly. + +The man uttered a cry of anguish. “That I did not, sir,” he sobbed. +“Oh, Lord! I have never had a policeman’s hand on me. I have been +honest always.” + +“Until you took his lordship’s money,” replied the curate quietly. “But +I understand. You have never been found out before, you mean.” + +No doubt when people of a certain class, for which respectability has +long spelled livelihood, do fall into the law’s clutch they suffer very +sharply. Master Felton continued to pour forth heartrending prayers; +but he might have saved his breath. The curate’s thoughts were +elsewhere. He was thinking that a witness so valuable must be kept +within reach at any cost and it did flash across his brain that the +best course would be to hand him over now to the police, and trust to +the effect which his statements respecting the rector should produce +upon the inquiry. But the reflection that the allegations of a man on +his trial for burglary would not obtain much credence led Clode to +reject this simple course and adopt another. “Look here!” he said +curtly. “I am going to deal mercifully with you, my man. But—but,” he +continued, frowning impatiently, as he saw the other about to speak—“on +certain conditions. You are not to leave Claversham. That is the first. +If you leave the town before I give you the word, I shall put the +police on your track without an instant’s delay. Do you hear that?” + +“I will stop as long as you like, sir,” said the servant submissively, +but with wonder apparent both in his voice and face. + +“Very well. I wish it for the present, no matter why. Perhaps because I +would see that you lead an honest life for awhile.” + +“And—how shall I live, sir?” said the culprit timidly. + +“For the present you may continue to draw your half-sovereign a week,” +the curate answered hastily, his face reddening, he best knew why. +“Possibly I may tell Mr. Lindo at once. Possibly I may give you another +chance, and tell him later, if I find you deserving. What is your +address?” + +“I am at the Bull and Staff,” muttered Felton. It was a small public +house of no very good repute. + +“Well, stay there,” Stephen Clode answered after a moment’s thought. +“But see you get into no harm. And since you are living on the rector’s +bounty, you may say so.” + +The man looked puzzled as well as relieved, but, stealing a doubtful +glance at the curate’s dark fate, he found his eyes still upon him, and +cowered afresh. “Yes, take care,” said Clode, smiling unpleasantly as +he saw the effect his look produced. “Do not try to evade me or it will +be the worse for you, Felton. And now go! But see you take nothing from +here.” + +The detected one cast a sly glance at the half-rifled box which still +lay on the carpet at his feet, a few gold coins scattered round it; +then he looked up again. “It is all there, sir,” he said, cringing. “I +had but just begun.” + +“Then go!” said the curate, pointing with emphasis to the door. “Go, I +tell you!” + +The man’s presence annoyed and humiliated him so that he felt a +positive relief when the valet’s back was turned. Left alone he stood +listening, a cloud on his brow, until the faint sound of the outer door +being pulled to reached his ear, and then, stooping hastily, he +gathered up the sovereigns and half-sovereigns, which lay where they +had fallen, and put them into the box. This done, he rose and laid the +box itself upon the table by his side. And again he stood still, +listening, a dark shade on his face. + +Long ago, almost at the moment of his entrance, he had seen the pale +shimmer of papers at the back of the little cupboard. Now, still +listening stealthily, he thrust in his hand and drew out one of the +bundles and opened it. The papers were parish accounts in his own +handwriting! With a gesture of fierce impatience he thrust them back +and drew out others, and, disappointed again in these, exchanged them +hastily for a third set. In vain! The last were as worthless to him as +the first. + +He was turning away baffled and defeated, when he saw lying at the back +of the lower compartment of the cupboard, whence the cash-box had come, +two or three smaller packets, consisting apparently of letters. The +curate reached hastily for one of these, and the discovery that it +contained some of Lindo’s private accounts, dated before his +appointment, made his face flush and his fingers tremble with +eagerness. He glanced nervously round the room and stopped to listen; +then, moving the candle a little nearer, he ran his eye over the +papers. But here, too, though the scent was hot, he took nothing, and +he exchanged the packet for one of the others. Looking at this, he saw +that it was indorsed in Lindo’s handwriting, “Letters relating to the +Claversham Living.” + +“At last,” Clode muttered, his eyes burning, “I have it now.” The +string which bound the packet was knotted tightly, and his fingers +seemed all thumbs as he labored to unfasten it. But he succeeded at +last, and opening the uppermost letter (they were all folded across), +saw that it was written from Lincoln’s Inn Fields. “My dear sir,” he +read; and then—with a mighty crash sounding awfully in his ears—the +door behind him was flung open just as he had flung it open himself an +hour before, and, dropping the letter, he sprang round, to find the +rector confronting him with a face of stupid astonishment. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. +TOWN TALK. + + +He was a man, as the reader will perhaps have gathered, of many shifts, +and cool-headed; but for a moment he felt something of the anguish of +discovery which had so tortured the surprised servant. The table shook +beneath his hand, and it was with difficulty he repressed a wild +impulse to overturn the candle, and escape in the darkness. He did +repress it, however; nay, he forced his eyes to meet the rector’s, and +twisted his lips into the likeness of a smile. But when he thought of +the scene afterward he found his chief comfort in the reflection that +the light had been too faint to betray his full embarrassment. + +Naturally the rector was the first to speak. “Clode!” he ejaculated +softly, his surprise above words. “Is it you? Why, man,” he continued, +still standing with his hand on the door and his eyes devouring the +scene, “what is up?” + +The money-box stood open at the curate’s side, and the letters lay +about his feet where they had fallen. The little cupboard yawned among +the books. No wonder Lindo’s amazement, as he gradually took it all in, +rather increased than diminished, or that the curate’s tongue was dry +and his throat husky when he at last found his voice. “It is all right. +I will explain it,” he stammered, almost upsetting the table in his +agitation. “I expected you before,” he added fussily, moving the light. + +“The dickens you did!” slipped from the rector. It was difficult for +him not to believe that his arrival had been the last thing expected. + +“Yes,” returned the curate, with a little snap of defiance. He was +recovering himself, and could look the other in the face now. “But I am +glad you did not come before, all the same.” + +“Why?” + +“I will explain.” + +The light which the one candle gave was not so meagre that Clode’s +embarrassment had altogether escaped Lindo; and had the latter been a +suspicious man he might have had queer thoughts, and possibly expressed +them. As it was, he was only puzzled, and when the curate said he would +explain, answered simply, “Do.” + +“The truth is,” said Stephen Clode, beginning with an effort, “I have +taken a good deal on myself, and I am afraid you will blame me, Mr. +Lindo. If so, I cannot help it.” His face flushed, and he beat a tattoo +on the table with his fingers. “I came across,” he continued, “to +borrow a book a little before ten. The lights here were out; but, to my +surprise, your house-door was open.” + +“As I found it myself!” the rector exclaimed. + +“Precisely. Naturally I had misgivings, and I looked into the hall. I +saw a streak of light proceeding from the doorway of this room, and I +came in softly to see what it meant. I heard a man moving about in +here, and I threw open the door much as you did.” + +“Did you?” said Lindo eagerly. “And who was it—the man, I mean?” + +“That is just what I cannot tell you,” replied the curate. His face was +pale, but there was a smile upon it, and he met the other’s gaze +without flinching. He had settled his plan now. + +“He got away, then?” said the rector, disappointed. + +“No. He did not try either to escape or to resist,” was the answer. + +“But was he really a burglar?” + +“Yes.” + +“Then where is he?” The rector looked round as if he expected to see +the man lying bound on the floor. “What did you do with him?” + +“I let him go.” + +Lindo whistled; and when he had done whistling still stood with his +mouth open and a face of the most complete mystification. “You let him +go?” he repeated mechanically, but not until after a pause of half a +minute or so. “Why, may I ask?” + +“You have every right to ask,” the curate answered with firmness, and +yet despondently. “I will tell you why—why I let him go, and why I +cannot tell you his name. He is a parishioner of yours. It was his +first offence, and I believe him to be sincerely penitent. I believe, +too, that he will never repeat the attempt, and that the accident of my +entrance saved him from a life of crime. I may have been wrong—I dare +say I was wrong,” continued the curate, growing excited—excitement came +very easily to him at the moment—“but I cannot go back from my word. +The man’s misery moved me. I thought what I should have felt in his +place, and I promised him, in return for his pledge that he would live +honestly in the future, that he should go free, and that I would not +betray his name to any one—to any one!” + +“Well!” exclaimed the rector, his tone one of unbounded admiration in +every sense of the word. “When you do a thing nobly, my dear fellow, +you do do it nobly, and no mistake! I wonder who it was! But I must not +ask you.” + +“No.” said Clode. “And now,” he continued, still beating the tattoo on +the table, “you do not blame me greatly?” + +“I do not, indeed. No. Only I think perhaps that you should have +retained the right to tell me.” + +“I should have done so,” said the curate regretfully. + +“He has taken nothing, I suppose?” the rector continued, turning to the +cupboard, and, not only satisfied with the explanation, but liking +Clode better than he had liked him before. + +“No,” the other answered. “I was putting things straight when you +entered and startled me. He had dropped the money about the floor, but +you will find it right, I think. He has made a mess among the papers, I +fear, and damaged the cupboard door in forcing it, but that is the +extent of the mischief. By the way,” the curate added, “I have a key to +this cupboard at my lodgings. Williams gave it to me. He only kept +parish matters here. I must let you have it.” + +“Right,” said the rector carelessly; and, a few more words having +passed between them as to the attempted robbery, and the manner in +which the outer door had been opened, the curate took his hat and +prepared to go. “You had a pleasant party, I suppose?” he said, pausing +and turning when halfway across the hall. + +“A _very_ pleasant one,” Lindo answered with enthusiasm. + +“They are nice people,” said Clode smoothly. + +“They are—very nice. You told me I should find them so, and you were +right. Good-night.” + +“Good-night.” + +Such harmless words! And yet they roused the curate’s jealousy anew. As +he walked home, the church clock tolling midnight above his head, he +drank in no peaceful influence from the dark stillness or the solemn +sound. He was gnawed by fresh hatred of the man who had surprised and +confounded him, and forced him to lie and quibble in order to escape +from a dishonorable position. If you would make a man your enemy come +upon him when he is doing something of which he is ashamed. He will +fear you afterward, but he will hate you more. In the curate’s case it +was only he who knew himself discovered, so that he had no ground for +fear. But he hated none the less vigorously. + +And, somehow, in a few days an ugly rumor of which the new rector was +the subject began to gain currency in the town. It was an ill-defined +rumor, coming to one thing in one person’s mouth and to a different +thing in another’s—a kind of cloud on the rector’s fair fame, shifting +from moment to moment, and taking ever a fresh shape, yet always a +cloud. + +One whispered that he had obtained the presentation as the reward of +questionable services rendered to the patron. Another that he had +forged his own deed of presentation, if such a thing existed. A third +that he had been presented by mistake; and a fourth that he had +deceived the authorities as to his age. It was noticeable that these +rumors began low down in the social scale of the town and worked their +way upward, which was odd; and that, whatever form the rumor took, +there was not one who heard it who did not within a fortnight or three +weeks come to associate it with the presence of a seedy, down-looking, +unwholesome man, who was much about the rector’s doorway, and, when he +was not there, was generally to be found at the Bull and Staff. Whether +he was the disseminator of the reports, or, alike with the rector, was +the unconscious subject of them, was not known; but at sight of +him—particularly if he were seen, as frequently happened, in the +rector’s neighborhood—people shrugged their shoulders and lifted their +eyebrows, and expressed a great many severe things without using their +tongues. + +To the circle of the rector’s personal friends the rumors did not +reach. That was natural enough. To tell a person that his or her +intimate friend is a forger or a swindler is a piquant but somewhat +perilous task. And no one mentioned the matter to the Hammonds, or to +the archdeacon, or to the Homfrays of Holberton, or the other county +people living round, with whom it must be confessed that, after that +dinner-party at the Town House, he consorted perhaps too exclusively. +It might have been thought that even the townsfolk, seeing the young +fellow’s frank face passing daily about their streets, and catching the +glint of his fair curly hair when, the wintry sunlight pierced the +lanthorn windows and fell in gules and azure on the reading-desk, would +have been slow to believe such tales of him. + +They might have been; but circumstances and Mr. Bonamy were against +him. The lawyer did not circulate the stories; he had not even +mentioned them out-of-doors, nor, for aught the greater part of +Claversham knew, had heard of them at all. But all his weight—and with +the Low-Church middle-class in the town it was great—was thrown into +the scale against the rector. It was known that he did not trust the +rector. It was known that day by day his frown on meeting the rector +grew darker and darker. And the why and the wherefore not being +understood—for no one thought of questioning the lawyer, or observed +how frequently of late the curate happened upon him in the street or +the reading-room—many concluded that he knew more of the clergyman’s +antecedents than appeared. + +There was one person, and perhaps only one, who openly circulated and +rejoiced in these rumors. That was a man whom Lindo met daily in the +street and passed with a careless nod and a word, not dreaming for an +instant that the spiteful little busybody was concerning himself with +him. The man was Dr. Gregg, the snappish, ill-bred man who had chanced +upon Lindo and the Bonamy girls breakfasting together at Oxford. The +sight, it will be remembered, had not pleased him, for he had long had +a sneaking liking for Miss Kate himself, and had only refrained from +trying to win her because he still more desired to be of the “best set” +in Claversham. He had been ashamed, indeed, up to this time of his +passion; but, reading on that occasion unmistakable admiration of the +girl in the young clergyman’s face, and being himself rather cavalierly +treated by Lindo, he had somewhat changed his views. The girl had +acquired increased value in his eyes. Another’s appreciation had +increased his own, and, merely as an incident, the man who had effected +this has earned his hearty jealousy and ill-will. And this, while Lindo +thought him a vulgar but harmless little man. + +But if the rector, immersed in new social engagements, did not see +whither he was tending, others, though they knew nothing of the +unpleasant tales we have mentioned, saw more clearly. The archdeacon, +coming into town one Saturday five or six weeks after Lindo’s arrival, +did his business early and turned his steps toward the rectory. He felt +pretty sure of finding the young fellow at home, because he knew it was +his sermon day. A few yards from the door he fell in, as it chanced, +with Stephen Clode. The two stood together talking, while the +archdeacon waited to be admitted, and presently the curate said, “If +you wish to see the rector, archdeacon, I am afraid you will be +disappointed. He is not at home.” + +“But I thought that he was always at home on Saturdays?” + +“Generally he is,” Clode replied, looking down and tracing a pattern +with the point of his umbrella. “But he is away to-day.” + +“Where?” said the archdeacon rather abruptly. + +“He has gone to the Homfrays’ at Holberton. They have some sort of +party to-day, and the Hammonds drove him over.” Despite himself, the +curate’s tone was sullen, his manner constrained. + +“Oh!” said the archdeacon thoughtfully. The Homfrays were his very good +friends, but of the county families round Claversham they were reckoned +the fastest and most frivolous. And he sagely suspected that a man in +Lindo’s delicate position might be wiser if he chose other companions. +“Lindo seems to see a good deal of the Hammonds,” he remarked after a +pause. + +“Yes,” said Clode. “It is very natural.” + +“Oh, very natural,” the archdeacon hastened to say; but his tone +clearly expressed the opinion that “toujours Hammonds” was not a good +bill of fare for the rector of Claversham. “Very natural, of course. +Only,” he continued, taking courage, for he really liked the rector, +“you have had some experience here, and I think it would be well if you +were to give him a hint not to be too exclusive. A town rector must not +be too exclusive. It does not do.” + +“No,” said Clode. + +“It is different in the country, of course. And then there is Mr. +Bonamy. He is unpleasant, I know, and yet he is honest after a fashion. +Lindo must beware of getting across with him. He has done nothing about +the sheep yet, has he?” + +“No.” + +“Well, do not let him, if you can help it. You are not urging him on in +that, are you?” + +“On the contrary,” the curate answered rather warmly, “I have all +through told him that I would not express an opinion on it. If +anything, I have discouraged him in the matter.” + +“Well, I hope he will let it drop now. I hope he will let it drop.” + +They parted then, and the archdeacon, sagely revolving in his mind the +evils of exclusiveness, strolled back to the hotel where he put up his +horses. On his way, casting his eye down the wide, quiet street, with +its old-fashioned houses on this side and that, he espied Mr. Bonamy’s +tall spare figure approaching, and he purposely passed the inn and went +to meet him. As a county magnate the archdeacon could afford to know +Mr. Bonamy, and even to be friendly with him. I am not sure, indeed, +that he had not a sneaking liking and respect for the rugged, snappish, +self-made man. + +“How do you do, Mr. Bonamy?” he began. And then, after saying a few +words about closing a road in which he was interested, he slid into a +mention of Lindo, with a view to seeing how the land lay. “I have just +been to call on your rector,” he said. + +“You did not find him at home,” replied Bonamy, with a queer grin, and +a little jerk of his head which sent his hat still farther back. + +“No, I was unlucky.” + +“Not more than most people,” said the churchwarden, with much +enjoyment. “I will tell you what it is, Mr. Archdeacon. Mr. Lindo is +better suited for your place. He would make a very good archdeacon. +With a pair of horses and a park phaeton and a small parish, and a +little general superintendence of the district—with that and the life +of a country gentleman he would get on capitally.” + +There was just so much of a jest in the words that the clergyman had no +choice but to laugh. “Come, Bonamy,” he said good-humoredly, “he is +young yet.” + +“Oh, yes, he is quite out of place here in that respect, too!” replied +the lawyer naïvely. + +“But he will improve,” pleaded the archdeacon. + +“I am not sure that he will have the chance,” Mr. Bonamy answered in +his gentlest tone. + +The archdeacon was so far from understanding him that he did not answer +save by raising his eyebrows. Could Bonamy really be so foolish, he +wondered, as to think he could get rid of a beneficed clergyman. The +archdeacon was surprised, and yet that was all he could make of it. + +“He is away at Mr. Homfray’s of Holberton now,” the lawyer continued, +condemnation in his thin voice. + +“Well, there is no harm in that, Mr. Bonamy,” replied the archdeacon, +somewhat offended, “as long as he is back to do the duty to-morrow.” + +Mr. Bonamy grunted. “A one-day-a-week duty is a very fine thing,” he +said. “You clergymen are to be envied, Mr. Archdeacon!” + +“You would be a great deal more to be envied yourself, Mr. Bonamy,” the +magnate returned with heat, “if you did not carp at everything and look +at other people through distorted glasses. Fie! here is a young +clergyman new to the parish, and, instead of helping him, you find +fault with everything he does. For shame! For shame, Mr. Bonamy!” + +“Ah!” said the lawyer, quite unabashed, “you did not mean to say that +when you came across the street to me. But—well, least said soonest +mended, and I will wish you good evening. You will have a wet drive +home, I am afraid, Mr. Archdeacon.” + +And he put up his umbrella and went his way sturdily, while the +archdeacon, crossing to his carriage, which was in front of the inn, +entertained an uncomfortable suspicion that he had done more harm than +good by his intercession. “I am afraid,” he said to himself, as he +handled the reins and sent his horses down the street in a fashion of +which he was not a little proud—“I am afraid that there is trouble in +front of that young man. I am afraid there is.” + +If he had known all, he might have shaken his head still more gravely, + + + + +CHAPTER X. +OUT WITH THE SHEEP. + + +Stephen Clode, while listening with a certain pleasure to the +archdeacon’s hints, did not dream of the good turn which fortune was +about to do him. If he had foreseen it, he would probably have taken a +bolder part in the conversation, and parted from the elder clergyman +with a more jubilant step. As it was, he heard no rumor that evening, +nor was it until ten o’clock on the Sunday morning that he learned +anything was amiss. Calling at the house in the churchyard at that +hour, he was received by Mrs. Baker herself; and he remarked at once +that the housekeeper’s face fell in a manner far from flattering when +she recognized him. + +“Oh, it is you, is it, Mr. Clode?” she said, her tone one of +disappointment. “You have not seen him, sir, have you?” + +“Seen whom?” the curate replied in surprise. + +“Mr. Lindo, sir?” + +“Why? Is he not here?” + +“He is not, indeed, sir,” the housekeeper said, putting her head out to +look up and down. “He never came back last night, and we have not heard +of him. I sent across to the Town House to inquire, and the only thing +Mrs. Hammond could say was that Mr. Lindo was to follow them, and they +supposed he had come.” + +“Well, but—who is to do the duty at the church?” Clode ejaculated. His +dismay at the moment was genuine, for he did not at once see how much +this was to his advantage. + +“There is only you, sir, unless he comes in time,” the housekeeper +added despondently. + +“But I am going to the Hamlet church,” said Clode, rapidly turning +things over in his mind. If there was no one at the parish church to +conduct the chief service of the week, what a talk there would be! Why +it would almost be matter for the bishop’s interference! “You see I +cannot possibly neglect that,” he continued, in answer as much to the +remonstrance of his own conscience as to the housekeeper. “It was the +rector’s own arrangement, Mrs. Baker. You may be sure he will be here +in time for the eleven o’clock service. Mr. Homfray has kept him over +night. That is all.” + +“You do not think he has met with an accident, sir? They say the +coal-pits on Baer Hill——” + +“Pooh, pooh! He will be here in a few minutes, you will see,” the +curate answered. And he affected to be so cheerfully certain of this +that he would not wait even for a little while, but started at once for +the Hamlet church—a small chapel-of-ease in the outskirts of the town. +There he put on his surplice early, and was ready in excellent time. +Punctuality is a virtue. + +At half-past ten the bells of the great church began to ring, and +presently door after door in the quiet streets about it opened +silently, and little parties issued forth in their Sunday clothes and +walked stiffly and slowly toward the building. At the moment when the +High Street was dotted most thickly with these groups, and the small +bell was tinkling its impatient summons, the rattle of an old +taxed-cart was heard as the vehicle flashed quickly over the bridge at +the foot of the street. One and another of the church-goers turned in +curiosity to gaze, for such a sound was rare on a Sunday morning. Judge +of their astonishment, then, when they recognized, perched up beside +the boy who urged on the pony, no less a person than the rector +himself! As he jogged up the street in his sorry conveyance and with +his sorry companion, he had to pass under the fire of a battery of eyes +which did not fail to notice all the peculiarities of his appearance. +His tie was awry and his chin unshaven. He had a haggard, dissipated +air, as of one who had been up all night, and there was a great smudge +on his cheek. He looked dissipated—-nothing less than disreputable, +some said; and he seemed aware of it, for he sat erect, gazing straight +before him, and declining to see any one. At the top of the street he +descended hastily, and, as the bell jerked out its final note, hurried +toward the vestry with a depressed and gloomy face. + +“Well!” said Mr. Bonamy to Kate, who was walking up by his side, and +whose face for some mysterious reason was flushed and troubled, “I +think that is the coolest young man I have ever met!” + +“Eh?” said a voice behind them as they entered the porch—the speaker +was Gregg. “What do you think of that, Bonamy? A gay young spark, is he +not?” + +There was time for no more then. But as the congregation waited in +their seats through a long voluntary, many were the nods and winks, and +incessant the low mutterings, as one communicated to another the +details of the scene outside, and his or her view of them. When the +rector appeared—nine minutes late by Mr. Bonamy’s watch—he looked pale +and fagged, and the sermon he preached was of the shortest. Nine-tenths +of the congregation noted only the brevity of the discourse and drew +their conclusions. But Kate Bonamy, who sat by her father with downcast +eyes and a tinge of color still in her cheeks, and who scarcely once +looked up at the weary face and tumbled hair, fancied, heaven knows +why, that she detected a new pathos and a deeper tone of appeal in the +few simple sentences; and though she had scarcely spoken to the rector +for a month, and was nursing a tiny contempt for him, the girl felt on +a sudden more kindly disposed toward the young man. + +Not so Mr. Bonamy, He came out of church chuckling; full of a grim +delight in the fulfilment of his predictions. It was not his custom to +linger in the porch, for he was not a sociable man; but he did so +to-day, and, letting Kate and Daintry go on, formed one of a coterie of +men, who had no difficulty in coming to a conclusion about the rector. + +“He has been studying hard, poor fellow!” said Gregg, with a wink—there +is no dislike so mean and cruel as that which the ill-bred man feels +for the gentleman—“reading the devil’s books all night!” + +“Nine minutes late!” said the lawyer. “That is what comes of having a +young fellow who is always gadding about the country!” + +“He could not gad to a more congenial place than Holberton, I should +think,” sneered a third. + +And then all the sins which the Homfrays had ever committed, and all +those which had ever been laid to their charge, were cited to render +the rector’s case more black. To do him justice, Mr. Bonamy took but a +listener’s part in this. He was a shrewd man, and he did not believe +that the rector could have had anything to do with an elopement from +Holberton which had taken place before his name was heard in the +county; but he was honestly assured that the young fellow had been +sitting over the cards half the night. And as for the other crimes, +perhaps he would commit them if he were left to follow his own foolish +devices. + +“What is ill-gotten soon goes,” said one charitable person with a +sneer. “You may depend upon it that what we hear is true.” + +“It is all of a piece,” said another. “A man does not have a follower +of that kind for nothing?” + +“It comes over the devil’s back, and goes—you know how?” said a third. +“But perhaps he is wise to make the most of it while it lasts. He is +consequential enough now, but the Homfrays will not have much to say to +him presently, you will see. A few weeks, and he will go.” + +“Well, let him go for the d—d dissipated gambling parson he is!” said +Gregg coarsely, carried away by the unusual agreement with him. “And +the sooner the better, say I!” + +The man beside him, a little startled by the doctor’s violence, turned +round to make sure that they were not overheard, and found himself face +to face with the rector, who, seeking to go out—as was not his custom, +for he generally used the vestry door—by the porch, had walked into the +midst of the group, even as Gregg opened his mouth. A glance at the +young man’s reddening cheek and compressed lips apprised the startled +group that he had overheard something at least. + +In one way it was the crisis of Lindo’s fate at Claversham. But he did +not know it. If he had been wise—if he had been such a man as his +curate, for instance; or if, without being wise, he had learned a +little of the prudence which comes of necessity with years—he would +have passed through them in silence, satisfied with such revenge as +mute contempt could give him. But he was not old, nor very wise; and +perhaps certain things had lately jarred on his nerves, so that he was +not quite himself. He did not pass by in silence, but, instead, stood +for a moment. Then, singling Gregg out with a withering glance, “I am +much obliged to you for your good opinion,” he said to him; “but I +should be still more obliged if you would swear elsewhere, sir, and not +in the porch of my church. Leave the building! Go at once!” And he +pointed toward the churchyard with the air of an angry schoolmaster. + +But Gregg did not move. He was astounded by this direct attack, but he +had the courage of numbers on his side, and, though he did not dare to +answer, he did not budge. Neither did the others, though they felt +ashamed of themselves, and looked all ways at once. Only one of them +all met the rector’s glance fairly, and that was Mr. Bonamy. “I think +the least said the soonest mended, Mr. Lindo,” he replied, with an +acrid smile. + +“I am sorry that you did not think of that before,” retorted the young +man, standing before them with his fair head thrown back, his clerical +coat hanging loose, and his brow dark with indignation—for he had heard +enough to be able to guess the cause of Gregg’s remark. “Do you come to +church only to cavil and backbite?—to put the worst construction on +what you cannot understand?” + +“Speaking for myself,” replied the church warden coolly, “the sole +thing with which I can charge myself is the remark that you were +somewhat late for service this morning, Mr. Lindo.” + +“And if I was?” said the clergyman in his haughtiest tone. + +“Well, of course there may have been a good cause for it,” the lawyer +replied drily. “But it is a thing I have not known happen here for +twenty years.” + +An altercation with these men, none of whom were well disposed toward +him, and half of whom were tradespeople, was the last thing which the +young rector should have allowed himself to enter upon, and the last +thing indeed to which he would have condescended in his normal frame of +mind. But on this unlucky morning he was nervous and irritable; and, +finding himself thus bearded and defied, he spoke foolishly. “You +trouble yourself too much, Mr. Bonamy,” he said impulsively, “with +things which do not concern you! The parish, among other things. You +have set yourself, as I know, to thwart and embarrass me; but I warn +you that you are not strong enough! I shall find means to——” + +“To put me down, in fact?” said Mr. Bonamy. + +The young man hesitated, his face crimson. His opponent’s sallow +features, seamed with a hundred astute wrinkles, warned him, if the +covert smiles of the others did not, that, in his present mood at any +rate, he was not a match for the lawyer. He had gone too far already, +as he was now aware. “No,” he replied, swallowing his rage, “but to +keep you to your proper province, as I hope to keep to mine. I wish you +good morning.” + +He passed through them, and hurried away, more angry with them, and +with himself for allowing them to provoke him, than he had ever felt in +his life. He knew well that he had been foolish. He knew that he had +lowered himself in their eyes by his display of temper. But, though he +was bitterly annoyed with himself, the consciousness that the fault had +originally lain with them, and that they had grievously misjudged him, +kept his anger hot; for there is no wrath so fierce as the indignation +of the man falsely accused. He called them under his breath an +uncharitable, spiteful, tattling crew; and was so far unnerved in +thought of them that he had entered his dining-room before he +remembered that he was engaged to take the mid-day meal at the Town +House, as he had done once or twice before, and then walked up with +Laura to the schools. + +He washed and changed hurriedly, keeping his anger hot the while, and +then went across, with the tale on the tip of his tongue. Again, if he +had been wise, he would have kept what had happened to himself. But the +soothing luxury of unfolding his wrong to some one who would sympathize +was one he could not in his soreness forego. + +It was a particularly mild day for the fourth Sunday in Advent, and he +found Miss Hammond still lingering before the door, She was looking for +violets under the north wall, and he joined her, and naturally broke +out at once with the story of what had happened. She was wearing a +little close bonnet, which set off her piquant features and bright +coloring to peculiar advantage, and, as far as looks went, no young man +in trouble ever had a better listener. Only to stand beside her on the +lawn, where the old trees shut out all view of the town and the +troubles he connected with it, was a relief. Of course the search for +violets was soon abandoned. “It is abominable!” she said. But her voice +was like the cooing of a dove. She did everything softly. Even her +indignation was gentle. + +“But you have not heard yet,” he protested, “why I really was late.” + +“I know what is being said,” she murmured, looking up at him, a gleam +of humor in her brown eyes—“that you stayed at the Homfrays’ all night, +playing cards. My maid told me as we came in—after church.” + +“Ha! I knew that they were saying something of the kind,” he replied +savagely. He was so stern that she felt her little attempt at badinage +reproved. “The true reason was of a very different description. What +spiteful busybodies they are! I started to return last evening about +half-past nine, but as I passed Baer Hill Colliery I learned that there +had been an accident. A man going down the shaft with the night shift +had been crushed—hurt beyond help,” the rector continued in a lower +voice. “He wanted to see a clergyman, and the other pitmen, some of +whom had seen me pass earlier in the day, stopped me and took me to +him.” + +“How sad! How very sad!” she ejaculated. Somehow she felt ill at ease +with him in this mood. With his last words a kind of veil had fallen +between them. + +“I stayed with him the night,” the rector continued. “He died at +half-past nine this morning. I came straight from that to this. And +they say these things of me!” + +His voice, though low, was hard, and yet there was a suspicious break +in it as he uttered his last words. Injustice touches a man, young and +not yet hardened, very sorely; and he was overwrought. Laura, fingering +her little bunch of violets, heard the catch in his voice, and knew +that he was not very far from tears. + +She was almost terrified. She longed to respond, to say the proper +thing, but here her powers deserted her. She was not capable of much +emotion, unless the call especially concerned herself; and she could +not rise to this occasion. She could only murmur again that it was +abominable and too bad, or, taking her cue from the young man’s face, +that it was very sad. She said enough, it is true, to satisfy him, +though not herself; for he only wanted a listener. And when he went in +to lunch Mrs. Hammond more than bore him out in all his denunciations; +so that when he left to go to the schools he had fully made up his mind +to carry things through. + +This unfortunate quarrel indeed did him great injury by throwing him +into the arms of the party which his own pleasure and taste led him to +prefer. He did not demur when Mrs. Hammond—meaning little evil, but +expressing prejudices which at one time she had sedulously cultivated +(for when one lives near the town one must take especial care not to be +confounded with it)—talked of a set of butchers and bakers, and said, +much more strongly than he had, that Mr. Bonamy must be kept in his +place. A little quarrel with the lawyer, a little social relaxation in +which the young fellow had lost sight of the excellent intentions with +which he had set out, then this final quarrel—such had been the course +of events; sufficient, taken with his own fastidiousness and +inexperience, to bring him to this. + +Mrs. Hammond, standing at the drawing-room window, watched him as he +walked down the short drive. “I like that young man,” she said +decisively. “He is thrown away upon those people.” + +Laura, who had not gone to the schools, yawned. “He has not one-half +the brains of some one else we know, mother,” she answered. + +“Who is that?” + +Laura did not reply; and probably her mother understood, for she did +not press the question. “Well,” Mrs. Hammond said, after a moment’s +silence, “perhaps he has not. I do not know. But at any rate he is a +gentleman from the crown of his head to the tips of his toes.” + +“I dare say he is,” said Laura languidly. + +Mrs. Hammond, depositing her own portly form in a suitable chair, +watched her daughter curiously. She would have given a good deal to be +able to read the girl’s mind and learn her intentions; but she was too +wise to ask questions, and had always given Laura the fullest liberty. +She had watched the growth of the intimacy between her and Mr. Clode +without demur, feeling a strong liking for the man herself, though she +scarcely thought him a suitable match for her daughter. On the old +rector’s death there had seemed for a few days a chance of Mr. Clode +being appointed his successor; and at that time Mrs. Hammond had +fancied she detected a shade of anxiety and excitement in her +daughter’s manner. But Mr. Clode had not been appointed, and the new +rector had come; and Laura had apparently transferred her favor from +the curate to him. + +At this Mrs. Hammond had felt somewhat troubled—at first; but in a +short time she had naturally reconciled herself to the change, the +rector’s superiority as a _parti_ being indisputable. Yet still Mrs. +Hammond felt no certainty as to Laura’s real feelings, and, gazing at +her this afternoon, was as much in the dark as ever. That the girl was +fond of her she knew; indeed, it was quite a pretty sight to see the +daughter purring about the mother. But Mrs. Hammond was more than half +inclined to doubt now whether Laura was fond, or capable of being fond, +of any other human being except herself. + +She sighed gently as she thought of this, and rang the bell for tea. “I +think we will have it early this afternoon,” she said, “I feel I want a +cup.” + + + + +CHAPTER XI. +THE DOCTOR SPEAKS. + + +The feelings with which the curate hastened on the conclusion of his +own service, to learn what had happened at the great church may be +imagined. His excitement and curiosity were not the less because he had +to hide them. If there really had been no service—if the rector had not +appeared—what a scandal, what a subject for talk was here! Even if the +rector had appeared a little late there would still be whispering; for +new brooms are expected to sweep clean. The curate composed his dark +face, and purposely made one or two sick calls at houses which lay in +his road, lest he might seem to ask the question he had to put too +pointedly. By the time he reached the rectory he had made up his mind, +judging from the absence of stir in the streets, that nothing very +unusual had happened. + +“Is the rector in?” he asked the servant. + +“No, sir; he has gone to the Town House to dinner,” the girl answered. + +Involuntarily Mr. Clode frowned. “He was in time for service, I +suppose?” he asked, more abruptly than he had intended. + +“Oh, yes, sir,” said the unconscious maid, who had not been to church. + +“Thank you; that is all,” he answered, turning away. So nothing had +come of it after all! His heart was sick with disappointed hope as he +turned into his own dull lodgings; and he felt that the rector in being +in time had wronged him afresh, and by dining at the Town House had +added insult to injury. + +But in the course of the day he learned how late the rector had been; +and early next morning some rumor of the triangular altercation in the +church porch also reached him—of course in an exaggerated form. As a +fact, all Claversham was by this time talking of it, Mr. Bonamy’s +companions, with one exception, having taken good care to make the most +of his success, and to paint the rebuff he had administered to the +clergyman in the deepest colors. The curate heard the news with a face +of grave concern, but with secret delight; and, turning over in his +mind what use he might make of it, came opportunely upon Gregg as the +latter was going his rounds. “Hallo!” he said, calling so loudly that +the doctor, who had turned away and would fain have retreated, could +not decently escape, “you are the very man I wanted to see! What is +this absurd story about the rector and you? There is not a word of +truth in it, I suppose?” + +“I am sure I cannot say until you tell me what it is,” replied the +doctor snappishly. He was a little afraid of the curate, who had a +knack of being unpleasant without giving an opening in return. + +“Why, you seem rather sore about it,” Clode remarked, with apparent +surprise. + +“I do not know why I should!” sneered the doctor, his face a dark red +with anger. + +“Certainly not, if there is no truth in the story,” the curate replied, +looking down with his eyes half shut at the chafing little man. “But I +suppose it is all an invention, Gregg?” + +“It is not an invention that the rector was abominably rude to me,” +blurted out the doctor, who scarcely knew with whom to be most +angry—his present tormentor or the first cause of his trouble. + +“Pooh!” said Clode, “it is only his way.” + +“Then it is a d——, it is a most unpleasant way!” retorted the doctor +savagely. + +“He means no harm,” said the curate gaily. “Why did you not answer him +back?” + +Dr. Gregg’s face turned a shade redder. That was where the shoe +pinched. Why had he not answered him back as Bonamy had, and not stood +mute, acknowledging himself the smaller man? That was what was +troubling him now, and making him fancy himself the laughing-stock of +the town. “I will answer him back in a way he will not like!” he cried +viciously, striving to hide his embarrassment under a show of bluster. + +“Tut-t-tut!” said the curate provokingly, “do not go and make a fool of +yourself by saying things like that, when you know you don’t mean them, +man. What can you say to the rector?” + +“I will ask him——” + +But what he would ask the rector was lost to the world, for at this +moment Mr. Bonamy, coming down the pavement behind him, touched his +sleeve. “I have just been to your house, doctor,” he said. “My youngest +girl is a little out of sorts. Would you mind stepping in and seeing +her?” + +Gregg swallowed his wrath, and was perhaps thankful for the +interruption. He said he would; and the lawyer turned to Mr. Clode. +“Well,” he said, “so you have made up your minds to fight?” + +“I am not quite sure,” said the curate, with caution—for he knew better +than to treat Mr. Bonamy as he treated Gregg—“that I take you.” + +“You have not seen your principal this morning?” replied the lawyer, +with a smile which for him was almost benevolent. The prospect of a +fight was as the Mountains of Beulah to him. + +“Do you mean Mr. Lindo?” said the curate, with some curtness. + +The lawyer nodded. “I see you have not,” he continued. “Perhaps you do +not know that he turned the sheep out of the churchyard after breakfast +this morning, and half of them were found nearly a mile down the Red +Lane!” + +“I did not know it,” said the curate gravely. But it was as much as he +could do to restrain his exultation and show no sign save of concern. + +“Well, it is the fact,” the lawyer replied, rubbing his hands. “It is +quite true he gave the church wardens notice to remove them a fortnight +ago; but we did not comply, because we say it is our affair and not +his. Now you may tell him from me that the only question in my mind is +the form of action.” + +“I will tell him,’ said the curate with dignity. + +“Just so! What do you say, Gregg?” + +But the doctor, grinning from ear to ear with satisfaction, was gone; +and the curate, not a whit less pleased in his heart, hastened to +follow his example. “Bonamy one, and Gregg two,” he said softly to +himself, “and last, but not least, one who shall be nameless, three! He +has made three enemies already, and, if those be not enough, with right +on their side, to oust him from his seat when the time comes, why, I +know nothing of odds!” + +“With right on their side,” said the curate, even to himself. He had +made no second attempt to pry into the rector’s secrets or to bring +home to him a knowledge of the wrongfulness of his possession. But he +did still believe, or persuaded himself he believed, that Lindo was a +guilty man; or why should the young rector pension the old earl’s +servant? And on this ground Clode justified to himself the secret +ill-turns he was doing him. A month’s intimacy with the rector would +probably have convinced an impartial mind of his good faith. But the +curate had not, it must be remembered, an impartial mind; and we are +all very apt to believe what suits us. + +To return to the little doctor, whom we left going on his way in a mood +almost hilarious. He hoped that this fresh escapade of the rector’s +would wipe out the memory of the fray in which he had himself borne so +inglorious a part. And the more he thought of it, the greater was his +admiration of the lawyer, whom he had long patronized in a timid +fashion, much as a snub-nosed King Charlie treats the butcher’s +mongrel. Now he felt a positive reverence for him. He began to think it +possible that, with all his drawbacks of birth, Mr. Bonamy might become +a personage in the town, and pretty Kate not so bad a match. The result +of these musings was that, by the time he reached the lawyer’s door, an +idea which he had first entertained on seeing the young clergyman’s +admiration for Kate Bonamy, and which he had since turned over more +than once in his mind, had become on a sudden a settled purpose. So +much so that, as the doctor rang the bell, he looked at his hands, +which were not so clean as they might have been, pished and pshawed, +settled his light-blue scarf—which the next minute rose again to the +level of his collar—and at length went in with a briskly juvenile air +and an engaging smile. + +He found Daintry lying on the sofa in the dining-room down-stairs, her +head on a white bed-pillow. Kate was leaning over her. The room was in +some disorder—littered with this and that, a bottle of eau de Cologne, +Mr. Bonamy’s papers, books, and sewing; but it looked comfortable, for +it was very evidently inhabited. A fastidious eye might have thought it +was too much inhabited; and yet proofs of refinement were not wanting, +though the sofa was covered with horsehair, and the mirror was heavy +and ugly, and the grate, knee-high, was as old as the Georges. There +were flowers on the table and on the little cottage piano; and by the +side of the last was a violin-case. Not many people in Claversham knew +that Mr. Bonamy played the violin. Still fewer had heard him play, for +he never did so out of his own house. + +Possibly a very particular suitor might have preferred to find Kate +attending on her sister in a boudoir, free from a lawyer’s papers, +furnished in a less solid and durable style, and with some livelier +look-out than through wire blinds upon a dull street. But another might +have thought that the office in which she was engaged, and the +gentleness of her touch and eye as she went about it, made up for all +deficiencies. + +Dr. Gregg was not of a nature to appreciate either the deficiencies or +the set-off; but he had eyes for the girl’s grace and beauty, for the +neatness of the well-fitting blue gown and the white collar and cuffs; +and he shook hands with her and devoted himself to Daintry—who disliked +him extremely and was very fractious—with the most anxious solicitude. +“It is only a sick headache!” he said finally, with bluntness which was +meant for encouragement. “It is nothing, you know.” + +“I wish you had it, then!” Daintry wailed, burying her face in the +pillow. + +“It will be gone in the morning!” he retorted, rising and keeping his +temper by an unnatural effort. “She will be the better for it +afterward, Miss Bonamy.” + +To this Daintry vouchsafed no answer, unless a muttered “Rubbish!” was +intended for one. He affected not to hear it, at any rate. He was all +good-temper this morning; the unfortunate point about this being that +his good nature was a shade more unpleasant than his usual snappish +manner. + +At any rate Kate thought it so. She felt the instinctive repulsion +which the wrong man’s wooing awakens in an unspoiled girl. She was +conscious of an added dislike for the man as she held out her hand to +him at the dining-room door. But she did not divine the cause of this; +no, nor conjecture his purpose when he said in a low voice that he +wished to speak to her outside. + +“May we go in here a moment?” he muttered, when the door was closed +behind them. He pointed to the room on the other side of the hall, +which Mr. Bonamy used in summer as a kind of office. + +“There is no fire there,” Kate answered. “I think it has been lighted +up-stairs, however, if you will not mind coming up, Dr. Gregg. Is there +anything”—this was when he had silently followed her into the stiff +drawing-room, where the newly lit fire was rather smoking than +burning—“serious the matter with her, then?” + +Her voice was steady, but her eyes betrayed the sudden anxiety his +manner had aroused in her. + +“With your sister?” he answered slowly. He was really pondering how he +should say what he had come to say. But, naturally, she set down his +thoughtfulness to a professional cause. + +“Yes,” she said anxiously. + +“Oh, no—nothing, nothing. The truth is,” continued the doctor, +following up a happy thought and smiling approval of it, “the matter is +with me, Miss Bonamy.” + +“With you!” Kate exclaimed, opening her eyes in astonishment. Her +momentary anxiety had put all else out of her head. She thought the +doctor had gone mad. + +“Yes,” he said jerkily, but with a grin of tender meaning. “With me. +And you are the cause of it. Now do not be frightened, Miss Kate,” he +continued hastily, seeing her start of apprehension. “You must have +known for a long time what I was thinking of.” + +“Indeed I have not,” Kate murmured in a low voice. She did not affect +to misunderstand him. + +“Well, you easily might have known it then,” he retorted, forgetting +his _rôle_ for an instant. “But the long and the short of it is that I +want you to marry me. I do!” he repeated, overcoming something in his +throat, and going on from this point swimmingly. “And you will please +to hear me out, and not answer in a hurry, Miss Kate. If you like—but I +should not think that you would want it—you can have until to-morrow to +think it over.” + +“No,” she replied impulsively, her face crimson. And then she shut her +mouth so suddenly, it seemed she was afraid to let anything escape it +except that unmistakable monosyllable. + +“Very well,” he replied, comfortably settling his elbow upon the +mantel-shelf, “that is as you like. I hope it does not want much +thinking over myself. I will not boast that I am a rich man, but I am +decently off. I flatter myself that I can keep my head above water—and +yours, too, for the matter of that.” + +“Oh, it is not that,” she began hurriedly. + +He interrupted her. “No, no,” he said jocularly—-his last remarks had +put him into a state of considerable self-satisfaction, and he no more +thought it possible that she could or would refuse him than that the +sky could fall—“do not buy a pig in a poke! Hear me out first, Miss +Kate, and we shall start fair. You have been in my house, and, if it is +not quite so large a house as this, I will answer for it you will find +it a great deal more lively. You will see people you have never seen +here, nor will see while your name is Bonamy. You will have—well, +altogether a better time. Not that I mind myself,” the doctor added +rather vaguely, forgetting the French proverb about those who excuse +themselves, “what your name is, not I! So don’t you think you could say +Yes at once, my dear?” + +He took a step nearer, thinking he had put it rather neatly and without +any nonsense. Possibly, from his point of view of things, he had. But +Kate fell back, nevertheless, as he advanced. + +“Oh, no,” she said, flushing painfully. “I could not! I could not +indeed, Dr. Gregg! I am very sorry.” + +“Come, come,” he said, holding out his hand, his tone one of pleasant +raillery. He had looked for some hanging back, some show of coyness and +bashfulness, and was prepared to laugh in his sleeve at it—“I think you +can, Kate. I think it is possible.” That it was in woman’s nature to +say No to his comfortable home and the little lift in society he had to +offer—it is only little lifts we appreciate, just up the next floor +above us—he did not believe. + +But Kate soon undeceived him. “I am afraid it is not possible,” she +said firmly. “Indeed, I may say at once, Dr. Gregg, that it is out of +the question what you ask; though I thank you, I am sure.” + +His face fell ludicrously, and his thick black brows drew together in a +very ominous fashion. But he still could not believe that she meant it. +“I do not think you understand,” he said, “that the house is ready, and +the furniture and servants, and there is nothing to prevent you +stepping into it all whenever you please. I will take you away from +this,” he continued, darting a scornful glance round the stiff chilly +room—“I do not suppose that ten people enter this room in the +twelvemonth—and I will show you something like life. It is an offer not +many would make you. Come, Kate, do not be a little fool! You are not +going to say No, so say Yes at once. And don’t let us shilly-shally!” + +He had put out his hand as he spoke and captured hers. But she snatched +it from him again almost roughly, and stepped back. The right man might +have used the words the doctor used, and might have scolded her with +impunity, but not the wrong one. Her face, perplexed and troubled a +moment before, grew decided enough now. “I am going to say No, +nevertheless, Dr. Gregg,” she replied firmly. “I thought I had already +said it. I will be as plain as you have been. I do not like you as a +wife should like her husband, nor otherwise than as a friend.” + +“A friend!” he exclaimed. He gasped as a man does who has been plunged +suddenly into cold water. His face was red with anger, and his little +black eyes glared at her banefully. “Oh, bother your friendship!” he +added violently. “I did not ask you for that!” + +“I have nothing else to give you,” she replied coldly. + +He gasped again. Refused by the Bonamy girl! He had never thought of +this. He was beside himself with astonishment and anger, with +disappointment and wounded pride. “You would not have said this a month +ago!” he cried at last. “It was a pity I did not ask you then!” + +“I should have given you the same answer.” + +“Oh, no,” he replied ironically, swinging his hat to and fro. “Oh, no, +you would not—not at all, Miss Bonamy. You would have sung to a very +different tune if I had whistled to you before this niminy-piminy +parson showed his face here! Do not think that I am such a fool as not +to see which way the wind is blowing.” + +She stood looking at him in silence. But her face was scarlet, and her +hand shook with rage. + +He saw it. “Pooh! do not think to frighten me!” he said coarsely. “When +a man has offered to marry you he has a right to speak his mind! It +will be a long time, I warrant you, before your parson will have the +same right to speak. He was very great with you once, but he has quite +another set of friends now, and I have not heard of him offering to +introduce you to them.” + +“Will you go, Dr. Gregg?” she cried passionately, pointing to the door. +His taunts were torture to her. “Will you go, or do you wish to stay +and insult me further?” + +“I wish to say one thing, and I am going to say it,” he replied, +nodding triumphantly. “You are pretty proud of your capture, but you +need not be. He will not be much of a match when we have stripped him +of the living he has no right to, and shown him the detected swindler +he is! Wait! Wait a little, Miss Bonamy, and when your parson is +ruined, as he will be before three months are out, high as he holds his +head now, perhaps you will be sorry that you did not take my offer. +Why,” he added scornfully, “I should say you are the only person in the +parish who does not know he has no more right where he is than I have.” + +“Go!” she said, pointing to the door. Her face was white now. + +“So I will when I have said one more word——” + +“You won’t say it!” cried a sharp voice behind him. “You will go now!” +He shot round, and there was Daintry with her hand on the door. Her +hair was in disorder, her cheeks were flushed, her greenish-gray eyes +were aglow with anger. He saw that she had overheard something of what +had passed, and he began to tremble. He had said more than he intended. +“You will go now, as Kate tells you,” she cried, “I will not have——” + +“Leave the room, child!” he snarled, stamping his foot. + +“I shan’t!” she retorted fiercely. “And if you do not go before I count +three I will fetch the dogs.” + +Dr. Gregg made a movement as if he would have put her out of the room. +But her presence had a little sobered him, and he stopped. “Look here,” +he said. + +“One!” cried Daintry, who knew well that the doctor had a particular +dislike for Snorum, and that the dog’s presence was at any time enough +to drive him from the house. + +He turned and looked at Kate. She had gone to the window and was gazing +out, her back to him, her figure proud and scornful. “Miss Bonamy,” he +said. + +“Two!” cried Daintry. “Are you going, or shall I fetch Snorum?” + +With a muttered oath he took up his hat and went down the stairs and +out into the street. There at the door he stood a moment, grinding his +teeth, as the full sense of the calamity which had befallen him came +home to him. He had stooped and been rejected—had been rejected by +Bonamy’s daughter. He walked away, and still his anger did not +decrease, but all the same he began to be a little thankful that the +child had interrupted him. Had he gone on he might have said too much. +As it was, he had an idea that perhaps he had said more than was quite +prudent. And this had presently a wonderful effect in the way of +sobering him. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. +THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL. + + +It was tea-time at Mr. Bonamy’s; five-thirty, that is, for the lawyer +knew nothing of four o’clock tea. He would have stared had he been +invited into the drawing-room to take it, or had his daughters produced +one of those dainty afternoon tea-tables which were in use at the Town +House, and asked him to support his cup and saucer on his knee. +Compromises found no favor with him. Tea was a meal—he had always so +considered it; and he liked to have the dining-room table laid for it. +Possibly Kate, had she enjoyed more of her own way, would have altered +this, as she would certainly have reformed the drawing-room. But Mr. +Bonamy, who was in many things an indulgent father, was conservative in +some. Four o’clock tea, and a daily use of the drawing-room, were +refinements which he had always regarded as peculiar to a certain set; +and in his pride he would not appear to ape its ways or affect to +belong to it. + +Almost to the moment he came into the room, which was as bright and +cheerful as gaslight and firelight could make it. Laying some letters +under a weight on the mantel-shelf, he turned round and stood with his +back to the fire-place. “How is the child?” he asked. “Has she gone to +bed?” + +“Yes,” Kate answered, lifting the lid of the teapot and looking in; “I +think she will be all right after a night’s rest.” + +“You do not look very bright yourself, Kate,” he remarked, as he sat +down. + +Her cheek flushing, she made the old old woman’s excuse. “I have a +little headache,” she said. “It will be better when I have had my tea.” + +He took a piece of toast and buttered it deliberately. “Gregg came and +saw her?” he asked. + +“Yes. He said it was only a sick headache, and would pass off.” + +The lawyer made no comment at the moment, but went on eating his toast. +But presently he looked up. “What is the matter, Kitty?” he said, not +unkindly. + +Her face burning, she peered again quite unnecessarily into the teapot. +Then she said hurriedly, “I have something I think I ought to tell you, +father. Dr. Gregg has asked me to marry him!” + +“The deuce he has!” Mr. Bonamy answered in unmistakable surprise. For a +moment he did not know what to say, or how to feel about it. If any one +had informed the Claversham people that the lawyer’s moroseness was not +natural to the man, but the product of many slights, the informant +would have lost his pains. Yet in a great measure this was so; and +first among the things which of late years had exercised Mr. Bonamy a +keen anxiety for his daughters’ happiness had place. He had never made +any move toward procuring them the society of their equals; nay, he had +done many things in his pride calculated rather to prolong their +exclusion. Yet all the time he had bitterly resented it, and had spent +many a wakeful night in pondering gloomily over the dull lives to which +they were condemned. Now—strange that he had never thought of it +before—as far as Kate was concerned, he saw a way of escape opening. +Gregg had a fair practice, some private means, a good house, a +tolerable position in the town. In a word, he was perfectly eligible. +Yet Mr. Bonamy was not altogether pleased. He had no fastidious +objection to the doctor. It did not occur to him that the doctor was +not a gentleman. But he did know that he did not like him. + +So the lawyer, after one exclamation of surprise, was for a moment +silent. Then he asked, “Well Kate, and what did you say?” + +“I said No,” Kate answered in a low voice. + +“He is a well-to-do man,” Mr. Bonamy said, slowly stirring his tea. +“Not that you need think of that only. But you are not likely to know +many people who could make you more comfortable. I believe he is +skilful in his profession. It is a chance, girl, not to be lightly +thrown away.” + +“I could not—I could not marry him,” Kate stammered, her agitation now +very apparent. “I do not like him. You would not have me——” + +“I would not have you marry any one you do not like!” Mr. Bonamy +replied, almost sternly. “But are you sure that you know your own +mind?” + +“Quite,” Kate said, with a shudder. + +“Hum! Well, well; there is no more to be said, then,” he answered. +“Don’t cry, girl.” + +Kate managed to obey him. And in a moment, bravely steadying her voice, +she asked, “What is this about Mr. Lindo, father? I heard that he had +turned the sheep out of the churchyard.” + +The lawyer thought she asked the question in order to change the +subject; and he answered briskly, with less reserve perhaps than he +might have exercised at another time. “It is quite true,” he said. “He +is making a fool of himself, as I expected. You cannot put old heads on +young shoulders. However, what has happened has convinced me of one +thing.” + +“What is that?” she asked in a low voice. + +“That he does not know himself that he has no right here.” + +“But has he none?” she murmured, in the same tone. He noticed that her +manner was conscious and embarrassed; but naturally he set this down to +the former topic. He thought she was trying to avoid a scene, and he +admired her for it. + +“Well, I doubt if he has,” he answered, “though I am not quite sure +that people have not lit upon a mare’s nest. It is the talk of the town +that there was some mistake in his presentation, and there is a +disreputable fellow hanging on his heels, and apparently living on him, +who is said to be in the secret, and to be making the most of it. I do +not believe that now, however,” the lawyer continued, falling into a +brown study and speaking as much to himself as to her. “If he knew he +were insecure he would live more quietly than he does. All the same, he +is likely to learn a lesson he will not forget.” + +“How?” she asked, her spoon tinkling tremulously against the side of +the cup, and her head bent low over it, as though she saw something +interesting in the lees. + +Mr. Bonamy laughed in his out-of-door manner. “How?” he said grimly. +“Well, if there be any mistake he is going the right way to suffer by +it. If he kept quiet, and went softly, and made no enemies, very little +might be said and nothing done when the mistake came out. But as it +is—well, he has made a good many enemies, and the chances are that he +will lose the best berth he will ever get into. It will be bad for him, +but the better for the parish.” + +“Don’t you think,” said Kate very gently, “that he means well?” + +Mr. Bonamy grunted. “Perhaps so; but he does not go the right way to do +it,” he rejoined. “His good fortune has turned his head, and he has put +himself in the hands of the Hammond set, and that does not do at +Claversham.” The lawyer ended with a harsh laugh, which said more +plainly than any words, that it never would do while John Bonamy was +church warden at Claversham. + +“It seems a pity,” Kate said, almost under her breath. She had never +raised her eyes from the tea-tray since the subject was introduced, and +if her father had looked closely he would have seen that her very ears +were scarlet. “Could you not give him a word of warning?” + +“I!” said the lawyer, with asperity. “Certainly not; why should I?” + +Kate did not say, and her father, with another impatient word or two, +rose from the table, and presently went out. She rang the bell +mechanically and had the table cleared, and in the same mood turned to +the fire and, putting her feet on the fender, began to brood over the +coals, which were burning red and low in the grate. + +Five times—five times only, counting the Oxford escapade as one, she +had spoken to him; and they—“they” meant Claversham, for it was her +chief misery to believe that the whole town was talking of her—had made +this of it! They had noticed his attentions, and had seen them +scornfully withdrawn when he learned who she was. Oh, it was cowardly +of him—cowardly! And yet—and yet—so her thoughts ran, taking a fresh +turn—had he ever said a word or cast a glance at her which meant +anything—which all the world might not have heard and seen? No, never. +And, with that, her anger changed its course and ran against Gregg. Him +she would never forgive. It was his evil imagination, his base +suspicions, which had built it all up; and Mr. Lindo was no more to +blame—though she a little despised him for his weakness and +conventionality—than she was herself. + +It seemed most sad that he should be ruined because no one would say a +word to warn him. Brooding over the fire, she felt a girl’s pity for +the young man’s ill-fortune. She forgot the last month, during which +she had spoken to him but once—and then he had seemed embarrassed and +anxious to be gone—and remembered only how frank and gay he had been in +the first blush of his hopes at Oxford, how pleasantly he had smiled, +how well and yet how quaintly his new dignity had sat upon him, and how +naïvely he had shaken it off at times and shown himself a boy, with a +boy’s love of fun and mischief. Or, again, she remembered how +thoughtful he had been for them, how considerate, how much at home in +scenes new to them, with how lordly an air he had provided for their +comfort. Oh, it was a pity—a grievous pity, that his hopes should end +in such a disaster as Mr. Bonamy foretold! And all because no one would +say a friendly word to him! + +The next day (Tuesday) was a wet day—a sleety, blusterous winter day, +and she did not go out. But on the Wednesday, as the rector crossed the +churchyard after reading the Litany, he saw Miss Bonamy passing his +door. He fancied, with a little astonishment—for she had constantly +evinced the same avoidance of intimacy with him which had at first +piqued him—that she slightly checked her pace so as to meet him. And, +to tell the truth, the rector was half pleased and half annoyed. He had +hardened his heart and set his face to crush Mr. Bonamy. + +He had in his pocket a letter from the lawyer, warning him that, unless +he altered his course, a writ would be served upon him. And a dozen +times to-day he had in his mind called the church warden hard names. +But yet he was not absolutely ill-pleased to see Miss Bonamy. He felt a +certain excitement in the _rencontre_ under the circumstances. He would +meet her magnanimously, and of course she would ignore the quarrel. He +hated Mr. Bonamy for a puritanical old pettifogger; but that was no +reason why he should be rude to his daughter. + +Lindo saw, when he was a few paces from her and had raised his hat, +that her face expressed much more emotion, if not embarrassment, than +seemed to be called for by the occasion. And naturally this +communicated itself to him. “I have not seen you for a long time,” he +said, as he shook hands. Perhaps the worst thing he could have said +under the circumstances. + +She assented, however. “No,” she said, sloping her umbrella behind her +so as to keep off the wind and a half-frozen drizzle with which it was +laden. And, as she did this, her eyes met his gallantly. “But I am +glad, Mr. Lindo,” she continued, “that I have met you to-day, because I +have something I want to say to you.” + +On the instant he vowed within himself that it would be in bad taste, +in the worst taste, if she referred to the quarrel or to parish +matters. And he answered very frigidly. “What is that, Miss Bonamy?” he +said. “Pray speak on.” + +She detected the change of tone, and for a second her gray eyes +flashed. But she had come to say something. She had counted the cost, +and nothing he could do should prevent her saying it. She had been +awake all night, torturing herself with imagining the things he would +think of her. But she was not to be deterred by the reality. “Do you +know, Mr. Lindo,” she said steadily, “what is being said of you in the +town?” + +“A good many hard things.” he answered half lightly and half bitterly. +“So I have reason to believe. But I do not think that they will affect +me one way or the other, Miss Bonamy.” + +“And so,” she answered, with spirit, “you will not thank any one for +telling you of them? That is what you mean, is it not?” + +He was very sore, and her interference annoyed him excessively—possibly +because he valued her good opinion. He would not deny the feeling she +imputed to him. “Possibly I do mean something of that kind,” he said. +“Where ignorance is bliss—you know.” + +“Yet there is one thing,” she replied, “being said of you in the town, +which I think you should be told, Mr. Lindo. Your friends probably will +not hear it, or, if they do, they will not venture to tell you of it.” + +“Indeed,” he answered. “You pique my curiosity.” + +“It is being commonly said,” she rejoined, looking down for the first +time, “that you have no right to the living, and were appointed by some +mistake, or—or fraud.” + +He did not answer her at once. He was so completely taken by surprise +that he stood looking at her with his mouth open. His first and better +impulse was to laugh heartily. But what he did was to say in a very +quiet way, “Indeed. That is being said, is it? It is quite true I had +not heard it. May I ask, Miss Bonamy, if you had it from your father?” + +If his tone had been cold before, it was freezing now. But she was not +to be daunted, and she answered with considerable presence of mind, “I +heard from my father that that was the report in the town, but I also +heard him express his disbelief in the greater part of it.” + +“I am much obliged to him,” said the rector through his closed teeth. +“He did not think I had been guilty of fraud, then?” + +“No, he did not,” Kate muttered, her voice faltering for the first +time. + +“Indeed. I am much obliged to him.” + +He had received it even worse than she had expected. It was terrible to +go on in the face of such scorn and incredulity. But to stop there was +to have done only evil, as Kate knew, and she persevered. “I have one +more thing I wish to say, if you will permit me,” she continued +steadying her voice and striving to speak in as indifferent a manner as +possible. + +He bowed, his face hard and contemptuous. + +The wind had shifted slightly, and, to protect herself from the small +rain which was falling, she changed her position, so as to face the +churchyard. He saw only her profile. If he looked proud, involuntarily +he remarked how proud she looked also—how pure and cold was the line of +her features, softened only by the roundness of her chin. “I am told,” +she said in a low voice, “that the fewer enemies you make, and the more +quietly you proceed, the greater will be the chance of your remaining +when the mistake is found out. Pray,” she said more sharply, for he had +raised his hand, as if to interrupt, “have patience for a moment, Mr. +Lindo. I shall not trouble you again. I only wish you to know that +those who have cause to dislike you—I do not mean my father, there are +others—are congratulating themselves that you are playing into their +hands, and consider that every disagreement between you and any part of +the parish is a weapon given them, to be used when the crisis comes.” + +“When the mistake is found out?” he said, grimly repeating her words. +“Or the fraud? But I forgot—Mr. Bonamy does not believe in that!” + +“You understand me, I think,” she said, ignoring the latter part of his +speech. + +“And may I ask,” he continued, his eyes on her face, “who my +ill-wishers are?” + +“I do not think that matters,” she replied. + +“Then, at least, why am I indebted to you for this warning?” + +His tone as he asked the question was as contemptuous as before. And +yet Kate felt that this she must answer. To refuse to answer it, or to +evade it, would be to lay herself open to surmises of all kinds. + +“I thought it a pity that you should fall into a trap unwarned,” she +answered, looking away at the yew-trees. “And it seemed to me that, for +several reasons, your friends were not likely to warn you.” + +“There, I quite agree with you,” he retorted quickly. “My friends would +not have believed in the trap.” + +“Perhaps not,” she said, outwardly unmoved. + +“I am astonished that you did; I am astonished that you should have +believed anything so absurd, Miss Bonamy!” he said severely. At that +moment, as it happened, two people came round the flank of the church. +The one was the curate; the other was Dr. Gregg. Kate looked at them, +and her face flamed. The rector looked, and felt only relief. They +would afford him an excuse to be gone. “Ah, there is Mr. Clode,” he +said indifferently. “I was just looking for him. I think, if you will +excuse me, Miss Bonamy, I will seize the opportunity of speaking to him +now.” And raising his hat, with a formality which one of the men took +to be a pretence and a sham, he left her and walked across to them. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. +LAURA’S PROVISO. + + +When a mine has been laid, and the fuse lit, and the tiny thread of +smoke has begun to curl upward, it is apt to seem a long time—so I am +told by those who have stood and watched such things—before the earth +flies into the air. So it seemed to Stephen Clode. The curate looked to +see an explosion follow immediately upon the rector taking the decisive +step of turning out the sheep. But week after week elapsed, until +Christmas was some time gone, and nothing happened. Mr. Bonamy, with a +lawyer’s prudence, wrote another letter, and for a time, perhaps out of +regard to the season, held his hand. There was talk of Lord Dynmore’s +return, but no sign of it as yet. And Dr. Gregg snapped and snarled +among his intimates, but in public was pretty quiet. + +It was noticeable, however, that the rector was invited to none of the +whist-parties which were a feature of the town life at this season; and +to those who looked closely into things and listened to the gossip of +the place it was plain that the breach between him and the bulk of his +parishioners was growing wider. The rector was much with the Hammonds, +and carried his head high—higher than ever, one of his parishioners +thought since a talk she had had with him in the churchyard. The habit +of looking down upon a certain section of the town, because they were +not quite so refined as himself, because they were narrow in their +opinions, or because the Hammonds looked down upon them, was growing +upon him. And he yielded to it none the less because he was all the +time dissatisfied with himself. He was conscious that he was not acting +up to the standard he had set himself on coming to the town. He was not +living the life he had hoped to live. He visited his poor and gave +almost too largely in the hard weather, and was diligent at services +and sermon-writing. But there was a flaw in his life, and he knew it; +and yet he had not the strength to set it right. + +All this Mr. Clode might have observed—he was sagacious enough; but for +the time his judgment was clouded by his jealousy, and in his +impatience he fancied that the rector’s troubles were passing away. +Each visit Lindo paid to the Town House, each time his name was coupled +with Laura Hammond’s, as people were beginning to couple it, chafed the +curate’s sore afresh and kept it raw. So that even Stephen Clode’s +self-restraint and command of temper began to fail him, and more than +once he said sharp things to his commanding-officer, which made Lindo +open his eyes in unaffected surprise. + +Clode began to feel indeed that the position was becoming intolerable; +and though he had long ago determined that the waiting-game was the one +he ought to play, he presently—in the first week of the new +year—changed his mind. + +Lindo had announced his intention of devoting the afternoon—it was +Wednesday—to his district; and, taking advantage of this, the curate +thought he might indulge himself in a call at the Town House without +fear of unpleasant interruption. He would not admit that he had any +other motive in going there than just to pay a visit—which he certainly +owed. But in truth he was in a dangerous humor. And, alas! when he had +been ushered along the thickly carpeted passage and entered the +drawing-room, there, comfortably seated in the half-light before the +fire, the tea-things gleaming beside them, were Laura and the rector! + +The curate’s face grew dark. He almost felt that Lindo, who had really +been driven in by the rain, had betrayed him; and he shook hands with +Laura and sat down in complete silence, unable to trust himself to +answer the rector’s cheery greeting by so much as a word. It was all he +could do to answer “Thank you,” when Miss Hammond asked him if he would +take tea. She, of course, saw that something was amiss, and felt not a +little awkward between her two friends; but luckily the rector remained +ignorant and at his ease—he saw nothing, and went on talking. It was +the best thing he could have done, only, unfortunately, he had to do +with a man whom nothing in his present mood could please. + +“I am glad you have turned up at this particular moment,” Lindo said. +“Let me have your opinion. Miss Hammond says that I am pauperizing the +town by giving too much away.” + +“If you are half as generous at our bazaar on the 10th,” she retorted, +“you will do twice as much good.” + +“Or half as much evil!” he said lightly. + +“Have it that way, if you like,” she answered laughing. + +The curate set his teeth together in impotent rage. They were so easy, +so unconstrained, on such excellent terms with one another. When Laura, +who was secretly quaking, held out the toast to him and let her eyes +dwell for an instant on his, he looked away stubbornly. “Were you +asking my opinion?” he said in a voice he vainly strove to render cold +and dispassionate. + +“To be sure,” said the rector, stirring his tea and enjoying himself. +“Miss Hammond is not impartial. She is biassed by her bazaar.” + +If he had known the strong passions that were at work on the other side +of the tea-table! But the curate had his back to the shaded lamp, and +only a fitful gleam of fire-light betrayed even to Laura’s suspicious +eyes that he was not himself. Yet, when he spoke, Lindo involuntarily +started, so thinly veiled was the sneer in his tone. “Well, there is +one pensioner, I think, you would do well to strike off your list,” he +said. “He does not do you much credit.” + +“Who is that? Old Martin at the Gas House?” + +“No, the gentleman at the Bull and Staff!” replied the curate bluntly. + +“At the Bull and Staff? Who is that?” + +“Felton.” + +For a moment the rector looked puzzled. He had almost forgotten the +name of Lord Dynmore’s servant. Then he colored slightly. “Yes, I know +whom you mean,” he said, taken aback as much by the other’s +unlooked-for tone as by the mention of the man. “But I did not know he +lived at the Bull and Staff. It is not much of a place, is it?” + +“I should say that it was very nearly the worst house in the town!” +said the curate. + +“Indeed! I will speak to him about it.” + +“I would speak to him about getting drunk, if I were you!” Clode +replied with a short laugh. “He is drunk six days in the week; every +day except Saturday, when he comes to you and pulls a long face above a +clean neck-cloth. He is the talk of the town!” + +The rector stared; naturally wondering what on earth had come to the +curate to induce him to take that line. He was rather surprised than +offended, however, and merely answered, “I am sorry to hear it. I will +speak to him about it.” + +“Who is this person?” Miss Hammond asked hurriedly. “I do not think +that I know any one in the town of that name.” The subject seemed to be +a dangerous one, but anything was better than to leave the curate free +to conduct the discussion. + +He it was, however, who answered her. “He is a _protégé_ of the +rector’s!” he said, with a laugh that was undisguisedly offensive. “You +had better ask him.” + +“He is a servant of Lord Dynmore’s,” Lindo said, speaking to her with +studious politeness, and otherwise ignoring Clode’s interruption. + +“But why you find him in board and lodging at the Bull and Staff free, +gratis, and for nothing,” interposed the curate again with the same +rudeness, “passes my comprehension!” + +“Perhaps that is my business,” said the rector, losing patience. + +Both men stood up. Laura rose, too, with a scared face, and stood +gazing at them, amazed at the storm which had so suddenly arisen. The +curate’s height, as the two stood confronting one another, seemed to +give him the advantage; and his dark rugged face, kindling with +long-repressed feelings, wore the provoking smile of one who, confident +in his own powers, has wilfully thrown down the glove and is determined +to see the matter through. The rector’s face, on the other hand, was +red; and, though he faced his man squarely and threw back his head with +the haughtiness of his kind, his anger was mixed with wonder, and it +was plain that he was at a loss to understand the other’s ebullition or +to decide how to deal with it. There was a moment’s silence, which +Laura had not the presence of mind, nor the curate the will, to break. +Then the rector said, “Perhaps we had better let this drop for the +moment, Mr. Clode.” + +“As you will,” replied the curate recklessly. + +“Well, I do will,” Lindo rejoined, with some _hauteur_. And he looked, +still standing erect and expectant, as if he thought that Clode could +not do otherwise than take his leave. + +But that was just what the curate had not the slightest intention of +doing. Instead, with a cynical smile, he coolly sat himself down again. +His superior’s eyes flashed with redoubled anger at this, which seemed +to him, after what had passed, the grossest impertinence; but Mr. Clode +in his present mood cared nothing for that, and made it very plain that +he did not. “Will you think me exacting if I ask for another cup of +tea, Miss Hammond?” he said quietly. + +That was enough to make the rector’s cup run over. He did not wait to +hear Laura’s answer, but himself said. “Perhaps I had better say good +evening, Miss Hammond.” + +“You will not forget the bazaar?” she answered, making no demur, but at +once holding out her hand. + +There was a faint note of appeal in her voice which begged him not to +be angry, and yet he was angry. “The bazaar?” he said coldly. “Oh, yes, +I will not forget it.” + +And with that he took up his hat and went, feeling much as a man does +who, walking along a well-known road, has put his foot into a hole and +fallen heavily. He was almost more astonished and aggrieved than hurt. + +When he was gone there was silence in the room. I do not know whether +Laura had been conscious, while the two men wrangled before her, that +she was the prize of the strife, and so, like the maidens of old, had +been content to stand by passive and expectant, satisfied to see the +best man win, or whether she had been too much alarmed to interpose. +But certain it is that, when she was left alone with the curate, she +felt almost as uncomfortable as she had ever felt in her life. She +tried to say something indifferent, but for once she was too nervous to +frame the words. And Mr. Clode, instead of assisting her, instead of +bridging over the awkwardness of the moment, as he should have done, +since he was the person to blame for it all, sat silent and morose, +brooding over the fire and sipping his tea. At last he spoke. “Well,” +he said abruptly, turning his dark eyes suddenly on hers. “Which is it +to be, Laura?” + +He had never spoken to her in that tone before, and had any one told +her that morning that she would submit to it, she would have laughed +her informant to scorn. But there was a new-born masterfulness in the +curate’s manner which cowed her. “I do not know what you mean,” she +murmured, her face hot, her heart beating. + +“I think you do,” he answered sternly, without removing his eyes from +her. “Is it to be the rector, or is it to be me, Laura? You must choose +between us.” + +She recovered herself with a kind of gasp. “Are you not going a little +too fast?” she said, trying to smile, and speaking with something of +her ordinary manner. “I did not know that my choice was limited to the +two you mention, Mr. Clode, or that I had to choose one at all.” + +“I think you must,” was his only answer. “You must choose between us.” +Then, with a sudden movement, he rose and stood over her. “Laura!” he +said in a different tone, in a low voice, which thrilled through her +and awoke feelings and emotions hitherto asleep. “Laura, do not play +with me! I am a man. Is he more? Is he as much? I love you with all my +being! He cares only to kill time with you! Will you throw me over +because he is a little richer, because I am the curate and he is the +rector? If so, well, tell me, and I shall understand you!” + +It was not the way she had thought he would end. The force, the +abruptness, the almost menace of the last four words took her by +surprise and subdued her afresh. If she had had any doubt before which +of the two men had her liking, she had none now. She knew that Clode’s +little finger was more to her than Lindo’s whole hand; for, like most +women, she had a secret admiration for force, even when exercised +without much regard to good taste. + +“You need not speak to me like that,” she said, in gentle deprecation +of his manner. + +He stooped over her. “Laura,” he said, “do you really mean it? Do you +mean you will——” + +“Wait, please!” she answered, recovering a little of her ascendency. +“Give me a little time. I want to think something out.” + +But time to think was just what he feared—ignorant as yet of his true +position—to give her; and his face grew dark and sullen again. “No,” he +said, “I will not!” + +She rose suddenly. “You will do as I ask you now,” she said, asserting +herself bravely, “or I shall leave you.” + +He bowed silently, and she sat down again. “Sit down, please,” she said +to him. He obeyed her. “Now,” she continued, raising her hand so as to +shade her eyes from the fire, “I will be candid with you, Mr. Clode. If +I had no other alternative than the one you have mentioned—to choose +between you and Mr. Lindo—I—I should certainly prefer you. No!” she +continued sharply, bidding him with her hand to keep his seat, “hear me +out, please. You have not stated the case correctly. In the first +place—well, you put me in the awkward position of having to confess +that Mr. Lindo has made no such proposal as you seem to fancy; and, +secondly, there are others in the world.” + +“I do not care,” the curate exclaimed, his deep voice trembling with +exultation—“I do not care though there be millions—now!” + +She moved her hand, and for a second her eyes, full of a tenderness +such as he had never seen in them before, met his. The look drew him +from his seat again, but she sent him back to it by an imperious +gesture. “I said I would be candid,” she continued, “and I intend to be +so, though until a few minutes ago I never thought that I should speak +to you as I am doing.” + +“You shall never repent it,” he answered fondly. + +“I hope not,” she rejoined. But then she paused and was silent. + +He sat waiting patiently for a while; but, as she still said nothing, +he rose. “Laura,” he said. + +“Yes, I know,” she answered, almost abruptly. “But candor does not come +very easily, sir, under certain circumstances. Don’t you know you have +made me afraid of you?” + +He showed that he would have reassured her in the most convincing and +practical manner. But, notwithstanding her words, she had regained her +power and presence of mind, and she repelled him. + +“Wait until you have heard what I have got to say,” she said. “It is +this. I would not marry Mr. Lindo because he is a rector with a living +and a position—not though he were six times a rector! But all the same +I will not marry a curate! No,” she added in a lower tone, and with a +glance which intoxicated him afresh—“not though he be you!” + +He stood silent, looking down at her, waiting for more. Neither by word +nor gesture did he express dissent. It is possible he already +understood, and felt with her. + +“To marry a curate,” she continued in a low voice, “is, for a girl such +as I am, failure. I have held my head rather high, and I have stood by +and seen other girls married. Therefore to marry a curate, after all, +would be an ignominious failure. Are you very angry with me?” she +continued quietly, “or do you understand?” + +“I think I understand,” he answered, with just a tinge of bitterness in +his tone. + +“And despise me? Well, you must. I told you I was going to be candid, +and perhaps it is as well—as well, I mean, that you should know me,” +she replied, apparently unmoved. + +“I am content,” he answered, catching her spirit. + +“And so am I,” she said. “To no one else in the world would I have said +as much as I have said to you. To no other man would I say, ‘Win a +living, and I will be yours!’ But I say it to you. Do as much as that +for me and I will marry you, Stephen. If you cannot, I cannot.” + +“You are very prosaic,” he replied, lapsing into bitterness again. + +“Oh, if you are not content” she retorted. + +He did not let her finish the sentence. “You will marry me on the day I +obtain a living?” he asked. + +“I will,” she answered bravely. + +She was standing up now, and he too—standing where the rector had stood +an hour before. She let him pass his arm round her waist, but when he +would have drawn her closer to him, and bent his head to kiss her, she +hung back. “No,” she said, blushing hotly, “I think”—with a shy +laugh—“that you are making too certain, sir.” + +“Do you wish me _not_ to succeed?” he replied, looking down at her; and +it must be confessed the lover’s _rôle_ became him better than +nine-tenths of those who knew his dark, rugged face would have +believed. + +She shook her head, smiling. + +“Then if you wish me success,” he replied, “you must send me out with +some guerdon of your favor.” And this time she did not resist. He drew +her to him and kissed her thrice. Then she escaped from him and took +refuge on the other side of the fireplace. + +“You must not do that again,” she said, biting her lip and trying to +look at him reproachfully. “At any rate, you have had your guerdon now. +When you come back a victor I will crown you. But until then we are +friends only. You understand, sir?” + +And, though he demurred, he presently said he understood. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. +THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD. + + +When Stephen Clode left the Town House after his interview with Laura, +he was in a state of exaltation—lifted completely out of his ordinary +cool and calculating self by what had happened. It was raining, but he +had gone some distance before he remarked it, and even then he did not +at once put up his umbrella, but strode along through the darkness, his +thoughts in a whirl of triumph and excitement. The crisis had come +suddenly, but he had not been found unequal to it. He had gone in +through the gates despondent, and come out in joy. He had pitted +himself against his rival, and had had the best of it. He had wooed, +and, almost in spite of his mistress, had won! + +He did not for the first few moments consider whether his altercation +with the rector was likely to have unpleasant consequences, nor did he +trouble himself about the manner in which he was to do Laura’s bidding. +Such considerations would come later—with the reaction. For the present +they did not occur to him. It was enough that Laura might be his—that +she never could be the rector’s. + +He felt the need, in his present excited mood, of some one to speak to, +and instead of turning into his own lodgings he passed on to the +reading-room, a large, barely furnished room, looking upon the top of +the town, and used as a club by the leading townsfolk and a few of the +local magnates who lived near. He entered it, and, to his surprise, +found the archdeacon seated under the naked gas-burners, interested in +the “Times.” The sight filled him with astonishment, for it was seldom +the county members used the room after sunset. + +“Why, Mr. Archdeacon,” he said—his tongue naturally hung loose at the +moment, and a _bonhomie_, difficult to assume at another time, came +easily to him now—“what in the world brings you here at this hour?” + +The archdeacon laid down his paper. “Upon my word I think I was half +asleep,” he said. “I am in for the ‘Free Foresters’’ supper. I thought +the hour was half-past six, and came into town accordingly, whereas I +find it is half-past seven. I have been here the best part of +three-quarters of an hour killing time.” + +“But I thought that the rector always said grace for the ‘Free +Foresters,’ the curate answered in some surprise. + +“It has been the custom for them to ask him,” the archdeacon replied +cautiously. “By the way you did it last year, did you not?” + +“Yes, for Mr. Williams. He was confined to his room.” + +“I thought so. Well, this year these foolish people seem to have taken +a fancy not to have the rector, and they came to me. I tried to +persuade them to have him, but it was no good. And so,” the archdeacon +added, in a lower tone, “I thought it would look less like a slight if +I came than if any other clergyman—you, for instance—were the clerical +guest.” + +“To be sure,” said the curate warmly. “It was most thoughtful of you.” + +The archdeacon hitched his chair a little nearer the fire. He felt the +influence of the curate’s sympathy. The latter had said little, but his +manner warmed the old gentleman’s heart, and his tongue also grew more +loose. “I wonder whether you know,” he said genially, rubbing his hands +up and down his knees, which he was gently toasting, and looking +benevolently at his companion, “how near you were to having the living, +Clode?” + +“Do you mean Claversham?” replied the curate, experiencing a kind of +shock at this reference to the subject so near his heart. + +“Yes, of course.” + +“I never thought I had a chance of it!” + +“You had so good a chance,” responded the archdeacon, nodding his head +wisely, “that only one thing stood between you and it.” + +“May I ask what that was?” the curate rejoined, his heart beating fast. + +“A promise. The earl had promised his old friend that he should have +this living. Lord Dynmore told me so himself, the last time I saw him. +That would be nearly a year ago, when poor Williams was already +ailing.” + +“Well, that I supposed to be the case,” Clode answered, his tone one of +disappointment. “But I do not quite see how I was affected by it—more, +I mean, than others, archdeacon.” + +“That is what I am going to tell you, only it must not go farther,” the +archdeacon answered. “Lord Dynmore told me of this promise _à propos_ +of a resolution he had just come to—namely, that, subject to it, he +intended in future to give his livings (he has seven in all, you know) +to the curate, wherever the latter had been two years at least in the +parish, and stood well with it. I am not sure that I agree with him; +but he is a conscientious man, though an odd one, and he had formed the +opinion that that was the right course. So, come now, if anything +should happen to Lindo you would certainly drop into it. I am not quite +sure,” added the archdeacon confidentially, “though no one likes Lindo +better than I do, that yours would not have been the better +appointment.” + +The curate disclaimed this so warmly and loyally that the archdeacon +was more than ever pleased with him; and, half-past seven striking, +they parted at the door of the reading-room on the best of terms with +one another. The archdeacon crossed to his supper and speech, and the +curate turned into his rooms, and, throwing himself into the big +leather chair before the fire, fixed his eyes on the glowing coals, and +began to think—to apply what he had just heard to what he had known +before. + +A living? He had got to get a living. And without capital to invest in +one, or the favor of a patron, how was it to be done? The bishop? He +had no claim there. He had not been long enough in the diocese, and he +knew nothing of the bishop’s wife. There was only one living he could +get, only one living upon which he had a claim, and that was +Claversham. It all came back to that—with this added, that he had now a +stronger motive than ever for ejecting Lindo from it, and the absolute +knowledge to boot that, Lindo ejected, he would be his successor. + +Stephen Clode’s face grew dark and gloomy as he reached this stage in +his reflections. He believed that the rector was enjoying what he had +no right to enjoy, but still he would fain have had no distinct part in +depriving him of it. He would have much preferred to stand by and, save +by a word here and there, by little acts scarcely palpable, and quite +incapable of proof—do nothing himself to injure him. He knew what +loyalty was, and would fain have been loyal in big things at least. But +he did not see how it could be done. He fancied that the stir against +the rector was dying away. Bonamy had not moved. Gregg was a coward, +and of this matter of the “Free Foresters” he thought nothing. Probably +they would return to their allegiance another year, and among the poor +the rector’s liberality would soon make friends for him. Altogether, +the curate, getting up and walking the room restlessly and with a +knitted brow, was forced to the conviction that, if he would be helped, +he must help himself, and that now was the time. The iron must be +struck before it cooled. Something must be done. + +But what? Clode’s mind reverted first to the discharged servant, and +discussed more than one way in which he might be used. There was an +amount of danger, however, in tampering with him which the thinker’s +astuteness did not fail to note, and which led him presently to +determine to leave Felton alone. Perhaps he had made as much capital +out of him as could be made with safety. + +From him the curate’s thoughts passed naturally to the packet of +letters in the cupboard at the rectory, the letters which he had once +held in his hand, and which he could not but believe would prove the +rector’s knowledge of the fraud he was committing. Those letters! +Clode, walking up and down the room, pishing and pshawing from time to +time, could not disentangle his thoughts from them. The narrow chance +which had prevented him reading them before somehow made him feel the +more certain of their value now—the more anxious to hold them again in +his hands. + +Were they still in the cupboard, he wondered. He had retained, not with +any purpose, but in pure inadvertence, the key which he had mentioned +to the rector; and he had it now. He took it from the mantel-shelf, +toyed with it, dropped it into his pocket. Then he took up his hat, and +was going abruptly from the room when the little servant who waited on +him met him. She was bringing up his simple dinner. The curate’s first +impulse was to order it to be taken down and kept warm for him. His +second, to resume his seat and eat it hastily. When he had finished—he +could not have said an hour later what he had had—he took his hat again +and went out. + +Two minutes saw him at the rectory door, where he was just in time to +meet the rector going out. Lindo’s face flushed as he saw who his +visitor was, and there was more than a suspicion of haughtiness in his +tone as he greeted him. “Good-evening,” he said. “Do you want to see +me, Mr. Clode?” + +“If you please,” the curate answered simply. “May I come in?” + +For answer, Lindo silently held the door open, and Clode passed through +the hall into the library. He was in the habit of entering this room a +dozen times a week, but he never did so after leaving his own small +lodgings without being struck by its handsome proportions, by the grave +harmonious color of its calf-lined walls, and the air of studious quiet +which always reigned within them. Of all the rector’s possessions he +envied him this room the most. The very sight of the shaded lamp +standing on the revolving bookcase at the corner of the hearth, and of +the little table beside it, which still bore the rector’s coffee-cup +and a tiny silver ewer and basin, aroused his spleen afresh. But he +gave no outward sign of this. He stood with his hat in one hand, his +other leaning on the table, and his head slightly bent. “Rector,” he +said, “I am afraid I behaved very badly this afternoon.” + +“I certainly thought your manner rather odd,” replied the rector +shortly. But he was half disarmed already. + +“I was annoyed, much annoyed, about a private matter,” the curate +proceeded in an even, rather despondent tone. “It is a matter about +which I expect I shall presently have to take your opinion. But for the +present I am not at liberty to name it. However, I was in trouble, and +I foolishly wreaked my annoyance upon the first person I came across.” + +“That was, unfortunately, myself,” said Lindo, smiling. + +“It would have been very unfortunate indeed for me, if you were as some +rectors I could name,” the curate replied gravely, still with his eyes +cast down. “As it is—well, I think you will accept my apology.” + +“Say no more about it,” answered the rector hastily. There was nothing +he hated so much as a scene. “Have a cup of coffee, my dear fellow. I +will ring for a cup and saucer.” And, before the curate could protest, +Lindo was at the bell and had rung it, his manner almost the manner of +a boy. + +“Sit down, sit down!” he continued. “Sarah, a cup and saucer, please.” + +“But you were going out,” protested the curate, as he complied. + +“Only to the post with some letters,” the rector explained. “I will +send Sarah instead.” + +Clode sprang up again, a peculiar flush on his dark cheek, and a glint +as of excitement in his eye. + +“No, no,” he said, “I am putting you out. If you were going to the +post, pray go. You can leave me here and come back to me, if that be +all.” + +The rector hesitated, his letters in his hand. He might send Sarah. But +it wanted a few minutes only of nine o’clock, and, besides, he did not +approve of the maids going out so late. “Well, I think I will do as you +say,” he answered, feeling that compliance was perhaps the truest +politeness; “if you are sure that you do not mind.” + +“I beg you will,” the curate said warmly. + +The cup and saucer being at that moment brought in, the rector nodded +assent. “Very well; I shall not be two minutes,” he said. “Take care of +yourself while I am away.” + +The curate, left alone, muttered, “No, you will be at least four +minutes, my friend!” and waited, with his cup poised, until he heard +the outer door closed. Then he set it down. Assuring himself by a +steady look that the windows were shuttered, he rose and, quietly +crossing the room, as a man might who wished to examine a book, he +stood before the little cupboard among the shelves. Perhaps, because he +had done the thing before, he did not hesitate. His hand was as steady +as it had ever been. If it shook at all it was with eagerness. His task +was so easy and so devoid of danger, under the circumstances, that he +even smiled darkly, as he set the key in the lock, at the thought of +the more clumsy burglar whom he had detected there. He turned the key +and opened the door. Nothing could be more simple. The packet he wanted +lay just where he had looked to find it. He took it out and dropped it +into his breast-pocket, and, long before the time which he had given +himself was up, was back in his chair by the fire, with his coffee-cup +on his knee. + +He might have been expected to feel some surprise at his own coolness. +But, as a fact, his thoughts were otherwise employed. He was longing, +with intense eagerness, for the moment when he might take the next +step—when he might open the packet and secure the weapon he needed. He +fingered the letters as they lay in their hiding place, and could +scarcely refrain from taking them out and examining them there and +then. When Lindo returned, and broke into the room with a hearty word +about the haste he had made, the curate’s answer betrayed no +self-consciousness. On the contrary, he rather underplayed his part, +his eye and voice being for, a moment so absent as to surprise his +host. The next instant he was aware of this, and conducted himself so +warily during the half-hour he remained that he entirely erased from +the rector’s mind the unlucky impression of the afternoon. + +By half-past nine he was back in his own room, at his table, his hat +thrown this way, his umbrella that. It took him but a feverish moment +to turn up the lamp and settle himself in his chair. Then he took out +the packet of letters, and, untying the string which bound them +together, he opened the first—there were only six of them in all. This +was the one which he had partially read on the former occasion—Messrs. +Gearns & Baker’s first letter. He read it through now at his leisure, +without interruption, once, twice, thrice, and with a long breath laid +it down again, and sat gazing, with knitted brows, into the shadow +beyond the lamp’s influence. There was not a word in it, not an +expression, which helped him; nothing to show the recipient that he was +not the Reginald Lindo for whom the living was intended. + +The curate sat awhile before he opened the second, and that one he read +more quickly. He dealt in the same way with the next, and the next. +When, in a short minute or two, he had read them all and they lay in a +disordered pile before him—some folded and some unfolded, just as they +had dropped from his hands—he leaned back in his chair, and, folding +his arms, sat frowning darkly into vacancy. There was not a word to +help him in any one of them, not a sentence which even tended to +convict the rector. He had been at all his pains for nothing. He had—— + +The sound of a raised voice asking for him below, and the hasty tread +of a foot mounting the stairs two at a time, roused him with a start +from the dream of disappointment. In a second he was erect, motionless, +and listening, his hand upon and half covering the letters. A hasty +knock on the outside of his door, and the touch of fingers on the +handle, seemed at the last moment to nerve him to action. It was all +but too late. As the rector came hurriedly into the room, the curate, +his face pallid, and the drops of perspiration standing on his brow, +swept the letters aside and drew a newspaper partly over them. +“What—what is it?” he muttered, stooping forward, his hands on the +table. + +The rector was too full of the news he had brought to observe the +other’s agitation, the more as the lamp was between them, and his eyes +were dazzled by the light. “Why, what do you think Bonamy has done?” he +answered excitedly, as he closed the door behind him. He was breathing +quickly with the haste he had made, and, uninvited, he dropped into a +chair. + +“What?” said the curate hoarsely. He dared not look down at the table +lest he should direct the other’s eyes to what lay there, but he was +racked as he stood there with the fear that some damning corner of the +paper, some scrap of the writing, should still be visible. The shame of +possible discovery poured like a flood over his soul. “What is it?” he +repeated mechanically. He had not yet recovered enough presence of mind +to wonder why the rector should have paid this untimely call. + +“He has served me with a writ!” Lindo replied, his face hot with haste +and indignation, his lips curling. “At this hour of the night, too! A +writ for trespass in driving out the sheep from the churchyard.” + +“A writ!” the curate echoed. “It is very late for serving writs.” + +“Yes. His clerk, who handed it to me—he came five minutes after you +left—apologized, and took the blame for that on himself, saying he had +forgotten to deliver it on leaving the office.” + +“For trespass!” said the curate stupidly. What a fool he had been to +meddle with those letters! Why had he not had a little patience? Here, +after all, was the catastrophe for which he had been longing. + +“Yes, in the Queen’s Bench Division, and all the rest of it!” replied +the rector; and then he waited to hear what the curate had to say. + +But Clode had nothing to say, except “What shall you do?” + +“Fight!” replied Lindo briskly, getting up and approaching the table. +“That of course. And it was about that I came to you. I do not think +there is any lawyer here I should like to employ. Did not you tell me +the other day who the archdeacon’s were? Some people in Birmingham, I +think?” + +“I think I did,” the curate answered. He had overcome his first fear, +and, as he spoke, looked down at the table, on which he was still +leaning. His hasty movement had disordered his own papers, but none of +the tell-tale letters were visible so far as he could see. But what if +the rector took up the newspaper? Or casually put it aside? The curate +grew hot again, despite his great self-control. He felt himself on the +edge of a precipice down which he dared not cast his eye. + +“Well, can you give me their address?” the rector continued. + +“Certainly!” the curate answered. Indeed he leapt at the suggestion, +for it seemed to offer some chance of escape—at least a way by which he +might rid himself of his visitor. + +“Just write it down, that is a good fellow, then,” said the rector, +unconscious of what was passing in his mind. + +The curate said he would, and tore off at random—-the rector was +leaning his hand on the newspaper, and might at any moment be taken +with a fancy to raise it—the back sheet of the first stray note that +came to his fingers, and wrote the address upon it. “There, that is +it,” he said; and as he gave it to Lindo—he had written it standing up +and stooping—he almost pushed him away from the table. “That will serve +you, I think. They may be trusted, I am told. The best you can do, I am +sure, will be to place the matter in their hands at once.” + +“I will write before I sleep!” the younger clergyman answered heartily. +“You cannot think how the narrowness of these people provokes me! But I +will not keep you now. I see you are busy. Come round early in the +morning, will you, and talk it over?” + +“I will come the moment I have had breakfast,” the curate answered, +making no attempt to detain his visitor. + +The rector thereupon going, he stood eyeing the newspaper askance until +the other’s footsteps died away on the pavement outside. Then he swept +it off and stood contemplating the half-dozen letters with abhorrence. +He loathed and detested them. They had suddenly become to him such an +incubus as his victim’s body becomes to the murderer. The desire which +had tempted him to the crime was gone, and he felt them only as a +burden. They were the visible proof of his shame. To keep them was to +become a thief, and yet he shrank with a nervous terror quite new and +strange to him from the task of returning them—of going to the study at +the rectory and putting them back in the cupboard. It had been easy to +get possession of them; but to return them seemed a task so thankless, +and withal so perilous, that he quailed before it. With shaking hands +he bundled them together and locked them in the lowest drawer of his +writing table. He would return them to-morrow. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. +THE BAZAAR. + + +Long before noon on the next day the service of the writ at the rectory +was pretty well known in the town, and the course which the +churchwardens had taken was freely canvassed in more houses than one. +But they had on their side all the advantages of prescription, while of +the rector people said that there was no smoke without fire, and that +he would not have become the subject of so many comments and +strictures, and the centre of more than one dispute, without being in +fault. There had been none of these squabbles in old Mr. Williams’s +time, they said. Tongues had not wagged about him. But then, they +added, he had not aspired to drive tandem with the Homfrays! The town +had been good enough for him. He had not wanted to have everything his +own way, or thought himself a little Jupiter in the place. His head had +not been turned by a little authority conferred too early, and +conferred, if all the town heard was true, in some very odd and +unsatisfactory manner. + +To know that all round you people are saying that your conceit has led +you into trouble is not pleasant. And in one way and another this +impression was brought home to the young rector more than once during +these days, so that his cheek flamed as he passed the window of the +reading-room, or caught the half-restrained sniggle in which Gregg +ventured to indulge when in company. Nor were these annoyances all +Lindo had to bear. The archdeacon scolded him roundly for placing the +matter in the hands of the lawyers without consulting him. Mrs. Hammond +looked grave. Laura seemed less friendly than a while back. Clode’s +conduct was odd, too, and unsatisfactory. He was sometimes enthusiastic +and loyal enough, ready to back up his superior as warmly as could be +wished, and anon he would show himself the reverse of all this—sullen, +repellent, and absolutely unsympathetic. + +So that the rector was not having a very sunny time, albeit the heat of +conflict kept him warm; and he threw back his head and set his fair +pleasant face very hard as he strode about the town, his long-tailed +black coat flapping behind him. He hugged himself more than ever on the +one thing which his opponents could not take from him. When all was +said and done, he must still be rector of Claversham. If his promotion +had not brought him as much happiness as he had expected, if he had not +been able to do in his new position all he had hoped, the promotion and +the position were yet undeniable. Knowing so well all the circumstances +of his appointment, he never gave two thoughts to the curious story +Kate Bonamy had told him. He was sorry that he had treated her so +cavalierly, and more than once he had thought with a regret almost +tender of the girl and the interview. But, for the rest, he treated it +as the ignorant invention of the enemy. Possibly on the strength of +certain ’Varsity prejudices he was a little too prone to exaggerate the +ignorance of Claversham. + +On the day before the bazaar a visitor arrived in Claversham, in the +shape of a small, dark, sharp-featured man, with a peculiarly alert +manner, whom the reader will remember to have met in the Temple. Jack +Smith, for he it was—we parted from him last at Euston Station—may have +come over on his own motion, or acting upon a hint from Mr. Bonamy, +who, since the refusal of Gregg’s offer, had thought more and more of +the future which lay before his girls. The house had seemed more and +more dull, not to him as himself, but to him considering it in the +night-watches through their eyes. Hitherto the lawyer had not +encouraged the young Londoner’s visits, perhaps because he dreaded the +change in his way of life he might be forced to make. But now, whether +he had given him a hint to come or not, he received him with undoubted +cordiality. + +Almost the first question Jack asked, Daintry hanging over the back of +his chair and Kate smiling in more subdued radiance opposite him, was +about his friend, the rector. Fortunately, Mr. Bonamy was not in the +room. “And how about Lindo?” he asked. “Have you seen much of him, +Kate?” + +“No, we have not seen much of him,” she answered, getting up to put +something straight which was not much awry before. + +“Father has served him with a writ, though,” Daintry explained, nodding +her head seriously. + +Jack whistled. “A writ!” he exclaimed. “What about?” + +“About the sheep in the churchyard. Mr. Lindo turned them out,” Kate +explained hurriedly, as if she wished to hear no more upon the subject. + +But Jack was curious; and gradually he drew from them the story of the +rector’s iniquities, and acquired, in the course of it, a pretty +correct notion of the state of things in the parish. He whistled still +more seriously then. “It seems to me that the old man has been putting +his foot in it here,” he said. + +“He has,” Daintry answered solemnly, nodding any number of times. “No +end!” + +“And yet he is the very best of fellows,” Jack replied, rubbing his +short black hair in honest vexation. “Don’t you like him?” + +“I did,” said Daintry, speaking for both of them. + +“And you do not now?” + +The child reddened, and rubbed herself shyly against Kate’s chair. +“Well, not so much!” she murmured, Jack’s eyes upon her. “He is too big +a swell for us.” + +“Oh, that is it, is it?” Jack said contemptuously. + +He pressed it no farther, and appeared to have forgotten the subject; +but presently, when he was alone with Kate, he recurred to it. “So, +Lindo has been putting on airs, has he?” he observed. “Yet, I thought +when Daintry wrote to me, after you left us, that she seemed to like +him.” + +“He was very kind and pleasant to us on our journey,” Kate answered, +compelling herself to speak with indifference. “But—well, you know, my +father and he have not got on well; so, of course, we have seen little +of him lately.” + +“Oh, that is all, is it?” Jack answered, moving restlessly in his +chair. + +“That is all,” said Kate quietly. + +This seemed to satisfy Jack, for at tea he surprised her—and, for +Daintry, she fairly leapt in her seat—by calmly announcing that he +proposed to call on the rector in the course of the evening. “You have +no objection, sir, I hope,” he said, coolly looking across at his host. +“He has been a friend of mine for years, and though I hear you and he +are at odds at present, it seems to me that that need not make mischief +between us.” + +“N—no,” said Mr. Bonamy slowly. “I do not see why it should.” +Nevertheless, he was greatly astonished. He had heard that Jack and Mr. +Lindo were acquainted, but had thought nothing of it. It is possible +that the discovery of this friendship existing between the two led him +to take new views of the rector. He continued, “I dare say in private +he is not an objectionable man.” + +“Quite the reverse, I should say!” Jack answered stoutly. + +“You have known him well?” + +“Very well.” + +“Umph! Then it seems to me it was a pity he did not confine himself to +private life,” ejaculated the lawyer, with some scorn. “As a rector I +do not like him.” + +“I am sorry for that,” Jack answered cheerfully. “But I have not known +much of him as a rector, though indeed, as it happened, he brought the +offer of the living straight to me, and I was the first person who +congratulated him on his promotion.” + +Mr. Bonamy lifted his eyes slowly from the teacup he was raising to his +lips, and looked fixedly at his visitor, an expression much resembling +strong curiosity in his face. If a question was on the tip of his +tongue he refrained from putting it, however, and Jack, who by no means +wished to hear the tale of his friend’s shortcomings repeated, said no +more until they rose from the table. Then he remarked, “Lindo dines +late, I expect.” + +He put the question to Kate, but the lawyer answered it. “Oh, yes, he +does everything which is fashionable,” he answered drily. And Jack, +putting this and that together, began to see still more clearly how the +land lay, and on what shoals his friend had wrecked his popularity. + +About half-past eight he went to the rectory, but found that Lindo was +not at home. The door was opened to him, however, by Mrs. Baker, who +had often seen the barrister in the East India Dock Road, and knew him +well; and she pressed him to walk in and wait. “He dined at home, sir,” +she explained. “I think he has only slipped out for a few minutes.” + +He followed her accordingly across the panelled hall to the study, +where for a moment a whimsical smile played upon his face as he viewed +its spacious comfort. The curtains were drawn, the fire was burning +redly, and the lamp was turned half down. The housekeeper made as if +she would have turned it up, but he prevented her. “I like it as it +is,” he said genially. “This is better than No. 383, Mrs. Baker?” + +“Well, sir,” she answered, looking round with an air of modest +proprietorship, “it is a bit more like.” + +“What would you have, Mrs. Baker?” he asked, laughing. “The bishop’s +palace?” + +“We may come to that in time, sir,” she answered, folding her arms +demurely. “But I do not know that I would wish it! He has a peck of +troubles now, and there would be more in a palace, I doubt.” + +“I agree with you,” Jack replied, laughing. “Troubles come thick about +an apron, Mrs. Baker.” + +“Ay, the men see to that!” retorted the good lady, getting the last +word and going away delighted. + +Left alone, Jack lay back in an arm-chair, and, nursing his hat, +wondered what Mrs. Baker would say when she discovered his connection +with the Bonamys. He had not been seated in this posture two minutes +before he heard the door of the house open and shut, and a man’s tread +cross the hall. The next moment the study door opened, and a tall man +appeared at it, and stood holding it and looking into the room. The +hall lamp was behind the newcomer, and Jack, seeing that he was not the +rector, sat still. + +The stranger, satisfied apparently that the room was empty, stepped in +and closed the door behind him; and, rapidly crossing the floor, stood +before one of the bookcases. He took something—a key Jack judged by +what followed—from his pocket, and with it he swiftly threw open a +cupboard among the books. + +There was nothing remarkable in the action; but the stranger’s manner +was hurried and nervous, and the looker-on leaned forward, curious to +learn what he was about. He expected to see him take something from the +cupboard. Instead, the man appeared to put something in. What it was, +however, Jack could not discern, for, leaning forward too far in his +anxiety to do so, he upset his hat with some noise on to the floor. + +The man turned on the instant as if he had been subjected to a galvanic +shock, and stood gazing in the direction of the sound. Jack heard him +draw in his breath with the sharp sound of sudden fear, and even by +that light could see that his face was drawn and white. The barrister +rose quietly in the gloom, the stranger at sight of him leaning back +against the book-case as if his legs refused to support him. Yet he was +the first to speak. “Who is there?” he said, almost in a whisper. + +“A visitor,” Jack answered simply. “I have been waiting to see Mr. +Lindo.” + +The curate—for he it was—drew a long breath, apparently of relief, and +in reality of such heartfelt thankfulness as he had never known before. +“What a start you gave me!” he murmured, his voice as yet scarcely +under his control. “I am Mr. Clode, Mr. Lindo’s curate. I was putting +up some parish papers, and thought the room was empty.” + +“So I saw,” Jack answered drily. “I am afraid your nerves are a little +out of order.” The curate muttered something which was inaudible, and, +raising his hand to the book-case, locked the cupboard door and put the +key in his pocket. Then he went to the lamp and turned it up. At the +same moment Jack, recovering his hat, advanced into the circle of +light, and the two men looked at one another. “I am afraid if you wish +to see the rector you will be disappointed,” the curate said, with +something of hauteur in his voice, assumed to hide his mistrust. “He +was to spend the evening at Mrs. Hammond’s. I doubt if he will be back +before midnight.” + +“Then I must call another time,” said Jack practically. + +“If I see him first, can I tell him anything for you?” the curate +persisted. Who was this man? Could he be a detective? he was wondering. + +But Jack was so far from being a detective that he had already +dismissed the suspicions he had at first entertained. “I think not, +thank you,” he answered; “I will call again.” + +“Can I give him any name?” Clode asked in despair. + +“Well, you might say Jack Smith called,” the barrister answered, “if +you will be so kind.” + +They parted at the door, and Clode went back into the house, where he +speedily learned all that Mrs. Baker knew of Mr. Smith. It dispelled +his first fear. The man was not a detective; still it sent him home +gloomy and ill at ease. What if so intimate a friend of the rector’s as +this Smith seemed to be should tell him of his curate’s visit to the +cupboard and the excuse which on the spur of the moment he had +invented? It might go ill with him then. What explanation could he +give? He tried to consider such a mishap impossible, or at all events +unlikely; but not with complete success. More than ever he wished that +he had not interfered with the letters. + +To return to Jack. Such mild festivities as the bazaar were not +uncommon in Claversham, but the Bonamy household at any rate had not +been wont to look forward to them with anything approaching +exhilaration. It is wonderful how some children growing up in any kind +of social shadow learn the fact; and Daintry Bonamy, scarcely less than +her sister, had come to regard the annual flower-show, the school +sports, and the regatta with distaste and repugnance, as occasions of +little pleasure and much humiliation. It was Mr. Bonamy’s will, +however, that they should attend, though he never went himself; and +times innumerable they had done so, outwardly in pretty dresses and +becoming hats, inwardly in sack-cloth and ashes. + +Jack’s presence changed all this, and for once the girls went up to +dress quite gaily. If Kate reflected that Jack’s intimacy with the +rector would be likely to bring them also into contact with him, she +said nothing; and from Jack—for the present at least—it was mercifully +hidden that, with all his kindness, his unfailing good-humor, his wit, +his devotion to her, his chief attraction in the girl’s eyes lay in the +fact that he was another man’s friend. + +When they entered the Assembly Room it was already well filled, the +main concourse being about the two stalls at the end of the room over +which the archdeacon’s wife and Mrs. Hammond respectively ruled. Here +the great people were mainly to be seen; and an acute observer would +soon have discovered that between those who habitually hung about this +end and those who surrounded the four lower stalls there was a great +gulf fixed. Those on the one side of this examined the dresses of those +on the other with indulgent interest, and, for the most part, through +double eyeglasses; while those on the other hand either returned the +compliment and made careful notes, or looked about deferentially for a +glance of recognition. The man who should have bridged that gulf, who +should have been equally at home with Mrs. Archdeacon and the +hotel-keeper’s wife, was the rector. But as the rector had entered, the +unlucky word “writ” had caught his ears, and he was in his most +unpleasant humor. He felt that the whole room was talking of him—the +majority with a narrow dislike, a few with sympathy. Was it unnatural +that, forgetting his situation, he should throw in his lot with his +friends, who were ever so much the pleasanter, the wittier, the more +amusing, and present a smiling front of defiance to his opponents or +those whom he thought to be such? At any rate, that was what he was +doing, and no one could remark the carriage of his head or the +direction of his eyes without feeling that there was something in the +town complaint that the new clergyman was above his work. + +Jack and his party did not at once come across him. They found enough +to amuse them at the lower end of the room—the more as to the barrister +the great and little with whom he rubbed shoulders were all one. +Strange to say, he did not discern any great difference even in their +dress! With Daintry hanging on his arm and Kate at his side he was +content, until, turning suddenly in the thick of the crowd to speak to +the elder girl, he saw her face turn crimson. At the same moment she +bowed slightly to some one behind him. He looked round quickly, with a +sharp jealous pang at his heart, to see who had called forth this show +of emotion, and found himself face to face with the rector. + +Lindo had looked forward to this meeting; he had prepared himself for +it; and yet, occurring in this way, it shook him out of his +self-possession. He colored almost as deeply as the girl had, and, +though he held out his hand with scarcely a perceptible pause, the +action was nervous and jerky. “By Jove! is it you, Jack?” he exclaimed, +his tone a mixture of old cordiality and new antagonism. “How do you +do, Miss Bonamy?” and he held out his hand to the girl also, who just +touched it with her fingers and drew back. “It is pleasant to see your +cousin’s face again,” he went on more glibly, yet clearly not at his +ease even now. “I was sorry that I was not in last night when he +called.” + +“Yes, I was sorry to miss you,” Jack answered slowly, his eyes on his +friend’s face. He could not quite understand matters. The girl’s +embarrassment had been almost a revelation to him, and yet it flashed +across his mind now that the cause of it might have been only the +quarrel between her father and the rector. The same thing might account +for Lindo’s shy, ungenial manner. And yet—and yet he could not quite +understand it, and, whether he would or no, his face grew hard. “You +heard I had looked in?” he added. + +“Yes; Mrs. Baker told me,” Lindo answered, moving to let some one pass +him, and glancing aside to smile a recognition. + +“She looks the better for the change, I think.” + +“Yes; she gets more fresh air now.” + +“It does not seem to have done you much good.” + +“No?” + +Certainly there was something amiss. These were old, tried college +friends, or had been so a few weeks back, and they had nothing more to +say to one another than this! The rector’s self-consciousness began to +infect the other, sowing in his mind he knew not what suspicions. So +that, if ever words of Daintry’s were welcome, they were welcome now. +“Jack is going to stay a week,” she said inconsequently, standing on +one leg the while with her arm through Jack’s and her big eyes on the +rector’s face. + +“I am very glad to hear it,” Lindo rejoined. “He will find me at home +more than once in the week, I hope.” + +“I will come and try,” said Jack. + +“Of course you will!” replied the rector, with a flash of his old +manner. “I shall be glad if you will remind him of his promise, Miss +Bonamy.” + +Kate murmured that she would. + +“You like your house?” said Jack. + +“Oh, very much—very much indeed.” + +“It is an improvement on No. 383?” continued the barrister, rather +drily. + +“It is—very much so!” + +The words were natural. They were the words Jack would have expected. +But, unfortunately, Gregg at that moment passed the rector’s elbow, and +the latter’s manner was cold and shy—almost as if he resented the +reference to his old life. Jack thought he did, and his lip curled. +Fortunately, Daintry again intervened. “Here is Miss Hammond,” she +said. “She is looking for you, Mr. Lindo.” + +The rector turned as Laura, threading her way through the press, came +smiling toward him. She glanced with some curiosity at Jack, and then +nodded graciously to Kate, whom she knew at the Sunday school and from +meeting her on such occasions as this. “How do you do, Miss Bonamy?” +she said pleasantly. “Will you pardon me carrying off the rector? We +want him to come to tea.” + +Kate bowed, and the rector took off his hat to the girls. Then he waved +an awkward farewell toward Jack, muttered “See you soon!” and went off +with his captor. + +And that was all! Jack turned away with his cousins to the nearest +stall, and bought and chatted. But he did both at random. His thoughts +were elsewhere. He was a keen observer, and he had seen too much for +comfort, yet not enough for comprehension. Nor did the occasional +glance which he shot at Kate’s preoccupied face, as she bent over the +wool-work and “guaranteed hand-paintings,” tend to clear up his doubts +or render his mood more cheerful. + +Meanwhile the rector’s frame of mind, as he rejoined his party, was not +a whit more enviable. He was angry with himself, angry with his friend. +The sight of Jack standing by Kate’s side had made his own conduct to +the girl at his last interview with her appear in a worse light than +before—more churlish, more ungrateful. He wished now—but morosely, not +with any tenderness of regret—that he had sought some opportunity of +saying a word of apology to her. And then Jack? He fancied he saw +condemnation written on Jack’s face, and that he too, to whom, in the +old days, he had confided his aspirations and resolves, was on the +enemy’s side—was blaming him for being on bad terms with his church +wardens and for having already come to blows with half the parish. + +It was not pleasant. But the more unpleasant things he had to face, the +higher he would hold his head. He disengaged himself presently—the +Hammonds had already preceded him—from the throng and bustle of the +heated room, and went down the stairs alone. Outside it was already +dark, and small rain was falling. The outlook was wretched, and yet in +his present mood he found a tiny satisfaction in the respect with which +the crowd of ragamuffins about the door fell back to give him passage. +With it all, he was some one. He was rector of the town. + +At the Hammond’s door he found a carriage waiting in the rain. It was +not one he knew, and as he laid down his umbrella he asked the servant +whose it was. + +“It is Lord Dynmore’s, sir,” the man answered, in his low trained +voice. “His lordship is in the drawing-room, sir.” + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. +“LORD DYNMORE IS HERE.” + + +When Lord Dynmore, a few minutes before the rector found his carriage +at the door, trotted at the heels of the servant into Mrs. Hammond’s +drawing-room, his entrance, unexpected as it was, caused a flutter +among those assembled there. Lords are still lords in the country, and +in the case of his hostess the sensation was wholly one of pleasure. +She was pleased to see him. She was still more pleased that he had +chosen to call at so opportune a moment, when his light would not be +hidden, and James had on his best waistcoat. Consequently she rose to +meet him with a beaming smile, and a cordiality only chastened by the +knowledge that Mrs. Homfray and the archdeacon’s wife were observing +her with critical jealousy. “Why, Lord Dynmore,” she exclaimed, “this +is most kind of you!” + +“How d’ye do? how d’ye do?” said the peer as he advanced. He was a +slight, short man with bushy gray whiskers and grizzled hair which, +being rather long, strayed over the fur collar of his overcoat. A noble +aquiline nose and keen eyes helped to give him, despite his shortness, +an air of being somebody. “How d’ye do? Why,” he continued, locking +round, “you are quite _en fête_ here.” + +“We have been at a bazaar, Lord Dynmore,” Laura answered. She was +rather a favorite with him and could “say things.” “I think you ought +to have been there too, to patronize it. We did not know that you were +in the country, but we sent you a card.” + +“Never heard a word of it!” replied his lordship positively. + +“But you must have had the card,” Laura persisted. + +“Never heard a word of it!” repeated his lordship, who had by this time +shaken hands with everyone in the room. When the company was not too +large he made a rule of doing this, thereby obviating the ill results +of a bad memory, and earning considerable popularity. “Archdeacon, you +are looking very well,” he continued. + +“I think I may say the same of you,” answered the clerical dignitary. +“You have had good sport?” + +“Capital! capital!” replied the peer in his jerky way. “But it won’t +last my time! In two years there will not be a head of buffalo in the +States! By the way, I saw your nephew.” + +“My nephew!” echoed the archdeacon. + +“Yes. Had him up to dinner in Kansas city. A good fellow—a very good +fellow. He put me up to one or two things worth knowing.” + +“But, Lord Dynmore, you must be thinking of some one else!” replied the +archdeacon in a fretful tone. “It could not be my nephew: I have not a +nephew out there.” + +“No?” replied the earl. “Then it must have been the dean’s. Or perhaps +it was old Canon Frampton’s—I am not sure now. But he was a good +fellow, an excellent fellow!” And my lord looked round and wagged his +head knowingly. + +The archdeacon’s niece, a young lady who had not seen the peer before, +nor indeed any peers, and who consequently was busy making a study of +him, looked astonished. Not so the others who knew him and his ways. It +was popularly believed that Lord Dynmore could keep two things, and two +only, in his mind—the head of game he had killed in each and every year +since he first carried a gun, and the amount of his annual income from +the time of the property coming to him. + +“There have been changes in the parish since you were here last,” said +Mrs. Hammond, deftly intervening. She saw that the archdeacon looked a +little put out. “Poor Mr. Williams is gone.” + +“Ah! to be sure! to be sure!” replied the earl. “Poor old chap. He was +a friend of my fathers’, and now you have a friend of mine in his +place. From generation to generation, you know. I remember now,” he +continued, tugging at his whiskers peevishly, “that I meant to see +Lindo before I called here. I must look him up by-and-by.” + +“I hope he will save you the trouble,” Mrs. Hammond answered. “I am +expecting him every minute.” + +“Capital! capital! He is a good fellow now, isn’t he? A really good +fellow! I am sure you ought to be much obliged to me for sending you +such a cheery soul, Mrs. Hammond. And he is not so very old,” the earl +added waggishly. “Not too old, you know, Miss Hammond. Young for his +years, at any rate.” + +Laura laughed and colored a little—what would offend in a commoner is +in a peer pure drollery; and, as it happened, at this moment the rector +came in. The news of the earl’s presence had kindled a spark of elation +in his eye. He had not waited for the servant to announce him; and as +he stood a second at the door, closing it, he confronted the company +with an air of modest dignity which more than one remarked. His glance +rested momentarily upon the figure of the earl, who was the only +stranger in the room, so that he had no difficulty in identifying him; +and he seemed in two minds whether he should address him. On second +thoughts he laid aside the intention, and advanced to Mrs. Hammond. “I +am afraid I scarcely deserve any tea,” he said pleasantly, “I am so +late.” + +Laura, who had risen, touched his arm. “Lord Dynmore is here,” she said +in a low voice, which was nevertheless distinctly heard by all. “I do +not think you have seen him.” + +He took it as an informal introduction, and turned to Lord Dynmore, who +was leaning against the fireplace, toying with his teacup and talking +to Mrs. Homfray. The young rector advanced a step and held out his +hand, a slight flush on his cheek. “There is no one whom I ought to be +better pleased to see than yourself, Lord Dynmore,” he said with some +feeling. “I have been looking forward for some time to this meeting.” + +“Ah, to be sure,” replied the peer, holding out his hand readily, +though he was somewhat mystified by the other’s earnestness. “I am +pleased to meet you, I am sure. Greatly pleased.” + +The listeners, who had heard what he had just said about his great +friend, the rector, stared. Only the person to whom the words were +addressed saw nothing odd in them. “You have not long returned to +England, I think?” he answered. + +“No; came back last Saturday night. And how is the rector? Where is he? +Why does he not show up? I understood Mrs. Hammond to say he was +coming.” + +The archdeacon, Mrs. Hammond, and the others were dumb with +astonishment. Even Lindo was surprised, thinking it very dull in the +earl not to guess at once that he was the new incumbent. So no one +answered, and the peer, glancing sharply round, discerned that every +one was at a loss. “Eh! Oh, I see,” he resumed in a different tone. +“You are not one of his curates? I made a mistake, I suppose. Took you +for one of his curates, do you see? That was all. Beg your pardon. Beg +your pardon, I am sure. But where is he?” + +“This _is_ the rector, Lord Dynmore,” said the archdeacon in an +uncertain, puzzled way. + +“No, no, no, no,” replied the great man fretfully. “I mean the old +rector—my old friend.” + +“He has forgotten that poor Mr. Williams is dead,” Laura murmured to +her mother, amid the general pause of astonishment. + +He overheard her. “Nothing of the kind, young lady!” he answered +irritably. “Nothing of the kind. Bless my soul, do you think I do not +know whom I present to my own livings? My memory is not so bad as that! +I thought this gentleman was Lindo’s curate, that was all. That was +all.” + +They stared at one another in awkward silence. The rector was the first +to speak. “I am afraid we are somehow at cross purposes still, Lord +Dynmore,” he stammered, his manner constrained. “I am not my own +curate—well, because I am myself Reginald Lindo, whom you were kind +enough to present to this living.” + +“To Claversham, do you mean?” + +“Yes.” + +“And do you say you are Reginald Lindo?” The peer grew very red in the +face as he put this question. + +“Yes, certainly I am.” + +“Then, sir, I say that certainly you are not!” was the rapid and +startling answer. “Certainly you are not! You are no more Reginald +Lindo than I am!” the peer repeated, striking his hand upon the table +by his side. “What do you mean by saying that you are, eh? What do you +mean by it?” + +“Lord Dynmore——” + +But the peer would not listen. “Who are you, sir? Answer me that +question first!” he cried. He was a choleric man, and he saw already +that there was something seriously amiss; so that the shocked, +astonished faces round him tended rather to increase than lessen his +wrath. “Answer me that!” + +“I think, Lord Dynmore, that you must be mad,” replied the rector, his +lips quivering. “I am as certainly Reginald Lindo as you are Lord +Dynmore!” + +“But what are you doing here?” retorted the other, storming down the +interruption which the archdeacon would have effected. “That is what I +want to know. Who made you rector of Claversham?” + +“The bishop, my lord,” answered the young man sternly. + +“Ay, but on whose presentation?” + +“On yours.” + +“On mine?” + +“Most assuredly,” replied the clergyman doggedly—“as the archdeacon +here, who indicted me, can bear witness.” + +“It is false!” Lord Dynmore almost screamed. He turned to the +panic-stricken listeners, who had instinctively grouped themselves +round the two, and appealed to them. “I presented a man nearly thrice +his age, do you hear!—a man of sixty. As for this—this Reginald Lindo, +I never heard of him in my life! Never! If he had letters of +presentation, I did not give them to him.” + +The young clergyman’s eyes flashed, and his face grew hard as a stone. +He guessed already the misfortune which had happened to him, and his +heart was sore, as well as full of wrath. But in his pride he betrayed +only the anger. “Lord Dynmore,” he said fiercely, “you will have to +answer for these insinuations. If there has been any error, the fault +has not lain with me!” + +“An error, you call it, do you? Let me——” + +“Oh, Lord Dynmore!” Mrs. Hammond gasped. + +“One moment, Lord Dynmore, if you please.” This from the archdeacon; +and he pressed his interruption, placing himself between the two men, +and almost laying his hands on the excited peer. “If there has been a +mistake,” he urged, “a few words will make it clear. I fully +believe—nay, I feel sure, that my friend here is not in fault, whoever +is.” + +“Ask your questions,” grunted my lord, breathing hard, and eyeing the +young clergyman as a terrier eyes the taller dog it means to attack. +“He will not answer them, trust me!” + +“I think he will,” replied the archdeacon with decision. His _esprit de +corps_ was rising. The earl’s rude insistance disgusted him. He +remarked, his eyes wandering for a moment while he considered how he +should frame his question, that another person, Mr. Clode, had silently +entered the room, and was listening with a darkly thoughtful face. It +occurred to the archdeacon to suggest that the ladies should withdraw, +but then again it seemed fair that, as they had heard the charges, they +should hear what answer the rector had to make; and he proceeded. +“First, Lord Dynmore,” he said, “I must ask you whom you intended to +present.” + +“My old friend, Reginald Lindo, of course.” + +“His address, please,” continued the archdeacon rather curtly. + +“Somewhere in the East End of London,” the earl answered. “Oh, I +remember now, St. Gabriel’s, Aldgate.” + +The archdeacon turned silently to the clergyman. “He was my uncle,” +Lindo explained gravely. “He died a year ago last October.” + +“Died!” The exclamation was Lord Dynmore’s. + +“Yes, died,” the young man retorted bitterly. “Your lordship keeps a +watchful eye upon your friends!” + +The shaft went home. The earl caught a quick breath, and his face +changed. The words awoke a slumbering chord in his memory and +recalled—not as might have been expected, old days of frolic and sport +spent with the friend whose death was thus coldly flung in his face—but +a scene in another world. He saw upon the instant a rock-bound valley, +inclosed by hills that rose in giant steps to the snowy line of the +Andes; and in its depths a tiny hunter’s camp. He saw an Indian fishing +in the brook, and near him a white man wandering away—a letter in his +hand. Then had come a shot, an alarm, a hasty striking of the tent, and +for many hours—even days—a rapid, dangerous march. In the excitement +the letter had been forgotten, to be recalled with its tidings here—and +now. + +He winced, and muttered, “Good heavens, and I had heard it.” The +clergyman caught the words, and his resentment waxed hot. “My uncle’s +death,” he continued grimly, in the tone of one rather making than +answering an accusation, “occurred a year before the presentation was +offered to me by your solicitors!” + +“Lord help us!” said the peer in a helpless, bewildered tone. “But are +you a clergyman, sir?” + +“That is a fresh insult, Lord Dynmore!” he replied warmly. + +“Hoity-toity!” retorted my lord, recovering himself, “you are a fine +man to talk of insults! And you in my living, without a shadow of title +to it! You must have had some suspicion, sir, that all was not right.” + +“I think I can answer for Mr. Lindo, there!” interposed the curate, +stepping forward for the first time. His face was deeply flushed, and +he spoke hurriedly, not looking up; perhaps, because all eyes were on +him. “When Mr. Lindo came here, I had reason to expect an older man. I +heard by chance from him—I think it was on the evening of his +arrival—that he had not long lost an uncle of the same name, and it +occurred to me then as just possible that there might have been a +mistake. But I particularly observed that he was perfectly free from +any suspicion of that kind himself.” + +“Pooh! There is nothing in that!” replied the archdeacon snappishly. + +“I think there is!” cried the earl in triumph. “A great deal in it. If +the idea occurred to a stranger, is it possible that the incumbent’s +own mind could be free from it?” + +“Is it possible,” the rector answered viciously, a ring as of steel in +his voice, “that a man who had had his dear friend’s death announced to +him could forget the news in a year, and think of him as still alive?” + +The earl gasped with passion. By a tremendous effort he refrained from +using bad words, and even forbore, in view of the alarmed looks of the +ladies and the archdeacon’s hasty expostulation, to call his opponent, +a villain or a scoundrel. He stammered only, “You—you—are you going to +give up my living?” + +“No,” was the answer. + +“You are not?” + +“Certainly I am not!” the rector answered. “If you had treated me +differently, Lord Dynmore,” he continued, speaking with his arms +crossed and his lip curling with scorn and defiance, “my answer might +have been different! Now, though the mistake has been with yourself or +your people, you have accused me of fraud! You have treated me as an +impostor! You have dared to ask me, though I have been ministering to +the people in this parish for months, whether I am a clergyman! You +have insulted me grossly, and, so doing, have put it out of my power to +resign had I been so minded! And you may be sure I shall not resign.” + +He looked handsome enough as he flung down his defiance. But the earl +cared nothing for his looks. “You will not?” he stuttered. + +“No! I acknowledge no authority whatever in you,” was the answer. “You +are _functus officio_. I am subject to the bishop, and to him only.” + +“Give me my hat,” mumbled the peer, turning abruptly away; and, tugging +up the collar of his fur coat, he began to grope about in a manner +which at another time would have been laughable. “Give me my hat, some +one,” he repeated. “Let me get out before I swear. I am _functus +officio_, am I? I have never been so insulted in my life! Never, so +help me heaven! Never! Let me get out!” + +His murmurs died away in the hall, Mr. Clode with much presence of mind +opening the door for him and letting him out. When they ceased, in the +room he had left there was absolute silence. The men avoided one +another’s eyes. The women, their lips parted, looked each at her +neighbor. Mrs. Homfray, the young wife of an old husband, was the first +to speak. “Well, I never!” she sighed. + +That broke the spell. The rector, who had hitherto gazed darkly, with +flushed brow and compressed lips, at the hearth-rug, roused himself. “I +think I had better go,” he said, his tone hard and ungracious, “You +will excuse me, I am sure, Mrs. Hammond. Good-night. Good-night.” + +The archdeacon took a step forward, with the intention of intercepting +him, but thought better of it, and stopped, seeing that the time was +not propitious. So, save to murmur an answer to his general farewell, +no one spoke, and he left the room under the impression, though he +himself had set the tone, that he stood alone among them; that he had +not their sympathies. Afterward he remembered this, and it added to his +unhappiness, and to the pride with which he endured it. But at the +moment he was scarcely aware of the impression. The blow had fallen so +swiftly, it was so unexpected and so crushing, that he went out into +the darkness stunned and bewildered, conscious only, as are men whom +some sudden accident has befallen, that in a moment all was changed +with him. + +An hour later Mrs. Hammond and her daughter alone remained. The last of +the visitors had departed, the dinner hour was long past, but they +still sat on, fascinated by the topic, reproducing for one another’s +benefit the extraordinary scene they had witnessed, and discussing its +probable consequences. “I am sure, quite sure, poor fellow, that he +knew nothing about it,” Mrs. Hammond declared for the twentieth time. + +“So the archdeacon seemed to think, mamma,” Laura answered. “And yet he +said that probably Mr. Lindo would have to go.” + +“Because of the miserable attacks these people have made upon him!” her +mother rejoined with indignation. “But think of the pity of it! Think +of the income! And such a house as it is!” + +“It _is_ a nice house,” Laura assented, thoughtfully gazing into the +fire, a slight access of color in her cheeks. + +“I think it is abominable!” + +“And then,” Laura said, continuing her chain of reflection, “there is +the view from the drawing-room windows.” + +“Oh, it is too bad! It is really too bad! I declare I am quite upset, I +am so sorry for him. Lord Dymnore ought to be ashamed of himself!” + +“Yes,” Laura assented rather absently, “I quite agree with you. And as +for the hall, with a Persian rug or two it would be quite as good as +another room.” + +“What hall? Oh, at the rectory?” + +“Yes.” + +Mrs. Hammond rose with a quick, pettish air of annoyance. “Upon my +word, Laura,” she exclaimed, drawing a little shawl about her +comfortable shoulders, “you seem to think more of the house than of the +poor fellow himself! Let us go to dinner. It is half-past eight, and +more.” + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. +THE LAWYER AT HOME. + + +If Mr. Clode, when he stepped forward to open the door for Lord +Dynmore, had any thought beyond that of facilitating his departure—if, +for instance, as is just possible, he had set his mind on having a +little private talk with the peer—he was disappointed. Lord Dynmore, +after what had happened, was in no mood for conversation. As, still +muttering and mumbling, he seized his hat from the hall table, he did +indeed notice his companion, but it was with the red angry glare of a +bull about to charge. The next moment he plunged headlong into his +brougham, and roared “Home.” + +The carriage plunged away into the darkness of the drive, as if it +would reach the Park at a leap. But it had barely cleared Mrs. +Hammond’s gates, and was still rattling over the stony pavement of the +top of the town, when the footman heard his master lower the window and +shout “Stop!” The horses were pulled up as suddenly as they had been +started, and the man got down and went to the door. “Do you know where +Mr. Bonamy the lawyer’s offices are?” Lord Dynmore said curtly. + +“Yes, my lord.” + +“Then drive there!” + +The footman got upon the box again. “What has bitten him now, I +wonder?” he grumbled to his companion as he passed on the order. “He is +in a fine tantrum in there!” + +“Who cares?” retorted the coachman, with a coachman’s fine +independence. “If old Bonamy is in, there will be a pair of them!” + +Mr. Bonamy was in. In that particular Lord Dynmore had better luck than +he perhaps deserved. Late as it was for business—it was after seven—the +gas was still burning in the lawyer’s offices, illuminating the +fanlight over the door and the windows of one of the rooms on the +ground floor—the right-hand room. The servant jumped down and rapped, +and his summons was answered almost immediately by Mr. Bonamy himself, +who jerked open the door, and stood holding it ajar, with the air of a +man interrupted in the middle of his work, and bent on sending the +intruder off with a flea in his ear. Catching sight of the earl’s +carriage, however, and the servant murmuring that my lord wished to see +him on business, the lawyer stepped forward, his expression changing to +one of extreme surprise. + +The Dynmore business had been hitherto monopolized by the London +solicitors to the estate. In cases where a country agent had been +necessary they had invariably employed a firm in Birmingham. Neither +Mr. Bonamy nor the other Claversham lawyer had ever risen to the +dignity of being concerned for Lord Dynmore, nor could Mr. Bonamy +recall any occasion in the past on which the great man had crossed the +threshold of his office. + +His appearance now, therefore, was almost as welcome as it was +unexpected. Yet from some cause, probably the lateness of the hour, +though that seems improbable, there was a visible embarrassment in the +lawyer’s manner as he recognized him; and Mr. Bonamy only stepped aside +to make way for him to enter upon hearing from his own lips that he +desired to speak with him. + +Then he opened the door of the room on the left of the hall. “If your +lordship will take a seat here,” he said, “I will be with you in a +moment.” + +The room was in darkness, but he struck a match and lit the gas, +placing a chair for Lord Dynmore, who, fretting and fuming and more +than half inclined as he took it to walk out again, said sharply that +he had only a minute to spare. + +“I shall not be a minute, my lord,” the lawyer answered. He retired at +once with that, closing the door behind him, and went, as his visitor +could hear, into the opposite room. Lord Dynmore looked round +impatiently. He had not so high as opinion of his own importance as +have some who are no peers. But he was choleric and accustomed to have +his own way, and he thought that at least this local man whom he was +going to patronize might receive him with more respect. + +Mr. Bonamy, however, was as good as his word. In less than a minute he +was back. Closing the door carefully behind him, he sat down at the +table. “I am entirely at your lordship’s service now,” he said, bowing +slightly. + +The earl laid his hat on the table. “Very well,” he answered abruptly. +“I have heard that you are a sharp fellow, Mr. Bonamy, and a good +lawyer, and that is why I have come to you—that and the fact that my +business will not wait and I have a mind to punish those confounded +London people who have let me into this mess!” + +That it was rather impatience than anything else which had brought him +he betrayed by getting up and striding across the room. Meanwhile the +lawyer, golden visions of bulky settlements and interminable leases +floating before his eyes, murmured his anxiety to be of service, and +waited to hear more. + +“It is about that confounded sneak of a rector of yours!” my lord +exclaimed, coming to a stand before the table. + +Mr. Bonamy started, his visions fading rapidly away. “What rector?” he +replied, gazing at his client in great astonishment. “Our rector, my +lord?” + +“The man who calls himself your rector!” the earl growled. “He is no +more a rector than I am, and pretty fools you were to be taken in by +him!” + +“Now that is odd!” the lawyer answered. He spoke absently, his eyes +resting on the peer’s face as if his thoughts were far away. + +“Odd or not,” Lord Dynmore replied, stamping on the floor with +undiminished irritation, “it is the fact, sir! And now if you will +listen to me I will tell you what I want you to do.” + +The lawyer bowed slightly again, and the earl proceeded to tell his +tale. Passing lightly over his own forgetfulness and negligence, he +laid stress on all the facts which seemed to show that Lindo could not +have accepted the living in good faith. He certainly made out a +plausible case, but his animus in telling it was so apparent that, when +he had finished and wound up by announcing his firm resolve to eject +the young man from his cure, Mr. Bonamy only shook his head with a +doubtful smile. “You will have to prove guilty knowledge on his part, +my lord,” he said gravely. + +“So I will!” quoth the earl roundly. + +Mr. Bonamy seemed for a moment inclined to shake his head again, but he +thought better of it. “Well, you may be right, my lord,” he answered. +“At any rate—without going further into the matter at this moment, or +considering what course your lordship, could or should adopt—I think I +can do one thing. I can lay some information on this point before you +at once.” + +“What! To show that he knew?” cried the earl eagerly. + +“Yes, I think so. But as to its weight——” + +“What is it? What is it? Let me hear it!” was the impatient +interruption. The earl was on his feet in a moment. “Why, gadzooks, we +may have him in a corner before the day is out, Mr. Bonamy,” he +continued. “True? I will be bound it is true!” + +Mr. Bonamy looked as if he very much doubted that, but he offered no +further opposition. Begging Lord Dynmore—who could not look upon him +with sufficient admiration, so much was he struck with this strange +preparedness—to excuse him for a moment, he left the room. He returned +almost immediately, however, followed by a man whom the earl at once +recognized, and recognized with the utmost astonishment. “Why, you +confounded rascal!” he gasped. “What are you doing here?” + +It was Felton. Yet not the same Felton whose surreptitious visit to the +rectory had been cut short by Mr. Clode. A few weeks of idleness and +drinking, a month or two at the Bull and Staff had much changed the +once sleek and respectable servant. Had he gone to the rectory for help +now, his tale could not have passed muster even for a moment. His coat +had come to hang loosely about him, and he wore no tie. His hands were +dirty and tremulous, his eyes shifty and bloodshot. His pasty face had +grown puffy and was stained with blotches which it was impossible to +misinterpret. He had gone down the hill fast. + +Seeing his old master before him he began to whimper, but the lawyer +cut him short. “This man, who says he was formerly your servant, has +come to me with a strange story, Lord Dynmore,” he said. + +“Ten to one it’s a lie!” replied the peer, scowling darkly at the poor +wretch. + +“So I think likely!” Mr. Bonamy rejoined with the utmost dryness. +“However, what he says is this: that when he landed in England without +a character he considered what he should do, and, remembering that he +had heard you say that Mr. Lindo the elder, whom he knew, had been +appointed to this living, he came down here to see what he could get +out of him.” + +“That is likely enough!” cried the peer scornfully. + +“When he called at the rectory, however, he found Mr. Lindo, the +younger, in possession. He had an interview with him, and he states +that Mr. Lindo, to purchase his silence, undertook to pay him ten +shillings a week until your return.” + +“Phaugh!” my lord exclaimed in astonishment. + +The servant mistook his astonishment for incredulity. “He did, my +lord!” he cried passionately. “It is heaven’s own truth I am telling! I +can bring half a dozen witnesses to prove it.” + +“You can?” + +“I can, my lord.” + +“Yes, but to prove what?” said the lawyer sharply. + +“That he paid me ten shillings a week down to last week, my lord.” + +“That will do! That will do!” cried the earl in great glee. “Set a +thief to catch a thief—that is the plan!” + +Mr. Bonamy looked displeased. “I think you are a little premature, my +lord,” he said with some sourness. + +“Premature? How?” + +“At present you have only this man’s word for what is on the face of it +a very improbable story.” + +“Improbable? I do not see it,” replied the peer quickly, but with less +heat. “He says that he has witnesses to prove that this fellow paid him +the money. If that be so, explain the payment if you can. And, mark +you, Mr. Bonamy, the allowance stopped last week—on my arrival, that +is.” + +The man cried eagerly that that was so; the earl at once bidding him be +silent for a confounded rascal as he was. Mr. Bonamy stood rubbing his +chin thoughtfully and looking on the floor, but said nothing; so that +the great man presently lost patience. “Don’t you agree with me?” he +cried irascibly. + +“I think we had better get rid of our friend here before we discuss the +matter, my lord,” the lawyer answered bluntly. “Do you hear, Felton?” +he continued, turning to the servant. “You may go now. Come to me +to-morrow morning at ten o’clock, and I will tell you what Lord Dynmore +proposes to do.” + +The ex-valet would have demurred to being thus set aside, but the earl +roaring “Go, you scoundrel!” in a voice he had been accustomed to obey, +and Mr. Bonamy opening the door for him, he submitted and went. The +streets were wet and gloomy, and he was more sober than he had been for +a week. In other words, his nerves were shaky, and he soon began, as he +slunk homeward, to torment himself with doubts. Had he made the best of +his story? Might it not have been safer to make a last appeal to the +rector? Above all, would Mr. Clode, whose game he did not understand, +hold his hand, or play the trump by disclosing that little burglary we +know of? Altogether Felton was not happy, and saw before him but one +resource—to get home as quickly as possible and get drunk. + +Meanwhile the lawyer, left alone with his client, seemed as much averse +as before to speaking out. Lord Dynmore had again to take the +initiative. “Well, it is good enough, sir, is it not?” he said, +frowning impatiently on his new adviser. “There is a clear case, I +suppose!” + +“I think your lordship had better hear first,” Mr. Bonamy answered, +“how your late servant came to bring his story to me.” He proceeded to +explain the course which the young clergyman had pursued in the parish +from the first, and the opposition and ill-will it had provoked. He +told the story from his own point of view, but with more fairness than +might have been expected, although, as was natural, when he came to the +matter of the sheep-grazing and the writ he took care to make his own +case good. The earl listened and chuckled, and at last interrupted him. + +“So you have been at him already?” he said, grinning. + +“Yes,” the lawyer answered slowly. “I may say, indeed, that I have been +in constant opposition to him since his arrival. Felton (the man who +has just left us) knew that, and it led him to bring his tale to me +this evening.” + +“When he could get no more money out of the parson!” the earl replied +with a sneer. “But, now, what is to be done, Mr. Bonamy?” + +Mr. Bonamy did not at once answer, but stood looking much disturbed. +His doubt and uneasiness, in fact, visibly increased as the seconds +flew by, and still Lord Dynmore’s gaze, bent on him at first in +impatience and later in surprise, seemed to be striving to probe his +thoughts. He looked down at the table and frowned, as if displeased by +the scrutiny; and when he at length spoke, his voice was harsher than +usual. “I do not think, my lord,” he said, “that I can answer that +question.” + +“Do you want to take counsel’s opinion?” + +“No, my lord,” Mr. Bonamy answered curtly. “I mean something different. +I do not think, in fact, that I can act for your lordship in this +matter.” + +“Cannot act for me?” the earl gasped. + +“That is what I mean,” Mr. Bonamy answered doggedly, a slight flush as +of shame on his sallow cheek. “I have explained, my lord, that I have +been constantly opposed to this young man, but my opposition has been +of a public nature and upon principle. I have no doubt that he and +others consider me his chief enemy in the place, and to that I have no +objection. But I am unwilling that he or others should think that +private interest has had any part in my opposition, and therefore, +being churchwarden, I would prefer, though I must necessarily offend +your lordship, to decline undertaking the business.” + +“But why? Why?” cried the earl, between anger and astonishment. + +“I have tried to explain,” Mr. Bonamy rejoined with firmness. “I am +afraid I cannot make my reasons clearer.” + +The earl swore softly and took up his hat. He really was at a loss to +understand; principally because, knowing that Mr. Bonamy had risen from +the ranks, he did not credit him with any fineness of feeling. He had +heard only that he was a clever and rather sharp practitioner, and a +man who might be trusted to make things unpleasant for the other side. +So he took up his hat and swore softly. “You are aware,” he said, +turning at the door and looking daggers at the solicitor, “that by +taking this course you are throwing away a share of my work?” + +Mr. Bonamy, wearing a rather more gaunt and grim air than usual, simply +bowed. + +“You will act for the other side, I suppose?” my lord snarled. + +“I shall not act professionally for any one, my lord!” + +“Then you are a damned quixotic fool—that is all I have to say!” was +the earl’s parting shot. Having fired it, he flung out of the room and +in great amaze roared for his carriage. + +A man is seldom so much inclined—on the surface, at any rate—to impute +low motives to others as when he has just done something which he +suspects to be foolish and quixotic. When Mr. Bonamy, a few minutes +later, entered his rarely used drawing-room and discovered Jack and the +two girls playing at Patience, he was in his most cynical mood. He +stood for a moment on the hearth-rug, his coat-tails on his arms, and +presently he said to Jack, “I am surprised to see you here.” + +Jack looked up. The girls looked up also. “I wonder you are not at the +rectory,” Mr. Bonamy continued ironically, “advising your friend how to +keep out of jail!” + +“What on earth do you mean, sir?” Jack exclaimed, laying down his cards +and rising from the table. He saw that the lawyer had some news and was +anxious to tell it. + +“I mean that he is in very considerable danger of going there!” was Mr. +Bonamy’s answer. “There has been a scene at Mrs. Hammond’s this +afternoon. By this time the story must be all over the town. Lord +Dynmore turned up there and met him—denounced him as a scoundrel, and +swore he had never presented him to the living.” + +For a brief moment no one spoke. Then Daintry found her voice. “My +goody!” she exclaimed, her eyes like saucers. “Who told you, father?” + +“Never you mind, young lady!” Mr. Bonamy retorted with good-humored +sharpness. “It is true. What is more, I am informed that Lord Dynmore +has evidence that Mr. Lindo has been paying a man, who was aware of +this, a certain sum every week to keep his mouth shut.” + +“My goody!” cried Daintry again. “I wonder, now, what he paid him! What +do you think, Jack?” And she turned to Jack to learn what he was doing +that he did not speak. + +Poor Jack! Why did he not speak? Why did he stand silent, gazing hard +into the fire? Because he resented his friend’s coldness? Because he +would not defend him? Because he thought him guilty? No, but because in +the first moment of Mr. Bonamy’s disclosure he had looked into Kate’s +face—his cousin’s face, who the moment before had been laughing over +the cards at his side, in all things so near to him—and he had read in +it, with the keen insight, the painful sympathy which love imparts, her +secret. Poor Kate! No one else had seen her face fall or discovered her +embarrassment. A few seconds later even her countenance had regained +its ordinary calm composure, even the blood had gone back to her heart. +But Jack had seen and read aright. He knew, and she knew that he knew. +When at last—but not before Mr. Bonamy’s attention had been drawn to +his silence—he turned and spoke, she avoided his eyes. “That is rather +a wild tale, sir, is it not?” he said with an effort and a pale smile. + +If Mr. Bonamy had not been a man of great shrewdness, he would have +been tempted to think that Jack had been in the secret all the time. As +it was, he only answered, “I have reason to think that there is +something in it, wild as it sounds. At any rate, the man in question +has himself told the story to Lord Dynmore.” + +“The pensioner?” + +“Precisely.” + +“Well, I should like to ask him a few questions,” Jack answered +drearily. But for the chill feeling at his heart, but for the knowledge +he had just gained, he would have treated the matter very differently. +He would have thought of his friend only—his feelings, his possible +misery. He would not have condescended in this first moment to the +evidence. But he could not feel for his friend. He could not even pity +him. He needed all his pity for himself. + +“I do not answer for the story,” Mr. Bonamy continued. “But there is no +doubt of one thing—that Mr. Lindo was appointed in error, whether he +was aware of the mistake or not. I do not know,” the lawyer added +thoughtfully, “that I shall pity him greatly. He has been very +mischievous here. And he has held his head very high.” + +“He is the more likely to suffer now,” Jack answered almost cynically. + +“Possibly,” the lawyer replied. Then he added, “Daintry, fetch me my +slippers, there is a good girl. Or, stay. Get me a candle and take them +to my room.” + +He went out after her, leaving the cousins alone. Neither spoke. Jack +stood near the corner of the mantel-shelf, gazing rigidly, almost +sullenly, into the fire. What was Lindo to him? Why should he be sorry +for him? A far worse thing had befallen himself. He tried to harden his +heart, and to resolve that nothing of his suffering should be visible +even to her. But he had scarcely formed the resolution when, his eyes +wandering despite his will to the pale set face on the other side of +the hearth, he sprang forward and, almost kneeling, took her hand in +both his own. “Kate,” he whispered, “is it so? Is there no hope for me, +then?” + +She, too, had been looking into the fire. She could feel for him now. +She no longer thought his attentions “nonsense” as at the station a +while back. But she could not speak. She could only shake her head, the +tears in her eyes. + +Jack laid down the hand and rose and went back to the fire, and stood +looking into it sorrowfully; but his thoughts were no longer wholly of +himself. Brave heart, the rarest of gentlemen, though he was neither +six feet high nor an Adonis, he had scarcely felt the weight of the +blow which had fallen on himself, before he began to think what he +could do to help her. Presently he put his thought into words. “Kate,” +he said, in a voice scarcely above a whisper, “can I do anything?” + +She had made no attempt to deny the inference he had drawn. She seemed +content, indeed, that he should have her secret, though the knowledge +of it by another would have covered her with shame. But at the sound of +his question she only shook her head with a sorrowful smile. + +It was all dark to him. He knew nothing of the past—only that the faint +suspicion he had felt at the bazaar was justified, and that Kate had +given away her heart. He did not dare to ask whether there was any +understanding between her and his friend; and, not knowing that, what +could he do? Nothing, he was afraid. + +Then a noble thought came into his head. “I am afraid,” he said slowly, +looking at his watch, “that Lindo is in great trouble. I think I will +go to him. It is not ten o’clock.” + +He tried not to look at her as he spoke, but all the same he saw the +crimson tide rise slowly over cheek and brow, which his prayer had left +so pure and pale. Her lip trembled and she rose hurriedly, muttering +something inaudible. Poor Jack! + +For a moment self got the upper hand, and he stood still, frowning. +Then he said gallantly, “Yes, I think I will go. Will you let my uncle +know in case I should be late.” + +He did not look at her again, but hurried out of the room. It was a +stiff, formal room, we know—a set, comfortless, middle-class room, +which had given the rector quite a shock on his first introduction to +it—but if it had grafted all the grace of the halls of Abencerrages +upon the stately comfort of a sixteenth-century dining-hall it would +have been no more than worthy of the man who quitted it. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. +A FRIEND IN NEED. + + +I have heard that the bitterest pang a boy feels on returning to school +after his first holidays is reserved for the moment when he opens his +desk and recalls the happy hour, full of joyous anticipation, when he +had closed that desk with a bang. Oh, the pity of it! The change from +that boy to this, from that morning to this evening! How meanly, how +inadequately—so it seems to the urchin standing with smudged cheeks +before the well-remembered grammar—did the lad who turned the key +estimate his real happiness! How little did he enter into it or deserve +it! + +Just such a pang shot through the young rector’s heart as he passed +into the rectory porch after that momentous scene at Mrs. Hammond’s. +His rage had had time to die down. With reflection had come a full +sense of his position. As he entered the house he remembered—remembered +only too well, grinding his teeth over the recollection—how secure, how +free from embarrassments, how happy had been his situation when he last +issued from that door a few, a very few, hours before. Such troubles as +had then annoyed him seemed trifles light as air now. Mr. Bonamy’s +writ, the dislike of one section in the parish—how could he have let +such things as these make him miserable for a moment? + +How, indeed? Or, if there were anything grave in his situation then, +what was it now? He had held his head high; henceforward he would be a +by-word in the parish, a man under a cloud. The position in which he +had placed himself would still be his, perhaps, but only because he +would cling to it to the last. Under no circumstances could it any +longer be a source of pride to him. He had posed, will he, nill he, as +the earl’s friend; he must submit in the future to be laughed at by the +Greggs and avoided by the Homfrays. It seemed to him indeed that his +future in Claversham could be only one long series of humiliations. He +was a proud man, and as he thought of this he sprang from his chair and +strode up and down the room, his cheeks flaming. Had there ever been +such a fall before! + +Mrs. Baker, as yet ignorant of it all, though the news was by this time +spreading through the town, brought him his dinner, and he ate +something in the dining-room. Then he went back to the study and sat +idle and listless before his writing-table. There was a number of +“Punch” lying on it, and he took this up and read it through drearily, +extracting a faint pleasure from its witticisms, but never for an +instant forgetting the cloud of trouble brooding over him. Years +afterward he could recall some of the jokes in that “Punch”—with a +shudder. Presently he laid it down and began to think. And then, before +his thoughts became quite insufferable, they were interrupted by the +sound of a voice in the hall. + +He rose and stood with his back to the fire, and as he waited, his eyes +on the door, his face grew hot, his brow defiant. He had little doubt +that the visitor was Clode. He had expected the curate before, and even +anticipated the relief of pouring his thoughts into a friendly ear. +None the less, now the thing had come, he dreaded the first moment of +meeting, scarcely knowing how to bear himself in these changed +circumstances. + +It was not Clode, however, who entered, but Jack Smith. The rector +started, and, uncertain whether the barrister had heard of the blow +which had fallen on him or no, stepped forward awkwardly, and held out +his hand in a constrained fashion. Jack, on his side, had his own +reasons for being ill at ease with his friend. But the moment the men’s +hands met they somehow closed on one another in the old hearty fashion, +and the grip told the rector that the other knew all. “You have heard?” +he muttered. + +“Mr. Bonamy told me,” the barrister answered. “I came across almost at +once.” + +“You do not believe that I was aware of the earl’s mistake, then?” +Lindo said, with a faint smile. + +“I should as soon believe that I knew of it myself!” Jack replied +warmly. He was glad beyond measure now that he had come. As he and +Lindo stood half facing one another, each with an elbow on the +mantel-shelf, he felt that he could defy the chill at his own +heart—that, notwithstanding all, his old friend was still dear to him. +Perhaps if the rector had been prospering as before, if no cloud had +arisen in his sky, it might have been different. But as it was, Jack’s +generous heart went out to him. “Tell me what happened, old fellow,” he +said cheerily—“that is, if you have no objection to taking me into your +confidence.” + +“I shall be only too glad of your help,” Lindo answered thankfully, +feeling indeed—so potent is a single word of sympathy—happier already. +“I would ask you to sit down, Jack,” he continued, in a tone of rather +sheepish raillery, “and have a cup of coffee or some whiskey, but I do +not know whether I ought to do so, now that Lord Dynmore says the +things are not mine.” + +“I will take the responsibility,” Jack answered, briskly ringing the +bell. “Was my lord very rude?” + +“Confoundedly!” the rector answered, and proceeded to tell his story. +Jack was surprised to find him at first more placable than he had +expected, but presently he learned that this moderation was only +assumed. The rector rose as he went on, and began to pace the room, +and, the motion freeing his tongue, he gradually betrayed the +indignation and resentment which he really felt. Jack asked him, with a +view to clearing the ground, whether he had quite made up his mind not +to resign, and was astonished by the force and anger with which he +repudiated the thought of doing so. “Resign? No never!” he cried, +standing still, and almost glaring at his companion. “Why should I? +What have I done? Was it my mistake, that I am to suffer for it? Was it +my fault, that for penalty I am to have the tenor of my life broken? Do +you think I can go back to the Docks the same man I left them? I +cannot. Nor is that all, or nearly all,” he added still more warmly—“I +have been called a swindler and an impostor. Am I by resigning to plead +guilty to the charge?” + +“No!” said Jack, himself catching fire, “certainly not! I did not +intend for a moment to advise that course. I think you would be acting +very foolishly if you resigned under these circumstances.” + +“I am glad of that,” the rector said, sitting down with a sigh of +relief. “I feared you did not quite enter into my feelings.” + +“I do thoroughly,” the barrister answered, with feeling, “but I want to +do more—I want to help you. You must not go into this business blindly, +old man. And, first, I think you ought to take the archdeacon or some +other clergyman into your confidence. Show him the whole of your case, +I mean, and——” + +“And act upon his advice?” said the young rector, rebellion already +flashing in his eye. + +“No, not necessarily,” the barrister answered, skilfully adapting his +tone to the irritability of his patient. “Of course your _bona fides_ +at the time you accepted the living is the point of importance to you, +Lindo. You did not see their solicitors—the earl’s people, I mean—did +you?” + +“No,” the rector answered somewhat sullenly. + +“Then their letter conveyed to you all you knew of the living and the +offer?” + +“Precisely.” + +“Let us see them, then,” replied Jack, rising briskly from his chair. +He had already determined to say nothing of the witness whom Mr. Bonamy +had mentioned to him as asserting that the rector had bribed him. He +knew enough of his friend to utterly disbelieve the story, and he +considered it as told to him in confidence. “There is no time like the +present,” he continued. “You have kept the letters, of course?” + +“They are here,” Lindo answered, rising also, and unlocking as he spoke +the little cupboard among the books; “I made them into a packet and +indorsed them soon after I came. They have been here ever since.” + +He found them after a moment’s search and without himself examining +them, pitched them to Jack, who had returned to his seat. The barrister +untied the string and glancing quickly at the dates of the letters, +arranged them in order and flattened them out on his knee. “Now,” he +said, “number one! That I think I have seen before.” He mumbled over +the opening sentences, and turned the page. “Hallo!” he exclaimed, +holding the letter from him, and speaking in a tone of surprise—almost +of consternation—“how is this?” + +“What?” said the rector. + +“You have destroyed the latter part of this letter! Why on earth did +you do that?” + +“I never did,” Lindo answered incredulously. Obeying Jack’s gesture he +came, and, standing by his chair, looked over his shoulder. Then he saw +that part of the latter half of the sheet had been torn off. The +signature and the last few words of the letter, were gone. He looked +and wondered. “I never did it,” he said positively, “whoever did. You +may be sure of that.” + +“You are certain?” + +“Absolutely certain,” the rector answered with considerable warmth. “I +remember arranging and indorsing the packet. I am quite sure that this +letter was intact then, for I read over every one. That was a few +evenings after I came here.” + +“Have you ever shown the letters to any one?” Jack asked suspiciously. + +“Never,” said the rector; “they have never been removed from this +cupboard, to my knowledge, since I put them there.” + +“Think! I want you to be quite sure,” Jack rejoined, pressing his point +steadily; “you see this letter is rendered utterly worthless by the +mutilation. Indeed, to produce it would be to raise a natural suspicion +that the last sentence of the letter was not in our favor, and we had +got rid of it. Of course the chances are that the earl’s solicitors +have copies, but for the present that is not our business.” + +“Well,” said the rector somewhat absently—he had been rather thinking +than listening—“I do remember now a circumstance which may account for +this. A short time after I came a man broke into the house and +ransacked this cupboard. Possibly he did it.” + +“A burglar, do you mean? Was he caught?” the barrister asked, +figuratively pricking up his ears. + +“No—or, rather, I should say yes,” the rector answered. And then he +explained that his curate, taking the man red-handed, had let him go, +in the hope that, as it was his first offence, he would take warning +and live honestly. + +“But who was the burglar?” Jack inquired. “You know, I suppose? Is he +in the town now?” + +“Clode never told me his name,” Lindo answered. “The man made a point +of that, and I did not press for it. I remember that Clode was somewhat +ashamed of his clemency.” + +“He had need to be,” Jack snorted. “It sounds an extraordinary story. +All the same, Lindo, I am not sure it has any connection with this.” He +held the letter up before him as though drawing inspiration from it. +“This letter, you see,” he went on presently, “being the first in date +would be inside the packet. Why should a man who wanted perhaps a bit +of paper for a spill or a pipe-light unfasten this packet and take the +innermost letter? I do not believe it.” + +“But no one else save myself,” Lindo urged, “has had access to the +letter. And there it is torn.” + +“Yes, here it is torn,” Jack admitted, gazing thoughtfully at it; “that +is true.” + +For a few moments the two sat silent, Jack fingering the letter, Lindo +with his eyes fixed gloomily on the fire. Suddenly the rector broke out +without warning or preface. “What a fool I have been!” he exclaimed, +his tone one of abrupt overwhelming conviction. “Good heavens, what a +fool I have been!” + +His friend looked at him in surprise, and saw that his face was +crimson. “Is it about the letter?” he asked, leaning forward, his tone +sharp with professional impatience. “You do not mean to say, Lindo, +that you really——” + +“No, no!” replied the young clergyman, ruthlessly interrupting him. “It +has nothing to do with the letter.” + +He said no more, and Jack waited for further light, but none came, and +the barrister reapplied his thoughts to the problem before him. He had +only just hit upon a new idea, however, when he was again diverted by +an interruption from Lindo. “Jack,” said the latter impressively, “I +want you to give a message for me.” + +“Not a cartel to Lord Dynmore, I hope?” the barrister muttered. + +“No,” Lindo answered, getting up and poking the fire unnecessarily—what +a quantity of embarrassment has been liberated before now by means of +pokers—“no, I want you to give a message to your cousin—Miss Bonamy, I +mean.” The rector paused, the poker still in his hand, and stole a +sharp glance at his companion; but, reassured by the discovery that he +was to all appearance buried in the letter, he continued: “Would you +mind telling her that I am sorry I misjudged her a short time back—she +will understand—and behaved, I feel, very ungratefully to her? She +warned me that there was a rumor afloat that something was amiss with +my title, and I am afraid I was very rude to her. I should like you to +tell her, if you will, that I—that I am particularly ashamed of +myself,” he added, with a gulp. + +He did not find the words easy of utterance—far from it; but the effort +they cost him was slight and trivial compared with that which poor Jack +found himself called upon to make. For a moment, indeed, he was silent, +his heart rebelling against the task assigned to him. To carry his +message to her! Then his nobler self answered to the call, and he +spoke. His words, “Yes, I’ll tell her,” came, it is true, a little +late, in a voice a trifle thick, and were uttered with a coldness which +Lindo would have remarked had he not been agitated himself. But they +came—at a price. The Victoria Cross for moral courage can seldom be +gained by a single act of valor. Many a one has failed to gain it who +had strength enough for the first blow. “Yes, I will tell her,” Jack +repeated a few seconds later, folding up the letter and laying it on +the table, but so contriving that his face was hidden from his friend. +“To-morrow will do, I suppose?” he added, the faintest tinge of irony +in his tone. He may be pardoned if he thought the apology he was asked +to carry came a little late. + +“Oh, yes, to-morrow will do,” Lindo answered with a start; he had +fallen into a reverie, but now roused himself. “I am afraid you are +very tired, old fellow,” he continued, looking gratefully at his +friend. “A friend in need is a friend indeed, you know. I cannot tell +you”—with a sigh—“how very good I think it was of you to come to me.” + +“Nonsense!” Jack said briskly. “It was all in the day’s work. As it is, +I have done nothing. And that reminds me,” he continued, facing his +companion with a smile—“what of the trouble between my uncle and you? +About the sheep, I mean. You have put it in some lawyer’s hands, have +you not?” + +“Yes,” Lindo answered reluctantly. + +“Quite right, too,” said the barrister. “Who are they?” + +“Turner & Grey, of Birmingham.” + +“Well, I will write,” Jack answered, “if you will let me, and tell them +to let the matter stand for the present. I think that will be the best +course. Bonamy won’t object.” + +“But he has issued a writ,” the rector explained. A writ seemed to him +a formidable engine. As well dally before the mouth of a cannon. + +But Jack knew better. The law’s delays were familiar to him. He was +aware of many a pleasant little halting-place between writ and +judgment. “Never mind about that,” he answered, with a confident laugh. +“Shall I settle it for you? I shall know better, perhaps, what to say +to them.” + +The rector assented gladly; adding: “Here is their address.” It was +stuck in the corner of a picture hanging over the fireplace. He took it +down as he spoke and gave it to Jack, who put it carelessly into his +pocket, and, seizing his hat, said he must go at once—that it was close +on twelve. The rector would have repeated his thanks; but Jack would +not stop to hear them, and in a moment was gone. + +Reginald Lindo returned to the study after letting him out, and, +dropping into the nearest chair, looked round with a sigh. Yet, the +sigh notwithstanding, he was a hundredfold less unhappy now than he had +been at dinner or while looking over that number of “Punch.” His +friend’s visit had both cheered and softened him. His thoughts no +longer dwelt on the earl’s injustice, the desertion of his friends, or +the humiliations in store for him; but went back again to the warning +Kate Bonamy had given him. Thence it was not unnatural that they should +revert to the beginning of his acquaintance with her. He pictured her +at Oxford, he saw her scolding Daintry in the stiff drawing-room, or +coming to meet him in the Red Lane; and, the veil of local prejudice +torn from his eyes by the events of the day, he began to discern that +this girl, with all the drawbacks of her surroundings, was the fairest, +bravest, and noblest girl he had met at Claversham, or, for aught he +could remember, elsewhere. His eyes glistened. He was sure—so sure that +he would have staked his life on the result—that for all the earls in +England Kate Bonamy would not have deserted him! + +He had reached this point, and Jack had been gone some five minutes or +more, when he was startled by a loud rap at the house door. He stood up +and, wondering who it could be at this hour, took a candle and went +into the hall. Setting the candlestick on a table, he opened the door, +and there, to his astonishment, was Jack come back again! + +“Capital!” said the barrister, slipping in and shutting the door behind +him, as though his return were not in the least degree extraordinary, +“I thought it was you. Look here; there is one thing I forget to ask +you, Lindo. Where did you get the address of those lawyers?” + +He asked the question so earnestly, and his face, now it could be seen +by the strong light of the candle at his elbow, wore so curious an +expression, that the rector was for a moment quite taken aback. “They +are good people, are they not?” he said, wondering much. + +“Oh, yes, the firm is good enough,” Jack answered impatiently. “But who +gave you their address?” + +“Clode,” the rector answered. “I went round to his lodgings and he +wrote it down for me.” + +“At his lodgings?” cried the barrister. + +“To be sure.” + +“Ah! then look here,” Jack replied, laying his hand on Lindo’s sleeve +and looking up at him with an air of peculiar seriousness—“just tell me +once more, so that I may have no doubt about it: Are you sure that from +the time you docketed those letters until now you have never removed +them—from this house, I mean?” + +“Never!” + +“Never let them go out of the house?” + +“Never!” answered the rector firmly. “I am as certain of it as a man +can be certain of anything.” + +“Thanks!” Jack cried. “All right. Good night.” And that was all; for, +turning abruptly, in a twinkling he had the door open and was gone, +leaving the rector to go to bed in such a state of mystification as +made him almost forget his fallen fortunes. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. +THE DAY AFTER. + + +Oddly enough, the rector’s first thought on rising next morning was of +his curate. He had expected, as we have seen, that Clode would call +before bedtime. Disappointed in this, he still felt so certain that the +curate would hasten as soon as possible to offer his sympathy and +assistance that after breakfast he repaired to his study for the +express purpose of receiving him. To find one friend in need is good, +but to find two is better. The young clergyman felt, as people in +trouble of a certain kind do feel, that though he had told Jack all +about it, it would be a relief to tell Stephen all about it also; the +more as Jack, whom he had told, was his personal friend, while Clode +was identified with the place and his unabated confidence and esteem—of +retaining which the rector made no doubt—would go some way toward +soothing the latter’s wounded pride. + +It was well, however, that Lindo, sitting down at his writing-table to +await his visitor, found there some scattered notes upon which he could +employ his thoughts, and which without any great concentration of mind +he could form into a sermon. For otherwise his time would have been +wasted. Ten o’clock came, and eleven, and half-past eleven; but no +curate. + +Mr. Clode, in fact, was engaged elsewhere. About half-past ten he +turned briskly into the drive leading to Mrs. Hammond’s house and +walked up it at a good pace, with the step of a man who has news to +tell, and is going to tell it. The morning was bright and sunny, the +air crisp and fresh, yet not too cold. The gravel crunched pleasantly +under his feet, while the hoar-frost melting on the dark green leaves +of the laurels bordered his path with a million gems as brilliant as +evanescent. Possibly the pleasure he took in these things, possibly +some thought of his own, lent animation to the curate’s face and figure +as he strode along. At any rate, Miss Hammond, meeting him suddenly at +a turn in the approach, saw a change in him, and, reading the signs +aright, blushed. + +“Well?” she said, smiling a question as she held out her hand. They had +scarcely been alone together since the afternoon when the rector’s +inopportune call had brought about an understanding between them. + +“Well?” he answered, retaining her hand. “What is it, Laura?” + +“I thought you were going to tell me,” she said, glancing up with shy +assurance. The morning air was not fresher. She was so bright and +piquant in her furs and with her dazzling complexion, that other eyes +than her lover’s might have been pardoned for likening her to the frost +drops on the laurels. At any rate, she sparkled as they did. + +He looked down at her, fond admiration in his eyes. Had he not come up +on purpose to see her? + +“I think it is all right,” he said, in a slightly lower tone. “I think +I may answer for it, Laura, that we shall not have much longer to +wait.” + +She gazed at him, seeming for the moment startled and taken by +surprise. “Have you heard of a living, then?” she murmured, her eyes +wide, her breath coming and going. + +He nodded. + +“Where?” she asked, in the same low tone. “You do not mean—here!” + +He nodded again. + +“At Claversham!” she exclaimed. “Then will he have to go, really?” + +“I think he will,” Clode replied, a glow of triumph warming his dark +face and kindling his eyes. “When Lord Dynmore left here yesterday he +drove straight to Mr. Bonamy’s. You hardly believe it, do you? Well, it +is true, for I had it from a sure source. And, that being so, I do not +think Lindo will have much chance against such an alliance. It is not +as if he had many friends here, or had got on well with the people.” + +“The poor people like him,” she urged. + +“Yes,” Clode answered sharply. “He has spent money among them. It was +not his own, you see.” + +It was a brutal thing to say, and she cast a glance of gentle reproof +at him. She did not remonstrate, however, but, slightly changing the +subject, asked, “But even if Mr. Lindo goes, are you sure of the +living?” + +“I think so,” he answered, smiling confidently down at her. + +She looked puzzled. “How do you know?” she asked. “Did Lord Dynmore +promise it to you?” + +“No; I wish he had,” he answered. “All the same, I think I am fairly +sure of it without the promise.” And then he related to her what the +archdeacon had told him as to Lord Dynmore’s intention of presenting +the curates in future. “Now do you see, Laura?” he asked. + +“Yes, I see,” she answered, looking down and absently poking a hole in +the gravel with the point of her umbrella. + +“And you are content?” + +“Yes,” she answered, looking up brightly from a little dream of the +rectory as it should be, when feminine taste had transformed it with +the aid of Persian rugs and old china and the hundred knickknacks which +are half a woman’s life—“Yes, I am content, Mr. Clode.” + +“Say ‘Stephen.’” + +“I am quite content, Stephen,” she answered obediently, a bright blush +for a moment mingling with her smile. + +He was about to make some warm rejoinder, when the sound of footsteps +approaching from the house diverted his attention, and he looked up. +The new-comer was Mrs. Hammond, also on her way into the town. She +waved her hand to him. “Good morning,” she cried in her cheery +voice—“you are just the person I wanted to see, Mr. Clode. This is good +luck. Now, how is he?” + +“Who? Mrs. Hammond,” said the curate, quite taken by surprise. + +“Who?” she replied warmly, reproach in her tone. She was a kind-hearted +woman, and the scene in her drawing-room had really cost her a few +minutes’ sleep. “Why, Mr. Lindo, to be sure. Whom else should I mean? I +suppose you went in last night at once and told him how much we all +sympathized with him? Indeed, I hope you did not leave him until you +saw him well to bed, for I am sure he was hardly fit to be left alone, +poor fellow!” + +Mr. Clode stood silent, and looked troubled. Really, if it had occurred +to him, he would have called to see Lindo. But it had not occurred to +him, after what had happened—perhaps because he had been busied about +things which “seemed worth while.” He regretted now, since Mrs. Hammond +seemed to think it so much a matter of course, that he had not done so; +the more as the omission compelled him to choose his side earlier than +he need have done. However, it was too late now. So he shook his head. +“I have not seen him, Mrs. Hammond,” he said gravely. “I have not been +to the rectory.” + +“What! you have not seen him?” she cried in amazement. + +“No, I have not,” he answered, a slight tinge of hauteur in his manner. +After all, he reflected that he would have found it painful to play +another part before Laura after disclosing so much of his mind to her. +“What is more, Mrs. Hammond,” he continued, “I am not anxious to see +him; for, to tell you the truth, I fear that the meeting could only be +a painful one.” + +“Why, you do not mean to say,” the lady answered in a low, awe-stricken +voice, “that you think he knew anything about it, Mr. Clode?” + +“At any rate,” the curate replied firmly, “I cannot acquit him.” + +“Not acquit him!—Mr. Lindo!” she stammered. + +“No, I cannot,” Clode replied, striving to express in his voice and +manner his extreme conscientiousness and the gloomy sense of +responsibility under which he had arrived at his decision. “I cannot +get out of my head,” he continued, “Lord Dynmore’s remark that, if the +circumstances aroused suspicion in my mind, they could scarcely fail to +apprise Mr. Lindo, who was more nearly concerned, of the truth, or +something like the truth. Mind!” the curate added with a great show of +candor, “I do not say, Mrs. Hammond, that Mr. Lindo knew. I only say I +think he suspected.” + +“Well, _that_ is very good of you!” Mrs. Hammond exclaimed, displaying +a spirit and a power of sarcasm he had not expected. “I dare say Mr. +Lindo will be much obliged to you for _that!_ But, for my part, I think +it is a distinction without a difference!” + +“Oh, no!” the curate protested hastily. + +“Well, I think it is, at any rate!” retorted the lady, very red in the +face, and with all the bugles in her bonnet shaking. “However, everyone +to his opinion. But that is not mine, and I am sorry it is yours. Why, +you are his curate!” she added in a tone of indignant wonder, which +brought the blood to Clode’s cheeks, and made him bite his lip in +impotent anger. “You ought to be the last person to doubt him!” + +“Can I help it if I do?” he answered sullenly. + +“Mother,” said Laura quickly, intercepting the angry reply which was on +Mrs. Hammond’s lips, “if Mr. Clode thinks in that way, can he be blamed +for telling us? We are not the town. What he has told us he has told us +in confidence.” + +“A confidence Mrs. Hammond has made me bitterly regret,” he rejoined, +taking skilful advantage of her intervention. + +Mrs. Hammond grunted. She was still angry, but she felt herself +baffled. “Well, I do not understand these things, perhaps,” she said. +“But I do not agree with Mr. Clode, and I am not going to pretend to.” + +“I am sure he does not wish you to,” said Laura sweetly. “Only you did +not quite understand, I think, that he was only giving us his private +opinion. Of course he would not tell it to the town.” + +“Well, that makes a difference, of course,” Mrs. Hammond allowed. “But +now, however, I will say good-morning! I shall go straight to the +rectory now and inquire. Are you coming, Laura?” + +Laura thought it better to go and with a bright little nod, tripped off +after her mother. Mr. Clode, thus deserted, walked slowly down the +drive, wondering whether he had been premature in his revolt. He did +not think so; and yet he wished he had not been so hasty—that he had +not shown his hand quite so early. The truth was, he had been a little +carried away by the events of the previous afternoon. But, even now, +the more he thought of it, the more hopeless seemed the rector’s +position. Openly denounced by his patron as an impostor, at war with +his church-warden, disliked by a powerful section of the parish, one +action already commenced against him and another threatened—what else +could he do but resign? “He may say he will not to-day and to-morrow,” +the curate thought, smiling darkly to himself, “but they will be too +much for him the day after.” + +And whether Mr. Clode told this opinion of his in the town or not, it +was certainly a very common one. Never had Claversham been treated to +such a dish of gossip as this. On the evening of the bazaar, before the +unsold goods had been cleared from the tables, the wildest rumors were +already afloat in the town. The rector had been arrested; he had +decamped; he was to be tried for fraud; he was not in holy orders at +all; Mrs. Bedford would have to be married over again! With the morning +these reports died away, and something like the truth came to be +known—to the inexpressible satisfaction of Dr. Gregg and his like. The +doctor was in and out of half the houses in the town that day. +“Resign!” he would say with a shriek—“of course he will resign! And +glad to escape so easily!” Dr. Gregg, indeed, was in his glory now. The +parts were reversed. It was for him now to meet the rector with a +patronizing nod; only, for some reason best known to himself, and +perhaps connected with an essential distinction between the two men, he +preferred to celebrate his triumph figuratively, and behind Lindo’s +back. + +What was said, and how it was said, can well be imagined. When a man +who for some cause has held his head a little above his neighbors +stumbles and falls, we know what is likely to be said of him. And the +young rector knew, and in his heart and in his study suffered horribly. +All the afternoon of the day after the bazaar he walked the town with a +smile on his face, ostensibly visiting in his district, really +vindicating his pride and courage. He carried his head as high as ever, +and the skirts of his long black coat fluttered as bravely as before. +Dr. Gregg, who saw him from the reading-room window, gave it as his +opinion that he did not know what shame meant. But at heart the young +man was unutterably miserable. He knew that inquisitive eyes were upon +his every gesture; that he was watched, jeered at, worst of all—pitied. +He guessed, as the day wore on, drawing the inference from the curate’s +avoidance of him, that even Clode had deserted him; and this, perhaps, +almost as much as the resentment he harbored against Lord Dynmore, +hardened him in his resolve not to resign or abate one tittle of his +rights. + +He fancied he stood alone. But, of course, there were some who +sympathized with him, and some who held their tongues and declined to +commit themselves to any opinion. Among the latter Mr. Bonamy was +conspicuous—to the intense disgust of Dr. Gregg, whose first +expression, indeed, on hearing the news had been, “What nuts for +Bonamy!” As a fact, however, the snappish little doctor had never found +his friend so morose and unpleasant as when he tried to sound him on +this subject. He espied him on the other side of the street, and rushed +across, stuttering almost before he reached him, “Well? He will have to +resign, won’t he?” + +“Who?” said Mr. Bonamy, standing still, and fixing his cold gray eyes +on the excited little man. “Who will have to resign?” + +“Why, the rector, to be sure!” rejoined Gregg, feeling the check +unpleasantly. + +“Will he?” + +“Well, I should say so,” urged the doctor, now quite taken aback, and +gazing at the other with eyes of surprise. “But I suppose you know +best, Bonamy.” + +“Then I am going to keep my knowledge to myself!” snarled the lawyer; +and, rattling a handful of silver in his pocket, he stalked away, his +hat on the back of his head, and his lank figure more ungainly than +usual. He was in the worst of tempers; angry with Lord Dynmore and +dissatisfied with himself—given to calling himself, half a dozen times +in an hour, a quixotic fool for having thrown away the earl’s business +for the sake of a scruple that was little more than a whim. It is all +very well to have a queer rugged code of honor of one’s own, and to +observe it; but when the observance sends away business—such business +as brings with it the social considerations which men prize most highly +when they most affect to despise it—why then a man is apt to take out +his self-denial in ill-temper. Mr. Bonamy did so. + +Dr. Gregg went away calling the lawyer a bear and an ill-bred fellow +who did not know his own friends. Alas! the same thing might have been +said, and with greater justice, of the rector. The archdeacon sat an +hour in his study, waiting patiently for him to return from his +district, and after all got but a sorry reception. The elder man +expressed, and expressed very warmly—he had come to do so—his full +belief in Lindo’s honesty and good faith, and was greatly touched by +the effect his words produced upon the young fellow, who had come into +the room, after learning his visitor’s presence, with set lips and eyes +of challenge, but had by-and-by to turn his back on his friend and look +out of the window, while in a very low tone he murmured his thanks. +But, alas! the archdeacon went farther, and let drop something about +concession, and then the boat was over! + +“Concession!” said the young man, turning as on a pivot, with every +hair of his whiskers bristling, and his voice clear enough now. “What +kind of concession do you mean?” + +“Well,” said the archdeacon persuasively, “the earl is a choleric man—a +most passionate man, I know; and, when excited, utterly foolish and +wrong-headed. But in his cooler moments I do not know any one more just +or, indeed, more generous. And I feel sure that if you could prevail on +yourself to meet him half-way——” + +“By resigning?” snapped the rector, interrupting him point-blank with +the question. + +“Oh, no, no,” said the archdeacon, “I do not mean that.” + +“Then in what way? How?” + +But as the archdeacon really meant by resigning, he could not answer +the question, and the interview ended in Lindo roundly declaring, as he +walked up and down the room, “I will not resign! Understand that, +archdeacon! I will not resign! If Lord Dynmore can put me out, well and +good—let him. If not, I stay. He may be just or generous,” continued +the young man scornfully—“all I know is that he insulted me grossly, +and as no gentleman would have insulted another.” + +“He is passionate, and was taken by surprise,” the archdeacon ventured +to say. But Lindo would not listen; and his visitor had presently to +go, fearing that he had done more harm than good by his mediation. As +for the rector, he was severely scolded later in the evening by Jack +Smith for having omitted to lay the letters offering him the living +before the archdeacon, or to explain to him the precise circumstances +under which he had accepted it. + +“But he said he did not doubt me,” the rector urged rather fractiously. + +“Pooh! that is not the point,” the barrister retorted. “Of course he +does not. He knows you. But I want to put him in possession of such a +case as he may lay before others who do not know you. Look here, you +are acquainted with a man called Felton, are you not?” + +“Yes,” Lindo answered, with a slight start. + +“Well, perhaps you are not aware that he has been to Lord Dynmore—so +the tale runs in the town, and I know it is true—and stated that you +have been for weeks bribing him to keep the secret.” + +The rector sat motionless, staring at his friend. “I did not know it,” +he said at last, quite quietly. He was becoming accustomed to surprises +of this kind. “It is a wicked lie, of course.” + +“Of course,” Jack assented tossing one leg easily over the other, and +thrusting his hands deep into his trousers’ pockets. “But what do you +say to it?” + +“The man came to me,” Lindo answered steadily, “and told me that he was +Lord Dynmore’s servant, and that, crossing from America, he had +foolishly lost his money at play. He begged me to assist him until Lord +Dynmore’s return, and I did so. Some ten days ago I discovered that he +was leading a disreputable life, and I stopped the allowance.” + +“Thanks,” said Jack, nodding his head. “That is precisely what I +thought. But the mischief of it is, you see, that the man’s tale may be +true in his eyes. He may have believed that he was blackmailing you. +And therefore, since we cannot absolutely refute his story, it is the +more important that we should show as good a case as possible +_aliunde_. Nor does it make any difference,” Jack continued drily, +“that the man, after seeing Lord Dynmore last night, has taken himself +quietly off this morning.” + +“What! Felton?” the rector exclaimed, coming suddenly upright. + +“Yes. There is no doubt he has absconded. Bonamy’s clerk has been after +him all day, and has discovered that he begged half-a-crown from your +curate, to whom he was seen speaking at the Top of the Town about ten +this morning. Since that time he has not been seen.” + +“He may turn up yet,” said the rector. + +“I do not think he will,” the barrister replied, with a shrewd gleam in +his eyes. “But you must not flatter yourself that his disappearance +will do you any good. Of course some people will say that he was afraid +to remain and support a false statement. But more, I fear, will lean to +the opinion that he was got out of the way by some one—you, for +instance.” + +“I see,” said Lindo slowly, after a long pause. “Then it is the more +imperative that I should not dream of resigning.” + +“I think so,” said Jack. + + + + +CHAPTER XX. +A SUDDEN CALL. + + +“Kate,” said Daintry, looking up from a lesson book as her sister +entered the dining-room a few mornings after the bazaar, “are you +_never_ going to see old Peggy Jones again? I am sure that you have not +been near her for a fortnight?” + +“I ought to go, I know,” Kate answered, pausing by the sideboard, with +a big bunch of keys dangling from her fingers and an absent expression +in her gray eyes. “I have not been for some time.” + +“I should think you had not!” quoth Daintry severely. “You have hardly +been out of the house the last four days.” + +A faint color stole into the elder girl’s face, and, seeming suddenly +to recollect what she wanted, she turned and began to search in the +drawer behind her. She knew quite well that what Daintry said was +true—that she had not been out for four days. Jack had delivered the +rector’s message to her, and she had listened with downcast eyes and a +grave composure—a composure so perfect that even the messenger who held +the clue in his hand was almost deceived by it. All the same, it had +made her very happy. The young rector appreciated at last the motive +which had led her to give him that strange warning. He was grateful to +her, and anxious to make her understand his gratitude. And while she +dwelt on this with pleasure, she foresaw with a strange mingling of joy +and fear, of anticipation and shrinking, that the first time she met +him abroad he would strive to make it still more clear to her. + +So for four days, lest she should seem even to herself to be +precipitating the meeting, she had refrained from going out. Now, when +Daintry remarked upon the change in her habits, she blushed at the +thought that she might all the time have been exaggerating a trifle; +and, though she did not go out at once, in the course of the afternoon +she did issue forth, and called upon old Peggy. Coming back she had to +pass through the churchyard, and there, on the very spot where she had +once forced herself to address him, she met the rector. + +She saw him while he was still some way off, and before he saw her, and +she looked eagerly for any trace of the trouble of the last few days. +It had not changed him, at any rate. It had rather accentuated him, she +thought. He looked more boyish, more impetuous, more independent than +ever, as he came swinging along, his blond head thrown back, his eyes +roving this way and that, his long skirts flapping behind him. Of +defeat or humiliation he betrayed not a trace; and the girl wondered, +seeing him so calm and strong, if he had really sent her that +message—which seemed to have come from a man hard pressed. + +A glance told her all this; and then he saw her, and, a flash of +recognition sweeping across his face, quickened his steps to meet her. +He seemed to be shaking hands with her before he had well considered +what he would say, for when he had gone through that ceremony, and said +“Good morning.” he stood awkwardly silent. Then he said hurriedly, “I +have been waiting for some time to speak to you, Miss Bonamy.” + +“Indeed?” she said calmly. She wondered at her own self-control. + +“Yes,” he answered, his color rising. “And I could not have met you in +a better place.” + +“Why?” she asked. As if she did not know! The simplest woman is an +actress by nature. + +“Because,” he answered, “it is well that I should do penance where I +sinned, Miss Bonamy,” he continued impetuously, yet in a low voice, and +with his eyes on the ground. “I owe you a deep apology for my rude +thanklessness when I met you here last. You were right and I was wrong; +but if it had been the other way, still I ought not to have behaved to +you as I did. I thought—that is—I——” + +He faltered and stopped. He meant that he had thought that she was +playing into her father’s hands, but he could hardly tell her that. She +understood, however, or guessed, and for the first time she blushed. +“Pray, do not say any more about it,” she said hurriedly. + +“I did send you a message,” he answered. + +“Oh, yes, yes,” she replied, anxious only to put an end to his +apologies. + +“Well,” he rejoined with a smile which did not completely veil his +earnestness, “I do find it a little more pleasant to look farther back +to our Oxford visit. But you are going this way. May I turn with you?” + +“I am only going home,” Kate answered coldly. He had been humble enough +to her. He had said and looked all she had expected. But he was not at +all the crushed, beaten man whom she had looked to meet. He was, +outwardly at least, the same man who had once sought her society for a +few weeks and had then slighted her and shunned her to consort with the +Homfreys and their class. He had not said he was sorry for _that_. + +He read her tone aright, and he colored furiously, growing in a second +a thousand times more confused than before. It was on the cards that he +would accept the rebuff, and leave her in resentment. Indeed, that was +his first impulse. But the consciousness, which the next moment filled +his mind, that he had deserved this, and perhaps the charm of her gray +eyes and proud downturned face, overcame him. “I will come a little way +with you, if you will let me,” he said, turning and walking by her +side. + +Kate’s heart gave a great leap. She understood both the first thought +and the second, the weaker impulse and the stronger one which mastered +it, and she would not have been a woman had she not felt her triumph. +She hastened to find something to say, and could think only of the +bazaar. She asked him if it had been a success. + +“The bazaar?” he said. “To tell you the truth, I am afraid I hardly +know. I should say so, now you ask me, but I have not given much +thought to it since. I have been too fully occupied with other things,” +he added, a note of bitterness in his voice. “Ah! Miss Bonamy,” with a +fresh change of tone, “what a good fellow your cousin is!” + +“Yes, he is indeed!” she answered heartily. + +“I cannot tell you,” he continued, “what generous help and support he +has given me during the last few days. He has been the greatest +possible comfort to me.” + +She looked up at him impulsively. “He is Daintry’s hero,” she said. + +“Yes,” he answered laughing, “I remember that her praise made me almost +jealous of him. That was when I first knew you—when I was coming to +Claversham, you remember, Miss Bonamy, full of pleasant anticipations +and hopes. The reality has been different. Jack has told you, of +course, of Lord Dynmore’s strange attack upon me? But perhaps,” he +added, checking himself, and glancing at her, “I ought not to speak to +you about it, as your father is acting for him.” + +“I do not think he is,” she murmured, looking straight before her. + +“But—it is true the only communication I have had since has been from +London—still I thought—I mean I was under the impression that Lord +Dynmore had at once gone to your father.” + +“I think he saw him at the office,” Kate answered, “but I believe my +father is not acting for him.” + +“Do you know why?” said the rector bluntly. “Why he is not, I mean?” + +“No,” she said—that and nothing more. She was too proud to defend her +father, though he had let drop enough in the family circle to enable +her to come to a conclusion, and she might with truth have made out a +story which would have set the lawyer in a light differing much from +that in which the rector was accustomed to view him. + +Reginald Lindo walked on considering the matter. Suddenly he said, “The +archdeacon thinks I ought to resign. What do you think, Miss Bonamy?” + +Her heart began to beat quickly. He was seeking her advice!—asking her +opinion in this matter so utterly important to him, so absolutely +vital! For a moment she could not speak, she was so filled with +surprise. Then she said gently, her eyes on the pavement, “I do not +think I can judge.” + +“But you must have heard—more I dare say than I have!” he rejoined with +a forced laugh. “Will you tell me what you think?” + +She looked before her, her face troubled. Then she spoke bravely. + +“I think you should judge for yourself,” she said in a low tone, full +of serious feeling. “The responsibility is yours. I do not think that +you should depend entirely on any one’s advice, but should try to do +right according to your conscience—not acting hastily, but coolly, and +on reflection.” + +They were almost at Mr. Bonamy’s door when she said this, and he +traversed the remainder of the distance without speaking. At the steps +he halted and held out his hand. “Thank you,” he said simply. “I hope I +shall use this advice to better purpose than the last you gave me. +Please remember me to your sister. Good-by.” + +She bowed silently and went in, and he turned back and walked up the +street. The dusk was falling. A few yards in front of him the lame +lamplighter was going his rounds, ladder on shoulder. In every other +shop the gas was beginning to gleam. The night was coming, was almost +come, yet still above the houses the sky, a pale greenish-blue, was +bright with daylight, against which the great tower of the church stood +up bulky and black. The young man was in a curious mood. Though he +walked the common pavement, he felt himself, as he gazed upward, alone +with his thoughts which went back, will he nill he, to his first +evening in Claversham. He remembered how free from reproach or +stumbling-blocks his path had seemed then, to what blameless ends he +had in fancy devoted himself. What works of thanksgiving, small but +beneficent as the tiny rills which steal downward through the ferns to +the pasture, he had planned. And in the centre of that past dream of +the future he pictured now—Kate Bonamy. Well, the reality had been +different. + +He was just beginning to wonder when he would be likely to meet her +again, and to dwell with curious pleasure on some of the details of her +dress and appearance, when the sudden clatter of hoofs behind him +caused him to turn his head. Far down the street a rider had just +turned the corner, and was now galloping up the middle of the roadway, +the manner in which he urged on his pony speaking loudly of disaster +and ill news. Opposite the rector he pulled up and cried out, “Where is +the doctor’s, sir?” + +Lindo turned sharply round and rang the bell of the house behind him, +which happened to be Gregg’s. + +“Here,” he said briefly. “What is it, my man?” + +“An explosion in the Big Pit at Baerton,” the man replied, almost +blubbering with excitement and the speed at which he had come. “There +is like to be fifty killed and as many hurt, I was told. But I came +straight off.” + +“When did it happen?” Lindo asked, a wave of wild excitement following +his first impulse of horror. + +“About an hour and a quarter ago, as near as I can say,” the messenger, +a farm laborer called from the plough, answered. + +Dr. Gregg was out, and the clergyman walked by the side of the horse, a +crowd gathering behind him as the news spread, to the house of Mr. +Keogh the other doctor, who fortunately lived close by. He was at home, +and, the messenger going in to tell him the particulars, in five +minutes his gig was at the door, The rector, who had gone in too, came +out with him, and, without asking leave, climbed to the seat beside +him. + +“Hallo!” said the surgeon, an elderly man, stout and white-haired, “are +you coming, too, Mr. Lindo?” + +“I think,” the rector answered, “that there may be cases in which you +can do little and I much. Mr. Walker, the vicar of Baerton, is ill in +bed, I know; and as the news has come to me first, I think I ought to +go.” + +“Right you are!” said Mr. Keogh gruffly. “Let go!” + +In another moment the fast trotting cob was whirling the two men down +the street. They turned the corner sharply, and as the breeze met them +on the bridge, compelling Lindo to turn up the collar of his coat and +draw the rug more closely round him, the church clock in the town +behind them struck the half-hour. “Half-past five,” said the rector. +The surgeon did not answer. They were in the open country now, the +hedges speeding swiftly by them in the light of the lamps, and the long +outline of Bear Hill, a huge misshapen hump which rose into a point at +one end, lying dim and black before them. A night drive is always +impressive. In the gloom, in the sough of the wind, in the sky serenely +star-lit, in a tumult of hurrying clouds, in the rattle of the wheels, +in the monotonous fall of the hoofs, there is an appeal to the sombre +side of a man. How much more when the sough of the wind seems to the +imagination a cry of pain, and the night is a dark background on which +the fancy paints dying faces! At such a time the cares of life, which +day by day rise one beyond another and prevent us dwelling over-much on +the end, sink into pettiness, leaving us face to face with weightier +issues. + +“There have been accidents here before?” the clergyman asked, after a +long silence. + +“Thirty-five years ago there was one!” his companion answered, with a +groan which betrayed his apprehensions. “Good heavens, sir, I remember +it now! I was young then and fresh from the hospitals; but it was +almost too much for me!” + +“I hope that this one has been exaggerated,” Lindo replied, entering +fully into the other’s feelings. “I did not quite understand the man’s +account; but, as far as I could follow it, one of the two shafts—the +downcast shaft I think it was—-was jammed full of rubbish and rendered +quite useless.” + +“Just what I expected!” ejaculated his companion. + +“And they could now communicate with the workings only through the +upcast shaft, in which they had rigged up some temporary lifting gear.” + +“Ay, and it is the deepest pit here,” the surgeon chimed in, as the +horse began to breast the steeper part of the ascent, and the furnace +fires, before and above them, began to flicker and glow, now sinking +into darkness, now flaming up like beacon-fires. “The workings are two +thousand feet below the surface, man!” + +“Stop!” Lindo said. “Here is some one looking for us, I think.” + +Two women with shawls over their heads came to the side of the gig. “Be +you the doctors?” said one of them; and then in another minute the two +were following her up the side of the cutting which here confined the +road. The hillside gained, they were hurried round pit-banks and +slag-heaps, and under cranes and ruinous sinking walls, and over and +under mysterious obstacles, sometimes looming large in the gloom and +sometimes lying unseen at their feet—until they emerged at length with +startling abruptness into a large circle of dazzling light. Four great +fires were burning close together, and round them, motionless and for +the most part silent, in appearance almost apathetic, stood hundreds of +dark shadows—men and women waiting for news. + +The silence and inaction of so large a crowd struck a chill to Lindo’s +heart. When he recovered himself, he was standing in the midst of a +dozen rough fellows, some half-stripped, some muffled up in +pilot-jackets or coarse shiny clothes. The crowd seemed to be watching +them, and they spoke now and then to one another in a desultory +expectant fashion, from which he judged they were in authority. + +“It is a bad job—a very bad job!” his companion was saying nervously. +“Is there anything I can do yet?” + +“Well, that depends, doctor,” answered one of the men, his manner of +speaking proving that he was not a mere working collier. “There is no +one up yet,” he added, eyeing the doctor dubiously. “But it does not +exactly follow that you can do nothing. Some of us have just come up, +and there is a shift of men exploring down there now. Three bodies have +been recovered, and they are at the foot of the shaft; and three poor +fellows have been found alive, of whom one has since died. The other +two are within fifty yards of the shaft, and as comfortable as we can +make them. But they are bad—too bad to come up in a bucket; and we can +rig up nothing bigger at present so there they are fixed. The question +is, will you go down to them?” + +Mr. Keogh’s face fell, and he shook his head. He was no longer young, +and to descend a sheer depth of five hundred yards in a bucket dangling +at the end of a makeshift rope was not in his line. “No, thank you,” he +said, “I could not do it.” + +“Come, doctor,” the man persisted—he was the manager of a neighboring +colliery—“you will be there in no time.” + +“Just so,” said the surgeon drily. “It is the coming back is the rub, +you see, Mr. Peat. No, thank you, I could not.” + +The other still urged him. “These poor fellows are about as bad as they +can be, and you know if the mountain will not go to Mahomet, Mahomet +must go to the mountain.” + +“I know; and if it were a mountain, well and good,” Mr. Keogh answered, +smiling in sickly fashion as his eye strayed to a black well-like hole +close at hand—a mere hole in some loose planks surmounted by a windlass +and fringed with ugly wreckage. “But it is not. It is quite the other +thing, you see.” + +Mr. Peat, the manager, shrugged his shoulders, and glanced at his +companions rather in sorrow than surprise. Lindo, standing behind the +doctor, saw the look. Till then he had stood silent. Now he pressed +forward. “Did I hear you say that one of the injured men died after he +was found?” he asked. + +“Yes, that is so,” the manager answered, looking keenly at him, and +wondering who he was. + +“The others that are hurt—are their lives in danger?” + +“I am afraid so,” the man replied. + +“Then I have a right to be with them,” the rector answered quickly. “I +am a clergyman, and I have hastened here, fearing this might be the +case. But I have also attended an ambulance class, and I can dress a +burn. Besides, I am a younger man than our friend here, and, if you +will let me down, I will go.” + +“By George, sir!” exclaimed the manager, looking round for approval and +smiting his thigh heavily, “you are a man as well as a parson, and down +you shall go, and thank you! You may make the men more comfortable, and +any way you will put heart into them, for you have some to spare +yourself. As for danger, there is none!—Jack!”—this in a louder voice +to some one in the background—“just twitch that rope! And get that tub +up, will you? Look slippery now.” + +Lindo felt a hand on his arm and, obeying the silent gesture of the +nearest gaunt figure, stepped aside. In a twinkling the man stripped +off the parson’s long coat and put on him the pilot jacket from his own +shoulders; a second man gave Lindo a peaked cap of stiff leather in +place of his soft hat and a third fastened a pit lamp round his neck, +explaining to him how to raise the wick without unlocking the lamp, and +also showing him that, if it hung too much on one side or were upset, +its flame would expire of itself. And upon one thing Lindo was never +tired of dwelling afterward—the kindly tact of these rough men, and how +by seemingly casual words, and even touches, the roughest sought to +encourage him, while ignoring the possibility of his feeling alarm. + +Meanwhile Mr. Keogh, standing in a state of considerable perplexity and +discomfiture where the rector had left him, heard a well-known voice at +his elbow, and turned to find that Gregg had arrived. The younger +doctor was not the man to be awed into silence, and, as he came up, was +speaking loudly. “Hallo, Mr. Keogh!” he said. “Heard you were before +me. Have you got them all in hand? Cuts or burns mostly, eh?” + +“They are not above ground yet,” Mr. Keogh answered. He and Gregg were +not on speaking terms, but such an emergency as this was allowed to +override their estrangement. + +“Oh, then we shall have to wait,” Gregg answered, looking round on the +scene with a mixture of curiosity and professional _aplomb_. “I wish I +had spared my horse. Any other medical man here?” + +“No; and they want one of us to go down in the bucket,” Keogh +explained. “There are some injured men at the foot of the shaft. I have +a wife and children, and I thought that perhaps you——” + +“Would not mind breaking my neck!” Gregg retorted with decision. “No, +thank you, not for me I hope to have a wife and children some day, and +I will keep my neck for them. Go down!” he repeated, looking round with +extreme scorn. “Pooh! No one can expect us to do it! It is these +people’s business, and they are used to it; but there is not a sane man +in the kingdom, besides, would go down that place after what has just +happened. It is a quarter of a mile as a stone falls, if it is an +inch!” + +“It is all that,” assented the other, much relieved. + +“And a height makes me giddy,” Dr. Gregg added. + +“I feel the same now,” said his elder. + +“No; every man to his trade,” Gregg concluded, settling the matter to +his satisfaction. “Let them bring them up, and we will doctor them. But +while they are below ground—— Hallo!” + +His last word was an oath of surprise and anger. Happening to glance +round, the doctor saw Lindo coming forward to the shaft, and recognized +him in spite of his disguise. One look, and Gregg would cheerfully have +given ten pounds either to have had the rector away, or to have arrived +a little later himself. He had reckoned already in his own mind that, +if no outsider went down, he could scarcely be blamed for taking care +of himself. But, if the rector went down, the matter would wear a +different aspect. And Dr. Gregg saw this so clearly that he turned pale +with rage and chagrin, and swore more loudly than before. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI. +IN PROFUNDIS. + + +The young clergyman’s face, as he walked forward to the shaft, formed +no index to his mind, for while it remained calm and even wore a faint +smile, he was inwardly conscious of a strong desire to take hold of +anything which presented itself, even a straw. He stepped gravely into +the tub amid a low murmur, and, clutching the iron bar above it, felt +himself at a word of command lifted gently into the air, and swung over +the shaft. For an uncomfortable five seconds or so he remained +stationary; then there was a jerk—another—and the dark figures, the +lines of faces, and the glare of the fires leapt suddenly above his +head. He found himself dropping through space with a swift, sickening +motion, as of one falling away from himself. His heart rose into his +throat. There was a loud buzzing in his ears, and yet above this he +heard the dull rattling sound of the rope being paid out. Every other +sense was spent in the stern clutch of his hands on the bar above his +head. + +In a few seconds the horrible sensation of falling passed away. He was +no longer in space with nothing stable about him, but in a small tub at +the end of a tough rope. Except for a slight swaying motion, he hardly +knew that he was still descending; and presently a faint light, more +diffused than his own lamp, grew visible. Then he came gently to a +standstill, and some one held up a lantern to his face. With difficulty +he made out two huge figures standing beside him, who laid hold of his +tub and pulled it toward them until it rested on something solid. “You +are welcome,” growled one, as, aided by a hand of each, Lindo stepped +out. “You will be the doctor, I suppose, master? Well, this way. Catch +hold of my jacket.” + +Lindo obeyed, being only too glad of the help thus given him; for +though the men seemed to move about with ease and certainty, he could +make out nothing but shapeless gloom. “Now you sit right down there,” +continued the collier, when they had moved a few yards, “and you will +get the sight of your eyes in a bit.” + +He did as he was bid, and one by one the objects about him became +visible. His first feeling was one of astonishment. He had put a +quarter of a mile of solid earth between himself and the sunlight, and +yet, for all he could see, he might be merely in a cellar under a +street. He found himself seated on a rough bench, in a low-roofed, +windowless, wooden cabin, strangely resembling a very dirty London +office in a fog. True, everything was black—very black. On another +bench, opposite him, sat the two colliers who had received him, their +lamps between their knees. His first impulse was to tell them hurriedly +that he was not the doctor. “I am afraid you must be disappointed,” he +added, “but I hope one will follow me down. I am a clergyman, and I +want to do something for those poor fellows, if you will take me to +them.” + +The two men betrayed no surprise, but he who had spoken before quietly +poked up the wick of his lamp and held the lantern up so as to get a +good view of his face. “Ay, ay,” he said, nodding, as he lowered it +again. “I thought you weren’t unbeknown to me. You are the parson we +fetched to poor Lucas a while ago. Well, Jim will have a rare cageful +of his friends with him to-night.” + +The rector shuddered. Such apathy, such matter-of-factness was new to +him. But though his heart sank as the collier rose and, swinging his +lamp in his hand, passed through the doorway, he made haste to follow +him; and the man’s next words, “You had best look to your steps, +master, for there is a deal of rubbish come down”—pointing as they did +to a material danger—brought him, in the diversion of his thoughts, +something like relief. + +The road on which he found himself, being the main heading or highway +of the pit, was a good wide one. It was even possible to stand upright +in it. Here and there, however, it was partially blocked by falls of +coal caused by the explosion, and over one of these his guide put out +his hand to assist him. Lindo’s lamp was by this time burning low. The +pitman silently took it and raised the wick, a grim smile distorting +his face as he handed it back. “You will be about the first of the +gentry,” he muttered, “as has been down this pit without paying his +footing.” + +Lindo took the words for a hint, and was shocked by the man’s +insensibility. “My good fellow,” he answered, “if that is all, you +shall have what you like another time. But for heaven’s sake let us +think of these poor fellows now.” + +The man turned on him and swore furiously. “Do you think I meant that?” +he cried, with another violent oath. + +The rector recoiled, not at the sound of the man’s profanity, but in +disgust at his own mistake. Then he held out his hand. “My man,” he +said, “I beg your pardon. It was I who was wrong.” + +The giant looked at him with another stare, but made no answer, and a +dozen steps brought them to another cabin. Across the doorway—there was +no door—hung a rough curtain of matting. This the man raised, and, +holding his lamp over the threshold, invited the rector to look in. “I +guess,” he added significantly, “that you would not have made that +mistake, master, after seeing this.” + +Lindo peered in. On the floor, which was little more than six feet +square, lay four quiet figures, motionless, and covered with coarse +sacking. No human eye falling on them could have taken them for +anything but what they were. The visitor shuddered, as his guide let +the curtain fall again and muttered with a backward jerk of the head, +“Two of them I came down with this morning—in the cage.” + +The rector had nothing to answer, and the man, preceding him to a cabin +a few yards farther on, invited him by a sign to enter, and himself +turned back the way they had come. A faint moaning warned Lindo, before +he raised the matting, what he must expect to see. Instinctively, as he +stepped in, his eyes sought the floor; and although three pitmen +crouching upon one of the benches rose and made way for him, he hardly +noticed them, so occupied was he with pitiful looking at the two men +lying on coarse beds on the floor. They were bandaged and muffled +almost out of human form. One of them was rolling his sightless face +monotonously to and fro, pouring out an unceasing stream of delirious +talk. The other, whose bright eyes met the newcomer’s with eager +longing, paused in the murmur which seemed to ease his pain, and +whispered, “Doctor!” so hopefully that the sound went straight to +Lindo’s heart. + +To undeceive him, and to explain to the others that he was not the +expected surgeon, was a bitter task with which to begin his +ministrations; but he was greatly cheered to find that, even in their +disappointment, they took his coming as a kindly thing, and eyed him +with surprised gratitude. He told them the latest news from the +bank—that a cage would be rigged up in a few hours at farthest—and +then, conquering his physical shrinking, he knelt down by the least +injured man and tried to turn his surgical knowledge to account. It was +not much he could do, but it certainly eased the poor man’s present +sufferings. A bandage was laid more smoothly here, a little cotton-wool +readjusted there, a change of posture managed, a few hopeful words +uttered which helped the patient to fight against the shock—so that +presently he sank into a troubled sleep. Lindo tried to do his best for +the other also, terrible as was the task; but the man’s excitement and +unceasing restlessness, as well as his more serious injuries, made help +here of little avail. + +When he rose, he found one of the watchers holding a cup of brandy +ready for him; and, sitting down upon the bench behind, he discovered a +coat laid there to make the seat more comfortable, though no one seemed +to have done it, or to be conscious of his surprise. They talked low to +him, and to one another, in a disjointed taciturn fashion, with immense +gaps and long intervals of silence. He learned that there were +twenty-seven men yet missing, but it was thought that the afterdamp had +killed them all. Those already found alive had been in the main +heading, where the current of air gave them a better chance. + +One or other of the workers was continually going out to listen for the +return of the party who were exploring the workings near the foot of +the other shaft; and once or twice a member of this party, exhausted or +ill, looked in for a dose of tea or brandy, and then stumbled out again +to get himself conveyed to the upper air. These looked curiously at the +stranger, but, on some information being muttered in their ears, made a +point on going out of giving him a nod which was full of tacit +acknowledgment. + +In a quiet interval he looked at his watch and wound it up, finding the +time to be half-past two. The familiar action carried his mind back to +his neat, spotless bedroom at the rectory and the cares and anxieties +of everyday life, which had been forgotten for the last five hours. +Could it be so short a time, he asked himself, since he was troubled by +them? It seemed years ago. It seemed as if a gulf, deep as the shaft +down which he had come, divided him from them. And yet the moment his +thoughts returned to them the gulf became less, and presently, although +his eyes were still fixed upon the poor collier’s unquiet head and the +murky cabin with its smoky lamp, he was really back in Claversham, +busied with those thoughts again, and pondering on the time when he +should be above ground. The things that had been important before rose +into importance again, but their relative values among themselves were +altered, in his eyes at any rate. With what he had seen and heard in +the last few hours fresh in his mind, with the injured men lying still +in his sight—one of them never to see the sun again—he could not but +take a different, a wider, a less selfish view of life and its aims. +His ideal of existence grew higher and purer, his notion of success +more noble. In the light of his own self-forgetting energy and of +others’ pain he saw things as they affected his neighbor rather than +himself and so presently—not in haste, but slowly in the watches of the +night—he formed a resolution which shall be told presently. The +determinations to which men come at such times are, in nine cases out +of ten, as transitory as the emotions on which they are based. But this +time, and with this man, it was not to be so. Kate Bonamy’s words, +bringing before his mind the responsibility which rested upon him, had +in a degree prepared him to examine his position gravely and from a +lofty standpoint; so that the considerations which now assailed him +could scarcely fail to have due and lasting weight with him, and to +leave impressions both deep and permanent. + +He was presently roused from his reverie by a sound which caused his +companions to rise to their feet with the first signs of excitement +they had betrayed in their manner. It was the murmur of voices in the +heading, which, beginning far away, rapidly approached and gathered +strength. Going to the door of the cabin, he saw lights in the gallery +becoming each instant more clear. Then the forms of men coming on by +twos and threes rose out of the darkness. And so the procession wound +in, and Lindo found himself suddenly surrounded—where a moment before +no sounds but painful ones had been heard—by the hum and bustle, the +quick question and answers, of a crowd. For the men brought good news. +The missing were found; and though many of them were burned or +scorched, and others were suffering from the effects of the afterdamp, +the explorers brought back with them no still, ominous burden, nor even +any case of hopeless injury, such as that of the poor fellow in +delirium over whom his mates bent with the strange impassive patience +which seems to be a quality peculiar to those who get their living +underground. + +Not that Lindo at the time had leisure to consider their behavior. The +injured were brought to him as a matter of course, and he did what he +could with simple bandages and liniment to keep the air from their +wounds, and to enable the men to reach the surface with as little pain +as possible. For more than an hour, as he passed from one to the other, +his hands were never empty; he could think only of his work. The +deputy-manager, who had been leading the rescue party, was thoroughly +prostrated. The rest never doubted that the stranger was a surgeon, and +it was curious to see their surprise when the general taciturnity +allowed the news to spread that he was only a parson. They were like +savants with a specimen which, known to belong to a particular species, +has none of the class attributes, and sets at defiance all preconceived +ideas upon the subject. He, too, when he was at length free to look +about him, found matter for astonishment in his own sensations. The +cabin and the roadway outside, where the men sat patiently waiting +their turns to ascend, had become almost homelike in his eyes. The +lounging figures here thrown into relief by a score of lamps, there +lost in the gloom of the background, had grown familiar. He knew that +this was here and that was there, and had his receptacles and +conveniences, his special attendants and helpers. In a word, he had +made the place his own, yet without forgetting old habits—for more than +once he caught himself looking at his watch, and wondering when it +would be day. + +Toward seven o’clock a message directed to him by name came down. A +cage would be rigged up within the hour. Before that period elapsed, +however, he was summoned to see the poor fellow die who had been +delirious ever since he was found and who now passed away in the same +state. It was a trying scene coming just when the clergyman’s +wrought-up nerves were beginning to feel a reaction—the more trying as +all looked to him to do anything that could be done. But that was +nothing; and he felt gravely thankful when the poor man’s sufferings +were over and the throng of swarthy faces melted from the open doorway. + +He sat apart a little after that until a commotion outside the cabin +and a cheery voice asking for Mr. Lindo summoned him to the door, where +he found the same manager who had sent him down the night before, and +who now greeted him warmly. “It is not for me to thank you,” Mr. Peat +said—“I have nothing to do with this pit—the owner, to whom what has +happened will be reported, will do that; but personally I am obliged to +you, Mr. Lindo, and I am sure the men are.” + +“I wanted only to be of help,” the clergyman answered simply. “There +was not much I could do.” + +“Well, that is a matter of opinion,” the manager replied. “I have mine, +and I know that the men who have come up have theirs. However, here is +the cage; perhaps you will not mind going up with poor Edwards?” + +“Not at all,” said the rector; and, following the manager to the cage, +he stepped into it without any suspicion that this was a trick on the +part of Mr. Peat to insure his volunteer’s services being recognized. + +He found the ascent a very different thing from the descent. The steady +upward motion was not unpleasant, and long before the surface was +reached his eyes, accustomed to darkness, detected a pale gleam of +light stealing downward, and could distinguish the damp brickwork +gliding by. Presently the light grew stronger—grew dazzling in its +wonderful whiteness. “We are going up nicely,” his companion murmured, +remembering in his gratitude that the ascent, which was a trifle to him +even with shattered nerves, might be unpleasant to the other—“we are +nearly there.” + +And so they were; and slowly and gently they rose into the broad +daylight and the sunshine which seemed to proclaim to the rector’s +heart that sorrow may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning. + +Standing densely packed round the pit’s mouth was a great crowd—a +crowd, at any rate, of many hundreds. They greeted the appearance of +the cage with a quick drawing-in of the breath and a murmur of pity. +Lindo’s face and hands were as black as any collier’s; his dress seemed +at the first glance as theirs. But as he helped to lift his injured +companion out and carry him to the stretcher which stood at hand, the +word who he was ran round; and, though no one spoke, the loudest +tribute could scarcely have been more eloquent than the respect with +which the rough assemblage fell away to right and left that he might +pass out to the trap which had been thoughtfully provided—first to +carry him to the vicarage for a wash, and afterward to take him home. +His heart was full as he walked down the lane, every man standing +uncovered, and the women gazing on him with unspoken blessings in their +eyes. + +A very few hours before he had felt at war with the world. He had said, +not perhaps that all men were liars, but that they were unjust, full of +prejudice and narrowness, and ill-will; that, above all, they judged +without charity. Now, as the pony-cart rattled down the road through +the cutting, and the sunny landscape, the winding river, and the plain +round Claversham opened before him, he felt far otherwise. He longed to +do more for others than he had done. He dwelt with wonder on the +gratitude which services so slight had evoked from men so rough as +those from whom he had just parted; and unconsciously he placed the +balance in their favor to the general account of the world, and +acknowledged himself its debtor. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII. +THE RECTOR’S DECISION. + + +The church clock was striking nine as the rector, jogging along behind +the little pony, came in sight of the turnpike-house outside the town. +He had no overcoat, and the drive had chilled him; and, anxious at once +to warm himself and to reach the rectory as quietly as possible, he +bade the driver stop at the gate and set him down. The lad had been +strictly charged to see the parson home, and would have demurred, but +Lindo persisted good-humoredly, and had his way. In two minutes he was +striding briskly along the road, his shoulders squared, and the night’s +reflections still running like a rich purple thread through the common +stuff of his every-day thoughts. + +In this mood, which the pure morning air and crisp sunshine tended to +favor and prolong, he came at a corner plump upon Mr. Bonamy, who, like +all angular, uncomfortable men, was an early riser, and had this +morning chosen to extend his before-breakfast walk in the direction of +Baerton. The lawyer’s energy had already been rewarded. He had met Mr. +Keogh, and learned not only the earlier details of the accident—which +were, indeed, known to all Claversham, for the town had sat up into the +small hours listening for wheels and discussing the catastrophe—but had +further received a minute description of the rector’s conduct. +Consequently his thoughts were already busy with the clergyman when, +turning a corner, he came unexpectedly upon him. + +Lindo met his glance and looked away hastily. The rector had been +anxious to avoid, by going home at once, any appearance of parading +what he had done, and he would have passed on with a brief +good-morning. But the lawyer seemed to be differently disposed. He +stopped short in the middle of the path, so that the clergyman could +not pass him without rudeness, and nodded a jerky greeting. “You have +not walked all the way, I suppose, Mr. Lindo?” he said, his keen small +eyes reading the other’s face like a book. + +“No,” the rector answered, coloring uncomfortably under his gaze. “I +drove as far as the turnpike, Mr. Bonamy.” + +“Well, you may think yourself lucky to be well out of it,” the lawyer +rejoined, with a dry smile. “To be here at all, indeed,” he continued, +with a gesture of the hand which seemed meant to indicate the sunshine +and the upper air. “When a man does a foolhardy thing he does not +always escape, you know.” + +The younger man reddened. But this morning he had his temper well under +control and he merely answered, “I thought I was called upon to do what +I did, Mr. Bonamy. But of course that is a matter of opinion. Perhaps I +was wrong, perhaps right. I did what I thought best at the moment, and +I am satisfied.” + +Mr. Bonamy shrugged his shoulders. “Oh, well, every man to his notion,” +he said. “I do not approve, myself, of people running risks which do +not lie within the scope of their business. And as nothing has happened +to you——” + +“The risk of anything happening,” the rector rejoined, with warmth, +“was so small that the thing is not worth discussing, Mr. Bonamy. There +is a matter, however,” he continued, changing the subject on a sudden +impulse, “which I think I may as well mention to you now as later. You, +as churchwarden, have in fact, a right to be informed of it. I——” + +“You are cold,” said Mr. Bonamy abruptly. “Allow me to turn with you.” + +The rector bowed and complied. The request, however, had checked the +current of his speech, even the current of his thoughts, and he did not +finish his sentence. He felt, indeed, for a moment a temptation as +sudden as it was strong. He saw at a glance what his resolve meant. He +discerned that what had appeared to him in the isolation of the night +an act of dignified self-surrender must, and would, seem to others an +acknowledgment of defeat—almost an acknowledgment of dishonor. He +recalled, as in a flash, all the episodes of the struggle between +himself and his companion. And he pictured the latter’s triumph. He +wavered. + +But the events of the night had not been lost upon him, and, after a +brief hesitation, he set the seal on his purpose. “You are aware, I +know, Mr. Bonamy,” he said, “of the circumstances under which, in Lord +Dynmore’s absence, I accepted the living here.” + +“Perfectly,” said the lawyer drily. + +“He has made those circumstances the subject of a grave charge against +me,” the rector continued, a touch of hauteur in his tone. “That you +have heard also, I know. Well, I desire to say once more that I +repudiate that charge in the fullest and widest sense.” + +“So I understand,” Mr. Bonamy murmured. He walked along by his +companion’s side, his face set and inscrutable. If he felt any surprise +at the communication now being made to him he had the skill to hide it. + +“I repudiate it, you understand!” the clergyman repeated, stepping out +more quickly in his excitement, and glaring angrily into vacancy. “It +is a false and wicked charge! But it does not affect me. I do not care +a jot for it. It does not in any sense force me to do what I am going +to do. If that were all, I should not dream of resigning the living, +but, on the contrary, would hold it, as a few days ago I had determined +to hold it, in the face of all opposition. However,” he continued, +lowering his tone, “I have now examined my position in regard to the +parish rather than the patron, and I have come to a different +conclusion, Mr. Bonamy—namely, to place my resignation in the proper +hands as speedily as possible.” + +Mr. Bonamy nodded gently and silently. He did not speak, he did not +even look at the clergyman; and this placid acquiescence irritated the +young man into adding a word he had not intended to say. “I tell you +this as my church-warden, Mr. Bonamy,” he continued stiffly, “and not +as desiring or expecting any word of sympathy or regret from you. On +the contrary,” he added, with some bitterness, “I am aware that my +departure can be only a relief to you. We have been opposed to one +another since my first day here.” + +“Very true,” said Mr. Bonamy. “I suppose you have considered——” + +“What?” + +“The effect which last night’s work may have on the relations between +you and Lord Dynmore?” + +“I do not understand you,” the rector answered haughtily, and yet with +some wonder. What did the man mean? + +“You know, I suppose,” Mr. Bonamy retorted, turning slightly so as to +command a view of his companion’s face, “that he is the owner of the +Big Pit at Baerton from which you have just come?” + +“Lord Dynmore is?” + +“To be sure.” + +A flush of crimson swept over the rector’s brow and left him red and +frowning. “I did not know that!” he said, his teeth set together. + +“So I perceive,” the lawyer replied, with a nod. “But I can reassure +you. It is not at all likely to affect the earl’s plans. He is an +obstinate man, though in some points a good-natured one, and he will +most certainly accept your resignation if you send it in. But here you +are at home.” He paused, standing awkwardly by the clergyman’s side. +Then he added, “It is a comfortable house. I do not think that there is +a more comfortable house in Claversham.” + +He retired a few steps into the churchyard as he spoke, and stood +looking up at the massive old-fashioned front of the rectory, as if he +had never seen the house before. The clergyman, anxious to be indoors +and alone, shot an impatient glance at him, and waited for him to go. +But he did not go, and presently something in his intent gaze drew +Lindo, too, into the churchyard, and the two ill-assorted companions +looked up together at the old gray house. The early sun shone aslant on +it, burnishing the half-open windows. In the porch a robin was hopping +to and fro. “It is a comfortable, roomy house,” the lawyer repeated. + +“It is,” the rector answered slowly, as if the words were wrung from +him. And he, too, stood looking up at it as if he were fascinated. + +“A man might grow old in it,” murmured Mr. Bonamy. There was a slight, +but very unusual, flush on his parchment-colored face, and his eyes, +when he turned with an abrupt movement to his companion, did not rise +above the latter’s waistcoat. “Comfortably too, I should say,” he added +querulously, rattling the money in his pockets. “I think if I were you +I would reconsider my determination. I think I would, do you know? As +it is, what you have told me will not go any farther. You did one +foolish thing last night. I would not do another to-day, if I were you, +Mr. Lindo.” + +And he turned abruptly away—his head down, his coat-tails swinging, and +both his hands thrust deep into his trouser-pockets—such a shrewd, +angular, ungainly figure as only a small country town can show. He left +the rector standing before his rectory in a state of profound surprise +and bewilderment. The young man felt something very like a lump in his +throat as he turned to go in. He discerned that the lawyer had meant to +do a kind, nay, a generous action; and yet if there was a man in the +world whom he had judged incapable of such magnanimity it was Mr. +Bonamy! He went in not only touched, but ashamed. Here, if he had not +already persuaded himself that the world was less ill-conditioned than +he had lately thought it, was another and a surprising lesson! + +Meanwhile Mr. Bonamy went home, and finding his family already at +breakfast, sat down to the meal in a very snappish humor. The girls +were quick to detect the cloud on his brow, and promptly supplied his +wants, forbearing, whatever their curiosity, to make any present +attempt to satisfy it. Jack was either less observant or more hardy. He +remarked that Mr. Bonamy was late, and elicited only a grunt. A further +statement that the morning was more like April than February gained no +answer at all. Still undismayed, Jack tried again, plunging into the +subject which the three had been discussing before the lawyer entered. +“Did you hear anything of Lindo, sir?” he asked, buttering his toast. + +“I saw him,” the lawyer said curtly. + +“Was he all right?” + +“More right than he deserved to be!” Mr. Bonamy snarled. “What right +had he down the pit at all? Gregg did not go.” + +“More shame to Gregg, I think!” Jack said. + +Mr. Bonamy prudently shifted his ground, and got back to the rector. +“Well, all I can say is that a more foolish, reckless, useless piece of +idiocy I never heard of in my life!” he declared in a tone of scorn. + +“I call it glorious!” said Daintry, looking dreamily across the table +and slowly withdrawing an egg-spoon from her mouth. “I shall never say +anything against him again.” + +Mr. Bonamy looked at her for an instant as if he would annihilate her. +And then he went on with his breakfast. + +Apparently, however, the outburst had relieved him, for presently he +began on his own account. + +“Has your friend any private means?” he asked, casting an ungracious +glance at the barrister, and returning at once to his buttered toast. + +“Who? Lindo, do you mean?” Jack replied in surprise. + +“Yes.” + +“Something, I should say. Perhaps a hundred a year. Why?” + +“Because, if that is all he has,” the lawyer growled, buttering a fresh +piece of toast and frowning at it savagely, “I think that you had +better see him and prevent him making a fool of himself. That is all.” + +His tone meant more than his words expressed. Kate’s eyes sought Jack’s +in alarm, only to be instantly averted. Though she had the urn before +her, she turned red and white, and had to bury her face in her cup to +hide her discomposure. Yet she need not have feared. Mr. Bonamy was +otherwise engaged, and as for Jack, her embarrassment told him nothing +of which he was not already aware. He knew that his service was and +must be a thankless and barren service—that to him fell the empty part +of the slave in the triumph. Had he not within the last few hours—when +the news that the rector had descended the Big Pit to tend the wounded +and comfort the dying first reached the town, and a dozen voices were +loud in his praise—had he not seen Kate’s face now bright with triumph +and now melting with tender anxiety. Had he not felt a bitter pang of +jealousy as he listened to his friend’s praises? and had he not crushed +down the feeling manfully, bravely, heroically, and spoken as loudly, +ay, and as cordially after an instant’s effort, as the most fervent? + +Yes, he had done all this and suffered all this, being one of those who +believe that + + +Loyalty is still the same, +Whether it win or lose the game: +True as the dial to the sun, +Although it be not shone upon. + + +And he was not going to flinch now. He put no more questions to Mr. +Bonamy, but, when breakfast was finished, he got up and went out. It +needed not the covert glance which he shot at Kate as he disappeared, +to assure her that he was going about her unspoken errand. + +Five minutes saw him face to face with the rector on the latter’s +hearth-rug. Or, rather, to be accurate, five minutes saw him staring +irate and astonished at his host while Lindo, with one foot on the +fender and his eyes on the fire, seemed very willing to avoid his gaze. +“You have made up your mind to resign!” Jack exclaimed, in accents +almost awe-stricken. “You are joking!” + +But the rector, still looking down, shook his head. “No, Jack, I am +not,” he said slowly. “I am in earnest.” + +“Then may I ask when you came to this extraordinary resolution?” the +barrister retorted. “And why?” + +“Last night; and because—well, because I thought it right,” was the +answer. + +“You thought it right?” + +Jack’s tone was a fine mixture of wonder, contempt, and offence. It +made Lindo wince, but it did not shake his resolution. “Yes,” he said +firmly. “That is so.” + +“And that is all you are going to tell me, is it? You put yourself in +my hands a few days ago. You took my advice and acted upon it, and now, +without a word of explanation, you throw me over! Good heavens! I have +no patience with you!” Jack added, beginning to walk up and down the +room. “Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday? Tell me that.” + +“Well,” the rector began, turning and speaking slowly, “the truth is——” + +“No!” cried the barrister, interrupting him ruthlessly. “Tell me this +first. Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday?” + +“It is, but the view I take of it is different,” the young clergyman +answered earnestly. “Let me explain, Jack. When I agreed with you a few +days ago that the proper course for me to follow, the course which +would most fitly assert my honesty and good faith, was to retain the +living in spite of threats and opposition, I had my own interests and +my own dignity chiefly in view. I looked upon the question as one +solely between Lord Dynmore and myself; and I felt, rightly as I still +think, that, as a man falsely accused by another man, I had a right to +repel the charge by the only practical means in my power—by maintaining +my position and defying him to do his worst.” + +He paused. + +“Well,” said Jack drily. + +But the rector did not continue at once, and when he did speak it was +with evident effort. He first went back to the fire, and stood gazing +into it in the old attitude, with his head slightly bowed and his foot +on the fender. The posture was one of humility, and so unlike the man, +that it struck Jack and touched him strangely. At last Lindo did +continue. “Well,” he said slowly, “that was all right as far as it +went. My mistake lay in taking too narrow a view. I thought only of +myself and Lord Dynmore, when I should have been thinking of the parish +and of—a word I know you are not very fond of—the Church. I should have +remembered that with this accusation hanging over me I could not hope +to do much good among my people; and that to many of them I should seem +an interloper, a man clinging obstinately to something not his own nor +fairly acquired. In a word, I ought to have remembered that for the +future I should be useless for good and might, on the other hand, +become a stumbling-block and occasion for scandal—both inside the +parish and outside. You see what I mean, I am sure.” + +“I see,” quoth Jack contemptuously, “that you need a great many words +to make out your case. What I do not think you have considered is the +inference which will be drawn from your resignation—you will be taken +to have confessed yourself in the wrong.” + +“I cannot help that.” + +“Will not that be a scandal?” + +“It will, at any rate, be one soon forgotten.” + +“Now, I tell you what!” Jack exclaimed, standing still and confronting +the other with the air of a man bent on speaking his mind though the +heavens should fall. “This is just a piece of absurd Quixotism, Lindo. +You are a poor man, without means and without influence; and you are +going, for the sake of a foolish idea—a mere speculative scruple—to +give up an income and a house and a useful sphere of work such as you +will never get again! You are going to do that, and go back—to what? To +a miserable curacy—don’t wince, my friend, for that is what you are +going to do—and an income one-fifth of that which you have been +spending for the last six months! Now the sole question is, are you +quite an idiot?” + +“You are pretty plain-spoken,” said the rector, smiling feebly. + +“I mean to be!” was Jack’s uncompromising retort. “I have asked you, +and I want an answer—are you a fool?” + +“I hope not.” + +“Then you will give up this fool’s notion?” Jack replied viciously. + +But the rector’s only answer was a shake of the head. He did not look +round. Had he done so, he would have seen that, though Jack’s keen face +was flushed with anger and annoyance, his eyes were moist and wore an +expression at variance with his tone. + +He missed that, however; and Jack made one more attempt. “Look here,” +he said bluntly; “have you considered that if you stop you will find +your path a good deal smoothed by last night’s work?” + +“No, I have not,” the rector answered stubbornly. + +“Well, you will find it so, you may be sure of that! Why, man alive!” +Jack continued with vehemence, “you are going to be the hero of the +place for the time. No one will believe anything against you, except, +perhaps, Gregg and a few beasts of his kind. Whereas, if you go now, do +you know who will get your berth?” + +“No.” + +Jack rapped out the name. “Clode! Clode, and no one else, I will be +bound!” he said. “And you do not love him.” + +The rector had not expected the reply. He started, and, removing his +foot from the fender, turned sharply so as to face his friend. “No,” he +said slowly, “I do not think I do like him. I consider that he has +behaved badly, Jack. He has not stood by me as he should have done, or +as I would have stood by him had our positions been reversed. I do not +think he has called here once since the bazaar, except on business, and +then I was out. I had planned, indeed, to see him to-day and ask him +what it meant, and, if I found he had come to an adverse opinion in my +matter, to give him notice. But now——” + +“You will make him a present of the living instead,” Jack said grimly. + +“I do not know why he should get it,” the rector answered, with a +frown, “more than any one else.” + +“It is the common report that he will,” Jack retorted. “As for that, +however——” + +But why follow him through all the resources of his art? He put forth +every effort—perhaps against his own better judgment, for a man will do +for his friend what he will not do for himself—to persuade the rector +to recall his decision. And he failed. He succeeded, indeed, in +wringing the young clergyman’s heart and making him wince at the +thought of his barren future and his curate’s triumph; but there his +success ended. He made no progress toward inducing him to change his +mind; and presently he found that all the arguments he advanced were +met by a set formula, to which the rector seemed to cling as in +self-defence. + +“It is no good, Jack,” he answered—and if he said it once, he said it +half a dozen times—“it is no good! I cannot take any one’s advice on +this subject. The responsibility is mine, and I cannot shift it! I must +try to do right according to my own conscience!” + +Jack did not know that the words were Kate’s, and that every time the +rector repeated them he had Kate in his mind. But he saw that they were +unanswerable; and when he had listened to them for the sixth time he +took up his hat in a huff. “Well, have our own way!” he said. “After +all, you are right. It is your business and not mine. Give Clode the +living if you like!” + +And he went out sharply. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. +THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS. + + +Seldom, if ever, had the curate passed a week so harassing as that +which was ushered in by the bazaar, and was destined to end—though he +did not know this—in the colliery accident. During these seven days he +managed to run through a perfect gamut of feelings. He rose each day in +a different mood. One day he was hopeful, confident, assured of +success; the next fearful, despondent, inclined to give up all for +lost. One day he went about telling himself that the rector would not +resign; that he would not resign himself in his place; that people were +mad to say he would; that men do not resign livings so easily; that the +very circumstances of the case must compel the rector to stand his +ground. The next he saw everything in a different light. He appreciated +the impossibility of a man attacked on so many sides maintaining his +position for any length of time. One hour he bitterly regretted that he +had cut himself off from his chief, the next he congratulated himself +as sincerely on being untrammelled by any but a formal bond. Why, +people might even have expected him, had he strongly supported the +rector, to refuse the living! + +He saw Laura several times during the week, but he did not open to her +the extent of his hopes and fears. He shrank from doing so out of a +natural prudent reticence; which after all meant only the refraining +from putting into words things perfectly understood. To some extent he +kept up between them the thin veil of appearances, which many who go +through life in closest companionship, preserve to the end, though each +has long ago found it transparent. But though he said nothing, +confining the tumult of his feelings to his own breast, he was not +blind, and he soon perceived that Laura shared his suspense, and was +watching the rector’s fortunes with an interest as selfish and an eye +as cold as his own. Which, far from displeasing him, rather increased +his ardor. + +As the days passed by, however, bringing only the sickness of hope +deferred and tidings of the rector’s sturdy determination to hold what +he had got, the curate began, not in a mere passing mood, but, on +grounds of reason and calculation, to lose hope. Every tongue in the +town was wagging about Lindo. My lord was, or was supposed to be, +setting the engines of the law in motion. Mr. Bonamy was believed, +probably with less reason, to be contemplating an appeal to the bishop +and the Court of Arches. In a word, all the misfortunes which Clode had +foreseen were accumulating about the devoted head; and yet—and yet it +was a question whether the owner of the head was a penny the worse! +Perhaps some day he might be. The earl was a great man, with a long +purse, and he might yet have his way. But this was not likely to +happen, as the curate now began to see, until long after the Rev. +Stephen Clode’s connection with the parish and claim upon the living +should have become things of the past. + +On the top of this conviction, which sufficiently depressed him, came +the news of the colliery accident—news which did not reach him until +late at night. It plunged him into the depth’s of despair. He cursed +the ill-luck which had withheld from him the opportunity of +distinguishing himself, and had granted it to the rector. He saw how +fatally the affair would strengthen the latter’s hands. And in effect +he gave up. He resigned himself to despair. He had not the spirit to go +out, but sat until long after noon, brooding miserably over the fire, +his table littered with unremoved breakfast things, and his mind in a +similar state of slovenly disorder. That was a day, a miserable day, he +long remembered. + +About half-past two he made an effort to pull himself together. +Mechanically putting a book in his pocket, he took his hat and went +out, with the intention of paying two or three visits in his district. +He had pride enough left to excite him to the effort, and sufficient +sense to recognize its supreme importance. But, even so, before he +reached the street he was dreaming again—the old dreary dreams. He +started when a voice behind him said brusquely, “Going your rounds, I +see! Well, there is nothing like sticking to business, whatever is on +foot. Shall I have to congratulate you this time?” + +He knew the voice and turned round, a scowl on his dark face. The +speaker was Gregg—Gregg wearing an air of unusual jauntiness and +gaiety. It fell from him, however, as he met the other’s eyes, leaving +him, metaphorically speaking, naked and ashamed. The doctor stood in +wholesome dread of the curate’s sharp tongue and biting irony, nor +would he have accosted him in so free-and-easy a manner now, had he not +been a little lifted above himself by something he had just learned. + +“Congratulate me? What do you mean?” Clode replied, turning on him with +the uncompromising directness which is more “upsetting” to a man +uncertain of himself than any retort, however discourteous. + +“What do I mean?” the doctor answered, striving to cover his +discomfiture with a feeble smile. “Well, no harm, at any rate, Clode. I +hope I shall have to congratulate you. But if you are going to——” + +“On what?” interrupted the curate sternly. “On what are you going to +congratulate me?” + +“Haven’t you heard the news?” Gregg said in surprise. + +“What news? Of the pit accident?” Clode answered, restraining with +difficulty a terrible outburst of passion. “Why I should think there is +not a fool within three counties has not heard it by this time!” + +He almost swore at the man, and was turning away, when something in the +doctor’s “No, no!” struck him, excited as he was, as peculiar. “Then +what is it?” he said, hanging on his heel, half curious and half in +scorn. + +“You have not heard about the rector?” + +The curate glared. “About the rector?” he said in a mechanical way. A +sudden stillness fell on his face and tone at mention of the name. “No, +what of him?” he continued, after another pause. + +“You have not heard that he is resigning?” Gregg asked. + +The curate’s eyes flashed with returning anger. “No,” he said grimly. +“Nor any one else out of Bedlam!” + +“But it is so! It is true, I tell you!” the doctor answered in the +excitement of conviction. “I have just seen a man who had it from the +archdeacon, who left the rectory not an hour ago. He is going to resign +at once.” + +The curate did not again deny the truth of the story. But he seemed to +Gregg, watching eagerly for some sign of appreciation, to take the news +coolly, considering how important it was to him. He stood silent a +moment, looking thoughtfully down the street, and then shrugged his +shoulders. That was all. Gregg did not see the little pulse which began +to beat so furiously and suddenly in his cheek, nor hear the buzzing +which for a few seconds rendered him deaf to the shrill cries of the +schoolboys playing among the pillars of the market hall. + +“Mr. Lindo has changed his mind since yesterday, then,” Clode said at +last, speaking in his ordinary rather contemptuous tone. + +“Yes, I heard he was talking big then,” replied the doctor, delighted +with his success. “Defying the earl, and all the rest of it. That was +quite in his line. But I never heard that much came of his talking. +However, you are bound to stick up for him, I suppose.” + +The curate frowned a little at that—why, the doctor did not +understand—and then the two parted. Gregg went on his way to carry the +news to others, and Clode, after standing a moment in thought, turned +his steps toward the Town House. The sky had grown cloudy, the day cold +and raw. The leafless avenue and silent shrubberies through which he +strode presented but a wintry prospect to the common eye, but for him +the air was full of sunshine and green leaves and the songs of birds. +From despair to hope, from a prison to a palace, he had leapt at a +single bound. In the first intoxication of confidence he could even +spare a moment to regret that his hands were not _quite_ clean. He felt +a passing remorse for the doing of one or two things, as needless, it +now turned out, as they had been questionable. Nay, he could afford to +shudder, with a luxurious sense of danger safely passed, at the risks +he had been so foolish as to run; thanking Providence that his folly +had not landed him, as he now saw that it easily might have landed him, +in such trouble as would have effectually tripped up his rising +fortunes. + +He reached the Town House in a perfect glow of moral worth and +self-gratulation; and he was already half-way across the drawing-room +before he perceived that it contained, besides Mrs. Hammond and her +daughter, a third person. The third person was the rector. Except in +church the two men had not met since the day of the bazaar, and both +were unpleasantly surprised. Lindo rose slowly from a seat in one of +the windows, and, without stepping forward, stood silently looking at +his curate, as one requiring an explanation, not offering a greeting; +while Clode felt something of a shock, for he discerned at once that +the situation would admit of no half measures. In the presence of Mrs. +Hammond, to whom he had expressed his view of the rector’s conduct, he +could not adopt the cautious apologetic tone which he would probably +have used had he met Lindo alone. He was fairly caught. But he was not +a coward, and before the tell-tale flush had well mounted to his brow +he had determined on his _rôle_. + +Half-way across the room he stopped, and looked at Mrs. Hammond. “I +thought you were alone,” he said with an air of constraint, partly +real, partly assumed. + +“There is only the rector here,” she answered bluntly. And then she +added, with a little spice of malice, for Mr. Clode had not been a +favorite with her since his defection, “I suppose you are not afraid to +meet him?” + +“Certainly not,” the curate answered, thus challenged. And he turned +haughtily to meet the rector’s angry gaze. “I am not aware that I have +any need to be. I am glad to see that you are none the worse for your +gallant conduct last night,” he added with perfect _aplomb_. + +“Thank you,” Lindo answered, choking down his indignation with an +effort. For a week—for a whole week—this, his chosen lieutenant, had +not been near him in his trouble! “I am much obliged to you,” he +continued, “but I am rather surprised that your anxiety on my account +did not lead you to come and see me at the rectory.” + +“I called, and failed to find you,” Clode answered, sitting resolutely +down. + +Lindo followed his example. “I believe you did once,” he replied +contemptuously. Had a friend been about to succeed him, he could have +borne even to congratulate him. But the thought of this man entering on +the enjoyment of all the good things he was resigning was well-nigh +unendurable. Though he knew that it would best consort with his dignity +to be silent, he could not refrain from pursuing the subject. “You +thought,” he went on, the same gibe in his tone, “that a non-committal +policy was best, I suppose?” + +The curate for a moment sat silent, his dark face glowing with +resentment. “If you mean,” he said at last, neither Mrs. Hammond nor +her daughter venturing to interfere—the former because she thought he +was only getting his deserts, and the latter because she felt no call +to champion him at present—“if you mean that I did not wish to publish +my opinion, you are right, Mr. Lindo.” + +“I think you published it sufficiently for your purpose’” the young +rector retorted with bitterness. + +“Then why throw my non-committal policy in my teeth?” replied the +curate deftly. Thereby winning at least a logical victory. + +Lindo sneered and grew, of course, twice as angry as before. “Very +neatly put!” he said. “I do not doubt that you would have got out of +your confession of faith—or lack of faith—as cleverly, if circumstances +had required it.” + +The words were scarcely out of his mouth before Miss Hammond rose in a +marked way and left the room; while Clode for a moment glared at him as +though he would resent the insult—for it was little less—in a practical +manner. Fortunately the curate’s, calculating brain told him that +nothing could be gained by this, and with an admirable show of patience +and forbearance he waved the words aside. “I really do not understand +you,” he said with a maddening air of superiority. “I cannot be blamed +for having formed an opinion of my own on a subject which affected me. +Then, having formed it, what was I to do? Publish it, or keep it to +myself? As a fact, I did not publish it.” + +“Except by your acts,” said the rector. + +“Take it that way, then,” the curate replied, still with patience. “Do +I gather that you would have had me, though I held an opinion adverse +to you, come to you as before, be about you, treat you in all respects +as if I were on your side? Is that your complaint? That I did not play +the hypocrite?” + +The rector felt that he was fairly defeated and out-manœuvred; so much +so that Mrs. Hammond, whose sympathies were entirely on his side, +expected him to break into a furious passion. But the very skill and +coolness of his adversary acted as a warning and an example, and by a +mighty effort he controlled himself. He rose from his chair with +outward calmness, and, saying contemptuously, “Well, I am glad that I +know what your opinion is—an open foe is less dangerous than a secret +one,” he turned from Clode. Holding out his hand to his hostess, he +muttered some form of leave-taking, and walked out of the room with as +much dignity as he could muster. He had certainly had the worst of the +encounter. + +And he felt very bitter about it, as he crossed the top of the town. +Whether the curate knew of his intention of resigning or not, his +conduct in turning upon him and openly expressing his disbelief in his +honesty was alike cruel and brutal. The man was false. The rector felt +sure of it. But the pain which he experienced on this account—the pain +of a generous man misunderstood and ill-requited—soon gave way to +self-reproach. He had brought the thing on himself by his indiscreet +passion. He had acted like a boy! He was not fit to be in a responsible +position. + +While he was still full of this, chewing the cud of his imprudence, he +saw a slender figure, which he recognized, crossing the street a little +way before him. He knew it at the first glance. In a moment he +recognized the graceful lines, the half-proud, half-gentle carriage of +the head, the glint of the cold February sun in the fair hair. It was +Kate Bonamy; and the rector, as he increased his pace, became +conscious, with something like a shock, of the pleasure it gave him to +see her, though he had parted from her not twenty-four hours before. In +a moment he was at her side, and she, turning suddenly, saw him with a +start of glad surprise. “Mr. Lindo!” she stammered, holding out her +hand before he offered his, and uttering the first words which rose to +her lips, “I am so glad!” + +She was thinking of the pit accident, of the risk and his safety, and +perhaps a little of his good name. And he understood. But he affected +not to do so. “Are you indeed, Miss Bonamy?” he answered. “Glad that I +am going?” + +His eyes met hers, and then both his and hers fell. “No,” she said +gently and slowly. “But I am very glad, Mr. Lindo, that you have done +what seemed right to you without considering your own advantage.” + +“I have done a great deal since I saw you yesterday,” he answered, +taking refuge in a jest. + +“You have, indeed.” + +“Including taking your advice.” + +“I am quite sure you had made up your mind before you asked my +opinion,” she answered earnestly. + +“No,” he said, “I am sure I had not. It was your hint which led me to +think the position out from the beginning. When I did so it struck me +that, irritated by Lord Dynmore’s words and manner, I had considered +the question only as it affected him and myself. Going on to think of +the parish, I came to the conclusion, that I was quite unfit for the +position.” + +Kate started. The end of his sentence was a surprise to her. They were +walking along side by side now—very slowly—and she looked at him, mute +interrogation in her eyes. + +“I am too young,” he said. “Your father, you know, was of that opinion +from the first.” + +“Oh, but”—she answered hurriedly, “I——” + +“You do not think so?” he said with a droll glance. “Well, I am glad of +that. What? You were not going to say that, Miss Bonamy?” + +“No,” she answered, blushing. “I was going to say that my father’s +opinion might not now be the same, Mr. Lindo.” + +“I expect it is. However, the opinion on which I acted was my own. I +have a very hasty temper, do you know. This very afternoon I have been +quarrelling, and have put my foot into it! I confess I thought when I +came here that I could manage. Now I see I am not fit for it—for the +living, I mean.” + +“Perhaps,” she answered slowly and in a low voice, “you are the more +fit because you feel unfit.” + +“Well, I do not think I dare act on that,” he cried gaily. “So you now +see before you, Miss Bonamy, a very humble personage—a kind of clerical +man-of-all-work out of place! You do not know an incumbent of easy +temper who wants a curate, do you?” + +He spoke lightly, without any air of seeking or posing for admiration. +Yet there was a little inflection of bitterness in his voice which did +not escape her ear, and perhaps spoke to it—and to her heart—more +loudly, because it was not intended for either. She suddenly looked at +him, and her face quivered, and then she looked away. But he had seen +and understood. He marked the color rising to the roots of her hair, +and was as sure as if he had seen them that her eyes were wet with +tears. + +And then he knew. He felt a sudden answering yearning toward her, a +forgetfulness of all her surroundings, and of all his surroundings save +herself alone. What a fool, what an ingrate, what a senseless clod he +had been, not to have seen months before—when it was in his power to +win her, when he might have asked for something besides her pity, when +he had something to offer her—that she was the fairest, purest, noblest +of women! Now, when it was too late, and he had sacrificed all to a +stupid conventionality, a social prejudice—what was her father to her +save the natural crabbed foil of her grace and beauty—now he felt that +he would give all, only he had nothing to give, to see her wide gray +eyes grow dark with tenderness, and—and love. + +Yes, love. That was it. He knew now. “Miss Bonamy,” he said hurriedly. +“Will you——” + +Kate started. “Here is my cousin,” she said quietly, and yet with +suspicious abruptness. “I think he is looking for me, Mr. Lindo.” + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. +THE CUP AT THE LIP. + + +The ten days which followed the events just described were long +remembered in Claversham with fondness and regret. The accident at +Baerton, and the strange position of affairs at the rectory, falling +out together, created intense excitement in the town. The gossips had +for once as much to talk about as the idlest could wish, and found, +indeed, so much to say on the one side and the other that the grocer, +it was rumored, ordered in a fresh supply of tea, and the two bakers +worked double tides at making crumpets and Sally Lunns, and still +lagged behind the demand. Old Peggy from the almshouse hung about the +churchyard half the day, noting who called at the rector’s, and took as +much interest in her task as if her weekly dole had depended on Mr. +Lindo’s fortunes; while every one who could lay the least claim to +knowing more than his neighbors became for the time the object of as +many attentions as a London belle. + +The archdeacon drove in and out daily. Once the rumor got abroad that +he had gone to see Lord Dynmore; and more than once it was said that he +was away at the palace conferring with the bishop. Those most concerned +walked the streets with the faces of sphinxes. The curate and the +rector were known to be on the most distant terms; and to put an edge +on curiosity, already keen, Mrs. Hammond was twice seen talking to Mr. +Bonamy in the street. + +Even the poor colliers’ funeral, though a great number of the townsmen +trooped out to the bleak little churchyard on Baer Hill to witness +it—and to be rewarded by the sight of the young rector reading the +service in the midst of a throng of bareheaded pitmen such as no +Claversham eye had ever seen before—even this, which in ordinary times +would have furnished food for talk for a month, at least, went for +little now. It was discussed, indeed, for an evening, and then recalled +only for the sake of the light which it was supposed to throw upon the +rector’s fate. + +That gentleman, indeed, continued to present to the public an unmoved +face. But in private, in the seclusion of his study—the lordly room +which he had prized and appreciated from the first, taking its spacious +dignity as the measure of his success—he wore no mask. There he had—as +all men have, the man of destiny and the conscript alike—his solitary +hours of courage and depression, anxiety and resignation. Of hope also; +for even now—let us not paint him greater than he was—he clung to the +possibility that Lord Dynmore, whom every one agreed in describing as +irascible and hasty, but generous at bottom, would refuse to receive +his resignation of the living, and this in such terms as would enable +him to remain without sacrificing his self-respect. There would be a +victory indeed, and at times he could not help dwelling on the thought +of it. + +Consequently, when Mrs. Baker, four days after the funeral, ushered in +the archdeacon, and the young rector, turning at his writing-table, +read his fate in the old gentleman’s eyes, the news came upon him with +crushing weight. Yet he did not give way. He rose and welcomed his +visitor with a brave face. “So the bearer of the bow-string has come at +last!” he said lightly, as the two met on the hearth-rug. + +The archdeacon held his hand a few seconds longer than was necessary. +“Yes,” he said, “I am afraid that is about what I am. I am sorry to +bring you such news, Lindo—more sorry than I can tell you.” And, having +got so far, he dropped his hat and picked it up again in a great hurry, +and for a moment did not look at his companion. + +“After all,” the rector said manfully, “it is the only news I had a +right to expect.” + +“There is something in that,” the archdeacon admitted, sitting down. +“That is so, perhaps. All the same,” he went on, looking about him +unhappily, and rubbing his head in ill-concealed irritation, “if I had +known how the earl would take it, I should not have advised you to make +any concessions. No, I should not. But, there, he is an odd man—odder +than I thought.” + +“He accepts my offer to resign, of course?” + +“Yes.” + +“And that is all?” the rector said, a little huskiness in his tone. +“That is all,” the archdeacon replied, rubbing his head again. It was +plain that he had hard work to keep his vexation within bounds. + +“Well, I must not complain because he has taken me at my word,” the +rector said, recovering himself a little. + +“Well, I hoped the bishop might have had a word to say to it,” the +archdeacon grumbled. “But he had not, and I could not get to see his +wife. He spoke very highly of your conduct, but he did not see his way +clear, he said, to interfering.” + +“I scarcely see how he could,” Lindo answered slowly. + +“Well, I do not know. Bonamy’s representation in the church-wardens’ +names was very strong—very strong indeed, coming from them, you know.” + +Lindo reddened. “There is an odd man for you, if you like,” he said +impulsively. He was glad, perhaps, to change the subject. “He has +scarcely said a civil word to me since I came. He even began an action +against me. Yet when this happened he turned round and in his way +fought for me.” + +“Well, that is Bonamy all over!” the archdeacon answered, almost with +enthusiasm. “He is rough and crabbed, but he has the instincts of a +gentleman, which are the greater credit to him, since he is a self-made +man. I think I can tell you something about him, though, which you do +not know.” + +“Indeed?” said Lindo mechanically. + +“Yes. It has to do with your letter, too. I had it from Lord Dynmore. +In the first flush of his anger, it seems, he went to Bonamy and +directed him to take the necessary steps to eject you. He is not the +earl’s solicitor, and he must have seen an excellent opportunity of +getting hold of the Dynmore business through this. He could not but see +it. Nevertheless, he declined.” + +“Why?” asked the rector shortly. + +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders. “Ah! that I cannot say,” he +answered. “I only know that he did, putting forward some scruple or +other which sent the earl off almost foaming with rage; and, of course, +sent off with him Bonamy’s chance of his business.” + +“He is a strange man!” Lindo sighed as he spoke. + +The archdeacon took a turn up the room. “Now,” he said, coming back, “I +want to talk to you about another man.” + +“Clode?” muttered the rector. + +“Well, yes; you have guessed it,” the elder clergyman assented. “The +truth is, I am to offer him the living if you report well of him.” + +“I do not like him,” Lindo said briefly. + +“To be candid,” replied the other as briefly, “neither do I, now.” + +To that Lindo for a moment said nothing. The young man had fallen into +an old attitude, and stood with his foot on the fender, his head bent, +his eyes fixed on the fire. He was passing through a temptation. Here +was a brave vengeance ready to his hand. The man who had behaved badly, +heartlessly, disloyally to him, who had taken part against him, and +been hard and unfriendly from the moment of Lord Dynmore’s return, was +now in his power. He had only to say that he distrusted Clode, that he +suspected him of being unscrupulous, even that their connection had not +been satisfactory to himself—and the thing was done. Clode would not +have the living. + +Yet he hesitated to say those words. He felt that the thing was a +temptation. + +He remembered that Clode had worked well in the parish, and that his +only offence was a private one. And, not at once, but after a pause, he +gulped down the temptation, and, looking up with a flushed face, spoke. +“Yes,” he said, “I must report well of him—in the parish, that is. He +is a good worker. I am bound to say as much as that, I think.” + +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders once more. “Right!” he said, with +a certain curtness which hid his secret disgust. “I suppose that is +all, then. Will you come with me and tell him?” + +“No,” the rector answered very decidedly, “certainly I will not.” + +“It will look well,” the other still suggested. + +“No,” Lindo replied again, almost in anger, “I cannot sincerely +congratulate the man, and I will not!” + +Nor would he budge from that resolve; and when the archdeacon called at +the curate’s lodgings a few minutes later, he called alone. The man he +sought was out, however. “Mr. Clode is at the Reading-Room, I think, +sir,” the landlady said, with her deepest courtesy. And thither, +accordingly, after a moment’s hesitation, the archdeacon went. + +The gas in the big, barely-furnished room, which we have visited more +than once, had just been lit, but the blinds still remained up; and in +this mingling of lights the place looked less home-like and more +uncomfortable than usual. There were three people in the room when the +archdeacon entered. Two sat reading by the fire, their backs to the +door. The third—the future rector—was standing up near one of the +windows, taking advantage of the last rays of daylight to read the +_Times_, which he held open before him. The archdeacon cast a casual +glance at the others, and then stepped across to him and touched him on +the shoulder. + +Clode turned with a start. He had not heard the approaching footstep. +One glance at the newcomer’s face, however, set his blood in a glow. It +told him, or almost told him, all; and instinctively he dropped his +eyes, that the other might not read in them his triumph and exultation. + +The archdeacon’s first words confirmed him in his hopes. “I have some +good news for you, Mr. Clode,” he said, smiling benevolently. He had of +late distrusted the curate, as we have seen; but he was a man of kindly +nature, and such a man cannot convey good tidings without entering into +the recipient’s feelings. “I saw Lord Dynmore yesterday,” he continued. + +“Indeed,” said the curate a little thickly. His face had grown hot, but +the increasing darkness concealed this. + +“Yes,” the archdeacon resumed, in a confidential tone which was yet +pretty audible through the room. “You have heard, no doubt, that Mr. +Lindo has resigned the living?” + +The curate nodded. At that moment he dared not speak. A dreadful +thought was in his mind. What if the archdeacon’s good news was news +that the earl declined to receive the resignation? Some people might +call that good news! The mere thought struck him dumb. + +The archdeacon’s next words resolved his doubts. “Frankly,” the elder +man said in a genial tone, “I am sorry—sorry that circumstances have +forced him to take so extreme a step. But having said that, Mr. Clode, +I have done for the present with regret, and may come to pleasanter +matter. I have to congratulate you. I am happy to say that Lord +Dynmore, whom I saw yesterday, has authorized me to offer the living to +you.” + +The newspaper rustled in the curate’s grasp, and for a moment he did +not answer. Then he said huskily, “To me?” + +“Yes,” the archdeacon answered expansively—it was certainly a pleasant +task he had in hand, and he could not help beaming over it. “To you, +Mr. Clode. On one condition only,” he continued, “which is usual enough +in all such cases, and I venture to think is particularly natural in +this case. I mean that you have your late rector’s good word.” + +“Mr. Lindo’s good word?” the curate stammered. + +“Of course,” the unconscious archdeacon answered. + +The curate’s jaw dropped; but by an effort he forced a ghastly smile. +“To be sure,” he said. “There will be no difficulty about that, I +think.” + +“No,” replied the other, “for I have just seen him, and can say at once +that he is prepared to give it you. He has behaved throughout in a most +generous manner, and the consequence is that I have nothing more to do +except to offer you my congratulations on your preferment.” + +For a moment Clode could scarcely believe in his happiness. In the +short space of two minutes he had tasted to the full both the pleasure +of hope and the pang of despair. Could it be that all that was over +already? That the period of waiting and uncertainty was past and gone? +That the prize to which he had looked so long—and with the prize the +woman he loved—was his at last?—was actually in his grasp? + +His head reeled, great as was his self-control, and a haze rose before +his eyes. As this passed away he became conscious that the archdeacon +was shaking his hand with great heartiness, and that the thing was +real! He was rector, or as good as rector, of Claversham. The object of +his ambition was his! He was happy: perhaps it was the happiest moment +of his life. He had even time to wonder whether he could not do Lindo a +good turn—whether he could not somehow make it up to him. + +“You are very good,” he muttered, gratefully pressing the archdeacon’s +hand. + +“I am glad it is not a stranger,” that gentleman replied heartily. +“Oh,” he continued, turning and speaking in a different tone, “is that +you, Mr. Bonamy? Well, there can be no harm in your hearing the news +also. You are people’s warden, of course, and have a kind of claim to +hear it early. To be sure you have.” + +“What is the news?” Mr. Bonamy asked rather shortly. He had risen and +drawn near unnoticed, Jack Smith behind him. “Do I understand that Lord +Dynmore has accepted the rector’s resignation?” + +“That is so.” + +“And that he proposes to present Mr. Clode?” the lawyer continued, +looking at the curate as he named him. + +“Precisely,” replied the archdeacon, without hesitation. + +“I hope you have no objection, Mr. Bonamy,” said the curate, bowing +slightly with a gracious air. He could afford to be gracious now. He +even felt good—as men in such moments do. + +But in the lawyer’s response there was no graciousness, nor much +apparent goodness. “I am afraid,” he said, standing up gaunt and stiff, +with a scowl on his face, “that I must take advantage of that saving +clause, Mr. Clode. I am people’s warden, as the archdeacon says, and +frankly I object to your appointment—to your appointment as rector +here.” + +“You object!” the curate stammered, between wrath and wonder. + +“Bless me!” exclaimed the archdeacon in unmixed astonishment. “What do +you mean?” + +“Just what I say. I object,” repeated the lawyer firmly. This time +Clode said nothing, but his eyes flashed, and he drew himself up, his +face dark with passion. “Shall I state my objection now?” Mr. Bonamy +continued, with the utmost gravity. “It is not quite formal, but—very +well, I will do so. I have rather a curious story to tell, and I must +go back a short time. When Mr. Lindo’s honesty in accepting the living +was called in question about a month ago, he referred to the letters in +which Lord Dynmore’s agents conveyed the offer to him. He had those +letters by him. Naturally, he had preserved them with care, and he +began to regard them in the light of valuable evidence on his behalf, +since they showed the facts brought to his knowledge when he accepted +the living. I have said that he had preserved them with care; and, +indeed, he is prepared to say to-day, that from the time of his arrival +here until now, they have never, with his knowledge or consent, passed +out of his possession.” + +The lawyer’s rasping voice ceased for a moment. Stephen Clode’s face +was a shade paler, but away from the gas-jets this could not be +distinguished. He was arming himself to meet whatever shock was to +come, while below this voluntary action of the brain his mind ran in an +undercurrent of fierce, passionate anger against himself—anger that he +had ever meddled with those fatal letters. Oh, the folly, the +uselessness, the danger of that act, as he saw them now! + +“Nevertheless,” Mr. Bonamy resumed in the same even, pitiless tone, +“when Mr. Lindo referred to these letters—which he kept, I should add, +in a locked cupboard in his library—he found that the first in date, +and the most important of them all, had been mutilated.” + +The curate’s brow cleared. “What on earth,” he broke out, “has this to +do with me, Mr. Bonamy?” And he laughed—a laugh of relief and triumph. +The lawyer’s last words had lifted a weight from his heart. They had +found a mare’s nest after all. + +“Quite so!” the archdeacon chimed in with good-natured fussiness. “What +has all this to do with the matter in hand, or with Mr. Clode, Mr. +Bonamy? I fail to see.” + +“In a moment I will show you,” the lawyer answered. Then he paused, +and, taking a letter-case form his pocket, leisurely extracted from it +a small piece of paper. “I will first ask Mr. Clode,” he continued, “to +tell us if he supplied Mr. Lindo with the names of a firm of Birmingham +solicitors.” + +“Certainly I did,” replied the curate haughtily. + +“And you gave him their address, I think?” + +“I did.” + +“Perhaps you can tell me, then, whether that is the address you wrote +for him,” continued the lawyer smoothly, as he held out the paper for +the curate’s inspection. + +“It is,” Clode answered at once. “I wrote it for Mr. Lindo, in my own +room, and gave it him there. But I fail to see what all this has to do +with the point you have raised,” he continued with considerable heat. + +“It has just this to do with it, Mr. Clode,” the lawyer answered drily, +a twinkle in his eyes—“that this address is written on the reverse side +of the very piece of paper which is missing from Mr. Lindo’s letter—the +important letter I have described. And I wish to ask you, and I think +it will be to your interest to give as clear an answer to the question +as possible, how you came into possession of this scrap of paper.” + +The curate glared at his questioner. “I do not understand you,” he +stammered. And he held out his hand for the paper. + +“I think you will when you look at both sides of the sheet,” replied +the lawyer, handing it to him. “On one side there is the address you +wrote. On the other are the last sentence and signature of a letter +from Messrs. Gearns & Baker to Mr. Lindo. The question is a very simple +one. How did you get possession of this piece of paper?” + +Clode was silent—silent, though he knew that the archdeacon was looking +at him, and that a single hearty spontaneous denial might avert +suspicion. He stood holding the paper in his hand, and gazing stupidly +at the damning words, utterly unable to comprehend for the moment how +they came to be there. Little by little, however, as the benumbing +effects of the surprise wore off, his thoughts went back to the evening +when the address was written, and he remembered how the rector had come +in and surprised him, and how he had huddled away the letters. In his +disorder, no doubt, he had left one lying among his own papers, and +made the fatal mistake of tearing from it the scrap on which he had +written the address. + +He saw it all as he stood there, still gazing at the piece of paper, +while his rugged face grew darkly red and then again a miserable +sallow, and the perspiration sprang out upon his forehead. He felt that +the archdeacon’s eyes were upon him, that the archdeacon was waiting +for him to speak. He saw the mistake he had made, but his brain, +usually so ready, failed to supply him with the explanation he +required. + +“You understand?” Mr. Bonamy said slowly. “The question is, how this +letter came to be in your room that evening, Mr. Clode. That is the +question.” + +“I cannot say,” he answered huskily. He was so shaken by the unexpected +nature of the attack, and by the strange and ominous way in which the +evidence against him had arisen, that he had not the courage to look up +and face his accuser. “I think—nay, I am sure, indeed—that the rector +must have given me the paper,” he explained, after an awkward pause. + +“He is positive he did not,” Mr. Bonamy answered. + +Then Clode recovered himself and looked up. After all, it was only his +word against another’s. “Possibly he is,” he said, “and yet he may be +mistaken. I cannot otherwise see how the paper could have come into my +hands. You do not really mean,” he continued with a smile, which was +almost easy, “to charge me with stealing the letter, I suppose?” + +“Well, to be quite candid, I do,” Mr. Bonamy replied curtly. Nor was +this unexpected slap in the face rendered more tolerable by the +qualification he hastened to add—“or getting it stolen.” + +The curate started. “This is not to be borne,” he cried hotly. He +looked at the archdeacon as if expecting him to interfere. But he found +that gentleman’s face grave and troubled, and, seeing he must expect no +help from him at present, he continued, “Do you dare to make so serious +an accusation on such evidence as this, Mr. Bonamy?” + +“On that,” the lawyer replied, pointing to the paper, “and on other +evidence besides.” + +The curate flinched. Had they found Felton, the earl’s servant? Had +they any more scraps of paper—any more self-wrought damning evidence of +that kind? It was only by an effort, which was apparent to one at least +of his hearers, that he gathered himself together, and answered, with a +show of promptitude and ease, “Other evidence? What, I ask? Produce +it!” + +“Here it is,” said Mr. Bonamy, pointing to Jack Smith, who had been +standing at his elbow throughout the discussion. + +“What has he to do with it?” Clode muttered with dry lips. + +“Only this,” the barrister said quietly, addressing himself to the +archdeacon. “That some time ago I saw Mr. Clode replace a packet in the +cupboard in the rector’s library. He only discovered my presence in the +room when the cupboard door was open, and his agitation on observing me +struck me as strange. Afterward I made inquiries of Mr. Lindo, without +telling him my reason, and learned that Mr. Clode had no business at +that cupboard—which was, in fact, devoted to the rector’s private +papers.” + +“Perhaps, Mr. Clode, you will explain that,” said the lawyer with quiet +triumph. + +He might have denied it had he spoken out at once. He might have given +Jack the lie. But he saw with sudden and horrible clearness how this +thing fitted that other thing, and this evidence corroborated that; and +he lost his presence of mind, and for a moment stood speechless, +glaring at his new accuser. He did not need to look at the archdeacon +to be sure that his face was no longer grave only, but stern and +suspicious. The gas-jets flared before his eyes and dazzled him. The +room seemed to be turning. He could not answer. It was only when he had +stood for an age, as it seemed to him, dumb and self-convicted before +those three faces, that he summoned up courage to mutter, “It is false. +It is all false, I say!” and to stamp his foot on the floor. + +But no one answered him, and he quailed. His nerves were shaken. He, +who on ordinary occasions prided himself on his tact and management, +dared not now urge another word in his own defence lest some new piece +of evidence should arise to give him the lie. The meaning silence of +his accusers and his own conscience were too much for him. And, +suddenly snatching up his hat, which lay on a chair beside him, he +rushed from the room. + +He had not gone fifty yards along the pavement before he recognized the +mad folly of this retreat—the utter surrender of all his hopes and +ambitions which it meant. But it was too late. The strong man had met a +stronger. His very triumph and victory had gone some way toward undoing +him, by rendering him more open to surprise and less prepared for +sudden attack. Now it was too late to do more than repent. He saw that. +Hurrying through the darkness, heedless whither he went, he invented a +dozen stories to explain his conduct. But always the archdeacon’s grave +face rose before him, and he rejected the clever fictions and the +sophisms in support of them, which his ingenuity was now so quick to +suggest. + +How he cursed the madness, the insensate folly, which had wrecked him! +Had he only let matters take their own course and stood aside, he would +have gained his ends! For a minute and a half he had been as good as +rector of Claversham. And now! + +Laura Hammond, crossing the hall after tea, heard the outer door open +behind her, and, feeling the cold gust of air which entered, stopped +and turned, and saw him standing on the mat. He had let himself in in +this way on more than one occasion before, and it was not that which in +a moment caused her heart to sink. She had been expecting him all day, +for she knew the crisis was imminent, and had been hourly looking for +news. But she had not been expecting him in this guise. There was a +strange disorder in his air and manner. He was wet and splashed with +mud. He held his hat in his hand, as if he had been walking bareheaded +in the rain. His eyes shone with a wild light, and he looked at her +oddly. She turned and went toward him. “Is it you?” she said timidly. + +“Oh, yes, it is I,” he answered, with a forced laugh. “I want to speak +to you.” And he let drop the _portière_, which he had hitherto held in +his hand. + +There was a light in the breakfast-room, which opened on the hall, and +she led the way into that room. He followed her and closed the door +behind him. She pointed to a chair, but he did not take it. “What is +it?” she said, looking up at him in real alarm. “What is the matter, +Stephen?” + +“Everything!” he answered, with another laugh. “I am leaving +Claversham.” + +“You are leaving?” she said incredulously. + +“Yes, leaving!” he answered. + +“To-night?” she stammered. + +“Well, not to-night,” he answered, with rude irony. “To-morrow. I have +been within an ace of getting the living, and I—I have lost it. That is +all.” + +Her cheek turned a shade paler, and she laid one hand on the table to +steady herself. “I am so sorry,” she murmured. + +He did not see her tremor; he heard only her words, and he resented +them bitterly. “Have you nothing more to say than that?” he cried. + +She had much more to say—or, rather, had she said all that was in her +mind she would have had. But his tone helped her to recover +herself—helped her to play the part on which she had long ago decided. +In her way she loved this man, and her will had melted at sight of him, +standing downcast and defeated before her. Had he attacked her on the +side of her affections he might have done much—he might have prevailed. +But his hard words recalled her to her natural self. “What would you +have me say?” she answered, looking steadily across the table at him. +Something, she began to see, had happened besides the loss of the +living—something which had hurt him sorely. And as she discerned this, +she compared his dishevelled, untidy dress with the luxury of the room, +and shivered at the thought of the precipice on the brink of which she +had paused. + +He did not answer. + +“What would you have me say?” she repeated more firmly. + +“If you do not know, I cannot teach you,” he retorted, with a sneer. + +“You have no right to say that,” she replied bravely. “You remember our +compact.” + +“You intend to keep to it?” he answered scornfully. + +She had no doubt about that now, and she summoned up her courage by an +effort. “Certainly I do,” she murmured. “I thought you understood me. I +tried to make my meaning clear.” + +Clode did not answer her at once. He stood looking at her, his eyes +glowing. He knew that his only hope, if hope there might be, lay in +gaining some word from her now—now, before any rumor to his +disadvantage should get abroad in the town. But his temper, long +restrained, was so infuriated by disappointment and defeat, that for +the moment love did not prevail with him. He knew that a tender word +might do much, but he could not frame it. When he did at last find +tongue it was only to say, “And that is your final decision?” + +“It is,” she answered in a low voice. She did not dare to look up at +him. + +“And all you have to say to me?” + +“Yes. Except that I wish you well. I shall always wish you well, Mr. +Clode,” she muttered. + +“Thank you,” he answered coldly. + +So coldly, and with so much composure, that she did not guess the gust +of hatred of all things and all men which was in his heart. He was +beside himself with love, rage, disappointment. For a moment longer he +stood gazing at her downcast face. But she did not look up at him; and +presently, in a strange silence, he turned and went out of the room. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV. +HUMBLE PIE. + + +The success of reticence is great. Mr. Bonamy and his nephew, as they +went home to tea after their victory, plumed themselves not a little +upon the proof of this which they had just given Mr. Clode. They said +little, it is true; even to one another, but more than once Mr. Bonamy +chuckled in a particularly dry manner, and at the top of the street +Jack made an observation “You think the archdeacon was satisfied?” he +asked, turning to his companion for a moment. + +“Absolutely,” quoth Mr. Bonamy; and he strode on with one hand in his +pocket, his coat-tails flying, and his money jingling in a manner +inimitable by any other Claversham person. + +At tea they were both silent upon the subject, but the lawyer presently +let drop the fact that the earl had accepted the rector’s resignation. +Jack, watchfully jealous, poor fellow, yet in his jealousy loyal to the +core, glanced involuntarily at Kate to see what effect the news +produced upon her; and then glanced swiftly away again. Not so swiftly, +however, that the change in the girl’s face escaped him. He saw it +flush with mingled pride and alarm, and then grow grave and thoughtful. +After that she kept her eyes averted from him, and he talked busily to +Daintry. “I must be leaving you to-morrow,” he said by-and-by, as they +rose from the table. + +“You will be coming back again?” Mr. Bonamy answered, interrupting a +loud wail from Daintry. It should be explained that Jack had not stayed +through the whole of these weeks at Claversham, but had twice left for +some days on circuit business. Mr. Bonamy thought he was meditating +another of these disappearances. + +“I should like to do so,” Jack answered quietly, “but I must get back +to London now.” + +“Well, your room will be ready for you whenever you like to come to +us,” Mr. Bonamy replied with crabbed graciousness. And he fully meant +what he said. He had grown used to Jack’s company. He saw, too, the +change his presence had made in the girls’ lives, and possibly he +entertained some thoughts of a greater change which the cousin might +make in the life of one of them. + +So he was sorry to lose Jack. But Daintry was inconsolable. When she +and Kate were alone together she made her moan, sitting in a great +chair three sizes too big for her, with her legs sprawling before her, +her hands on the chair-arms, and her eyes on the fire. “Oh, dear, what +shall we do when he is gone, Kate?” she said disconsolately. “Won’t it +be miserable?” + +Kate, who was bending over her work, and had been unusually silent for +some time, looked up with a start and a rush of color to her cheeks. +“When who is gone—oh, you mean Jack!” she said rather incoherently. + +“Of course I do,” Daintry answered crossly. “But you never did care for +Jack.” + +“You have no right to say that,” Kate answered quickly, letting her +work drop for the moment. “I think Jack is one of the noblest, the most +generous—yes,” she continued quickly, “the bravest man I have ever +known, Daintry.” + +Her voice trembled, and Daintry saw with surprise that her eyes were +full of tears. “I never thought you felt like that about him,” the +younger girl answered penitently. + +“Perhaps I did not a little while back,” Kate answered gently, as she +took up her work again. “I know him better now, that is all.” + +It was quite true. She knew him better now. A fellow-feeling makes us +wondrous kind. Love, which blinds our eyes to some things, opens them +to others. Had Jack offered Kate “Their Wedding Journey” now she might +still have asked him to change the book for another, but assuredly she +would not have told him it sounded silly, nor hurt his feelings by so +much as a look. + +It was quite true that she thought him all she said, that her eyes grew +moist for his sake. But his was the minute only; the hour was +another’s. Daintry, proceeding to speculate gloomily on the dulness of +Claversham without Jack, thought her sister was attending to her, +whereas Kate’s thoughts were far away now, centred on a fair head and a +bright boyish face, and a solitary room in which she pictured Reginald +Lindo sitting alone and despondent, the short-lived brilliance of his +Claversham career already extinguished. What were his thoughts, she +wondered. Was he regretting—for the strongest have their hours of +weakness—the step he had taken? Was he blaming her for the advice she +had given? Was he giving a thought to her at all, or only planning the +new life on which he must now enter—forming the new hopes which must +henceforth cheer him on? + +Kate let her work drop and looked dreamily before her. Assuredly the +prospect was a dull and uninviting one. Before _his_ coming there had +always been the unknown something, which a girl’s future holds—a +possibility of change, of living a happier, fuller life. But now she +had nothing of this kind before her. He had come and robbed her even of +this, and given her in return only regret and humiliation, and a few—a +very few—hours of strange pleasure and sunshine and womanly pride in a +woman’s influence nobly used. Yet would she have had it otherwise? No, +not for all the unknown possibilities of change, not though Claversham +life should stretch its dulness unbroken through a century. + +She was sitting alone in the dining-room next morning, Mr. Bonamy being +at the office, and Daintry out shopping, when the maid came in and +announced that Mr. Lindo was at the door and wished to see her. “Are +you sure that he did not ask for Mr. Bonamy?” Kate said, rising and +laying down her work with outward composure and secret agitation. + +“No; he asked particularly for you, miss,” the servant answered, +standing with her hand on the door. + +“Very well; you can show him in here,” Kate replied, casting an eye +round her, but disdaining to remove the signs of domestic employment +which met its scrutiny. “He has come to say good-by,” she thought to +herself; and she schooled herself to play her part fitly and close the +little drama with decency and reserve. + +He came in looking very thoughtful. She need not have feared for her +father’s papers, her sister’s dog’s-eared Ollendorf, or her own sewing. +He did not so much as glance at them. She thought she saw business in +his eye, and she said as he advanced, “Did you wish to see me or my +father, Mr. Lindo?” + +“You, Miss Bonamy,” he answered, shaking hands with her. “You have +heard the news, I suppose?” + +“Yes,” she replied soberly. “I am so very sorry. I fear—I mean I regret +now, that when you——” + +“Asked for advice”—he continued, helping her out with a grave smile. He +had taken the great leather-covered easy-chair on the other side of the +fireplace, and was sitting forward in it, toying with his hat. + +“Yes,” she said, coloring—“if you like to put it in that very +flattering form—I regret now that I presumed to give it, Mr. Lindo.” + +“I am sorry for that,” he answered, looking up at her as he spoke. + +She felt herself coloring anew. “Why?” she asked rather tremulously. + +“Because I have come to ask your advice again. You will not refuse to +give it me?” + +She looked at him in surprise; with a little annoyance even. It was +absurd. Why should he come to her in this way? Why, because on one +occasion, when circumstances had impelled him to speak and her to +answer, she had presumed to advise—why should he again come to her of +set purpose? It was ridiculous of him. “I think I must refuse,” she +said gravely and a little formally. “I know nothing of business.” + +“It is not upon a matter of business,” he answered. + +She uttered a sigh of impatience. “I think you are very foolish, Mr. +Lindo. Why do you not go to my father?” + +“Well, because it is—because it is on a rather delicate matter,” he +answered impulsively. + +“Still I do not see why you should bring it to me,” she objected, with +a flash in her gray eyes, and many memories in her mind. + +“Well, I will tell you why I bring it to you,” he answered bluntly. +“Because I acted on your advice the other day; and that, you see, Miss +Bonamy, has put me in this fix; and—and, in fact, made other advice +necessary, don’t you see?” + +“I see you are inclined to be somewhat ungenerous,” she answered. “But +if it must be so, pray go on.” + +He rose slowly and stood leaning against the mantel-shelf in his +favorite attitude, his foot on the fender. “I will be as short as I +can,” he said, a nervousness she did not fail to note in his manner. +“Perhaps you will kindly hear me to the end before you solve my problem +for me. It will help me a little, I think, if I may put my case in the +third person. Miss Bonamy”—he paused on the name and cleared his +throat, and then went on more quickly—“a man I know, young and keen, +and at the time successful—successful beyond his hopes, so that others +of his age and standing looked on him with envy, came one day to know a +girl, and, from the moment of knowing her, to admire and esteem her. +She was not only very beautiful, but he thought he saw in her, almost +from the first hour of their acquaintance, such noble and generous +qualities as all men, even the weakest, would fain imagine in the woman +they love.” + +Kate moved suddenly in her chair as if to rise. Then she sat back +again, and he went on. + +“This was a weak man,” he said in a low voice. “He had had small +experience; let that be some excuse for him. He entered at this time on +a new field of work in which he found himself of importance and fancied +himself of greater importance. There he had frequent opportunities of +meeting the woman I have mentioned, who had already made an impression +on him. But his head was turned. He discovered that for certain small +and unworthy reasons her goodness and her fairness were not recognized +by those among whom he mixed, and he had the meanness to swim with the +current and to strive to think no more of the woman to whom his heart +had gone out. He acted like a cur, in fact, and presently he had his +reward. Evil times came upon him. The position he loved was threatened. +Finally he lost it, and found himself again where he had started in +life—a poor curate without influence or brilliant prospects. Then—it +seems an ignoble, a mean, and a miserable thing to say—he found out for +certain that he loved this woman, and could imagine no greater honor or +happiness than to have her for his wife.” + +He paused a moment, and stole a glance at her. Kate sat motionless and +still, her lips compressed and her eyes hidden by their long lashes, +her gaze fixed apparently on the fire. Save that her face was slightly +flushed, and that she breathed quickly, he might have fancied that she +did not understand, or even that she had not heard. When he spoke +again, after waiting anxiously and vainly for any sign, his voice was +husky and agitated. “Will you tell me, Miss Bonamy, what he should do?” +he said. “Should he ask her to forgive him and to trust him, or should +he go away and be silent?” + +She did not speak. + +“Kate, will you not tell me? Can I not hope to be forgiven?” He was +stooping beside her now, and his hand almost touched her hair. + +Then, at last, she looked up at him. “Will not my advice come a little +late?” she whispered tremulously and yet with a smile—a smile which was +at once bright and tearful and eloquent beyond words. + +Afterward she thought of a dozen things she should have said to +him—about his certainty of himself, about her father; but at the time +none of these occurred to her. If he had come to her with his hands +full, it would certainly have been otherwise. But she saw him poor +through his own act, and her pride left her. When he took her in his +arms and kissed her, she said not a word. And he said only, “My +darling!” + +* * * * * + + +The rich can afford to be niggardly. Lindo did not stay long, the +question he had to put once answered, his claim to happiness once +allowed. When Mr. Bonamy came in half an hour later, he found Kate +alone. There was an austere elation in his eye which for a moment led +her to think that he had heard her news. His first words, however, +dispelled the idea. “I have just seen Lord Dynmore,” he said, taking +his coat-skirts on his arms and speaking with a geniality which showed +that he was moved out of his every-day self. “He has—he has +considerably surprised me.” + +“Indeed?” said Kate, blushing and conscious, half-attentive and half +given up to thinking how she should tell her own tale. + +“Yes. He has very much surprised me. He has asked me to undertake the +agency of his property in this part of the country.” + +Kate dropped her sewing in genuine surprise “No?” she said. “Has he, +indeed?” + +Mr. Bonamy, pursing up his lips to keep back the smile of complacency +which would force its way, let his eyes rove round the room. “Yes,” he +said, “I do not mind saying here that I am rather flattered. Of course +I should not say as much out of doors.” + +“Oh, papa, I am so glad,” she cried, rising. An unwonted softness in +her tone touched and pleased him. + +“Yes,” he continued, “I am to go over to the park to-morrow to lunch +with him and talk over matters. He told me something else which will +astonish you. He has behaved very handsomely to Mr. Lindo. It seems he +saw him early this morning, after having an interview with the +archdeacon, and offered him the living of Pocklington, in +Oxfordshire—worth, I believe, about five hundred a year. He is going to +give the vicar of Pocklington the rectory here.” + +Kate’s face was scarlet. “But I thought—I understood,” she stammered, +“that Mr. Clode was to be rector here?” + +“Not at all,” said Mr. Bonamy, with some asperity. “The whole thing was +settled before ten o’clock this morning. Mary told me at the door that +Lindo had been here since, so I supposed he had told you something +about it.” + +“He did not tell me a word of it!” Kate answered impulsively, the +generous trick her lover had played breaking in upon her mind in all +its fulness. “Not a word of it! But papa”—with a pause and then a rush +of words—“he asked me to be his wife, and I—I told him I would.” + +For a moment Mr. Bonamy stared at his daughter as if he thought she had +lost her wits. Probably since his boyhood he had never been so much +astonished. “I was talking of Mr. Lindo,” he said at length, speaking +with laborious clearness. “You are referring to your cousin, I fancy.” + +“No,” Kate said, striving with her happy confusion. “I mean Mr. Lindo, +papa.” + +“Indeed! indeed!” Mr. Bonamy answered after another pause, speaking +still more slowly, and gazing at her as if he had never seen her +before, nor anything at all like her. “You have a good deal surprised +me. And I am not easily surprised, I think. Not easily, I think.” + +“But you are not angry with me, papa?” she murmured rather tearfully. + +For a moment he still stared at her in silence, unable to overcome his +astonishment. Then by a great effort he recovered himself. “Oh, no,” he +said, with a smack of his old causticity, “I do not see why I should be +angry with you, Kate. Indeed, I may say I foretold this. I always said +that young man would introduce great changes, and he has done it. He +has fulfilled my words to the letter, my dear!” + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI. +LOOSE ENDS. + + +Dr. Gregg was one of the first persons in the town to hear of the late +rector’s engagement. His reception of the news was characteristic. “I +don’t believe it!” he shrieked. “I don’t believe it! It is all rubbish! +What has he got to marry upon, I should like to know?” + +His informant ventured to mention the living of Pocklington. + +“I don’t believe it!” the little doctor shrieked. “If he had got that +he would see her far enough before he would marry her. Do you think I +am such a fool as to believe that?” + +“But you see, Bonamy—the earl’s agency will be rather a lift in the +world for him. And he has money.” + +“I don’t believe it!” shrieked Gregg again. But, alas! he did. He knew +that these things were true, and when he next met Bonamy he smiled a +wry smile, and tried to swallow his teeth, and grovelled, still with +the native snarl curling his lips at intervals. The doctor, indeed, had +to suffer a good deal of unhappiness in these days. Clode, about whom +he had boasted largely, was conspicuous by his absence. Lord Dynmore’s +carriage might be seen any morning in front of the Bonamy offices. And +rumor said that the earl had taken a strange fancy to the young +clergyman whom he had so belabored. Things seemed to Gregg and to some +other people in Claversham to be horribly out of joint at this time. + +Among others, poor Mrs. Hammond found her brain somewhat disordered. To +the curate’s unaccountable withdrawal, as to the translation of the +late rector to Pocklington, she could easily reconcile herself. But to +Mr. Lindo’s engagement to the lawyer’s daughter, and to the surprising +intimacy between the earl and Mr. Bonamy, she could not so readily make +up her mind. Why, it was reported that the earl had walked into town +and taken tea at Mr. Bonamy’s house! Still, facts are stubborn things, +nor was it long before Mrs. Hammond was heard to say that the lawyer’s +conduct in supporting Mr. Lindo in his trouble had produced a very +favorable impression on her mind, and prepared her to look upon him in +a new light. + +And Laura? Laura, during these changes, showed herself particularly +bright and sparkling. She was not of a nature to feel even defeat very +deeply, or to philosophize much over past mistakes. Her mother saw no +change in her—nay, she marvelled, recalling her daughter’s intimacy +with Mr. Clode and the obstinacy she had exhibited in siding with him, +that Laura could so completely put him out of her mind and thoughts. +But the least sensitive feel sometimes. The most thoughtless have their +moments of care. Even the cat, with its love of home and comfort, will +sometimes wander on a wet night. And there are times when Laura, +doubting the future and weary of the present, wishes she had had the +courage to do as her heart bade her, and make the plunge, careless what +the world, and her rivals, might say of her marriage to a curate. For +Clode’s rugged face and masculine will dominate her still. Though a +year has elapsed, and she has not heard of him, nor probably will hear +of him now, she thinks of him with regret and soreness. She had not +much to give, but to her sorrow she knows now that she gave it to him, +and that in that struggle for supremacy both were losers. + +The good wine last. Kate broke the news to Jack herself, and found it +no news. “Yes, I have just seen Lindo,” he answered quietly, taking her +hand, and looking her in the face with dry eyes. “May he make you very +happy, Kate, and—well, I can wish you nothing better than that.” Then +Kate broke down and cried bitterly. When she recovered herself Jack was +gone. + +If you were to describe that scene to Jack Smith’s friends in the +Temple they would jeer at you. They would cover you with ridicule and +gibes. There is no one so keen, so sharp, so matter-of-fact, so certain +to succeed as he, they say. They have only one fault to find with him, +that he works too hard; that he bids fair to become one of those legal +machines which may be seen any evening taking in fuel at solitary club +tables, and returning afterward to dusty chambers, with the regularity +of clockwork. But there is one thing even in his present life which his +Temple friends do not know, and which gives me hope of him. Week by +week there comes to him a letter from the country from a long-limbed +girl in short frocks, whose hero he is. Time, which, like Procrustes’ +bed, brings frocks and legs to the same length at last, heals wounds +also. + +When a day not far distant now shall show him Daintry in the bloom of +budding womanhood, is it to be thought that Jack will resist her? I +think not. But, be that as it may, with no better savor than that of +his loyalty, the silent loyalty of an English friend, could the +chronicle of a Bayard—much less the tale of a country town—come to an +end. + +THE END. + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR *** + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the +United States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. 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Weyman</title> +<link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> +<style type="text/css"> + +body { margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; + text-align: justify; } + +hr {width: 80%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;} + +div.chapter {page-break-before: always; margin-top: 4em;} + +p {text-indent: 1em; + margin-top: 0.25em; + margin-bottom: 0.25em; } + +.center {margin: auto; text-align:center; margin-top:24pt; margin-bottom:24pt} + +p.continue {text-indent: 0in; margin-top:9pt;} + +.poem2 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + +.t0 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:0em; margin-right:0px;} +.t1 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:1em; margin-right:0px;} + +h1,h2,h3,h4,h5 {text-align: center;} + +span.sc {font-variant: small-caps; font-size:110%;} +span.sc2 {font-variant: small-caps; font-size:90%;} + +hr.W10 {width:10%; color:black; margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt} + +a:link {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:visited {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:hover {color:red} + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + +<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The New Rector, by Stanley J. Weyman</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The New Rector</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Stanley J. Weyman</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: March 20, 2012 [eBook #39215]<br /> +[Most recently updated: June 14, 2021]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Charles Bowen</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR ***</div> + +<h1>THE NEW RECTOR</h1> + +<h5>BY</h5> + +<h2>STANLEY J. WEYMAN</h2> + +<h4>NEW YORK</h4> + +<h2>AMERICAN PUBLISHERS CORPORATION</h2> + +<h4>310-318 Sixth Avenue</h4> + +<h4><span class="sc2">Copyright 1891,<br/> +BY</span><br/> +UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY.</h4> + +<hr class="W10" /> + +<h5><i>All rights reserved</i></h5> + +<hr /> + +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap01">CHAPTER I. “LE ROI EST MORT!”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap02">CHAPTER II. “VIVE LE ROI!”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap03">CHAPTER III. AN AWKWARD MEETING.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap04">CHAPTER IV. BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap05">CHAPTER V. “REGINALD LINDO, 1850.”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap06">CHAPTER VI. THE BONAMYS AT HOME.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap07">CHAPTER VII. THE HAMMONDS’ DINNER PARTY.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap08">CHAPTER VIII. TWO SURPRISES.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap09">CHAPTER IX. TOWN TALK.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap10">CHAPTER X. OUT WITH THE SHEEP.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap11">CHAPTER XI. THE DOCTOR SPEAKS.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap12">CHAPTER XII. THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap13">CHAPTER XIII. LAURA’S PROVISO.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap14">CHAPTER XIV. THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap15">CHAPTER XV. THE BAZAAR.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap16">CHAPTER XVI. “LORD DYNMORE IS HERE.”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap17">CHAPTER XVII. THE LAWYER AT HOME.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap18">CHAPTER XVIII. A FRIEND IN NEED.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap19">CHAPTER XIX. THE DAY AFTER.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap20">CHAPTER XX. A SUDDEN CALL.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap21">CHAPTER XXI. IN PROFUNDIS.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap22">CHAPTER XXII. THE RECTOR’S DECISION.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap23">CHAPTER XXIII. THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap24">CHAPTER XXIV. THE CUP AT THE LIP.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap25">CHAPTER XXV. HUMBLE PIE.</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap26">CHAPTER XXVI. LOOSE ENDS.</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>THE NEW RECTOR.</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a>CHAPTER I.<br/> +“LE ROI EST MORT!”</h2> + +<p> +The king was dead. But not at once, not until after some short breathing-space, +such as was pleasant enough to those whose only concern with the succession lay +in the shouting, could the cry of “Long live the king!” be raised. +For a few days there was no rector of Claversham. The living was during this +time in abeyance, or in the clouds, or in the lap of the law, or in any strange +and inscrutable place you choose to name. It may have been in the prescience of +the patron, and, if so, no locality could be more vague, the whereabouts of +Lord Dynmore himself, to say nothing of his prescience, being as uncertain as +possible. Messrs. Gearns & Baker, his solicitors and agents, should have +known as much upon this point as any one; yet it was their habit to tell one +inquirer that his lordship was in the Cordilleras, and another that he was on +the slopes of the Andes, and another that he was at the forty-ninth +parallel—quite indifferently—these places being all one to Messrs. +Gearns & Baker, whose walk in life had lain for so many years about +Lincoln’s Inn Fields that Clare Market had come to be their ideal of an +uncivilized country. +</p> + +<p> +And more, if the whereabouts of Lord Dynmore could only be told in words rather +far-sounding than definite, there was room for a doubt whether his prescience +existed at all. For, according to his friends, there never was a man whose +memory was so notably eccentric—not weak, but eccentric. And if his +memory was impeccable, his prescience— But we grow wide of the mark. The +question being merely where the living of Claversham was during the days which +immediately followed Mr. Williams’s death, let it be said at once that we +do not know. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Williams was the late incumbent. He had been rector of the little +Warwickshire town for nearly forty years; and although his people were ready +enough to busy themselves with the question of his successor, he did not lack +honor in his death. His had been a placid life, such as suited an indolent and +easy-going man. “Let me sit upon one chair and put up my feet on another, +and there I am,” he was once heard to say; and the town repeated the +remark and chuckled over it. There were some who would have had the parish move +more quickly, and who talked with a sneer of the old port-wine kind of parson. +But if he had done little good, he had done less evil. He was kindly and +open-handed, and he had not an enemy in the parish. He was regretted as much as +such a man should be. Besides, people did not die commonly in Claversham. It +was but once a year, or twice at the most, that any one who was any one passed +away. And so, when the event did occur the most was made of it in an +old-fashioned way. When Mr. Williams passed for the last time into his +churchyard, there was no window which did not, by shutter or blind, mark its +respect for him, not a tongue which wagged foul of his memory. And then the +shutters were taken down and the blinds pulled up, and every one, from Mr. +Clode, the curate, to the old people at Bourne’s Almhouses, who, having +no affairs of their own, had the more time to discuss their neighbors’, +asked, “Who is to be the new rector?” +</p> + +<p> +On the day of the funeral two of these old pensioners watched the +curate’s tall form as he came gravely along the opposite side of the +street, to fall in at the door of his lodgings with two ladies, one elderly, +one young, who were passing so opportunely that it really seemed as if they +might have been waiting for him. He and the elder lady—she was so plump +of figure, so healthy of eye and cheek, and was dressed besides with such a +comfortable richness that it did one good to look at her—began to talk in +a subdued, decorous fashion, while the girl listened. He was telling them of +the funeral, how well the archdeacon had read the service, and what a crowd of +Dissenters had been present, and so on: and at last he came to the important +question. +</p> + +<p> +“I hear, Mrs. Hammond,” he said, “that the living will be +given to Mr. Herbert of Easthope, whom you know, I think? To me? Oh, no, I have +not, and never had, any expectation of it. Please do not,” he added, with +a slight smile and a shake of the head, “mention such a thing again. +Leave me in my content.” +</p> + +<p> +“But why should you not have it?” said the young lady, with a +pleasant persistence. “Every one in the parish would be glad if you were +appointed. Could we not do something or say something—get up a petition +or anything? Lord Dynmore ought, of course, to give it to you. I think some one +should tell him what are the wishes of the parish. I do indeed!” +</p> + +<p> +She was a very pretty young lady, with bright brown eyes and hair and rather +arch features, and the gentleman she was addressing had long found her face +pleasant to look upon; but at this moment it really seemed to him as the face +of an angel. Yet he only answered with a kind of depressed gratitude. +“Thank you, Miss Hammond,” he said. “If good wishes could +procure me the living, I should have an excellent reason for hoping. But as +things are, it is not for me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Pooh! pooh!” said Mrs. Hammond cheerily, “who knows?” +And then, after a few more words, they went on their way, and he turned into +his rooms. +</p> + +<p> +The old women were still watching. “I don’t well know who’ll +get it, Peggy,” said one, “but I be pretty sure of this, as he +won’t! It isn’t his sort as gets ’em. It’s the +lord’s friends, bless you!” +</p> + +<p> +So it appeared that she and Mr. Clode were of one mind on the matter. But was +that really Mr. Clode’s opinion? It was when the crow opened its beak +that it dropped the piece of cheese; and so to this day the wise man has no +chance or expectation of this or that until he gets it. And if a patron or a +patron’s solicitor has for some days had under his paperweight a letter +written in a hand that bears a strange likeness to the wise man’s—a +letter setting forth the latter’s claims and wisdom—what of that? +That is a private matter, of course. +</p> + +<p> +Be that as it may, there was scarcely a person in Claversham who did not give +some time that evening, and on subsequent evenings too, to the interesting +question who was to be the new rector. The rector was a big factor in the +town-life. Girls wondered whether he would be young, and hoped he would dance. +Their mothers were sanguine that he would be unmarried, and their fathers that +he would play whist. And one questioned whether he would buy Mr. +Williams’s stock of port, and another whether he would dine late. And +some trusted that he would let things be, and some hoped that he would cleanse +the stables. And only one thing was certain and sure and immutably +fixed—that, whoever he was, he would not be able to please everybody. +</p> + +<p> +Nay, the ripple of excitement spread far beyond Claversham. Not only at the +archdeacon’s at Kingsford Carbonel, five miles away among the orchards +and hopyards, was there much speculation upon the matter, but even at the +Homfrays’, of Holberton, ten miles out beyond the Baer Hills, there was +talk about it, and bets were made across the billiard-table. And in more +distant vicarages and curacies, where the patron was in some degree known, +there were flutterings of heart and anxious searchings of the +“Guardian” and Crockford. Those who seemed to have some chance of +the living grew despondent, and those who had none talked the thing over with +their wives after the children had gone to bed, until they persuaded themselves +that they would die at Claversham Rectory. Middle-aged men who had been at +college with Lord Dynmore remembered that they had on one occasion rowed in the +same boat with him; and young men who had danced with his niece thought +secretly that, dear little woman as Emily or Annie was, they might have done +better. And a hundred and eleven letters, written by people who knew less than +Messrs. Gearns & Baker of the Andes, seeing that they did not know that +Lord Dynmore was there or thereabouts, were received at Dynmore Park and +forwarded to London, and duly made up into a large parcel with other +correspondence by Messrs. Gearns & Baker, and so were despatched to the +forty-ninth parallel—or thereabouts. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a>CHAPTER II.<br/> +“VIVE LE ROI!”</h2> + +<p> +It was at the beginning of the second week in October that Mr. Williams died; +and, the weather in those parts being peculiarly fine and bright for the time +of year, men stood about in the churchyard with bare heads, and caught no +colds. And it continued so for some days after the funeral. But not everywhere. +Upon a morning, some three perhaps after the ceremony at Claversham, a young +gentleman sat down to his breakfast, only a hundred and fifty miles away, under +such different conditions—a bitter east wind, a dense fog, and a general +murkiness of atmosphere—that one might have supposed his not +over-plentiful meal to be laid in another planet. +</p> + +<p> +The air in the room—a meagrely furnished, much littered room, was yellow +and choking, and the candles burned dimly in the midst of yellow halos. The +fire seemed to be smouldering, and the owner of the room had to pay some +attention to it before he sat down and found a letter lying beside his plate. +He glanced at it doubtfully. “I do not know the handwriting,” he +muttered, “and it is not a subscription, for they never come in an east +wind. I am afraid it is a bill.” +</p> + +<p> +The letter was addressed to the Rev. Reginald Lindo, St. Barnabas Mission +House, 383 East India Dock Road, London, E. After scrutinizing it for a moment, +he pulled a candle toward him and tore open the envelope. +</p> + +<p> +He read the letter slowly, his teacup at his lips, and, though he was alone, +his face grew crimson. When he had finished it he turned back and read it +again, and then flung it down and, starting up, began to walk the room. +“What a boy I am!” he muttered. “But it is almost incredible. +Upon my honor it is almost incredible!” +</p> + +<p> +He was still at the height of his excitement, now sitting down to take a +mouthful of breakfast and now leaping up to pace the room, when his housekeeper +entered and said that a woman from Tamplin’s Rents wanted to see him. +</p> + +<p> +“What does she want, Mrs. Baxter?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Husband is dying, sir,” the old lady replied briefly. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know her at all?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, sir. She is as poor a piece as I have ever seen. She says that she +could not have come out, for want of clothes, if it had not been for the fog. +And they are not particular here, as I know—the hussies!” +</p> + +<p> +“Say that I shall be ready to go with her in less than five +minutes,” the young clergyman answered. “And here! Give her some +tea, Mrs. Baxter. The pot is half full.” +</p> + +<p> +He bustled about; but nevertheless the message and the business he was now upon +had sobered him, and as he buttoned up the letter in his breast-pocket, his +face was grave. He was a tall young man, fair, with regular features, and +curling hair cut rather short. His eyes were blue and pleasantly bold; and in +his every action and in his whole carriage there was a great appearance of +confidence and self-possession. Taking a book and a small case from a +side-table, he put on his overcoat and went out. A moment, and the dense fog +swallowed him up, and with him the tattered bundle of rags, which had a +husband, and very likely had nothing else in the world of her own. +Tamplin’s Rents not affecting us, we may skip a few hours, and then go +westward with him as far as the Temple, which in the East India Dock Road is +considered very far west indeed by those who have ever heard of it. +</p> + +<p> +Here he sought a dingy staircase in Fig-tree Court, and, mounting to the second +floor, stopped before a door which was adorned by about a dozen names, painted +in white on a black ground. He knocked loudly, and, a small boy answering his +summons with great alacrity and importance, our friend asked for Mr. Smith, and +was promptly ushered into a room about nine feet square, in which, at a table +covered with papers and open books, sat a small, dark-complexioned man, very +keen and eager in appearance, who looked up with an air of annoyance. +</p> + +<p> +“Who is it, Fred?” he said impatiently, moving one of the candles, +which the fog still rendered necessary, although it was high noon. “I am +engaged at present.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Lindo to see you, sir,” the boy announced, with a formality +very funny in a groom of the chambers about four feet high. +</p> + +<p> +The little man’s countenance instantly changed, and he jumped up +grinning. “Is it you, old boy?” he said. “Sit down, old +fellow! I thought it might be my own solicitor, and it is well to be prepared, +you know.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you are not really busy?” said the visitor, looking at him +doubtfully. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I am and I am not,” replied Mr. Smith; and, deftly tipping +aside the books, he disclosed some slips of manuscript. “It is an article +for the ‘Cornhill,’” he continued; “but whether it will +ever appear there is another matter. You have come to lunch, of course? And +now, what is your news?” +</p> + +<p> +He was so quick and eager that he reminded people who saw him for the first +time of a rat. When they came to know him better, they found that a stauncher +friend than Jack Smith was not to be found in the Temple. With this he had the +reputation of being a clever, clear-headed man, and his sound common-sense was +almost a proverb. Observing that Lindo did not answer him, he repeated, +“Is anything amiss, old fellow?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, not quite amiss,” Lindo answered, his face flushing a +little. “But the fact is”—taking the letter from the +breast-pocket—“that I have had the offer of a living, Jack.” +</p> + +<p> +Smith leaped up and clapped his friend on the shoulder. “By Jove! old +man,” he exclaimed heartily, “I am glad of it! Right glad of it! +You must have had enough of that slumming. But I hope it is a better living +than mine,” he continued, with a comical glance round the tiny room. +“Let us have a look! What is it? Two hundred and a house?” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo handed the letter to him. It was written from Lincoln’s Inn Fields, +and was dated the preceding day. It ran thus: +</p> + +<p> +“<span class="sc">Dear Sir</span>:—We are instructed by our client, +the Right Honorable the Earl of Dynmore, to invite your acceptance of the +living of Claversham in the county of Warwick, vacant by the death on the 15th +instant of the Rev. John Williams, the late incumbent. The living, of which his +lordship is the patron, is a town rectory, of the approximate value of +810<i>l</i> per annum and a house. Our client is travelling in the United +States, but we have the requisite authorities to proceed in due form and +without delay, which in this matter is prejudicial. We beg to have the pleasure +of receiving your acceptance at as early a date as possible, +</p> + +<p style="text-indent:30%"> +“And remain, dear Sir, +</p> + +<p style="text-indent:35%"> +“Your obedient servants, +</p> + +<p style="text-indent:45%"> +“<span class="sc">Gearns & Baker</span>. +</p> + +<p> +“To the Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A.” +</p> + +<p> +The barrister read this letter with even greater surprise than seemed natural, +and, when he had done, looked at his companion with wondering eyes. +“Claversham!” he ejaculated. “Why, I know it well!” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you? I have never heard you mention it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I knew old Williams!” Jack continued, still in amaze. “Knew +him well, and heard of his death, but little thought you were likely to succeed +him. My dear fellow, it is a wonderful piece of good fortune! Wonderful! I +shake you by the hand! I congratulate you heartily! But how did you come to +know the high and mighty earl? Unbosom yourself, my dear boy!” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not know him—do not know him from Adam!” replied the +young clergyman gravely. +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t mean it?” +</p> + +<p> +“I do. I have never seen him in my life.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack Smith whistled. “Are you sure it is not a hoax?” he said, with +a serious face. +</p> + +<p> +“I think not,” the rector-elect replied. “Perhaps I have +given you a wrong impression. I have had nothing to do with the earl; but my +uncle was his tutor.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!” said Smith slowly, “that makes all the difference. What +uncle?” +</p> + +<p> +“You have heard me speak of him. He was vicar of St. Gabriel’s, +Aldgate. He died about a year ago—last October, I think. Lord Dynmore and +he were good friends, and my uncle used often to stay at his place in Scotland. +I suppose my name must have come up some time when they were talking.” +</p> + +<p> +“Likely enough,” assented the lawyer. “But for the earl to +remember it, he must be one in a hundred!” +</p> + +<p> +“It is certainly very good of him,” Lindo replied, his cheek +flushing. “If it had been a small country living, and my uncle had been +alive to jog his elbow, I should not have been so much surprised.” +</p> + +<p> +“And you are just twenty-five!” Jack Smith observed, leaning back +in his chair, and eyeing his friend with undisguised and whimsical admiration. +“You will be the youngest rector in the Clergy List, I should think! And +Claversham! By Jove, what a berth!” +</p> + +<p> +A queer expression of annoyance for a moment showed itself in Lindo’s +face. “I say, Jack, stow that!” he said gently, and with a little +shamefacedness. “I mean,” he continued, smoothing down the nap on +his hat, “that I do not want to look at it altogether in that way, and I +do not want others to regard it so.” +</p> + +<p> +“As a berth, you mean?” Jack said gravely, but with a twinkle in +his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, from the loaves and fishes point of view,” Lindo commenced, +beginning to walk up and down the room. “I do not think an officer, when +he gets promotion, looks only at the increase in his pay. Of course I am glad +that it is a good living, and that I shall have a house, and a good position, +and all that. But I declare to you, Jack, believe me or not as you like, that +if I did not feel that I could do the work as I hope, please God, to do it, I +would not take it up—I would not, indeed. As it is, I feel the +responsibility. I have been thinking about it as I walked down here, and upon +my honor for a while I thought I ought to decline it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I would not do that!” said Gallio, dismissing the twinkle from his +eye, and really respecting his old friend, perhaps, a little more than before. +“You are not the man, I think, to shun either work or responsibility. Did +I tell you,” he continued in a different tone, “that I had an uncle +at Claversham?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Lindo, surprised in his turn. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, and I think he is one of your church wardens. His name is Bonamy, +and he is a solicitor. His London agent is my only client,” Jack said +jerkily. +</p> + +<p> +“And he is one of the church wardens! Well, that is strange—and +jolly!” +</p> + +<p> +“Umph! Don’t you be too sure of that!” retorted the barrister +sharply. “He is a—well, he has been very good to me, and he is my +uncle, and I am not going to say anything against him. But I am not quite sure +that I should like him for my church warden. <i>Your</i> church warden! Why, it +is like a fairy tale, old fellow!” +</p> + +<p> +And so it seemed to Lindo when, an hour later, the small boy, with the same +portentous gravity of face, let him out and bade him good-day. As the young +parson started eastward, along Fleet Street first, he looked at the moving +things round him with new eyes, from a new standpoint, with a new curiosity. +The passers-by were the same, but he was changed. He had lunched, and perhaps +the material view of his position was uppermost, for those in the crowd who +specially observed the tall young clergyman noticed in his bearing an air of +calm importance and a strong sense of personal dignity, which led him to shun +collisions, and even to avoid jostling his fellows, with peculiar care. The +truth was that he had all the while before his eyes, as he walked, an +announcement which was destined to appear in the “Guardian” of the +following week: +</p> + +<p> +“The Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A., St. Barnabas’ Mission, London, to +be Rector of Claversham. Patron, the Earl of Dynmore.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a>CHAPTER III.<br/> +AN AWKWARD MEETING.</h2> + +<p> +A fortnight after this paragraph in the “Guardian” had filled +Claversham with astonishment and Mr. Clode with a modest thankfulness that he +was spared the burden of office, a little dark man—Jack Smith, in +fact—drove briskly into Paddington Station, and, disregarding the offers +of the porters, who stand waiting on the hither side of the journey like Charon +by the Styx, and see at a glance who has the obolus, sprang from the hansom +without assistance, and bustled on to the platform. +</p> + +<p> +Here he looked up and down as if he expected to meet some one, and then, +glancing at the clock, found that he had a quarter of an hour to spare. He made +at once for the bookstall, and, with a lavishness which would have surprised +some of his friends, bought “Punch,” a little volume by Howells, +the “Standard,” and finally, though he blushed as he asked for it, +the “Queen.” He had just gathered his purchases together and was +paying for them, when a high-pitched voice at his elbow made him start. +“Why, Jack! what in the world are you buying all those papers for?” +The speaker was a girl about thirteen years old, who in the hubbub had stolen +unnoticed to his side. +</p> + +<p> +“Hullo, Daintry,” he answered. “Why did you not say that you +were here before? I have been looking for you. Where is Kate? Oh, yes, I see +her,” as a young lady turning over books at the farther end of the stall +acknowledged his presence by a laughing nod. “You are here in good +time,” he went on, while the younger girl affectionately slipped her arm +through his. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she said. “Your mother started us early. And so you +have come to see us off, after all, Jack?” +</p> + +<p> +“Just so,” he answered drily. “Let us go to Kate.” +</p> + +<p> +They did so, the young lady meeting them halfway. “How kind of you to be +here, Jack!” she said. “As you have come, will you look us out a +comfortable compartment? That is the train over there. And please to put this, +and this, and Daintry’s parcel in the corners for us.” +</p> + +<p> +This and this were a cloak and a shawl, and a few little matters in brown +paper. In order to possess himself of them, Jack handed Kate the papers he was +carrying. +</p> + +<p> +“Are they for me?” she said, gratefully indeed, but with a placid +gratitude which was not perhaps what the donor wanted. “Oh, thank you. +And this too? What is it?” +</p> + +<p> +“‘Their Wedding Journey,’” said Jack, with a shy +twinkle in his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“Is it pretty?” she answered dubiously. “It sounds silly; but +you are supposed to be a judge. I think I should like ‘A Chance +Acquaintance’ better, though.” +</p> + +<p> +Of course the little book was changed, and Jack winced. But he had not time to +think much about it, for he had to bustle away through the rising babel to +secure seats for them in an empty compartment of the Oxford train, and see +their luggage labelled and put in. This done, he hurried back, and pointed out +to them the places he had taken. “Oh, dear, they are in a through +carriage,” Kate said, stopping short and eyeing the board over the door. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he answered. “I thought that that was what you +wanted.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, I would rather go in another carriage, and change. We shall get to +Claversham soon enough without travelling with Claversham people.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed we shall,” Daintry chimed in. “Let us go and find +seats, and Jack will bring the things after us.” +</p> + +<p> +He assented meekly—very meekly for sharp Jack Smith—and presently +came along with his arms full of parcels, to find them ensconced in the nearer +seats of a compartment, which contained also one gentleman who was already deep +in the “Times.” Jack, standing at the open door, could not see his +face, for it was hidden by the newspaper, but he could see that his legs wore a +youthful and reckless air; and he raised his eyebrows interrogatively. +“Pooh!” whispered Daintry in answer. “How stupid you are! It +is all right. I can see he is a clergyman by his boots!” +</p> + +<p> +Jack smiled at this assurance, and, putting in the things he was holding, shut +the door and stood outside, looking first at the platform about him, on which +all was flurry and confusion, and then at the interior of the carriage, which +seemed in comparison peaceful and homelike. “I think I will come with you +to Westbourne Park,” he said suddenly. +</p> + +<p> +“Nonsense, Jack!” Kate replied, with crushing decision. “We +shall be there in five minutes, and you will have all the trouble of returning +for nothing.” +</p> + +<p> +He acquiesced meekly—poor Jack! “Well,” he said, with a new +effort at cheerfulness, “you will soon be at home, girls. Remember me to +the governor. I am afraid you will be rather dull at first. You will have one +scrap of excitement, however.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is that?” said Kate, very much as if she were prepared to +depreciate it before she knew what it was. +</p> + +<p> +“The new rector!” +</p> + +<p> +“He will make very little difference to us!” the girl answered, +with an accent almost of scorn. “Papa said in his letter that he thought +it was a great pity a local man had not been appointed—some one who knew +the place and the old ways. You say he is clever and nice; but either way it +will not affect us much.” +</p> + +<p> +No one noticed that the “Times” newspaper in the far corner of the +compartment rustled suspiciously, and that the clerical boots became agitated +on a sudden, as though their wearer meditated a move; and, in ignorance of +this, “I expect I shall hate him!” said Daintry calmly. +</p> + +<p> +“Come, you must not do that,” Jack remonstrated “You must +remember that he is not only a very good fellow, but a great friend of +mine.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then we ought indeed to spare him!” Kate said frankly, “for +you have been very good to us and made our visit delightful.” +</p> + +<p> +His face flushed with pleasure even at those simple words of praise. “And +you will write and tell me,” he continued eagerly, “that you have +reached your journey’s end safely.” +</p> + +<p> +“One of us will,” was the answer. “Daintry,” Kate went +on calmly, “will you remind me to write to Jack to-morrow evening?” +</p> + +<p> +His face fell sadly. So little would have made him happy. He looked down and +kicked the step of the carriage, and made his tiny moan to himself before he +spoke again. “Good-bye,” he said then. “They are coming to +look at your tickets. You are due out in one minute. Good-bye, Daintry.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Jack. Come and see us soon,” she cried earnestly, as she +released his hand. +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Kate.” Alas! Kate’s cheek did not show the +slightest consciousness that his clasp was more than cousinly. She uttered her +“Good-bye, Jack, and thank you so much,” very kindly, but her color +never varied by the quarter of a tone, and her grasp was as firm and as devoid +of shyness as his own. +</p> + +<p> +He had not much time to be miserable, however, then, for, the ticket-collector +coming to the window, Jack had to fall back, and in doing so made a discovery. +Kate, hunting for her ticket in one of those mysterious places in which ladies +will put tickets, heard him utter an exclamation, and asked, “What is it, +Jack?” +</p> + +<p> +To her surprise, the collector having by this time disappeared, he stretched +out his hand through the window to some one beyond her. “Why, +Lindo!” he cried, “is that you? I had not a notion of your +identity. Of course you are going down to take possession.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate, trembling already with a horrible presentiment, turned her head. Yes, it +was the clergyman in the corner who answered Jack’s greeting and rose to +shake hands with him, the train being already in motion. “I did not +recognize your voice out there,” he said, looking rather hot. +</p> + +<p> +“No? And I did not know you were going down to-day,” Jack answered, +walking beside the train. “Let me introduce you to my cousins, Miss +Bonamy and Daintry. I am sorry that I did not see you before. Good luck to you! +Good-bye, Kate!” +</p> + +<p> +The train was moving faster and faster, and Jack was soon left behind on the +platform gazing pathetically at the black tunnel which had swallowed it up. In +the carriage there was silence, and in the heart of one at least of the +passengers the most horrible vexation. Kate could have bitten out her tongue. +She was conscious that the clergyman had bowed in acknowledgment of +Jack’s introduction and had muttered something. But then he had sunk back +in his corner, his face wearing, as it seemed to her, a frown of scornful +annoyance. Even if nothing awkward had been said, she would still have shunned, +for a certain reason, such a meeting as this with a new clergyman who did not +yet know Claversham. But now she had aggravated the matter by her heedlessness. +So she sat angry, and yet ashamed, with her lips pressed together and her eyes +fixed upon the opposite cushion. +</p> + +<p> +For the Rev. Reginald, he had been by no means indifferent to the criticisms he +had unfortunately overheard. Always possessed of a fairly good opinion of +himself, he had lately been raising his standard to the rectorial height; and, +being very human, he had come to think himself something of a personage. If +Jack Smith had introduced him under the same circumstances to his aunt, there +is no saying how far the acquaintance would have progressed or how long the new +incumbent might have fretted and fumed. But presently he stole a look at Kate +Bonamy and melted. +</p> + +<p> +He saw a girl, slightly above the middle height, graceful and rounded of +figure, with a grave stateliness of carriage which oddly became her. Her +complexion was rather pale, but it was clear and healthy, and there was even a +freckle here and a freckle there which I never heard a man say that he would +have had elsewhere. If her face was a trifle long, with a nose a little +aquiline and curving lips too wide, yet it was a fair and dainty face, such as +Englishmen love. The brown hair, which strayed on to the broad white brow and +hung in a heavy loop upon her neck, had a natural waviness—the sole +beauty on which she prided herself. For she could not see her eyes as others +saw them—big gray eyes that from under long lashes looked out upon you, +full of such purity and truth that men meeting their gaze straightway felt a +desire to be better men and went away and tried—for half an hour. Such +was Kate outwardly. Inwardly she had faults of course, and perhaps pride and a +little temper were two of them. +</p> + +<p> +The rector was still admiring her askance, surprised to find that Jack Smith, +who was not very handsome himself, had such a cousin, when Daintry roused him +abruptly. For some moments she had been gazing at him, as at some unknown +specimen, with no attempt to hide her interest. Now she said suddenly, +“You are the new rector?” +</p> + +<p> +He answered stiffly that he was; being a good deal taken aback at being +challenged in this way. Remonstrance, however, was out of the question, and +Daintry for the moment said no more, though her gaze lost none of its +embarrassing directness. +</p> + +<p> +But presently she began again. “I should think the dogs would like +you,” she said deliberately, and much as if he had not been there to +hear; “you look as if they would.” +</p> + +<p> +Silence again. The rector smiled fatuously. What was a beneficed clergyman, +whose dignity was young and tender, to do, subjected to the criticism of +unknown dogs? He tried to divert his thoughts by considering the pretty +sage-green frock and the gray fur cape and hat to match which the elder girl +was wearing. Doubtless she was taking the latest fashions down to Claversham, +and fur capes and hats, indefinitely and mysteriously multiplying, would listen +to him on Sundays from all the nearest pews. And Daintry was silent so long +that he thought he had done with her. But no. “Do you think that you will +like Claversham?” she asked, with an air of serious curiosity. +</p> + +<p> +“I trust I shall,” he said, a flush rising to his cheek. +</p> + +<p> +She took a moment to consider the answer conscientiously, and, thinking badly +of it, remarked gravely, “I don’t think you will.” +</p> + +<p> +This was unbearable. The clergyman, full of a nervous dread lest the next +question should be, “Do you think that they will like you at +Claversham?” made a great show of resuming his newspaper. Kate, possessed +by the same fear, shot an imploring glance at Daintry; but, seeing that the +latter had only eyes for the stranger, hoped desperately for the best. +</p> + +<p> +Which was very bad. “It must be jolly,” remarked the unconscious +tormentor, “to have eight hundred pounds a year, and be a rector!” +</p> + +<p> +“Daintry!” Kate cried in horror. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, what is the matter?” asked Daintry, turning suddenly to her +sister with wide-open eyes. Her look of aggrieved astonishment at once overcame +Lindo’s gravity, and he laughed aloud. He was not without a charming +sense, still novel enough to be pleasing, that Daintry was right. It was jolly +to be a rector and have eight hundred a year! +</p> + +<p> +That laugh came in happily. It seemed to sweep away the cobwebs of +embarrassment which had lain so thickly about two of the party. Lindo began to +talk pleasantly, pointing out this or that reach of the river, and Kate, +meeting his cheery eyes, put aside a faint idea of apologizing which had been +in her head, and replied frankly. He told them tales of summer voyages between +lock and lock, and of long days idly spent in the Wargrave marshes; and, as the +identification of Mapledurham and Pangbourne and Wittenham and Goring rendered +it necessary that they should all cross and recross the carriage, they were +soon on excellent terms with one another, or would have been if the rector had +not still detected in Kate’s manner a slight stiffness for which he could +not account. It puzzled him also to observe that, though they were ready, +Daintry more particularly, to discuss the amusements of London and the goodness +of cousin Jack, they both grew reticent when the conversation turned toward +Claversham and its affairs. +</p> + +<p> +At Oxford he got out to go to the bookstall. +</p> + +<p> +“Jack was right,” said Daintry, looking after him. “He +<i>is</i> nice.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” her sister allowed, rising and sitting down again in a +restless fashion. “But I wish we had not fallen in with him, all the +same.” +</p> + +<p> +“It cannot be helped now,” said Daintry, who was evidently prepared +to accept the event with philosophy. +</p> + +<p> +Not so her sister. “We might go into another carriage,” she +suggested. +</p> + +<p> +“That would be rude,” said Daintry calmly. +</p> + +<p> +The question was decided for them by the young clergyman’s return. He +came along the platform, an animated look in his face. “Miss +Bonamy,” he said, stopping at the open door with his hand extended, +“there is some one in the refreshment-room whom I think that you would +like to see. Mr. Gladstone is there, talking to the Duke of Westminster, and +they are both eating buns like common mortals. Will you come and take a peep at +them?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t think that we have time,” she objected. +</p> + +<p> +“There is sure to be time,” Daintry cried. “Now, Kate, +come!” And she was down upon the platform in a moment. +</p> + +<p> +“The train is not due out for five minutes yet,” Lindo said, as he +piloted them through the crowd to the doorway. “There, on the left by the +fireplace,” he added. +</p> + +<p> +Kate glanced, and turned away satisfied. Not so Daintry. With rapt attention in +her face, she strayed nearer and nearer to the great men, her eyes growing +larger with each step. +</p> + +<p> +“She will be talking to them next,” said Kate, in a fidget. +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps asking him if he likes Downing Street,” Lindo suggested +slyly. “There, she is coming now,” he added, as Miss Daintry turned +and came to them at last. +</p> + +<p> +“I wanted to make sure,” she said simply, seeing Kate’s +impatience, “that I should know them again. That was all.” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite so; I hope you have succeeded,” Kate answered drily. +“But, if we are not quick, we shall miss our train.” And she led +the way back with more speed than dignity. +</p> + +<p> +“There is plenty of time—plenty of time,” Lindo answered, +following them. He could not bear to see her pushing her way through the mixed +crowd, and accepting so easily a footing of equality with it. He was one of +those men to whom their womenkind are sacred. He took his time, therefore, and +followed at his ease; only to see, when he emerged from the press, a long +stretch of empty platform, three porters, and the tail of a departing train. +“Good gracious!” he stammered, with dismay in his face. “What +does it mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“It means,” Kate said, in an accent of sharp annoyance—she +did not intend to spare him—“that you have made us miss our train, +Mr. Lindo. And there is not another which reaches Claversham today!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap04"></a>CHAPTER IV.<br/> +BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS.</h2> + +<p> +“There! That was your fault!” said Daintry, turning from the +departing train. +</p> + +<p> +The young rector could not deny it. He would have given anything for at least +the appearance of being undisturbed; but the blood came into his cheek, and in +his attempt to maintain his dignity he only succeeded in looking angry as well +as confused and taken aback. He had certainly made a mess of his escort duty. +What in the world had led him to go out of his way to make a fool of himself? +he wondered. And with these Claversham people! +</p> + +<p> +“There may be a special train to-day,” Kate suggested suddenly. She +had got over her first vexation, and perhaps repented that she had betrayed it +so openly. “Or we may be allowed to go on by a luggage-train, Mr. Lindo. +Will you kindly see?” +</p> + +<p> +He snatched at the relief which her proposal held out to him, and went away to +inquire. But almost at once he was back again. “It is most +vexatious!” he said loudly. “It is only three o’clock, and +yet there is no way of getting to Claversham to-night! I am very sorry, but I +never dreamed the company managed things so badly. Never!” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Kate drily. +</p> + +<p> +He winced and looked at her sharply, his vanity hurt again. But then he found +that he could not keep it up. No doubt it was a ridiculous position for a +beneficed clergyman, on his way to undertake the work of his life, to be +delayed at a station with two girls; but, after all, for a young man to be +angry with a young woman who is also pretty—well, the task is difficult. +“I am afraid,” he said shyly, and yet with a kind of frankness, +“that I have brought you into trouble, Miss Bonamy. As your sister says, +it was my fault. Is it a matter of great consequence that you should reach home +tonight?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am afraid that my father will be vexed,” she answered. +</p> + +<p> +“You must telegraph to him,” he rejoined. “I am afraid that +is all I can suggest. And that done, you will have only one thing to +consider—whether we shall stay the night here or go on to +Birmingham.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate looked at him, her gray eyes very doubtful, and did not at once answer. He +had clearly made up his mind to join his fortunes to theirs, while she, on her +side, had reasons for shrinking from intimacy with him. But he seemed to +consider it so much a matter of course that they should remain together and +travel together, that she scarcely saw how to put things on a different +footing. She knew, too, that she would get no help from Daintry, who already +regarded their detention in the light of a capital joke. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you going to do yourself, Mr. Lindo?” she said at last, +her manner rather chilling. +</p> + +<p> +He opened his eyes and smiled. “You discard me, then?” he said. +“You have lost all faith in me, Miss Bonamy? Well, I deserve it after the +scrape into which I have led you.” +</p> + +<p> +“I did not mean that,” she answered. “I wished to know if you +had made any plans.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he replied—“to make amends, if you will let me +take command of the party. We will stay in Oxford, and I will show you round +the colleges.” +</p> + +<p> +“No?” exclaimed Daintry. “Will you? How jolly! And +then?” +</p> + +<p> +“We will dine at the Mitre,” he answered, smiling, “if Miss +Bonamy will permit me to manage everything. And then, if you leave here at +nine-thirty to-morrow you will be at Claversham soon after twelve. Will that +suit you?” +</p> + +<p> +Daintry’s face answered sufficiently for her. As for Kate, she was in a +difficulty. She knew little of hotels: yet they must stop somewhere, and no +doubt Mr. Lindo would take a great deal of trouble off her hands. But would it +be proper to do as he proposed? She really did not know—only that it +sounded odd. That it would not be wise she knew. She could answer that question +at once. But how could she explain, and how tell him to go his way and leave +them? And, after all, to see Oxford would be delightful; and he really was very +pleasant, very different from the men she knew at home. +</p> + +<p> +“You are very good,” she said at length, with a grateful +sigh—“if we have no choice but between Oxford and +Birmingham.” +</p> + +<p> +“And no choice of guides at all,” he said, smiling, “you will +take me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she answered, looking away primly. +</p> + +<p> +Her reserve, however, did not last. Once through the station gates, that free +holiday feeling which we have all experienced on being set down in an unknown +town, with no duty before us save to explore it, soon possessed her; while he +wished nothing better than to play the showman—a part we love. The day +was fine and bright, though cold. She had eyes for beauty and a soul for the +past, and soon forgot herself; and he, piloting the sisters through Magdalen +Walks, now strewn with leaves, or displaying with pride the staircase of Christ +Church, the quaint library of Merton, or the ancient front of John’s, +forgot himself also, and especially his new-born dignity, in which he had lived +rather too much, perhaps, during the last three weeks. He showed himself in his +true colors—the colors known to his intimate friends—and was so +bright and cheery that Kate found herself talking to him in utter forgetfulness +of his position and theirs. The girl frankly sighed when darkness fell and they +had to go into the house, their curiosity still unsated. +</p> + +<p> +She thought it was all over. But, lo! there was a cheery fire awaiting them in +the “house” room (he had looked in for a few minutes on their first +arrival and given his orders), and before it a little table laid for three was +sparkling with plate and glass. Nay, there were two cups of tea ready on a +side-table, for it wanted an hour yet of dinnertime. Altogether, as Daintry +naïvely told him, “even Jack could not have made it nicer for us.” +</p> + +<p> +“Jack is a favorite of yours?” he said, laughing. +</p> + +<p> +“I should think so!” Daintry answered, in wonder. “There is +no one like Jack.” +</p> + +<p> +“After that I shall take myself off,” he replied. “I really +want to call on a friend, Miss Bonamy. But if I may join you at +dinner——” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, do!” she said impulsively. Then, more shyly, she added, +“We shall be very glad if you will, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +He felt singularly pleased with himself as he turned the windy corner of the +Broad. It was pleasant to be in Oxford again, a beneficed clergyman. Pleasant +to have such a future to look forward to, such a holiday moment to enjoy. +Pleasant to anticipate the cheery meal and the girl’s smile, half shy, +half grateful. And Kate?—she remained before the fire, saying little +because Daintry’s tongue gave few openings, but thinking a good deal. +Once she did speak. “It won’t last,” she said pettishly. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, Kate? Do you think he will be different at Claversham?” +Daintry protested. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course he will!” She spoke with a little scorn in her voice, +and that sort of decision which we use when we wish to crush down our own +unwarranted hopes. +</p> + +<p> +“But he is nice,” Daintry persisted. “You do think so, Kate, +don’t you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, he is very nice,” she said drily. “But he will be +in the Hammond set at home, and we shall see nothing of him.” +</p> + +<p> +But presently he was back, and Kate found it impossible to resist the charm. He +ladled the soup and dispensed the mutton-chops with a gaiety and boyish glee +which were really the stored-up effervescence of weeks, the ebullition of the +long-repressed delight which he took in his promotion. He learned casually that +the girls had been in London for more than a month staying with Jack’s +mother in Bayswater, and that they were very sorry to be upon their road home. +</p> + +<p> +“And yet,” he said—this was toward the end of +dinner—“I have been told that your town is a very picturesque one. +But I fancy that we never appreciate our home as we do a place strange to +us.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very likely that is so,” Kate answered quietly. And then a little +pause ensued, such as he had observed several times before, and come to connect +with any mention of Claversham. The girls’ tongues would run on frankly +and pleasantly enough about their London visit, or Mr. Gladstone; but let him +bring the talk round to his parish and its people, and forthwith something of +reserve seemed to come between him and them until the conversation strayed +afield again. +</p> + +<p> +After the others had finished, he still toyed with his meal, partly in lazy +enjoyment of the time, partly as an excuse for staying with them. They were +sitting in a momentary silence, when a boy passed the window chanting a ditty +at the top of his voice. The doggrel came clearly to their ears—— +</p> + +<div class="poem2"> +<p class="t0"> Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, +</p> + +<p class="t1">Birds in the wilderness, birds in the wilderness; +</p> + +<p class="t0">Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, +</p> + +<p class="t1">Samuel asking for more. +</p> +</div> + +<p> +As the sound passed on the young man looked up, a mischievous twinkle in his +eyes, and met their eyes, and all three burst into a merry peal of laughter. +They were the birds in the wilderness, sitting there in the circle of light, in +the strange room in the strange town, almost as intimate as if they had known +one another for years, or had been a week at sea together. +</p> + +<p> +But Kate, having acknowledged by that pleasant outburst her sense of the oddity +of the position, rose from the table, and the rector had to say good-night, +explaining at the same time that he should not travel with them next morning, +but intended to go on by a later train, as his friend wished to see more of +him. Nevertheless, he said he should be up to breakfast with them and should +see them off. And in this resolution he persisted, notwithstanding Kate’s +protest, which perhaps was not very violent. +</p> + +<p> +Notwithstanding, he was a little late next morning. When he came down he found +them already seated in the coffee-room. There were others breakfasting here and +there in the room, chiefly upon toast-racks and newspapers, and he did not at +once observe that the gentleman standing with his back set negligently against +the mantelpiece was talking to Kate. Arrived at the table, however, he saw that +it was so; and the cheery greeting on his lips faded into a commonplace +“Good-morning, Miss Bonamy.” He took no apparent notice of the +stranger as he added, “I am afraid I am rather late.” +</p> + +<p> +The intruder, a short dark-whiskered man between thirty and forty, seemed to +the full as much surprised by the clergyman’s appearance as Lindo was by +his, and as little able to hide the feeling as Kate herself to control the +color which rose in her cheeks. She gave Mr. Lindo his tea in silence, and then +with an obvious effort introduced the two men. “This is Dr. Gregg of +Claversham—Mr. Lindo,” she said. +</p> + +<p> +Lindo rose and shook hands. “Mr. Lindo the younger, I presume?” +said the doctor, with a bow and a swagger intended to show that he was quite at +his ease. +</p> + +<p> +“The only one, I am afraid,” replied the rector, smiling. Though he +by no means liked the look of the man. +</p> + +<p> +“Did I rightly catch your name?” was the +answer—“‘Mr. Lindo?’” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said the rector again, opening his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“But—you are not—you do not mean to say that you are the new +rector?” pronounced the dark man abruptly, and with a kind of +aggressiveness which seemed his most striking quality—“the rector +of Claversham, I mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“I believe so,” said Lindo quietly. “You want some more +water, do you not, Miss Bonamy?” he continued. “Let me ring the +bell.” He rose and crossed the room to do so. The truth was, he hated the +newcomer already. His first sentence had been enough. His manner was not the +manner of the men with whom Lindo had mixed, and the rector felt almost angry +with Kate for introducing Gregg—-albeit his parishioner—to him, and +quite angry with her for suffering the doctor to address her with the +familiarity he seemed to affect. +</p> + +<p> +And Kate, her eyes downcast, knew by instinct how it was with him, and what he +was thinking. “I have been telling Dr. Gregg,” she said hurriedly, +when he returned, “how we missed our train yesterday.” +</p> + +<p> +“Rather how I missed it for you,” Lindo answered gravely, much +engaged apparently with his breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, yes, it was very funny!” fired off the doctor, watching each +mouthful they ate. Daintry had finished, and was sitting back in her chair +kicking the leg of the table monotonously; not in the best of tempers +apparently. “Very funny indeed!” the doctor continued. “An +accident, I hope?” with a little sniggling laugh. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes!” said the rector, looking up at him with a black brow and +steadfast eyes—“it was an accident.” +</p> + +<p> +Gregg was a little cowed by the look, and in a moment, with a muttered word or +two, fidgeted himself away, cursing the general superciliousness of parsons and +the quiet airs of this one in particular. He was a little dog-in-the-mangerish +man, ill-bred, and, like most ill-bred men, resentful of breeding in others. +The fact that he had a sneaking liking for Kate did not tend to lessen his +disgustful wonder how the Bonamy girls and the new rector came to be travelling +together—which, indeed, to any Claversham person would have seemed a +portent. But, then, Lindo did not know that. +</p> + +<p> +The objectionable item removed, and the temptation to remark upon him overcome, +Lindo soon recovered his good temper, and rattled away so pleasantly that the +train time seemed to all of them to come very quickly. “There,” he +said, as he handed the last of Kate’s books into the railway-carriage, +“now I have done something to make amends for my fault, I trust. One +thing more I can do. When you get home you need not spare me. You can put it +all on my shoulders, Miss Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you,” Kate answered demurely. +</p> + +<p> +“You are going to do so, I see,” he said, laughing. “I fear +my character will reach Claversham before me.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not think we shall spread it very widely,” she answered in a +peculiar tone, which he naturally misunderstood. +</p> + +<p> +The train was already in motion then, and he shook hands with her as he walked +beside it. “Goodbye,” he said. And then he added in a lower +tone—he was such a very young rector—“I hope to see very much +of you in the future, Miss Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate sank back in her seat, her cheek a shade warmer. And in a moment he was +alone upon the platform. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap05"></a>CHAPTER V.<br/> +“REGINALD LINDO, 1850.”</h2> + +<p> +Long before the later train by which the rector came on arrived at the +Claversham station, the Rev. Stephen Clode was waiting on the platform. The +curate was a tall, dark man, somewhat over thirty, with a strong rugged face +and a bush of stiff black hair standing up from his forehead. He had been at +Claversham three years, enjoying all the importance which old Mr. +Williams’s long illness naturally gave to his curate and <i>locum +tenens</i>; and, though the town was agreed that his chagrin at having a new +rector set over his head was great, it must be admitted that he concealed it +with admirable skill. More than one letter had passed between him and the new +incumbent, and, in securing for the latter Mr. Williams’s good +old-fashioned furniture, and in other ways, he had made himself very useful to +Lindo. But the two had not met, and consequently the curate viewed the +approaching train with lively, though secret, curiosity. +</p> + +<p> +It came, the bell rang, the porter cried, “Claversham! Claversham!” +and the curate walked down it, past the carriage-windows, looking for the man +he had come to meet. Half-a-dozen people stepped out, and for a moment there +was a mimic tumult on the little platform; but nowhere amid it all could Clode +see any one like the new rector. “He has missed another train!” he +muttered to himself in contemptuous wonder; and he was already casting a last +look round him before turning on his heel, when a tall, fair young man, in a +clerical overcoat, who had been one of the first to alight, stepped up to him. +“Am I speaking to Mr. Clode?” said the stranger pleasantly. And he +lifted his hat. +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly,” the curate answered. “I am Mr. Clode. But I fear +I have not the——” +</p> + +<p> +“No, I know,” replied the other, smiling, and at the same time +holding out his hand. “Though, indeed, I hoped that you might have been +here on purpose to meet me. My name is Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate uttered an exclamation of surprise; and, hastily returning the +proffered grip, fixed his black eyes curiously on his new friend. “Mr. +Lindo did not mention that you were with him,” he answered in a tone of +some embarrassment. “But, there, let me see to your luggage. Is it all +here?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I think so,” Lindo answered, tapping one article after +another with his umbrella, and giving the stationmaster a pleasant +“Good-day!” “Is there an omnibus or anything?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” Clode said; “it will be all right. They know where to +take it. You will walk up with me, perhaps. It is about a quarter of a mile to +the rectory.” +</p> + +<p> +The new comer assented gladly, and the two passed out of the station together. +Lindo let his eye travel up the wide steep street before him, until it rested +on the noble tower which crowned the little hill and looked down now, as it had +looked down for five centuries, on the red roofs clustering about it. His +tower! His church! Even his companion did not remark, so slight was the action, +that, as he passed out of the station and looked up, he lifted his hat for a +second. +</p> + +<p> +“And where is your father?” Clode asked. “Was he delayed by +business? Or perhaps,” he added, dubiously scanning him, “you are +Mr. Lindo’s brother?” +</p> + +<p> +“I <i>am</i> Mr. Lindo!” said our friend, turning in astonishment +and looking at his companion. +</p> + +<p> +“The rector?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +It was the curate’s turn to stare now, and he did so—his face +flushing darkly and his eyes wide opened for once. He even seemed for a moment +to be stricken dumb with surprise and emotion. “Indeed!” he said at +last, in a half stifled voice which he vainly strove to control. “Indeed! +I beg your pardon. I had thought—I don’t know why—I mean that +I had expected to see an older man.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am sorry you are disappointed,” the rector replied, smiling +ruefully. “I am beginning to think I am rather young, for you are not the +first to-day who has made that mistake.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate did not answer, and the two walked on in silence, feeling somewhat +awkward. Clode, indeed, was raging inwardly. By one thing and another he had +been led to expect a man past middle life, and the only Clergy List in the +parish, being three years old and containing the name of Lindo’s uncle +only, had confirmed him in the error. He had never conceived the idea that the +man set over his head would be a fledgling, scarcely a year in priest’s +orders, or he would have gone elsewhere. He would never have stayed to be at +the beck and call of such a puppy as this! He felt now that he had been +entrapped, and he chafed inwardly to such an extent that he did not dare to +speak. To have this young fellow, six or seven years his junior, set over him +would humiliate him in the eyes of all those before whom he had long played a +different part! +</p> + +<p> +In a minor degree Lindo was also vexed—not only because he was +sufficiently sensitive to enter into the other’s feelings, but also +because he foresaw trouble ahead. It was annoying, too, to be received at each +new <i>rencontre</i> as a surprise—as the reverse of all that had been +expected and all that had been, as he feared, hoped. +</p> + +<p> +“You will find the rectory a very comfortable house,” said the +curate at last, his mind fully made up now that he would leave at the earliest +possible date. “Warm and old-fashioned. Rough-cast outside. Many of the +rooms are panelled.” +</p> + +<p> +“It looks out on the churchyard, I believe,” replied the rector, +with the same labored politeness. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, it stands high. The view from the windows at the back is pleasant. +The front is perhaps a little gloomy—in winter at least.” +</p> + +<p> +Near the top of the street a quaint, narrow flight of steps conducted them to +the churchyard—an airy, elevated place, surrounded on three sides by the +church and houses, but open on the fourth, where a terraced walk, running along +the summit of the old town wall, admitted the southern sun and afforded a wide +view of plain and hill. The two men crossed the churchyard, the new rector +looking about him with curiosity and a little awe, his companion marching +straight onward, his strongly-marked face set ominously. He would go! He would +go at the earliest possible minute! he was thinking. +</p> + +<p> +It did not affect him nor alter his resolution that in the wooden porch of the +old rectory the new rector turned to him and shyly, yet with real feeling, +besought his help and advice in the work before him. The young clergyman, +commonly so self-confident, was moved, and moved deeply, by the evening light +and his strange and solemn surroundings. Stephen Clode’s answer was in +the affirmative—it could hardly have been other; and it was spoken +becomingly, if a little coldly, in view of the rector’s advances; but, +even while the curate spoke it, he was considering how he might best escape +from Claversham. Still his Yea, yea, comforted his companion and lightened his +momentary apprehensions. +</p> + +<p> +Nor was the curate, when he had recovered from the first shock of surprise and +disgust, so foolish as to betray his feelings by wanton churlishness. He parted +from his companion at the door, leaving him to the welcome of Mrs. Baker, the +rector’s London housekeeper, who had come down two days before; but at +the same time he consented readily to return at half-past six and share his +dinner, and gave him in the course of the meal all the information in his +power. Left to himself, the rector went over the house under Mrs. Baker’s +guidance, and, as he trod the polished floors, could not but feel some access +of self-importance. The panelled hall, with its wide oak staircase, fed this, +and the spacious sombrely-furnished library, with its books and busts, its +antique clock and one good engraving, and its lofty windows opening upon the +garden. So, in a less degree, did the long oak-panelled dining-room and a +smaller sitting-room which looked to the front and the churchyard; and the +drawing-room, which was situated over the library, and seemed the larger +because Mr. Williams had furnished it but scantily and lived in it less. Then +there were six or seven bedrooms, and in the garden a stone basin and fountain. +Altogether, when the rector descended after washing his hands, and stood on the +library hearth-rug looking about him, he would have been more than human if he +had not, with a feeling of thankfulness, entertained also some faint sense of +self-congratulation and personal desert. Nor, probably, would Mr. Clode have +been human if, coming in and finding the younger man standing on that +hearth-rug, and betraying in his face and attitude something of his thoughts, +he on his part had not felt a degree of envy and antagonism. The man was so +prosperous, so self-contented, so conscious of his own merit and success. +</p> + +<p> +But the curate was too wise to betray this feeling; and, laying himself out to +be pleasant, he had, before the little meal was over, so far ingratiated +himself with his entertainer that the rector was greatly surprised when he +presently learned that Clode had not been to a university. “You astonish +me,” he said, “for you have so completely the manner of a +’varsity-man!” +</p> + +<p> +The observation was a little too gracious, a little wanting in tact, but it +would not have hurt the curate had he not been at the moment in a state of +irritation. As it was, Clode treasured it up, and never got rid of the feeling +that the Oxford man looked down upon him because he had been only at Wells; +whereas Lindo, with some prejudices and sufficiently prone to judge his +fellows, had far too high an opinion of himself to be bound by such +distinctions, but was just as likely to make a friend of a ploughboy, if he +liked him, as of a Christchurch man. After that speech, however, the curate was +more than ever resolved to go, and go quickly. +</p> + +<p> +But, when dinner was over and he was about to take his leave, he happened to +pick up, as he moved about the room, a small prayer-book which Lindo had just +unpacked, and which was lying on the writing-table. Clode idly looked into it +as he talked, and, seeing on the flyleaf “Reginald Lindo, 1850,” +took occasion, when he had done with the subject in hand, to discuss it. +“Surely,” he said, holding it up, “you did not possess this +in 1850, Mr. Lindo!” +</p> + +<p> +“Hardly,” Lindo answered, laughing. “I was not born until +’54.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then who?” +</p> + +<p> +“It was my uncle’s,” the rector explained. “I was his +god-son, and his name was mine also.” +</p> + +<p> +“Is he alive, may I ask?” the curate pursued, looking at the +title-page as if he saw something curious there—though, indeed, what he +saw was not new to him; only from it he had suddenly deduced a thought. +</p> + +<p> +“No, he died about a year ago—nearly a year ago, I think,” +Lindo answered carelessly, and without the least suspicion. “He was +always particularly kind to me, and I use that book a good deal. I must have it +rebound.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” Clode said mechanically; “it wants rebinding if you +value it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I shall have it done. And a lot of these books,” the rector +continued, looking at old Mr. Williams’s shelves, “want their +clothes renewing. I shall have them all looked to, I think.” He had a +pleasant sense that this was in his power. The cost of the furniture and +library had made a hole in his not very large private means; but that mattered +little now. Eight hundred a year, paid quarterly, will bind a book or two. +</p> + +<p> +Had the curate been attending, he would have read Lindo’s thoughts with +ease. But Clode was pursuing a train of reflections of his own, and so was +spared this pang. “Your uncle was an old man, I suppose,” he said. +“I think I observed in the Clergy List that he had been in orders about +forty years.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not quite so long as that,” Lindo replied. “He was +sixty-four when he died. He had been Lord Dynmore’s private tutor you +know, though they were almost of an age.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed,” the curate rejoined, still with that thoughtful look on +his face. “You knew Lord Dynmore through him, I suppose, then, Mr. +Lindo?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I got the living through him, if that what you mean,” Lindo +said frankly. “But I do not think that I ever met Lord Dynmore. Certainly +I should not know him from Adam.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah!” said the curate, “ah! indeed!” He smiled as he +gazed into the fire, and stroked his chin. In the other’s place, he +thought, he would have been more reticent. He would not have disclaimed, though +he might not have claimed, acquaintance with Lord Dynmore. He would have left +the thing shadowy, to be defined by others as they pleased. Thinking thus, he +got up somewhat abruptly, and wished Lindo good-night. A cool observer, indeed, +might have noticed—but the rector did not—a change in his manner as +he did so—a little accession of familiarity, which did seem not far +removed from a delicate kind of contempt. The change was subtle, but one thing +was certain. Stephen Clode had no longer any intention of leaving Claversham in +a hurry. That resolve was gone. +</p> + +<p> +Once out of the house, he passed quickly from the churchyard by a narrow lane +leading to an irregular open space quaintly called “The Top of the +Town.” Here were his own lodgings, on the first-floor over a +stationer’s; but he did not enter them. Instead, he strode on toward the +farther and darker side of the square, where were no buildings, but a belt of +tall trees stood up, gaunt and rustling in the night wind above a line of wall. +Through the trees the lights of a large house were visible. He walked up the +avenue which led to the door and, ringing loudly, was at once admitted. +</p> + +<p> +The sound of the bell came to the ears of two ladies who had been for some time +placidly expecting it. They were seated in a small but charming room filled +with soft, shaded light and warmth and color, an open piano and dainty pictures +and china, and a well-littered writing-table all contributing to the air of +accustomed luxury which pervaded it. The elder lady—that Mrs. Hammond +whom we saw talking to the curate on the day of the old rector’s +funeral—looked up expectantly as Mr. Clode entered, and, extending to him +a podgy white hand covered with rings, began to chide him in a rich full voice +for being so late. “I have been dying,” she said cheerfully, +“to hear what is the fate before us, Mr. Clode. What is he like?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” he answered, taking with a word of thanks the cup of tea +which Laura offered him, “I have one surprise in store for you. He is +comparatively young.” +</p> + +<p> +“Sixty?” said Mrs. Hammond interrogatively. +</p> + +<p> +“Forty?” said Laura, raising her eyebrows. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” Clode replied, smiling and stirring his tea, “you must +guess again. He is twenty-six.” +</p> + +<p> +“Twenty-six! You are joking,” exclaimed the elder lady. While Laura +opened her eyes very wide, but said nothing yet. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said the curate. “He told me himself that he was not +born until 1854.” +</p> + +<p> +The two ladies were loud in their surprise then, while for a moment the curate +sipped his tea in silence. The brass kettle hissed and bubbled on the hob. The +tea-set twinkled cheerfully on the wicker table, and faint scents of flowers +and fabrics filled the room with an atmosphere which he had long come to +associate with Laura. It was Laura Hammond, indeed, who had introduced him to +this new world. The son of an accountant living in a small Lincolnshire town, +he owed his clerical profession to his mother’s ardent wish that he +should rise in the world. His father was not wealthy, and, before he came as +curate to Claversham, Mr. Clode had had no experience of society. Then, +alighting: on a sudden in the midst of much such a small town as his native +place, he found himself astonishingly transmogrified into a person of social +importance. He found every door open to him, and among them the +Hammonds’, who were admitted to be the first people in the town. He fell +in easily enough with the “new learning,” but the central figure in +the novel pleasant world of refinement continued throughout to be Laura +Hammond. +</p> + +<p> +Much petting had somewhat spoiled him, and it annoyed him now, as he sat +sipping his tea, to observe that the ladies were far from displeased with his +tidings. “If he is a young man, he is sure not to be evangelical,” +said Mrs. Hammond decisively. “That is well. That is a comfort, at any +rate.” +</p> + +<p> +“He will play tennis, I dare say,” said Laura. +</p> + +<p> +“And Mr. Bonamy will be kept in some order now,” Mrs. Hammond +continued. “Not that I am blaming you, Mr. Clode,” she added +graciously—indeed, the curate was a great favorite with her, “but +in your position you could do nothing with a man so impracticable.” +</p> + +<p> +“He really will be an acquisition,” cried Laura gleefully, her +brown eyes shining in the firelight. And she made her tiny lace handkerchief +into a ball and flung it up—and did not catch it, for, with all her talk +of lawn-tennis, she was no great player. Her <i>rôle</i> lay rather in the +drawing-room. She was as fond of comfort as a cat, and loved the fire with the +love of a dog, and was, in a word, pre-eminently feminine, delighting to +surround herself with all such things as tended to set off this side of her +nature. “But now,” she continued briskly, when the curate had +recovered her handkerchief for her, “tell me what you think of him. Is he +nice?” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly; I should say so,” the curate answered, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +But, though he smiled, he became silent again. He was reflecting, with +well-hidden bitterness, that Lindo would not only override him in the parish, +but would be his rival in the particular inner clique which he +affected—perhaps his rival with Laura. The thought awoke the worst nature +of the man. Up to this time, though he had not been true, though he had kept +back at Claversham details of his past history which a frank man would have +avowed, though in the process of assimilating himself to his new surroundings +he had been over-pliant, he had not been guilty of any baseness which had +seemed to him a baseness, which had outraged his own conscience. But, as he +reflected on the wrong which this young stranger was threatening to do him, he +felt himself capable of much. +</p> + +<p> +“Mrs. Hammond,” he said suddenly, “may I ask if you have +destroyed Lord Dynmore’s letter which you showed me last week?” +</p> + +<p> +“Destroyed Lord Dynmore’s letter!” Laura answered, speaking +for her mother in a tone of comic surprise. “Do you think, sir, that we +get peers’ autographs every day of the week?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” Mrs. Hammond said, waving aside her daughter’s +flippancy and speaking with some stateliness. “It is not destroyed, +though such things are not so rare with us as Laura pretends. But why do you +ask?” +</p> + +<p> +“Because the rector was not sure when Lord Dynmore meant to return to +England,” Clode explained readily. “And I thought he mentioned the +date in his letter to you, Mrs. Hammond.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not think so,” said Mrs. Hammond. +</p> + +<p> +“Might I look?” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course,” was the answer. “Will you find it, Laura? I +think it is under the malachite weight in the other room.” +</p> + +<p> +It was, sitting there in solitary majesty. Laura opened it, and took the +liberty of glancing through it first. Then she gave it to him. “There, +you unbelieving man,” she said, “you can look. But he does not say +a word about his return.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate read rapidly until he came to one sentence, and on this his eye +dwelt a moment. “I hear with regret,” it ran, “that poor +Williams is not long for this world. When he goes I shall send you an old +friend of mine. I trust he will become an old friend of yours also.” +Clode barely glanced at the rest of the letter, but, as he handed it back, he +informed himself that it was dated in America two days before Mr. +Williams’s death. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” he admitted, “I was wrong. I thought he had said when +he would return.” +</p> + +<p> +“And you are satisfied?” said Laura. +</p> + +<p> +“Perfectly,” he answered. “Perfectly!” with a little +unnecessary emphasis. +</p> + +<p> +He lingered long enough to give them a personal description of the +new-comer—speaking always of him in words of praise—and then he +took his leave. As his hand met Laura’s, his face flushed ever so +slightly and his dark eyes glowed; and the girl, as she turned away, smiled +furtively, knowing well, though he had never spoken, that she was the cause of +this. So she was, but in part only. At that moment the curate saw something +besides Laura—he saw across a narrow strait of trouble the fairer land of +preferment, his footing on which once gained he might pretend to her and to +many other pleasant things at present beyond his reach. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap06"></a>CHAPTER VI.<br/> +THE BONAMYS AT HOME.</h2> + +<p> +Lindo made his first exploration of the neighborhood, not on the day after his +arrival, which was taken up with his induction by the archdeacon and with other +matters, but on the day after that. He chose to avoid the streets, in which he +felt somewhat shy, so polite were the attentions and so curious the glances of +his parishioners; and he selected instead a lane which, starting from the +churchyard, seemed to plunge at once into the country. It was a pleasant lane. +It lay deep sunk in a cutting through the sandstone rock—a cutting first +formed, perhaps, when the great stones for the building of the church were +dragged up that way. He paused halfway down the slope to look about him +curiously, and was still standing when some one came round the corner before +him. It was Kate Bonamy. He saw the girl’s cheek—she was +alone—flush ever so slightly as their eyes met; and he noticed, too, that +to all appearance she would have passed him with a bow had he not placed +himself in her way. “Come,” he said, laughing frankly as he held +out his hand, “you must not cut me, Miss Bonamy! Let me tell you, you +have quite the aspect of an old friend, for until now I have not seen one face +since I came here that was not absolutely new to me.” +</p> + +<p> +“It must feel strange, no doubt,” she murmured. +</p> + +<p> +“It is. <i>I</i> feel strange!” he replied. “I want you to +tell me where this road goes to, if you please. I am so strange, I do not even +know that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Kingsford Carbonel,” she answered briefly. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! The archdeacon lives there, does he not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“And the distance, please, is——?” +</p> + +<p> +“Three miles.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you,” he said. “Really you are as concise as a +mile-stone, Miss Bonamy. And now let me remind you,” he +continued—there was an air of “I am going on this moment” +about her, which provoked him to detain her the longer—“that you +have not yet asked me what I think of Claversham.” +</p> + +<p> +“I would rather ask you in a month’s time,” Kate answered +quietly, holding out her hand to take leave. “Though it is already +reported in the town that you will only stay a year, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +“I shall only stay a year!” the rector repeated in astonishment. +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly,” she answered, smiling, and relapsing for a moment into +the pleasant frankness of that day at Oxford—“only a year; your +days are already numbered.” +</p> + +<p> +“What do you mean?” he said point-blank. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you never heard the old tradition that as many times as a clergyman +sounds the bell at his induction, so many years will he remain in the living? +And the report in Claversham is that you rang it only once.” +</p> + +<p> +“You did not hear it yourself?” he said, catching her eyes +suddenly, a lurking smile in his own. +</p> + +<p> +Her color rose faintly. “I am not sure,” she said. Then, meeting +his eyes boldly, she added in a different tone, “Yes, I did hear +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Only once?” +</p> + +<p> +She nodded. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that is sad,” he answered. “Well, the tradition is new +to me. If I had known it,” he added, laughing, “I should have +tolled the bell at least fifty times. Clode should have instructed me; but I +suppose he thought I knew. I remember now that the archdeacon did say something +afterward, but I did not understand the reference. You know the archdeacon, +Miss Bonamy, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Kate, growing stiff again. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you not? Well, at any rate you can tell me where Mrs. Hammond lives. +She has kindly asked me to dine with her on Tuesday. I put my acceptance in my +pocket, and thought I would deliver it myself when I came back from my +walk.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mrs. Hammond lives at the Town House,” Kate answered. “It is +the large house among the trees by the top of the town. You cannot mistake +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Shall I have the pleasure of meeting you there?” he asked, holding +out his hand at last. +</p> + +<p> +“No; I do not know Mrs. Hammond,” Miss Bonamy said with decision. +“Good-day, Mr. Lindo.” And she was gone; rather abruptly at last. +</p> + +<p> +“That is odd—very odd,” Lindo reflected as, continuing his +walk, he turned to admire her graceful figure and the pretty carriage of her +head. “I fancied that in these small towns every one knew every one. What +sort of people are the Hammonds, I wonder? New, rich, and vulgar perhaps. It +may be, and that would account for it. Yet Clode spoke highly of them.” +</p> + +<p> +Something which he did not understand in the girl’s manner continued to +pique the young man’s curiosity after he had parted from her, and led him +to dwell more intently upon her than upon the scenery, novel as this was to +him. She had shown herself at one moment so frank, and at another so stiff and +constrained, that it was equally impossible to ascribe the one attitude to +shyness or the other to a naturally candid manner. The rector considered the +question so long, and found it so puzzling—and interesting—that on +his return to town he had come to one conclusion only—that it was his +immediate duty to call upon his church wardens. He had made the acquaintance of +Mr. Harper, his own warden, at his induction. It remained therefore to call +upon Mr. Bonamy, the peoples’ warden. When he had taken his lunch, it +seemed to him that there was no time like the present. +</p> + +<p> +He had no difficulty in finding Mr. Bonamy’s house, which stood in the +middle of the town, about halfway down Bridge Street. It was a substantial, +respectable residence of brick, not detached nor withdrawn from the roadway. It +had nothing aristocratic in its appearance, and was known by a number. Its +eleven windows, of which the three lowest rejoiced in mohair blinds, were +sombre, its doorway was heavy. In a word, it was a respectable middle-class +house in a dull street in a country town—a house suggestive of early +dinners and set teas. The rector felt chilled by its very appearance; but he +knocked, and presently a maid-servant opened the door about a foot. “Is +Mr. Bonamy at home?” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“No, sir,” the girl drawled, holding the door as if she feared he +might attempt to enter by force, “he is not.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, I am sorry I have missed him,” said the clergyman, handling +his card-case. “Do you know at what time he is likely to return?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, sir, I don’t,” replied the girl, who was all eyes for +the strange rector; “but I expect Miss Kate does. Will you walk +up-stairs, sir? and I will tell her.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps I had better,” he answered, pocketing his card-case. +Accordingly he walked in, and followed the servant to the drawing-room, where +she poked the sinking fire and induced a sickly blaze. +</p> + +<p> +Left to himself—for Kate was not there—he looked round curiously, +and as he looked the sense of disappointment which he had felt at sight of the +house grew upon him. It was a cold, uncomfortable room. It had a set, formal +look, which was not quaintness, nor harmony, and which was strange to the +Londoner. It was so neat: every article in it had a place, and was in its +place, and apparently never had been out of its place. There was a vase of +chrysanthemums on the large centre table, but the rector thought they must be +wax, they were so prim. There were other wax flowers—which he hated. He +almost shivered as he looked at the four walls. He felt obliged to sit upright +on his chair, and to place his hat exactly in the middle of a square of the +carpet, and to ponder over the question of what the maid had done with the +poker. For she had certainly not stirred the fire with the bright and shining +thing which lay in evidence in the fender. +</p> + +<p> +He was in the act of rising cautiously with the intention of solving this +mystery, when the door opened and the elder sister came in, Daintry following +her. “My father is not in, Mr. Lindo,” Kate said, advancing to meet +him, and shaking hands with him. +</p> + +<p> +“No; so I learned down-stairs,” he answered. “But +I——” +</p> + +<p> +The girl—she had scarcely turned from him—cut him short with an +exclamation of dismay. “Oh, Daintry, you naughty girl!” she cried. +“You have brought Snorum up.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Daintry simply—a large white dog, half bull-dog, +half terrier, with red-rimmed eyes and projecting teeth, had crept in at her +heels—“he followed me.” +</p> + +<p> +“You know papa would be so angry if he found him here.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I only want him to see Mr. Lindo. You are unkind, Kate! You know he +never gets a chance of seeing a stranger.” +</p> + +<p> +“You want to know if he likes me?” the rector said, laughing. +</p> + +<p> +“That is it,” she answered, nodding. +</p> + +<p> +But Kate, though she laughed, was inexorable. She bundled the big dog out. +“Do you know, she has two more like that, Mr. Lindo?” she said, +apologetically. +</p> + +<p> +“Snip and Snap,” said Daintry. “But they are not like that. +They are smaller. Jack gave me Snorum, and Snip and Snap are Snorum’s +sons.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is quite a genealogy,” the rector said, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, and Jack was the Genesis. Genesis means beginning, you know,” +Daintry explained. +</p> + +<p> +“Daintry, you must go down-stairs if you talk nonsense,” Kate said +imperatively. She was looking, the young man thought, prettier than ever in a +gray and blue plaid frock and the neatest of collars and cuffs. As for Daintry, +she shrugged her shoulders under the rebuke, and lolled in one of the +stiff-backed chairs, her attitude much like that of a vine clinging to a +telegraph-post. +</p> + +<p> +Her wilfulness had one happy effect, however. The rector in his amusement +forgot the chill formality of the room and the dull respectability of the +house’s exterior. For half an hour he talked on without a thought of the +gentleman whom he had come to see. Some inkling of the circumstances of the +case which had entered his head before the sisters’ appearance faded +again, and in gazing on the pure animated faces of the two girls he quickly +lost sight of the evidences of lack of taste which appeared in their +surroundings. If Kate, on her side, forgot for a moment certain chilling +realities and surrendered herself to the pleasure of the moment, it must be +remembered that hitherto—in Claversham, at least—her experience of +men had been confined to Dr. Gregg and his fellows, and also that none of us, +even the wisest and proudest, are always on guard. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy not appearing, Reginald left at last, perfectly assured that the +half-hour he had just spent was the pleasantest he had spent in Claversham. He +went out of the house in a gentle glow of enthusiasm. The picture of Kate +Bonamy, trim and neat, with her hair in a bright knot, and laughter softening +her eyes, remained with him, and he walked half-way down the street lost in a +delightful reverie. +</p> + +<p> +He was aroused by the approach of a tall, elderly man who had just turned the +corner before him, and was now advancing along the pavement with long, rapid +strides. The stranger, who seemed about sixty, wore a wide-skirted black coat, +and had a tall silk hat, from under which the gray hairs straggled thinly, set +far back on his head. His figure was spare, his face sallow, his features +prominent. His mouth was peevish, his eyes sharp and saturnine. As he walked he +kept one hand in his trousers’-pocket, the other swung by his side. The +rector looked at him a moment in doubt, and then stopped him. “Mr. +Bonamy, I am sure?” he said, holding out his hand. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I am,” replied the other, fixing him with a penetrating +glance. “And you, sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“May I introduce myself? I have just called at your house, and, +unluckily, failed to find you at home. I am Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, the new rector!” said Mr. Bonamy, putting out a cold hand, +while the chill glitter of his eye lost none of its steeliness. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, and I am glad to have intercepted you,” Lindo continued, with +a little color in his cheek, and speaking quickly under the influence of his +late enthusiasm, which as yet was proof against the lawyer’s reserve. +“For I have been extremely anxious to make your acquaintance, and, +indeed, to say something particular to you, Mr. Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +The elder man bowed to hide a smile. “As church warden, I presume?” +he said smoothly. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, and—and generally. I am quite aware, Mr. Bonamy,” +continued the rash young man in a fervor of frankness, “that you were not +disposed to look upon my appointment—the appointment of a complete +stranger, I mean—with favor.” +</p> + +<p> +“May I ask who told you that?” said Bonamy abruptly. +</p> + +<p> +The young clergyman colored. “Well, I—perhaps you will excuse me +saying how I learned it,” he answered, beginning to see that he would +have done better to be more reticent. There is no mistake which youth more +often makes than that of arousing sleeping dogs, and trying to explain things +which a wiser man would pass over in silence. Mr. Bonamy had his own reasons +for regarding the parson with suspicion, and had no mind to be addressed in the +indulgent vein. Nor was he propitiated when Lindo added, “I learned your +feeling, if I may say so, by an accident.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then I think you should have kept knowledge so gained to +yourself!” the lawyer retorted. +</p> + +<p> +The rector started and turned crimson under the reproof. His dignity was new +and tender, and the other’s tone was offensive in the last degree. Yet +the young man tried to control himself, and for the moment succeeded. +“Possibly,” he said, with some stiffness. “My only motive in +mentioning the latter, however, was this, that I hope in a short time, by +appealing to you for your hearty co-operation, to overcome any prejudices you +may have entertained.” +</p> + +<p> +“My prejudices are rather strong,” the lawyer answered grimly. +“You are quite at liberty to try, however, Mr. Lindo. But I may as well +warn you of one thing now, as frankness seems to be in fashion. I have just +been told that you are meditating considerable changes in our church here. Now, +I must tell you this, that I object to anything new—anything new, and not +only to new incumbents!” with a smile which somewhat softened his last +words. +</p> + +<p> +“But who informed you,” cried the rector in angry surprise, +“that I meditated changes, Mr. Bonamy?” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah!” the lawyer answered in his dryest and thinnest voice. +“That is just what I cannot tell you. Let us say that I learned +it—by accident, Mr. Lindo!” And his sharp eyes twinkled. +</p> + +<p> +“It is not true, however!” the rector exclaimed. +</p> + +<p> +“Is it not? Well,” with a slight cough, “I am glad to hear +it!” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy’s tone as he made this admission, however, was such that it +only irritated Lindo the more. “You mean that you do not believe +me!” he cried, speaking so fiercely that Clowes the bookseller, who had +been watching the interview from his shop-door, was able to repeat the words to +a dozen people afterward. “I can assure you that it is so. I am not +thinking of making any changes whatever—unless you consider the mere +removal of the sheep from the churchyard a change!” +</p> + +<p> +“I do. A great change,” replied the church warden with grimness. +</p> + +<p> +“But surely you do not object to it!” Lindo exclaimed in +astonishment. “Every one must agree that in these days, and in town +churchyards at any rate, the presence of sheep is unseemly.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not agree to that at all!” Mr. Bonamy answered calmly. +“Neither did Mr. Williams, the late rector, who had had long experience, +act as if he were of that mind.” +</p> + +<p> +The present rector threw up his hands in disgust—in disgust and wonder. +Remember, he was very young. The thing seemed to him so clear that he was +assured the other was arguing for the sake of argument—a thing we all +hate in other people—and he lost patience. “I do not think you mean +what you say, Mr. Bonamy,” he blurted out at last. He was much +discomposed, yet he made an attempt to assume an air of severity which did not +sit well upon him at the moment. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy grinned. “That you will see when you turn out the sheep, Mr. +Lindo,” he said. “For the present I think I will bid you good +evening.” and taking off his hat gravely—to the rector the gravity +seemed ironical—he went his way. +</p> + +<p> +Men take these things differently. To the lawyer there was nothing disturbing +in such a passage of arms as this. He was never so happy—Claversham knew +it well—as in and after a quarrel. “Master Lindo thought to twist +me round his finger, did he?” he muttered to himself as he stopped on his +own doorstep and thrust the key into the lock. “He has found out his +mistake now. We will have nothing new here—nothing new while John Bonamy +is warden, at any rate, my lad! It is well, however,” continued Mr. +Bonamy with a backward glance, “that Clode gave me a hint in time. Set a +beggar on horseback and he will ride—we know whither!” And the +lawyer went in and slammed the door behind him. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile, what is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the gander. The +younger man turned away, at the moment, indeed, in a white heat, full of wrath +at the other’s unreasonableness, folly, churlishness. But the comfortable +warmth which this engendered passed away quickly—alas! much too +quickly—and long before Lindo reached the rectory, though the walk +through the gray streets, where the shops were just being lighted, did not take +him two minutes, a chill depression had taken its place. This was a fine +beginning! This was a happy augury of his future administration of the parish! +To have begun by quarrelling with his church warden—could anything have +been worse? And the check had come so suddenly, so unexpectedly, and at a time +when he had been on such good terms with himself, that he felt it the more +sorely. He went into the house with his head bent, and was not best pleased to +find Stephen Clode inquiring after him in the hall. He would rather have been +alone. +</p> + +<p> +The curate, as he came forward, did not fail to note that something was amiss, +and a gleam of intelligence flashed for an instant across his dark face. +“Come into the study,” said the rector curtly. Since Clode was +here, and could not be avoided, he felt it would be a relief to tell him all. +And he did so, the curate listening and making no remark whatever, so that the +rector presently looked at him in surprise. “What do you think of +it?” he said, some impatience in his one. “It is unfortunate, is it +not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I don’t know,” the curate answered, leaning forward in +his chair, with his elbows on his knees and his eyes cast down upon the hat +which he was slowly revolving between his hands. “I am not astonished, +you know. What can you expect from a pig but a grunt?” +</p> + +<p> +The rector got up, and, leaning his arm on the mantel-shelf, felt, if the truth +be told, rather uncomfortable. “I do not understand you,” he said +at length. +</p> + +<p> +“It is what I should have expected from Bonamy. That is all.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then you must think him a very ill-conditioned man!” Lindo +retorted warmly, scarcely knowing whether the annoyance he felt was a +reminiscence of his late conflict or caused by his companion’s manner. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, again, what else can you expect?” Clode replied sagely, +looking up and shrugging his shoulders. “You know all about him, I +suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“I know nothing,” said the rector, frowning slightly. +</p> + +<p> +“He is not a gentleman, you know,” the curate answered, still +looking up and speaking with languid indolence as if what he said must be known +to everyone. “You have heard his history?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, I have not.” +</p> + +<p> +“He was an office-boy with Adams & Rooke, the old solicitors here, +swept out the office, and brought the coal, and so forth. He had his wits about +him, and old Adams gave him his articles, and finally took him into +partnership. Then the old men died off and it all came to him. He is well off, +and has power of a sort in the town; but, of course,” the curate added, +getting up lazily and yawning—“well, people like the Hammonds do +not visit with him.” +</p> + +<p> +There was silence in the room for a full minute. The rector had left the +fireplace and, with his back to the speaker, was raising the lamp-wick. +“Why did you not tell me this before?” he said at length, his voice +hard. +</p> + +<p> +“I did not see why I should prejudice you against the man before you saw +him,” replied the curate, with much reason. “Besides, I really was +not sure whether you knew his history or not. I am afraid I did not give much +thought to the matter.” +</p> + +<p> +“Umph!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap07"></a>CHAPTER VII.<br/> +THE HAMMONDS’ DINNER PARTY.</h2> + +<p> +The new top, the new book, the bride—the first joy in the possession of +each one of these fades, not gradually, but at a leap, as day fades in the +tropics. A chip in the wood, the turning of the last page, the first selfish +word, and the thing is done; ecstasy becomes sober satisfaction. It was so with +the rector. The first glamour of his good fortune, of his new toy, died +abruptly with that evening—with the quarrel with his church warden, and +the discovery of the cause of that constraint which he had remarked in Kate +Bonamy’s manner from the first. +</p> + +<p> +He was a conscientious man, and the failure of his good resolutions, his +aspirations to be the perfect parish priest, fretted him. Moreover, he had to +think of the future. He soon learned that Mr. Bonamy might not be a gentleman, +and was indeed reputed to be a stubborn, queer-tempered curmudgeon; but he +learned also that he had great influence in the town, though, except in the way +of business, he associated with few, and that he, Reginald Lindo, would have to +reckon with him on that footing. The certainty of this and of the bad beginning +he had made naturally depressed the young man, his customary good opinion of +himself not coming to his aid at once. And, besides, he carried about with +him—sometimes it came between him and his book, sometimes he saw it +framed by the autumn landscape—the picture of Kate’s pure proud +face. At such moments he felt himself humiliated by the slights cast upon her. +The Hammonds did not think her fit company for them! The Hammonds! +</p> + +<p> +Not that he knew the Hammonds yet, or many others, the days which intervened +between his induction and the dinner at the Town House being somewhat lonely +days, during which he was much thrown back upon himself, and only felt by slow +degrees the soothing influence of the routine work of his position. Of his +curate, and of him only, he naturally saw much, and found it small comfort to +learn from the Reverend Stephen that the fracas with Mr. Bonamy had not escaped +the attention of the town, but was being made the subject of comment by many +who were delighted to have so novel a subject as the new rector and his +probable conduct. +</p> + +<p> +He was sitting at breakfast a few days later—on the morning of the +Hammonds’ party—when Mrs. Baker announced an early visitor. +“No, he is not a gentleman, sir,” she said, “though he has on +a black coat. A stranger to the town, I think, but he will not say what he +wants, except to see you.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will come to him in the study,” replied her master. +</p> + +<p> +The housekeeper, however, going out, and taking a second glance at the caller, +did not show him into the study, but instead, gave him a seat in the hall on +the farther side from the coatstand. There the rector, when he came out, found +him—a pale fat-faced man, dressed neatly and decorously, though his +clothes were threadbare. He took him into the study, and asked him his +business. “But first sit down,” the rector added pleasantly, +desiring to set the man at his ease. +</p> + +<p> +The stranger sat down gingerly on the edge of a chair. For a moment there was a +pause of seeming embarrassment, and then, “I am body-servant, sir,” +he said abruptly, passing his tongue across his lips, and looking up furtively +to learn the effect of his announcement, “to the Earl of Dynmore.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed!” the rector replied, with a slight start. “Has Lord +Dynmore returned to England, then?” +</p> + +<p> +Again the man looked up slyly. “No, sir,” he answered with +deliberation, “I cannot say that he has, sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“You have brought some letter or message from him, perhaps?” the +clergyman hazarded. The stranger seemed to have a difficulty in telling his own +story. +</p> + +<p> +“No, sir, if you will pardon me, I have come about myself, sir,” +the man explained, speaking a little more freely. “I am in a little bit +of trouble, and I think you would help me, sir, if you heard the story.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am quite willing to hear the story,” said the rector gravely. +Looking more closely at the man, he saw that his neatness was only on the +surface. His white cravat was creased, and his wrists displayed no linen. An +air of seediness marked him in the full light of the windows, and, pale as his +face was, it wore here and there a delicate flush. Perhaps the man’s +admission that he was in trouble helped the rector to see this. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, sir, it was this way,” the servant began. “I was not +very well out there, sir, and his lordship—he is an independent kind of +man—thought he would be better by himself. So he gave me my passage-money +and board wages for three months, and told me to come home and take a holiday +until he returned to England. So far it was all right, sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes?” said the rector. +</p> + +<p> +“But on board the boat—I am not excusing what I did, sir; but there +are others have done worse,” continued the man, with another of his +sudden upward glances—“I was led to play cards with a set of +sharpers, and—and the end of it was that I landed at Liverpool yesterday +without a halfpenny.” +</p> + +<p> +“That was bad.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, it was, sir. I do not know that I ever felt so bad in my +life,” replied the servant earnestly. “And now you know my +position, sir. There are several people in the town—but they have no +means to help me—who can tell you I am his lordship’s valet, and my +name Charles Felton.” +</p> + +<p> +“You want help, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“I have not a halfpenny, sir! I want something to live on until his +lordship comes back.” +</p> + +<p> +His tone changed as he said this, growing hard and almost defiant. The rector +noted the alteration, and did not like it. “But why come to me?” he +said, more coldly than he had yet spoken. “Why do you not go to Lord +Dynmore’s steward, or agent, or his solicitor, my man?” +</p> + +<p> +“They would tell of me,” was the curt answer. “And likely +enough I should lose my place.” +</p> + +<p> +“Still, why come to me?” Lindo persisted—chiefly to learn +what was in the man’s mind, for he had already determined what he would +do. +</p> + +<p> +“Because you are rector of Claversham, sir,” the applicant retorted +at last. And he rose suddenly and confronted the parson with an unpleasant +smile on his pale face—“which is in my lord’s gift, as you +know, sir,” he continued, in a tone rude and almost savage—a tone +which considerably puzzled his companion, who was not conscious of having said +anything offensive to the man. “I came here, sir, expecting to meet an +older gentleman, a gentleman of your name, a gentleman known to me, and I find +you—and I see you, do you see, where I expected to find him.” +</p> + +<p> +“You mean my uncle, I suppose?” said Lindo. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, sir, you know best,” was the odd reply, and the man’s +look was as odd as his words. “But that is how the case stands; and, +seeing it stands so, I hope you will help me, sir. I do hope, on every account, +sir, that you will see your way to help me.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector looked at the speaker with a slight frown, liking neither the man +nor his behavior. But he had already made up his mind to help him, if only in +gratitude to his patron, whose retainer he was; and this, though the earl would +never know of the act, nor possibly approve of it. The man had at least had the +frankness to own the folly which had brought him to these straits, and Lindo +was inclined to set down the oddity of his present manner to the fear and +anxiety of a respectable servant on the verge of disgrace. “Yes,” +he said coldly, after a moment’s thought, “I am willing to help +you. Of course I shall expect you to repay me if and when you are able, +Felton.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will do that,” replied the man rather cavalierly. +</p> + +<p> +“You might have added, ‘and thank you, sir,’” the +rector said, with a keen glance of reproof. He turned, as he spoke, to a small +cupboard constructed between the bookshelves near the fireplace, and, opening +it, took out a cash-box. +</p> + +<p> +The man colored under his reproach, and muttered some apology, resuming, as by +habit, the tone of respect which seemed natural to him. All the same he watched +the clergyman’s movements with great closeness, and appraised, even +before it was placed in his hand, the sum which Lindo took from a compartment +set apart apparently for gold. “I will allow you ten shillings a +week—on loan, of course,” Lindo said after a moment’s +thought. “You can keep yourself on that, I suppose? And, besides, I will +advance you a sovereign to supply yourself with anything of which you have +pressing need. That should be ample. There are three half sovereigns.” +</p> + +<p> +This time the man did thank him with an appearance of heartiness. But before he +had said much the study door opened, and Stephen Clode came in, his hat in his +hand. “Oh, I beg your pardon,” the curate said, taking in at a +glance the open cash-box and the stranger’s outstretched hand, and +preparing to withdraw. “I thought you were alone.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come in, come in!” said the rector, closing the money-box hastily, +and with some embarrassment, for he was not altogether sure that he had not +done a foolish and quixotic thing. “Our friend here is going. You can +send me your address, Felton. Good-day.” +</p> + +<p> +The man thanked him and, taking up his hat, went. “Some one out of +luck?” said Clode. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“I did not much like his looks,” the curate remarked. “He is +not a townsman, or I should know him.” The rector felt that his +discretion was assailed, and hastened to defend himself. “He is +respectable enough,” he said carelessly. “As a fact, he is Lord +Dynmore’s valet.” +</p> + +<p> +“But has Lord Dynmore come back?” the curate exclaimed, his hand +arrested in the act of taking down a book from a high shelf, and his head +turning quickly. If he expected to learn anything, however, from his +superior’s demeanor he was disappointed. Lindo was busy locking the +cupboard, and had his back to him. +</p> + +<p> +“No, he has not come back,” Reginald explained, “but he has +sent the man home, and the foolish fellow lost his money on the boat coming +over, and wants an advance until his master’s return.” +</p> + +<p> +“But why on earth does he come to you for it?” cried the curate, +with undisguised, astonishment. +</p> + +<p> +The rector shrugged his shoulders. “Oh, I do not know,” he said, a +trifle of irritation in his manners. “He did, and there is an end of it. +Is there any news?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Clode seemed to find a difficulty in at once changing the direction of his +thoughts. But he did so with an effort, and, after a pause, answered, +“No, I think not. There is a good deal of interest felt in the question +of the sheep out there, I fancy—whether you will take your course or +comply with Mr. Bonamy’s whim.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not know myself,” said the young rector, turning and facing +the curate, with his feet apart and his hands thrust deep into his pockets. +“I do not, indeed. It is a serious matter.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is. Still you have the responsibility,” said the curate with +diffidence, “and, without expressing any view of my own on the subject, I +confess——” +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think if I bore the responsibility, I should feel called upon to do +what I myself thought right in the matter.” +</p> + +<p> +The younger man shook his head doubtfully. “There is something in +that,” he said; “but, on the other hand, one cannot look on the +point as an essential, and, that being so, perhaps one should prefer peace. +But, there, enough of that now, Clode. I think you said you were not going to +the Hammonds’ this evening?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, I am not.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector almost wished he were not. However sociable a man may be, a few days +of solitude and a little temporary depression will render him averse from +society if he be sensitive. Lindo as a man was not very sensitive; he held too +good an opinion of himself. But as rector he was, and as he walked across to +the Town House he anticipated anything but enjoyment. +</p> + +<p> +In a few minutes, however—has it not some time or other happened to all +of us?—everything was changed with him. He felt as if he had entered +another world. The air of culture and refinement which surrounded him from the +hall inward, the hearty kindness of Mrs. Hammond, the pretty rooms, the music +and flowers, Laura’s light laughter and pleasant badinage, all surprised +and delighted him. The party might almost have been a London party, it was so +lively. The archdeacon, a red-faced, cherry, white-haired man, whose +acquaintance Lindo had already made, and his wife, who was a mild image of +himself, were of the number, which was completed by their daughter and four or +five county people, all prepared to welcome and be pleased with the new rector. +Lindo, sprung from gentlefolk himself, had the ordinary experience of society; +but here he found himself treated as a stranger and a dignitary to a degree of +notice and a delicate flattery of which he had not before tasted the sweets. +Perhaps he was the more struck by the taste displayed in the house, and the wit +and liveliness of his new friends, because he had so little looked for +them—because he had insensibly judged his parish by his experience of Mr. +Bonamy, and had come expecting this house to be as his. +</p> + +<p> +If, under these circumstances, the young fellow had been unaffected by the +incense offered to him he would have been more than mortal. But he was not. He +began, before he had been in the house an hour, to change, all unconsciously of +course, his standpoint. He began to wonder especially why he had been so +depressed during the last few days, and why he had troubled himself so much +about the opinions of people whose views no sensible man would regard. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps the girl beside him—he took in Laura—contributed as much as +anything to this. It was not only that she was bright and sparkling, in the +luxury of her pearls and evening dress even enchanting, nor only that the +femininity which had enslaved Stephen Clode began to have its effects on her +new neighbor. But Laura had a way while she talked to him, while her lustrous +brown eyes dwelt momentarily on his, of removing herself and himself to a world +apart—a world in which downrightness seemed more downright and rudeness +an outrage. And so, while her manner gently soothed and flattered her +companion, it led him almost insensibly to—well, to put it in the +concrete—to think scorn of Mr. Bonamy. +</p> + +<p> +“You have had a misunderstanding,” she said softly, as they stood +together by the piano after dinner, a feathering plant or two fencing them off +in a tiny solitude of their own, “with Mr. Bonamy, have you not, Mr. +Lindo?” +</p> + +<p> +From anyone else, perhaps from her half an hour before, he would have resented +mention of the matter. Now he did not seem to mind. “Something of the +kind,” he said, laughing. +</p> + +<p> +“About the sheep in the churchyard, was it not?” she continued. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, will you pardon me saying something?” Resting both her hands +on the raised lid of the piano, she looked up at him, and it must be confessed +that he thought he had never seen eyes so soft and brilliant before. “It +is only this,” she said earnestly. “That I hope you will not give +way to him. He is a wretched, cross-grained, fidgety man and full of crotchets. +You know all about him, of course?” she added, a slight ring of pride in +her voice. +</p> + +<p> +“I know that he is my church warden,” said the rector, half in +seriousness. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes!” she replied. “That is just what he is fit for!” +</p> + +<p> +“You think so?” Lindo retorted, smiling. “Then you really +mean that I should be guided by him? That is it?” +</p> + +<p> +She looked brightly at him for a moment. “I think you will be guided only +by yourself,” she murmured; and, blushing slightly, she nodded and left +him to go to another guest. +</p> + +<p> +They were all in the same tale. “He is a rude overbearing man, Mr. +Lindo,” Mrs. Hammond said roundly, even her good nature giving place to +the <i>odium theologicum</i>. “And I cannot imagine why Mr. Williams put +up with him so long.” +</p> + +<p> +“No indeed,” said the archdeacon’s wife, complacently +smoothing down her skirt. “But that is the worst of a town parish. You +have this sort of people.” +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Hammond looked for the moment as if she would have liked to deny it. But +under the circumstances this was impossible. “I am afraid we have,” +she admitted gloomily. “I hope Mr. Lindo will know how to deal with +him.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think the archdeacon would,” said the other lady, shaking her +head sagely. +</p> + +<p> +But, naturally enough, the archdeacon was more guarded in his expressions. +“It is about removing the sheep from the churchyard, is it not?” he +said, when he and Lindo happened to be left standing together and the subject +came up. “They have been there a long time, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is true, I suppose,” the rector answered. “But,” +he continued rather warmly—“you do not approve of their presence +there, archdeacon?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, certainly not.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nor do I. And, thinking the removal right, and the responsibility +resting upon me, ought I not to undertake it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Possibly,” replied the older man. “But pardon me making a +suggestion. Is not the thing of so little importance that you may, with a good +conscience, prefer quiet to the trouble of raising it?” +</p> + +<p> +“If the matter were to end there, I think so,” replied the new +rector, with perhaps too strong an assumption of wisdom in his tone. “But +what if this be only a test case?—if to give way here means to encourage +further trespass on my right of judgment? The affair would bear a different +aspect then, would it not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no doubt. No doubt it would.” +</p> + +<p> +And that was all the archdeacon, who was a cautious man and knew Mr. Bonamy, +would say. But it will be observed that the rector had both altered his +standpoint and done another thing which most people find easy enough. He had +discovered an answer to his own arguments. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap08"></a>CHAPTER VIII.<br/> +TWO SURPRISES.</h2> + +<p> +On the evening of the Hammonds’ party, Mr. Clode sat alone in his room, +trying to compose himself to work. His lamp burned brightly, and his tea +kettle—he had already sent down his frugal dinner an hour or +more—murmured pleasantly on the hob. But for some reason Mr. Clode could +do no work. He was restless, gloomy, ill-satisfied. The suspicions which had +been aroused in his breast on the evening of the rector’s arrival had +received, up to to-day at least, no confirmation; but they had grown, as +suspicions will, feeding on themselves, and with them had grown the jealousy +which had fostered them into being. The curate saw himself already overshadowed +by his superior, socially and in the parish; and this evening felt this the +more keenly that, as he sat in his little room, he could picture perfectly the +gay scene at the Town House, where, for nearly two years, not a party had taken +place without his presence, no festivity had been arranged without his +co-operation. The omission to invite him to-night, however natural it might +seem to others, had for him a tremendous significance; so that from a jealousy +that was general he leapt at once to a jealousy more particular, and conjured +up a picture of Laura—with whose disposition he was not +unacquainted—smiling on the stranger, and weaving about him the same +charming net which had caught his own feet. +</p> + +<p> +At this thought Clode sprang up with a passionate gesture and began to walk to +and fro, his brow dark. He felt sure that Lindo had no right to his cure, but +he knew also that the cure was a freehold, and that to oust the rector from it +something more than a mere mistake would have to be shown. If the rector should +turn out to be very incompetent, if he should fall on evil times in the parish, +then indeed he might find his seat untenable when the mistake should be +discovered; and with an eye to this the curate had already dropped a word here +and there—as, for instance, that word which had reached Mr. Bonamy. But +Clode was not satisfied with that now. Was there no shorter, no simpler course +possible? There was one. The rector might be shown to have been aware of the +error when he took advantage of it. In that case his appointment would be +vitiated, and he might be compelled to forego it. +</p> + +<p> +Naturally enough, the curate had scarcely formulated this to himself before he +became convinced—in his present state of envy and suspicion—of the +rector’s guilt. But how was he to prove it? As he walked up and down the +room, chafing and hot-eyed, he thought of a way in which proof might be +secured. The letters which had passed between Lindo and Lord Dynmore’s +agents in regard to the presentation, must surely contain some word, some +expression sufficient to have apprised the young man of the truth—that +the living was intended not for him but for his uncle. A look at those letters, +if they were in existence, might give Stephen Clode, mere curate though he was, +the whip-hand of his rector! +</p> + +<p> +He had another plan in his mind, of which more presently, and probably he would +have pursued the idea which has just been mentioned no farther if his eye had +not chanced to light at the moment on a small key hanging upon a nail by the +fireplace. Clode looked at the key, and his face flushed. He stood thinking and +apparently hesitating, the lamp throwing his features into strong relief, while +a man might count twenty. Then he sat down with an angry exclamation and +plunged into his work. But in less than a minute he lifted his head. His glance +wandered again to the key; and, getting up suddenly, he took it down, put on +his hat, and went out. +</p> + +<p> +His lodgings were over the stationer’s shop, but he could go in and out +through a private passage. He saw, as he passed, however; that there was a +light in the shop, and he opened the side door. “I am going to the +rectory to consult a book, Mrs. Wafer,” he said, seeing his landlady +dusting the counter. “You can leave my lamp alight. I shall want nothing +more to-night, thank you.” +</p> + +<p> +She bade him good-night, and he closed the door again and rushed into the +street. Crossing the top of the town, he had to pass the Market Hall, where he +spoke to the one policeman on night duty; and here he saw that it was five +minutes to ten, and hastened his steps, in the fear that the rector’s +household might have retired. “He will not be home himself until eleven, +at the earliest,” the curate muttered as he turned rapidly into the +churchyard, which was very dark, the night being moonless. “I have a +clear hour. It was well that I looked in late the other night.” +</p> + +<p> +But, whatever his design, it received a sudden check. The rectory was closed! +The front of the house stood up dark and shapeless as the great church which +towered in front of it. The servants had gone to bed, and, as they slept at the +back, he would have found it difficult to arouse them, had it suited his plans +to do so. As it was, he did not dream of such a thing, and with a slight +shiver—for the night was cold, and now that his project no longer excited +him he felt it so, and felt too the influence of the night wind soughing in sad +fashion through the yews—he was turning away, when something arrested his +attention, and he paused. +</p> + +<p> +The something he had seen, or fancied he had seen, was a momentary glimmer of +light shining through the fanlight over the door. It could not affect him, for, +if the servants had really closed the house for the night, even if they had not +all gone to bed, he could scarcely go in. And yet some impulse led him to step +softly into the porch and grope for the knocker. +</p> + +<p> +His hand lit instead on the iron-studded surface of the old oak door, and, to +his surprise, he felt it move slightly under his touch. He pushed, and the door +slid slowly and silently open, disclosing the dusky outline of the hall, +faintly illuminated by a thin shaft of light which proceeded apparently from +the study, the door of which was a trifle ajar. +</p> + +<p> +The sight recalled to the curate’s mind the errand on which he had come, +and he stole across the hall on tiptoe, listening with all his ears. He heard +nothing, however, and presently he stood on the mat at the study door +intercepting the light. Then he did hear the dull footsteps of some one moving +in the room, and suddenly it occurred to him that the rector had stepped home +to fetch something—a song, music, or a book possibly—and was now +within searching for it. That would explain all. +</p> + +<p> +The curate was seized with panic at the thought, and, fearful of being +discovered in his present position—for though he might have done all he +had done in perfect innocence, conscience made a coward of him—he crept +across the hall again and passed out into the churchyard. There he stood in the +darkness, waiting and watching, expecting the rector to bustle out each minute. +</p> + +<p> +But five minutes passed, and even ten, as it seemed to the curate in his +impatience, and no one came out, nor did the situation alter. Then he made up +his mind that the person moving in the study could not be the owner of the +house, and he went in again and, crossing the hall, flung the study door wide +open and entered. +</p> + +<p> +There was a ringing sound as of coins falling on the floor, and a man who had +been kneeling low over something sprang to his feet and gazed with wide, +horror-stricken eyes at the intruder. A moment only the man looked, and then he +fell again on his knees. “Oh, mercy! mercy!” he cried, almost +grovelling before the curate. “Don’t give me up! I have never been +took! I have never been in jail or in trouble in my life! I did not know what I +was doing, sir! I swear I did not! Don’t give me up!” +</p> + +<p> +This cry, which was low and yet piercing, ended in hysterical sobbing. On the +table by his side stood a single candle, and by its light Clode saw that the +little cupboard among the books was open. The curate started at the sight, and +the words which he had been about to utter to the shrinking wretch begging for +mercy on the floor before him died away in his husky throat. His eyes, however, +burned with a gloomy rage, and when he recovered himself his voice was +pitiless. “You scoundrel!” he said, in the low rich tone which had +been so much admired in the church when he first came to Claversham, +“what are you doing here? Get up and speak!” And he made as if he +would spurn the creature with his foot. +</p> + +<p> +“I am a respectable man,” the rogue whined. “I am—that +is I was, I mean, sir—don’t be hard on me—Lord +Dynmore’s own valet. I will tell you all, sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know you!” rejoined Clode, looking harshly at him. “You +were here this morning. And Mr. Lindo gave you money.” +</p> + +<p> +“He did, sir. I confess it. I am a——” +</p> + +<p> +“You are an ungrateful scoundrel!” Stephen Clode answered, cutting +the man short. “That is what you are! And in a few days you will be a +convicted felon, with the broad-arrow on your clothes, my man!” +</p> + +<p> +To hear his worst anticipations thus put into words was too much for the poor +wretch. He fell on his knees, feebly crying for mercy, mercy! “You are a +minister of the gospel. Give me this one more chance, sir!” he prayed. +</p> + +<p> +“Stop that noise!” growled the curate fiercely, his dark face +rendered more rugged by the light and shadow cast by the single candle. +“Be silent! do you hear? and get up and speak like a man, if you can. +Tell me all—how you came here, and what you came for, and perhaps I may +let you escape. But the truth, mind, the truth!” he added truculently. +</p> + +<p> +The knave was too thoroughly terrified to think of anything else. “Lord +Dynmore dismissed me,” he muttered, his breath coming quickly. “He +missed some money in Chicago, and he gave me enough to carry me home, and bade +me go to the devil! I landed in Liverpool without a shilling—sir, it is +God’s truth—and I remembered the gentleman Lord Dynmore had just +put in the living here. I had known him, and he had given me half a sovereign +more than once. And I thought I would come to him. So I pawned my clothes, and +came on.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, yes!” exclaimed the curate, leaning forward, with fierce +impatience in his tone. “And then?” +</p> + +<p> +“Sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well? When you came here? What happened? Go on, fool!” He could +scarcely control himself. +</p> + +<p> +“I found a stranger,” whimpered the man—“another Mr. +Lindo. He had got in here somehow.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well? But there,” added the curate with a sudden change of manner, +“how do you know that Lord Dynmore meant to put the clergyman you used to +know in here?” +</p> + +<p> +“Because I heard him read a letter from his agents about it,” the +fellow replied at once. “And from what his lordship said I knew it was +his old pal—his old friend, sir, I mean, begging your pardon humbly, +sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“And when did you learn,” said the curate more quickly, “that +the gentleman here was not your Mr. Lindo?” +</p> + +<p> +“I heard in the town that he was a young man. And, putting one thing and +another together, and keeping a still tongue myself, I thought he would serve +me as well as the other, and I called——” +</p> + +<p> +“What did you say?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not much, sir,” answered the valet, a twinkle of cunning in his +eye. “The less said the sooner mended. But he understood, and he promised +to give me ten shillings a week.” +</p> + +<p> +“To hold your tongue?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, so I took it, sir.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate drew a long breath. This was what he had expected. It was to +information which might be drawn from this man that his second scheme had +referred. And here was the man at his service, bound by a craven fear to do his +bidding—bound to tell all he knew. “But why,” Clode asked +suspiciously, a thought striking him, “if what you say be true, are you +here now—doing this, my man?” +</p> + +<p> +“I was tempted, sir,” the servant answered, his tone abject again. +“I confess it truly, sir. I saw the money in the box here this morning, +sir, and I thought that my ten shillings a week would not last long, and a +little capital would set me up comfortably. And then the devil put it into my +head that the young gentleman would not persecute me, even if he caught +me.” +</p> + +<p> +“You did not think of me catching you?” said the curate grimly. +</p> + +<p> +The man uttered a cry of anguish. “That I did not, sir,” he sobbed. +“Oh, Lord! I have never had a policeman’s hand on me. I have been +honest always.” +</p> + +<p> +“Until you took his lordship’s money,” replied the curate +quietly. “But I understand. You have never been found out before, you +mean.” +</p> + +<p> +No doubt when people of a certain class, for which respectability has long +spelled livelihood, do fall into the law’s clutch they suffer very +sharply. Master Felton continued to pour forth heartrending prayers; but he +might have saved his breath. The curate’s thoughts were elsewhere. He was +thinking that a witness so valuable must be kept within reach at any cost and +it did flash across his brain that the best course would be to hand him over +now to the police, and trust to the effect which his statements respecting the +rector should produce upon the inquiry. But the reflection that the allegations +of a man on his trial for burglary would not obtain much credence led Clode to +reject this simple course and adopt another. “Look here!” he said +curtly. “I am going to deal mercifully with you, my man. +But—but,” he continued, frowning impatiently, as he saw the other +about to speak—“on certain conditions. You are not to leave +Claversham. That is the first. If you leave the town before I give you the +word, I shall put the police on your track without an instant’s delay. Do +you hear that?” +</p> + +<p> +“I will stop as long as you like, sir,” said the servant +submissively, but with wonder apparent both in his voice and face. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well. I wish it for the present, no matter why. Perhaps because I +would see that you lead an honest life for awhile.” +</p> + +<p> +“And—how shall I live, sir?” said the culprit timidly. +</p> + +<p> +“For the present you may continue to draw your half-sovereign a +week,” the curate answered hastily, his face reddening, he best knew why. +“Possibly I may tell Mr. Lindo at once. Possibly I may give you another +chance, and tell him later, if I find you deserving. What is your +address?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am at the Bull and Staff,” muttered Felton. It was a small +public house of no very good repute. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, stay there,” Stephen Clode answered after a moment’s +thought. “But see you get into no harm. And since you are living on the +rector’s bounty, you may say so.” +</p> + +<p> +The man looked puzzled as well as relieved, but, stealing a doubtful glance at +the curate’s dark fate, he found his eyes still upon him, and cowered +afresh. “Yes, take care,” said Clode, smiling unpleasantly as he +saw the effect his look produced. “Do not try to evade me or it will be +the worse for you, Felton. And now go! But see you take nothing from +here.” +</p> + +<p> +The detected one cast a sly glance at the half-rifled box which still lay on +the carpet at his feet, a few gold coins scattered round it; then he looked up +again. “It is all there, sir,” he said, cringing. “I had but +just begun.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then go!” said the curate, pointing with emphasis to the door. +“Go, I tell you!” +</p> + +<p> +The man’s presence annoyed and humiliated him so that he felt a positive +relief when the valet’s back was turned. Left alone he stood listening, a +cloud on his brow, until the faint sound of the outer door being pulled to +reached his ear, and then, stooping hastily, he gathered up the sovereigns and +half-sovereigns, which lay where they had fallen, and put them into the box. +This done, he rose and laid the box itself upon the table by his side. And +again he stood still, listening, a dark shade on his face. +</p> + +<p> +Long ago, almost at the moment of his entrance, he had seen the pale shimmer of +papers at the back of the little cupboard. Now, still listening stealthily, he +thrust in his hand and drew out one of the bundles and opened it. The papers +were parish accounts in his own handwriting! With a gesture of fierce +impatience he thrust them back and drew out others, and, disappointed again in +these, exchanged them hastily for a third set. In vain! The last were as +worthless to him as the first. +</p> + +<p> +He was turning away baffled and defeated, when he saw lying at the back of the +lower compartment of the cupboard, whence the cash-box had come, two or three +smaller packets, consisting apparently of letters. The curate reached hastily +for one of these, and the discovery that it contained some of Lindo’s +private accounts, dated before his appointment, made his face flush and his +fingers tremble with eagerness. He glanced nervously round the room and stopped +to listen; then, moving the candle a little nearer, he ran his eye over the +papers. But here, too, though the scent was hot, he took nothing, and he +exchanged the packet for one of the others. Looking at this, he saw that it was +indorsed in Lindo’s handwriting, “Letters relating to the +Claversham Living.” +</p> + +<p> +“At last,” Clode muttered, his eyes burning, “I have it +now.” The string which bound the packet was knotted tightly, and his +fingers seemed all thumbs as he labored to unfasten it. But he succeeded at +last, and opening the uppermost letter (they were all folded across), saw that +it was written from Lincoln’s Inn Fields. “My dear sir,” he +read; and then—with a mighty crash sounding awfully in his ears—the +door behind him was flung open just as he had flung it open himself an hour +before, and, dropping the letter, he sprang round, to find the rector +confronting him with a face of stupid astonishment. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap09"></a>CHAPTER IX.<br/> +TOWN TALK.</h2> + +<p> +He was a man, as the reader will perhaps have gathered, of many shifts, and +cool-headed; but for a moment he felt something of the anguish of discovery +which had so tortured the surprised servant. The table shook beneath his hand, +and it was with difficulty he repressed a wild impulse to overturn the candle, +and escape in the darkness. He did repress it, however; nay, he forced his eyes +to meet the rector’s, and twisted his lips into the likeness of a smile. +But when he thought of the scene afterward he found his chief comfort in the +reflection that the light had been too faint to betray his full embarrassment. +</p> + +<p> +Naturally the rector was the first to speak. “Clode!” he ejaculated +softly, his surprise above words. “Is it you? Why, man,” he +continued, still standing with his hand on the door and his eyes devouring the +scene, “what is up?” +</p> + +<p> +The money-box stood open at the curate’s side, and the letters lay about +his feet where they had fallen. The little cupboard yawned among the books. No +wonder Lindo’s amazement, as he gradually took it all in, rather +increased than diminished, or that the curate’s tongue was dry and his +throat husky when he at last found his voice. “It is all right. I will +explain it,” he stammered, almost upsetting the table in his agitation. +“I expected you before,” he added fussily, moving the light. +</p> + +<p> +“The dickens you did!” slipped from the rector. It was difficult +for him not to believe that his arrival had been the last thing expected. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” returned the curate, with a little snap of defiance. He was +recovering himself, and could look the other in the face now. “But I am +glad you did not come before, all the same.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” +</p> + +<p> +“I will explain.” +</p> + +<p> +The light which the one candle gave was not so meagre that Clode’s +embarrassment had altogether escaped Lindo; and had the latter been a +suspicious man he might have had queer thoughts, and possibly expressed them. +As it was, he was only puzzled, and when the curate said he would explain, +answered simply, “Do.” +</p> + +<p> +“The truth is,” said Stephen Clode, beginning with an effort, +“I have taken a good deal on myself, and I am afraid you will blame me, +Mr. Lindo. If so, I cannot help it.” His face flushed, and he beat a +tattoo on the table with his fingers. “I came across,” he +continued, “to borrow a book a little before ten. The lights here were +out; but, to my surprise, your house-door was open.” +</p> + +<p> +“As I found it myself!” the rector exclaimed. +</p> + +<p> +“Precisely. Naturally I had misgivings, and I looked into the hall. I saw +a streak of light proceeding from the doorway of this room, and I came in +softly to see what it meant. I heard a man moving about in here, and I threw +open the door much as you did.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did you?” said Lindo eagerly. “And who was it—the man, +I mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“That is just what I cannot tell you,” replied the curate. His face +was pale, but there was a smile upon it, and he met the other’s gaze +without flinching. He had settled his plan now. +</p> + +<p> +“He got away, then?” said the rector, disappointed. +</p> + +<p> +“No. He did not try either to escape or to resist,” was the answer. +</p> + +<p> +“But was he really a burglar?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then where is he?” The rector looked round as if he expected to +see the man lying bound on the floor. “What did you do with him?” +</p> + +<p> +“I let him go.” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo whistled; and when he had done whistling still stood with his mouth open +and a face of the most complete mystification. “You let him go?” he +repeated mechanically, but not until after a pause of half a minute or so. +“Why, may I ask?” +</p> + +<p> +“You have every right to ask,” the curate answered with firmness, +and yet despondently. “I will tell you why—why I let him go, and +why I cannot tell you his name. He is a parishioner of yours. It was his first +offence, and I believe him to be sincerely penitent. I believe, too, that he +will never repeat the attempt, and that the accident of my entrance saved him +from a life of crime. I may have been wrong—I dare say I was +wrong,” continued the curate, growing excited—excitement came very +easily to him at the moment—“but I cannot go back from my word. The +man’s misery moved me. I thought what I should have felt in his place, +and I promised him, in return for his pledge that he would live honestly in the +future, that he should go free, and that I would not betray his name to any +one—to any one!” +</p> + +<p> +“Well!” exclaimed the rector, his tone one of unbounded admiration +in every sense of the word. “When you do a thing nobly, my dear fellow, +you do do it nobly, and no mistake! I wonder who it was! But I must not ask +you.” +</p> + +<p> +“No.” said Clode. “And now,” he continued, still +beating the tattoo on the table, “you do not blame me greatly?” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not, indeed. No. Only I think perhaps that you should have retained +the right to tell me.” +</p> + +<p> +“I should have done so,” said the curate regretfully. +</p> + +<p> +“He has taken nothing, I suppose?” the rector continued, turning to +the cupboard, and, not only satisfied with the explanation, but liking Clode +better than he had liked him before. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” the other answered. “I was putting things straight when +you entered and startled me. He had dropped the money about the floor, but you +will find it right, I think. He has made a mess among the papers, I fear, and +damaged the cupboard door in forcing it, but that is the extent of the +mischief. By the way,” the curate added, “I have a key to this +cupboard at my lodgings. Williams gave it to me. He only kept parish matters +here. I must let you have it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right,” said the rector carelessly; and, a few more words having +passed between them as to the attempted robbery, and the manner in which the +outer door had been opened, the curate took his hat and prepared to go. +“You had a pleasant party, I suppose?” he said, pausing and turning +when halfway across the hall. +</p> + +<p> +“A <i>very</i> pleasant one,” Lindo answered with enthusiasm. +</p> + +<p> +“They are nice people,” said Clode smoothly. +</p> + +<p> +“They are—very nice. You told me I should find them so, and you +were right. Good-night.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good-night.” +</p> + +<p> +Such harmless words! And yet they roused the curate’s jealousy anew. As +he walked home, the church clock tolling midnight above his head, he drank in +no peaceful influence from the dark stillness or the solemn sound. He was +gnawed by fresh hatred of the man who had surprised and confounded him, and +forced him to lie and quibble in order to escape from a dishonorable position. +If you would make a man your enemy come upon him when he is doing something of +which he is ashamed. He will fear you afterward, but he will hate you more. In +the curate’s case it was only he who knew himself discovered, so that he +had no ground for fear. But he hated none the less vigorously. +</p> + +<p> +And, somehow, in a few days an ugly rumor of which the new rector was the +subject began to gain currency in the town. It was an ill-defined rumor, coming +to one thing in one person’s mouth and to a different thing in +another’s—a kind of cloud on the rector’s fair fame, shifting +from moment to moment, and taking ever a fresh shape, yet always a cloud. +</p> + +<p> +One whispered that he had obtained the presentation as the reward of +questionable services rendered to the patron. Another that he had forged his +own deed of presentation, if such a thing existed. A third that he had been +presented by mistake; and a fourth that he had deceived the authorities as to +his age. It was noticeable that these rumors began low down in the social scale +of the town and worked their way upward, which was odd; and that, whatever form +the rumor took, there was not one who heard it who did not within a fortnight +or three weeks come to associate it with the presence of a seedy, down-looking, +unwholesome man, who was much about the rector’s doorway, and, when he +was not there, was generally to be found at the Bull and Staff. Whether he was +the disseminator of the reports, or, alike with the rector, was the unconscious +subject of them, was not known; but at sight of him—particularly if he +were seen, as frequently happened, in the rector’s +neighborhood—people shrugged their shoulders and lifted their eyebrows, +and expressed a great many severe things without using their tongues. +</p> + +<p> +To the circle of the rector’s personal friends the rumors did not reach. +That was natural enough. To tell a person that his or her intimate friend is a +forger or a swindler is a piquant but somewhat perilous task. And no one +mentioned the matter to the Hammonds, or to the archdeacon, or to the Homfrays +of Holberton, or the other county people living round, with whom it must be +confessed that, after that dinner-party at the Town House, he consorted perhaps +too exclusively. It might have been thought that even the townsfolk, seeing the +young fellow’s frank face passing daily about their streets, and catching +the glint of his fair curly hair when, the wintry sunlight pierced the lanthorn +windows and fell in gules and azure on the reading-desk, would have been slow +to believe such tales of him. +</p> + +<p> +They might have been; but circumstances and Mr. Bonamy were against him. The +lawyer did not circulate the stories; he had not even mentioned them +out-of-doors, nor, for aught the greater part of Claversham knew, had heard of +them at all. But all his weight—and with the Low-Church middle-class in +the town it was great—was thrown into the scale against the rector. It +was known that he did not trust the rector. It was known that day by day his +frown on meeting the rector grew darker and darker. And the why and the +wherefore not being understood—for no one thought of questioning the +lawyer, or observed how frequently of late the curate happened upon him in the +street or the reading-room—many concluded that he knew more of the +clergyman’s antecedents than appeared. +</p> + +<p> +There was one person, and perhaps only one, who openly circulated and rejoiced +in these rumors. That was a man whom Lindo met daily in the street and passed +with a careless nod and a word, not dreaming for an instant that the spiteful +little busybody was concerning himself with him. The man was Dr. Gregg, the +snappish, ill-bred man who had chanced upon Lindo and the Bonamy girls +breakfasting together at Oxford. The sight, it will be remembered, had not +pleased him, for he had long had a sneaking liking for Miss Kate himself, and +had only refrained from trying to win her because he still more desired to be +of the “best set” in Claversham. He had been ashamed, indeed, up to +this time of his passion; but, reading on that occasion unmistakable admiration +of the girl in the young clergyman’s face, and being himself rather +cavalierly treated by Lindo, he had somewhat changed his views. The girl had +acquired increased value in his eyes. Another’s appreciation had +increased his own, and, merely as an incident, the man who had effected this +has earned his hearty jealousy and ill-will. And this, while Lindo thought him +a vulgar but harmless little man. +</p> + +<p> +But if the rector, immersed in new social engagements, did not see whither he +was tending, others, though they knew nothing of the unpleasant tales we have +mentioned, saw more clearly. The archdeacon, coming into town one Saturday five +or six weeks after Lindo’s arrival, did his business early and turned his +steps toward the rectory. He felt pretty sure of finding the young fellow at +home, because he knew it was his sermon day. A few yards from the door he fell +in, as it chanced, with Stephen Clode. The two stood together talking, while +the archdeacon waited to be admitted, and presently the curate said, “If +you wish to see the rector, archdeacon, I am afraid you will be disappointed. +He is not at home.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I thought that he was always at home on Saturdays?” +</p> + +<p> +“Generally he is,” Clode replied, looking down and tracing a +pattern with the point of his umbrella. “But he is away to-day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where?” said the archdeacon rather abruptly. +</p> + +<p> +“He has gone to the Homfrays’ at Holberton. They have some sort of +party to-day, and the Hammonds drove him over.” Despite himself, the +curate’s tone was sullen, his manner constrained. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!” said the archdeacon thoughtfully. The Homfrays were his very +good friends, but of the county families round Claversham they were reckoned +the fastest and most frivolous. And he sagely suspected that a man in +Lindo’s delicate position might be wiser if he chose other companions. +“Lindo seems to see a good deal of the Hammonds,” he remarked after +a pause. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Clode. “It is very natural.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, very natural,” the archdeacon hastened to say; but his tone +clearly expressed the opinion that “toujours Hammonds” was not a +good bill of fare for the rector of Claversham. “Very natural, of course. +Only,” he continued, taking courage, for he really liked the rector, +“you have had some experience here, and I think it would be well if you +were to give him a hint not to be too exclusive. A town rector must not be too +exclusive. It does not do.” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Clode. +</p> + +<p> +“It is different in the country, of course. And then there is Mr. Bonamy. +He is unpleasant, I know, and yet he is honest after a fashion. Lindo must +beware of getting across with him. He has done nothing about the sheep yet, has +he?” +</p> + +<p> +“No.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, do not let him, if you can help it. You are not urging him on in +that, are you?” +</p> + +<p> +“On the contrary,” the curate answered rather warmly, “I have +all through told him that I would not express an opinion on it. If anything, I +have discouraged him in the matter.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I hope he will let it drop now. I hope he will let it drop.” +</p> + +<p> +They parted then, and the archdeacon, sagely revolving in his mind the evils of +exclusiveness, strolled back to the hotel where he put up his horses. On his +way, casting his eye down the wide, quiet street, with its old-fashioned houses +on this side and that, he espied Mr. Bonamy’s tall spare figure +approaching, and he purposely passed the inn and went to meet him. As a county +magnate the archdeacon could afford to know Mr. Bonamy, and even to be friendly +with him. I am not sure, indeed, that he had not a sneaking liking and respect +for the rugged, snappish, self-made man. +</p> + +<p> +“How do you do, Mr. Bonamy?” he began. And then, after saying a few +words about closing a road in which he was interested, he slid into a mention +of Lindo, with a view to seeing how the land lay. “I have just been to +call on your rector,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“You did not find him at home,” replied Bonamy, with a queer grin, +and a little jerk of his head which sent his hat still farther back. +</p> + +<p> +“No, I was unlucky.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not more than most people,” said the churchwarden, with much +enjoyment. “I will tell you what it is, Mr. Archdeacon. Mr. Lindo is +better suited for your place. He would make a very good archdeacon. With a pair +of horses and a park phaeton and a small parish, and a little general +superintendence of the district—with that and the life of a country +gentleman he would get on capitally.” +</p> + +<p> +There was just so much of a jest in the words that the clergyman had no choice +but to laugh. “Come, Bonamy,” he said good-humoredly, “he is +young yet.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, he is quite out of place here in that respect, too!” +replied the lawyer naïvely. +</p> + +<p> +“But he will improve,” pleaded the archdeacon. +</p> + +<p> +“I am not sure that he will have the chance,” Mr. Bonamy answered +in his gentlest tone. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon was so far from understanding him that he did not answer save by +raising his eyebrows. Could Bonamy really be so foolish, he wondered, as to +think he could get rid of a beneficed clergyman. The archdeacon was surprised, +and yet that was all he could make of it. +</p> + +<p> +“He is away at Mr. Homfray’s of Holberton now,” the lawyer +continued, condemnation in his thin voice. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, there is no harm in that, Mr. Bonamy,” replied the +archdeacon, somewhat offended, “as long as he is back to do the duty +to-morrow.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy grunted. “A one-day-a-week duty is a very fine thing,” +he said. “You clergymen are to be envied, Mr. Archdeacon!” +</p> + +<p> +“You would be a great deal more to be envied yourself, Mr. Bonamy,” +the magnate returned with heat, “if you did not carp at everything and +look at other people through distorted glasses. Fie! here is a young clergyman +new to the parish, and, instead of helping him, you find fault with everything +he does. For shame! For shame, Mr. Bonamy!” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah!” said the lawyer, quite unabashed, “you did not mean to +say that when you came across the street to me. But—well, least said +soonest mended, and I will wish you good evening. You will have a wet drive +home, I am afraid, Mr. Archdeacon.” +</p> + +<p> +And he put up his umbrella and went his way sturdily, while the archdeacon, +crossing to his carriage, which was in front of the inn, entertained an +uncomfortable suspicion that he had done more harm than good by his +intercession. “I am afraid,” he said to himself, as he handled the +reins and sent his horses down the street in a fashion of which he was not a +little proud—“I am afraid that there is trouble in front of that +young man. I am afraid there is.” +</p> + +<p> +If he had known all, he might have shaken his head still more gravely, +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap10"></a>CHAPTER X.<br/> +OUT WITH THE SHEEP.</h2> + +<p> +Stephen Clode, while listening with a certain pleasure to the +archdeacon’s hints, did not dream of the good turn which fortune was +about to do him. If he had foreseen it, he would probably have taken a bolder +part in the conversation, and parted from the elder clergyman with a more +jubilant step. As it was, he heard no rumor that evening, nor was it until ten +o’clock on the Sunday morning that he learned anything was amiss. Calling +at the house in the churchyard at that hour, he was received by Mrs. Baker +herself; and he remarked at once that the housekeeper’s face fell in a +manner far from flattering when she recognized him. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, it is you, is it, Mr. Clode?” she said, her tone one of +disappointment. “You have not seen him, sir, have you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Seen whom?” the curate replied in surprise. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Lindo, sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why? Is he not here?” +</p> + +<p> +“He is not, indeed, sir,” the housekeeper said, putting her head +out to look up and down. “He never came back last night, and we have not +heard of him. I sent across to the Town House to inquire, and the only thing +Mrs. Hammond could say was that Mr. Lindo was to follow them, and they supposed +he had come.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, but—who is to do the duty at the church?” Clode +ejaculated. His dismay at the moment was genuine, for he did not at once see +how much this was to his advantage. +</p> + +<p> +“There is only you, sir, unless he comes in time,” the housekeeper +added despondently. +</p> + +<p> +“But I am going to the Hamlet church,” said Clode, rapidly turning +things over in his mind. If there was no one at the parish church to conduct +the chief service of the week, what a talk there would be! Why it would almost +be matter for the bishop’s interference! “You see I cannot possibly +neglect that,” he continued, in answer as much to the remonstrance of his +own conscience as to the housekeeper. “It was the rector’s own +arrangement, Mrs. Baker. You may be sure he will be here in time for the eleven +o’clock service. Mr. Homfray has kept him over night. That is all.” +</p> + +<p> +“You do not think he has met with an accident, sir? They say the +coal-pits on Baer Hill——” +</p> + +<p> +“Pooh, pooh! He will be here in a few minutes, you will see,” the +curate answered. And he affected to be so cheerfully certain of this that he +would not wait even for a little while, but started at once for the Hamlet +church—a small chapel-of-ease in the outskirts of the town. There he put +on his surplice early, and was ready in excellent time. Punctuality is a +virtue. +</p> + +<p> +At half-past ten the bells of the great church began to ring, and presently +door after door in the quiet streets about it opened silently, and little +parties issued forth in their Sunday clothes and walked stiffly and slowly +toward the building. At the moment when the High Street was dotted most thickly +with these groups, and the small bell was tinkling its impatient summons, the +rattle of an old taxed-cart was heard as the vehicle flashed quickly over the +bridge at the foot of the street. One and another of the church-goers turned in +curiosity to gaze, for such a sound was rare on a Sunday morning. Judge of +their astonishment, then, when they recognized, perched up beside the boy who +urged on the pony, no less a person than the rector himself! As he jogged up +the street in his sorry conveyance and with his sorry companion, he had to pass +under the fire of a battery of eyes which did not fail to notice all the +peculiarities of his appearance. His tie was awry and his chin unshaven. He had +a haggard, dissipated air, as of one who had been up all night, and there was a +great smudge on his cheek. He looked dissipated—-nothing less than +disreputable, some said; and he seemed aware of it, for he sat erect, gazing +straight before him, and declining to see any one. At the top of the street he +descended hastily, and, as the bell jerked out its final note, hurried toward +the vestry with a depressed and gloomy face. +</p> + +<p> +“Well!” said Mr. Bonamy to Kate, who was walking up by his side, +and whose face for some mysterious reason was flushed and troubled, “I +think that is the coolest young man I have ever met!” +</p> + +<p> +“Eh?” said a voice behind them as they entered the porch—the +speaker was Gregg. “What do you think of that, Bonamy? A gay young spark, +is he not?” +</p> + +<p> +There was time for no more then. But as the congregation waited in their seats +through a long voluntary, many were the nods and winks, and incessant the low +mutterings, as one communicated to another the details of the scene outside, +and his or her view of them. When the rector appeared—nine minutes late +by Mr. Bonamy’s watch—he looked pale and fagged, and the sermon he +preached was of the shortest. Nine-tenths of the congregation noted only the +brevity of the discourse and drew their conclusions. But Kate Bonamy, who sat +by her father with downcast eyes and a tinge of color still in her cheeks, and +who scarcely once looked up at the weary face and tumbled hair, fancied, heaven +knows why, that she detected a new pathos and a deeper tone of appeal in the +few simple sentences; and though she had scarcely spoken to the rector for a +month, and was nursing a tiny contempt for him, the girl felt on a sudden more +kindly disposed toward the young man. +</p> + +<p> +Not so Mr. Bonamy, He came out of church chuckling; full of a grim delight in +the fulfilment of his predictions. It was not his custom to linger in the +porch, for he was not a sociable man; but he did so to-day, and, letting Kate +and Daintry go on, formed one of a coterie of men, who had no difficulty in +coming to a conclusion about the rector. +</p> + +<p> +“He has been studying hard, poor fellow!” said Gregg, with a +wink—there is no dislike so mean and cruel as that which the ill-bred man +feels for the gentleman—“reading the devil’s books all +night!” +</p> + +<p> +“Nine minutes late!” said the lawyer. “That is what comes of +having a young fellow who is always gadding about the country!” +</p> + +<p> +“He could not gad to a more congenial place than Holberton, I should +think,” sneered a third. +</p> + +<p> +And then all the sins which the Homfrays had ever committed, and all those +which had ever been laid to their charge, were cited to render the +rector’s case more black. To do him justice, Mr. Bonamy took but a +listener’s part in this. He was a shrewd man, and he did not believe that +the rector could have had anything to do with an elopement from Holberton which +had taken place before his name was heard in the county; but he was honestly +assured that the young fellow had been sitting over the cards half the night. +And as for the other crimes, perhaps he would commit them if he were left to +follow his own foolish devices. +</p> + +<p> +“What is ill-gotten soon goes,” said one charitable person with a +sneer. “You may depend upon it that what we hear is true.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is all of a piece,” said another. “A man does not have a +follower of that kind for nothing?” +</p> + +<p> +“It comes over the devil’s back, and goes—you know +how?” said a third. “But perhaps he is wise to make the most of it +while it lasts. He is consequential enough now, but the Homfrays will not have +much to say to him presently, you will see. A few weeks, and he will go.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, let him go for the d—d dissipated gambling parson he +is!” said Gregg coarsely, carried away by the unusual agreement with him. +“And the sooner the better, say I!” +</p> + +<p> +The man beside him, a little startled by the doctor’s violence, turned +round to make sure that they were not overheard, and found himself face to face +with the rector, who, seeking to go out—as was not his custom, for he +generally used the vestry door—by the porch, had walked into the midst of +the group, even as Gregg opened his mouth. A glance at the young man’s +reddening cheek and compressed lips apprised the startled group that he had +overheard something at least. +</p> + +<p> +In one way it was the crisis of Lindo’s fate at Claversham. But he did +not know it. If he had been wise—if he had been such a man as his curate, +for instance; or if, without being wise, he had learned a little of the +prudence which comes of necessity with years—he would have passed through +them in silence, satisfied with such revenge as mute contempt could give him. +But he was not old, nor very wise; and perhaps certain things had lately jarred +on his nerves, so that he was not quite himself. He did not pass by in silence, +but, instead, stood for a moment. Then, singling Gregg out with a withering +glance, “I am much obliged to you for your good opinion,” he said +to him; “but I should be still more obliged if you would swear elsewhere, +sir, and not in the porch of my church. Leave the building! Go at once!” +And he pointed toward the churchyard with the air of an angry schoolmaster. +</p> + +<p> +But Gregg did not move. He was astounded by this direct attack, but he had the +courage of numbers on his side, and, though he did not dare to answer, he did +not budge. Neither did the others, though they felt ashamed of themselves, and +looked all ways at once. Only one of them all met the rector’s glance +fairly, and that was Mr. Bonamy. “I think the least said the soonest +mended, Mr. Lindo,” he replied, with an acrid smile. +</p> + +<p> +“I am sorry that you did not think of that before,” retorted the +young man, standing before them with his fair head thrown back, his clerical +coat hanging loose, and his brow dark with indignation—for he had heard +enough to be able to guess the cause of Gregg’s remark. “Do you +come to church only to cavil and backbite?—to put the worst construction +on what you cannot understand?” +</p> + +<p> +“Speaking for myself,” replied the church warden coolly, “the +sole thing with which I can charge myself is the remark that you were somewhat +late for service this morning, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +“And if I was?” said the clergyman in his haughtiest tone. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, of course there may have been a good cause for it,” the +lawyer replied drily. “But it is a thing I have not known happen here for +twenty years.” +</p> + +<p> +An altercation with these men, none of whom were well disposed toward him, and +half of whom were tradespeople, was the last thing which the young rector +should have allowed himself to enter upon, and the last thing indeed to which +he would have condescended in his normal frame of mind. But on this unlucky +morning he was nervous and irritable; and, finding himself thus bearded and +defied, he spoke foolishly. “You trouble yourself too much, Mr. +Bonamy,” he said impulsively, “with things which do not concern +you! The parish, among other things. You have set yourself, as I know, to +thwart and embarrass me; but I warn you that you are not strong enough! I shall +find means to——” +</p> + +<p> +“To put me down, in fact?” said Mr. Bonamy. +</p> + +<p> +The young man hesitated, his face crimson. His opponent’s sallow +features, seamed with a hundred astute wrinkles, warned him, if the covert +smiles of the others did not, that, in his present mood at any rate, he was not +a match for the lawyer. He had gone too far already, as he was now aware. +“No,” he replied, swallowing his rage, “but to keep you to +your proper province, as I hope to keep to mine. I wish you good +morning.” +</p> + +<p> +He passed through them, and hurried away, more angry with them, and with +himself for allowing them to provoke him, than he had ever felt in his life. He +knew well that he had been foolish. He knew that he had lowered himself in +their eyes by his display of temper. But, though he was bitterly annoyed with +himself, the consciousness that the fault had originally lain with them, and +that they had grievously misjudged him, kept his anger hot; for there is no +wrath so fierce as the indignation of the man falsely accused. He called them +under his breath an uncharitable, spiteful, tattling crew; and was so far +unnerved in thought of them that he had entered his dining-room before he +remembered that he was engaged to take the mid-day meal at the Town House, as +he had done once or twice before, and then walked up with Laura to the schools. +</p> + +<p> +He washed and changed hurriedly, keeping his anger hot the while, and then went +across, with the tale on the tip of his tongue. Again, if he had been wise, he +would have kept what had happened to himself. But the soothing luxury of +unfolding his wrong to some one who would sympathize was one he could not in +his soreness forego. +</p> + +<p> +It was a particularly mild day for the fourth Sunday in Advent, and he found +Miss Hammond still lingering before the door, She was looking for violets under +the north wall, and he joined her, and naturally broke out at once with the +story of what had happened. She was wearing a little close bonnet, which set +off her piquant features and bright coloring to peculiar advantage, and, as far +as looks went, no young man in trouble ever had a better listener. Only to +stand beside her on the lawn, where the old trees shut out all view of the town +and the troubles he connected with it, was a relief. Of course the search for +violets was soon abandoned. “It is abominable!” she said. But her +voice was like the cooing of a dove. She did everything softly. Even her +indignation was gentle. +</p> + +<p> +“But you have not heard yet,” he protested, “why I really was +late.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know what is being said,” she murmured, looking up at him, a +gleam of humor in her brown eyes—“that you stayed at the +Homfrays’ all night, playing cards. My maid told me as we came +in—after church.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ha! I knew that they were saying something of the kind,” he +replied savagely. He was so stern that she felt her little attempt at badinage +reproved. “The true reason was of a very different description. What +spiteful busybodies they are! I started to return last evening about half-past +nine, but as I passed Baer Hill Colliery I learned that there had been an +accident. A man going down the shaft with the night shift had been +crushed—hurt beyond help,” the rector continued in a lower voice. +“He wanted to see a clergyman, and the other pitmen, some of whom had +seen me pass earlier in the day, stopped me and took me to him.” +</p> + +<p> +“How sad! How very sad!” she ejaculated. Somehow she felt ill at +ease with him in this mood. With his last words a kind of veil had fallen +between them. +</p> + +<p> +“I stayed with him the night,” the rector continued. “He died +at half-past nine this morning. I came straight from that to this. And they say +these things of me!” +</p> + +<p> +His voice, though low, was hard, and yet there was a suspicious break in it as +he uttered his last words. Injustice touches a man, young and not yet hardened, +very sorely; and he was overwrought. Laura, fingering her little bunch of +violets, heard the catch in his voice, and knew that he was not very far from +tears. +</p> + +<p> +She was almost terrified. She longed to respond, to say the proper thing, but +here her powers deserted her. She was not capable of much emotion, unless the +call especially concerned herself; and she could not rise to this occasion. She +could only murmur again that it was abominable and too bad, or, taking her cue +from the young man’s face, that it was very sad. She said enough, it is +true, to satisfy him, though not herself; for he only wanted a listener. And +when he went in to lunch Mrs. Hammond more than bore him out in all his +denunciations; so that when he left to go to the schools he had fully made up +his mind to carry things through. +</p> + +<p> +This unfortunate quarrel indeed did him great injury by throwing him into the +arms of the party which his own pleasure and taste led him to prefer. He did +not demur when Mrs. Hammond—meaning little evil, but expressing +prejudices which at one time she had sedulously cultivated (for when one lives +near the town one must take especial care not to be confounded with +it)—talked of a set of butchers and bakers, and said, much more strongly +than he had, that Mr. Bonamy must be kept in his place. A little quarrel with +the lawyer, a little social relaxation in which the young fellow had lost sight +of the excellent intentions with which he had set out, then this final +quarrel—such had been the course of events; sufficient, taken with his +own fastidiousness and inexperience, to bring him to this. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Hammond, standing at the drawing-room window, watched him as he walked +down the short drive. “I like that young man,” she said decisively. +“He is thrown away upon those people.” +</p> + +<p> +Laura, who had not gone to the schools, yawned. “He has not one-half the +brains of some one else we know, mother,” she answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Who is that?” +</p> + +<p> +Laura did not reply; and probably her mother understood, for she did not press +the question. “Well,” Mrs. Hammond said, after a moment’s +silence, “perhaps he has not. I do not know. But at any rate he is a +gentleman from the crown of his head to the tips of his toes.” +</p> + +<p> +“I dare say he is,” said Laura languidly. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Hammond, depositing her own portly form in a suitable chair, watched her +daughter curiously. She would have given a good deal to be able to read the +girl’s mind and learn her intentions; but she was too wise to ask +questions, and had always given Laura the fullest liberty. She had watched the +growth of the intimacy between her and Mr. Clode without demur, feeling a +strong liking for the man herself, though she scarcely thought him a suitable +match for her daughter. On the old rector’s death there had seemed for a +few days a chance of Mr. Clode being appointed his successor; and at that time +Mrs. Hammond had fancied she detected a shade of anxiety and excitement in her +daughter’s manner. But Mr. Clode had not been appointed, and the new +rector had come; and Laura had apparently transferred her favor from the curate +to him. +</p> + +<p> +At this Mrs. Hammond had felt somewhat troubled—at first; but in a short +time she had naturally reconciled herself to the change, the rector’s +superiority as a <i>parti</i> being indisputable. Yet still Mrs. Hammond felt +no certainty as to Laura’s real feelings, and, gazing at her this +afternoon, was as much in the dark as ever. That the girl was fond of her she +knew; indeed, it was quite a pretty sight to see the daughter purring about the +mother. But Mrs. Hammond was more than half inclined to doubt now whether Laura +was fond, or capable of being fond, of any other human being except herself. +</p> + +<p> +She sighed gently as she thought of this, and rang the bell for tea. “I +think we will have it early this afternoon,” she said, “I feel I +want a cup.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap11"></a>CHAPTER XI.<br/> +THE DOCTOR SPEAKS.</h2> + +<p> +The feelings with which the curate hastened on the conclusion of his own +service, to learn what had happened at the great church may be imagined. His +excitement and curiosity were not the less because he had to hide them. If +there really had been no service—if the rector had not +appeared—what a scandal, what a subject for talk was here! Even if the +rector had appeared a little late there would still be whispering; for new +brooms are expected to sweep clean. The curate composed his dark face, and +purposely made one or two sick calls at houses which lay in his road, lest he +might seem to ask the question he had to put too pointedly. By the time he +reached the rectory he had made up his mind, judging from the absence of stir +in the streets, that nothing very unusual had happened. +</p> + +<p> +“Is the rector in?” he asked the servant. +</p> + +<p> +“No, sir; he has gone to the Town House to dinner,” the girl +answered. +</p> + +<p> +Involuntarily Mr. Clode frowned. “He was in time for service, I +suppose?” he asked, more abruptly than he had intended. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, sir,” said the unconscious maid, who had not been to +church. +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you; that is all,” he answered, turning away. So nothing had +come of it after all! His heart was sick with disappointed hope as he turned +into his own dull lodgings; and he felt that the rector in being in time had +wronged him afresh, and by dining at the Town House had added insult to injury. +</p> + +<p> +But in the course of the day he learned how late the rector had been; and early +next morning some rumor of the triangular altercation in the church porch also +reached him—of course in an exaggerated form. As a fact, all Claversham +was by this time talking of it, Mr. Bonamy’s companions, with one +exception, having taken good care to make the most of his success, and to paint +the rebuff he had administered to the clergyman in the deepest colors. The +curate heard the news with a face of grave concern, but with secret delight; +and, turning over in his mind what use he might make of it, came opportunely +upon Gregg as the latter was going his rounds. “Hallo!” he said, +calling so loudly that the doctor, who had turned away and would fain have +retreated, could not decently escape, “you are the very man I wanted to +see! What is this absurd story about the rector and you? There is not a word of +truth in it, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am sure I cannot say until you tell me what it is,” replied the +doctor snappishly. He was a little afraid of the curate, who had a knack of +being unpleasant without giving an opening in return. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, you seem rather sore about it,” Clode remarked, with apparent +surprise. +</p> + +<p> +“I do not know why I should!” sneered the doctor, his face a dark +red with anger. +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly not, if there is no truth in the story,” the curate +replied, looking down with his eyes half shut at the chafing little man. +“But I suppose it is all an invention, Gregg?” +</p> + +<p> +“It is not an invention that the rector was abominably rude to me,” +blurted out the doctor, who scarcely knew with whom to be most angry—his +present tormentor or the first cause of his trouble. +</p> + +<p> +“Pooh!” said Clode, “it is only his way.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then it is a d——, it is a most unpleasant way!” +retorted the doctor savagely. +</p> + +<p> +“He means no harm,” said the curate gaily. “Why did you not +answer him back?” +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg’s face turned a shade redder. That was where the shoe pinched. +Why had he not answered him back as Bonamy had, and not stood mute, +acknowledging himself the smaller man? That was what was troubling him now, and +making him fancy himself the laughing-stock of the town. “I will answer +him back in a way he will not like!” he cried viciously, striving to hide +his embarrassment under a show of bluster. +</p> + +<p> +“Tut-t-tut!” said the curate provokingly, “do not go and make +a fool of yourself by saying things like that, when you know you don’t +mean them, man. What can you say to the rector?” +</p> + +<p> +“I will ask him——” +</p> + +<p> +But what he would ask the rector was lost to the world, for at this moment Mr. +Bonamy, coming down the pavement behind him, touched his sleeve. “I have +just been to your house, doctor,” he said. “My youngest girl is a +little out of sorts. Would you mind stepping in and seeing her?” +</p> + +<p> +Gregg swallowed his wrath, and was perhaps thankful for the interruption. He +said he would; and the lawyer turned to Mr. Clode. “Well,” he said, +“so you have made up your minds to fight?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am not quite sure,” said the curate, with caution—for he +knew better than to treat Mr. Bonamy as he treated Gregg—“that I +take you.” +</p> + +<p> +“You have not seen your principal this morning?” replied the +lawyer, with a smile which for him was almost benevolent. The prospect of a +fight was as the Mountains of Beulah to him. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean Mr. Lindo?” said the curate, with some curtness. +</p> + +<p> +The lawyer nodded. “I see you have not,” he continued. +“Perhaps you do not know that he turned the sheep out of the churchyard +after breakfast this morning, and half of them were found nearly a mile down +the Red Lane!” +</p> + +<p> +“I did not know it,” said the curate gravely. But it was as much as +he could do to restrain his exultation and show no sign save of concern. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, it is the fact,” the lawyer replied, rubbing his hands. +“It is quite true he gave the church wardens notice to remove them a +fortnight ago; but we did not comply, because we say it is our affair and not +his. Now you may tell him from me that the only question in my mind is the form +of action.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will tell him,’ said the curate with dignity. +</p> + +<p> +“Just so! What do you say, Gregg?” +</p> + +<p> +But the doctor, grinning from ear to ear with satisfaction, was gone; and the +curate, not a whit less pleased in his heart, hastened to follow his example. +“Bonamy one, and Gregg two,” he said softly to himself, “and +last, but not least, one who shall be nameless, three! He has made three +enemies already, and, if those be not enough, with right on their side, to oust +him from his seat when the time comes, why, I know nothing of odds!” +</p> + +<p> +“With right on their side,” said the curate, even to himself. He +had made no second attempt to pry into the rector’s secrets or to bring +home to him a knowledge of the wrongfulness of his possession. But he did still +believe, or persuaded himself he believed, that Lindo was a guilty man; or why +should the young rector pension the old earl’s servant? And on this +ground Clode justified to himself the secret ill-turns he was doing him. A +month’s intimacy with the rector would probably have convinced an +impartial mind of his good faith. But the curate had not, it must be +remembered, an impartial mind; and we are all very apt to believe what suits +us. +</p> + +<p> +To return to the little doctor, whom we left going on his way in a mood almost +hilarious. He hoped that this fresh escapade of the rector’s would wipe +out the memory of the fray in which he had himself borne so inglorious a part. +And the more he thought of it, the greater was his admiration of the lawyer, +whom he had long patronized in a timid fashion, much as a snub-nosed King +Charlie treats the butcher’s mongrel. Now he felt a positive reverence +for him. He began to think it possible that, with all his drawbacks of birth, +Mr. Bonamy might become a personage in the town, and pretty Kate not so bad a +match. The result of these musings was that, by the time he reached the +lawyer’s door, an idea which he had first entertained on seeing the young +clergyman’s admiration for Kate Bonamy, and which he had since turned +over more than once in his mind, had become on a sudden a settled purpose. So +much so that, as the doctor rang the bell, he looked at his hands, which were +not so clean as they might have been, pished and pshawed, settled his +light-blue scarf—which the next minute rose again to the level of his +collar—and at length went in with a briskly juvenile air and an engaging +smile. +</p> + +<p> +He found Daintry lying on the sofa in the dining-room down-stairs, her head on +a white bed-pillow. Kate was leaning over her. The room was in some +disorder—littered with this and that, a bottle of eau de Cologne, Mr. +Bonamy’s papers, books, and sewing; but it looked comfortable, for it was +very evidently inhabited. A fastidious eye might have thought it was too much +inhabited; and yet proofs of refinement were not wanting, though the sofa was +covered with horsehair, and the mirror was heavy and ugly, and the grate, +knee-high, was as old as the Georges. There were flowers on the table and on +the little cottage piano; and by the side of the last was a violin-case. Not +many people in Claversham knew that Mr. Bonamy played the violin. Still fewer +had heard him play, for he never did so out of his own house. +</p> + +<p> +Possibly a very particular suitor might have preferred to find Kate attending +on her sister in a boudoir, free from a lawyer’s papers, furnished in a +less solid and durable style, and with some livelier look-out than through wire +blinds upon a dull street. But another might have thought that the office in +which she was engaged, and the gentleness of her touch and eye as she went +about it, made up for all deficiencies. +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg was not of a nature to appreciate either the deficiencies or the +set-off; but he had eyes for the girl’s grace and beauty, for the +neatness of the well-fitting blue gown and the white collar and cuffs; and he +shook hands with her and devoted himself to Daintry—who disliked him +extremely and was very fractious—with the most anxious solicitude. +“It is only a sick headache!” he said finally, with bluntness which +was meant for encouragement. “It is nothing, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +“I wish you had it, then!” Daintry wailed, burying her face in the +pillow. +</p> + +<p> +“It will be gone in the morning!” he retorted, rising and keeping +his temper by an unnatural effort. “She will be the better for it +afterward, Miss Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +To this Daintry vouchsafed no answer, unless a muttered “Rubbish!” +was intended for one. He affected not to hear it, at any rate. He was all +good-temper this morning; the unfortunate point about this being that his good +nature was a shade more unpleasant than his usual snappish manner. +</p> + +<p> +At any rate Kate thought it so. She felt the instinctive repulsion which the +wrong man’s wooing awakens in an unspoiled girl. She was conscious of an +added dislike for the man as she held out her hand to him at the dining-room +door. But she did not divine the cause of this; no, nor conjecture his purpose +when he said in a low voice that he wished to speak to her outside. +</p> + +<p> +“May we go in here a moment?” he muttered, when the door was closed +behind them. He pointed to the room on the other side of the hall, which Mr. +Bonamy used in summer as a kind of office. +</p> + +<p> +“There is no fire there,” Kate answered. “I think it has been +lighted up-stairs, however, if you will not mind coming up, Dr. Gregg. Is there +anything”—this was when he had silently followed her into the stiff +drawing-room, where the newly lit fire was rather smoking than +burning—“serious the matter with her, then?” +</p> + +<p> +Her voice was steady, but her eyes betrayed the sudden anxiety his manner had +aroused in her. +</p> + +<p> +“With your sister?” he answered slowly. He was really pondering how +he should say what he had come to say. But, naturally, she set down his +thoughtfulness to a professional cause. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she said anxiously. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no—nothing, nothing. The truth is,” continued the +doctor, following up a happy thought and smiling approval of it, “the +matter is with me, Miss Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +“With you!” Kate exclaimed, opening her eyes in astonishment. Her +momentary anxiety had put all else out of her head. She thought the doctor had +gone mad. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he said jerkily, but with a grin of tender meaning. +“With me. And you are the cause of it. Now do not be frightened, Miss +Kate,” he continued hastily, seeing her start of apprehension. “You +must have known for a long time what I was thinking of.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed I have not,” Kate murmured in a low voice. She did not +affect to misunderstand him. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, you easily might have known it then,” he retorted, +forgetting his <i>rôle</i> for an instant. “But the long and the short of +it is that I want you to marry me. I do!” he repeated, overcoming +something in his throat, and going on from this point swimmingly. “And +you will please to hear me out, and not answer in a hurry, Miss Kate. If you +like—but I should not think that you would want it—you can have +until to-morrow to think it over.” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” she replied impulsively, her face crimson. And then she shut +her mouth so suddenly, it seemed she was afraid to let anything escape it +except that unmistakable monosyllable. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well,” he replied, comfortably settling his elbow upon the +mantel-shelf, “that is as you like. I hope it does not want much thinking +over myself. I will not boast that I am a rich man, but I am decently off. I +flatter myself that I can keep my head above water—and yours, too, for +the matter of that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, it is not that,” she began hurriedly. +</p> + +<p> +He interrupted her. “No, no,” he said jocularly—-his last +remarks had put him into a state of considerable self-satisfaction, and he no +more thought it possible that she could or would refuse him than that the sky +could fall—“do not buy a pig in a poke! Hear me out first, Miss +Kate, and we shall start fair. You have been in my house, and, if it is not +quite so large a house as this, I will answer for it you will find it a great +deal more lively. You will see people you have never seen here, nor will see +while your name is Bonamy. You will have—well, altogether a better time. +Not that I mind myself,” the doctor added rather vaguely, forgetting the +French proverb about those who excuse themselves, “what your name is, not +I! So don’t you think you could say Yes at once, my dear?” +</p> + +<p> +He took a step nearer, thinking he had put it rather neatly and without any +nonsense. Possibly, from his point of view of things, he had. But Kate fell +back, nevertheless, as he advanced. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no,” she said, flushing painfully. “I could not! I could +not indeed, Dr. Gregg! I am very sorry.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come, come,” he said, holding out his hand, his tone one of +pleasant raillery. He had looked for some hanging back, some show of coyness +and bashfulness, and was prepared to laugh in his sleeve at it—“I +think you can, Kate. I think it is possible.” That it was in +woman’s nature to say No to his comfortable home and the little lift in +society he had to offer—it is only little lifts we appreciate, just up +the next floor above us—he did not believe. +</p> + +<p> +But Kate soon undeceived him. “I am afraid it is not possible,” she +said firmly. “Indeed, I may say at once, Dr. Gregg, that it is out of the +question what you ask; though I thank you, I am sure.” +</p> + +<p> +His face fell ludicrously, and his thick black brows drew together in a very +ominous fashion. But he still could not believe that she meant it. “I do +not think you understand,” he said, “that the house is ready, and +the furniture and servants, and there is nothing to prevent you stepping into +it all whenever you please. I will take you away from this,” he +continued, darting a scornful glance round the stiff chilly room—“I +do not suppose that ten people enter this room in the twelvemonth—and I +will show you something like life. It is an offer not many would make you. +Come, Kate, do not be a little fool! You are not going to say No, so say Yes at +once. And don’t let us shilly-shally!” +</p> + +<p> +He had put out his hand as he spoke and captured hers. But she snatched it from +him again almost roughly, and stepped back. The right man might have used the +words the doctor used, and might have scolded her with impunity, but not the +wrong one. Her face, perplexed and troubled a moment before, grew decided +enough now. “I am going to say No, nevertheless, Dr. Gregg,” she +replied firmly. “I thought I had already said it. I will be as plain as +you have been. I do not like you as a wife should like her husband, nor +otherwise than as a friend.” +</p> + +<p> +“A friend!” he exclaimed. He gasped as a man does who has been +plunged suddenly into cold water. His face was red with anger, and his little +black eyes glared at her banefully. “Oh, bother your friendship!” +he added violently. “I did not ask you for that!” +</p> + +<p> +“I have nothing else to give you,” she replied coldly. +</p> + +<p> +He gasped again. Refused by the Bonamy girl! He had never thought of this. He +was beside himself with astonishment and anger, with disappointment and wounded +pride. “You would not have said this a month ago!” he cried at +last. “It was a pity I did not ask you then!” +</p> + +<p> +“I should have given you the same answer.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no,” he replied ironically, swinging his hat to and fro. +“Oh, no, you would not—not at all, Miss Bonamy. You would have sung +to a very different tune if I had whistled to you before this niminy-piminy +parson showed his face here! Do not think that I am such a fool as not to see +which way the wind is blowing.” +</p> + +<p> +She stood looking at him in silence. But her face was scarlet, and her hand +shook with rage. +</p> + +<p> +He saw it. “Pooh! do not think to frighten me!” he said coarsely. +“When a man has offered to marry you he has a right to speak his mind! It +will be a long time, I warrant you, before your parson will have the same right +to speak. He was very great with you once, but he has quite another set of +friends now, and I have not heard of him offering to introduce you to +them.” +</p> + +<p> +“Will you go, Dr. Gregg?” she cried passionately, pointing to the +door. His taunts were torture to her. “Will you go, or do you wish to +stay and insult me further?” +</p> + +<p> +“I wish to say one thing, and I am going to say it,” he replied, +nodding triumphantly. “You are pretty proud of your capture, but you need +not be. He will not be much of a match when we have stripped him of the living +he has no right to, and shown him the detected swindler he is! Wait! Wait a +little, Miss Bonamy, and when your parson is ruined, as he will be before three +months are out, high as he holds his head now, perhaps you will be sorry that +you did not take my offer. Why,” he added scornfully, “I should say +you are the only person in the parish who does not know he has no more right +where he is than I have.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go!” she said, pointing to the door. Her face was white now. +</p> + +<p> +“So I will when I have said one more word——” +</p> + +<p> +“You won’t say it!” cried a sharp voice behind him. +“You will go now!” He shot round, and there was Daintry with her +hand on the door. Her hair was in disorder, her cheeks were flushed, her +greenish-gray eyes were aglow with anger. He saw that she had overheard +something of what had passed, and he began to tremble. He had said more than he +intended. “You will go now, as Kate tells you,” she cried, “I +will not have——” +</p> + +<p> +“Leave the room, child!” he snarled, stamping his foot. +</p> + +<p> +“I shan’t!” she retorted fiercely. “And if you do not +go before I count three I will fetch the dogs.” +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg made a movement as if he would have put her out of the room. But her +presence had a little sobered him, and he stopped. “Look here,” he +said. +</p> + +<p> +“One!” cried Daintry, who knew well that the doctor had a +particular dislike for Snorum, and that the dog’s presence was at any +time enough to drive him from the house. +</p> + +<p> +He turned and looked at Kate. She had gone to the window and was gazing out, +her back to him, her figure proud and scornful. “Miss Bonamy,” he +said. +</p> + +<p> +“Two!” cried Daintry. “Are you going, or shall I fetch +Snorum?” +</p> + +<p> +With a muttered oath he took up his hat and went down the stairs and out into +the street. There at the door he stood a moment, grinding his teeth, as the +full sense of the calamity which had befallen him came home to him. He had +stooped and been rejected—had been rejected by Bonamy’s daughter. +He walked away, and still his anger did not decrease, but all the same he began +to be a little thankful that the child had interrupted him. Had he gone on he +might have said too much. As it was, he had an idea that perhaps he had said +more than was quite prudent. And this had presently a wonderful effect in the +way of sobering him. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap12"></a>CHAPTER XII.<br/> +THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL.</h2> + +<p> +It was tea-time at Mr. Bonamy’s; five-thirty, that is, for the lawyer +knew nothing of four o’clock tea. He would have stared had he been +invited into the drawing-room to take it, or had his daughters produced one of +those dainty afternoon tea-tables which were in use at the Town House, and +asked him to support his cup and saucer on his knee. Compromises found no favor +with him. Tea was a meal—he had always so considered it; and he liked to +have the dining-room table laid for it. Possibly Kate, had she enjoyed more of +her own way, would have altered this, as she would certainly have reformed the +drawing-room. But Mr. Bonamy, who was in many things an indulgent father, was +conservative in some. Four o’clock tea, and a daily use of the +drawing-room, were refinements which he had always regarded as peculiar to a +certain set; and in his pride he would not appear to ape its ways or affect to +belong to it. +</p> + +<p> +Almost to the moment he came into the room, which was as bright and cheerful as +gaslight and firelight could make it. Laying some letters under a weight on the +mantel-shelf, he turned round and stood with his back to the fire-place. +“How is the child?” he asked. “Has she gone to bed?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” Kate answered, lifting the lid of the teapot and looking in; +“I think she will be all right after a night’s rest.” +</p> + +<p> +“You do not look very bright yourself, Kate,” he remarked, as he +sat down. +</p> + +<p> +Her cheek flushing, she made the old old woman’s excuse. “I have a +little headache,” she said. “It will be better when I have had my +tea.” +</p> + +<p> +He took a piece of toast and buttered it deliberately. “Gregg came and +saw her?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. He said it was only a sick headache, and would pass off.” +</p> + +<p> +The lawyer made no comment at the moment, but went on eating his toast. But +presently he looked up. “What is the matter, Kitty?” he said, not +unkindly. +</p> + +<p> +Her face burning, she peered again quite unnecessarily into the teapot. Then +she said hurriedly, “I have something I think I ought to tell you, +father. Dr. Gregg has asked me to marry him!” +</p> + +<p> +“The deuce he has!” Mr. Bonamy answered in unmistakable surprise. +For a moment he did not know what to say, or how to feel about it. If any one +had informed the Claversham people that the lawyer’s moroseness was not +natural to the man, but the product of many slights, the informant would have +lost his pains. Yet in a great measure this was so; and first among the things +which of late years had exercised Mr. Bonamy a keen anxiety for his +daughters’ happiness had place. He had never made any move toward +procuring them the society of their equals; nay, he had done many things in his +pride calculated rather to prolong their exclusion. Yet all the time he had +bitterly resented it, and had spent many a wakeful night in pondering gloomily +over the dull lives to which they were condemned. Now—strange that he had +never thought of it before—as far as Kate was concerned, he saw a way of +escape opening. Gregg had a fair practice, some private means, a good house, a +tolerable position in the town. In a word, he was perfectly eligible. Yet Mr. +Bonamy was not altogether pleased. He had no fastidious objection to the +doctor. It did not occur to him that the doctor was not a gentleman. But he did +know that he did not like him. +</p> + +<p> +So the lawyer, after one exclamation of surprise, was for a moment silent. Then +he asked, “Well Kate, and what did you say?” +</p> + +<p> +“I said No,” Kate answered in a low voice. +</p> + +<p> +“He is a well-to-do man,” Mr. Bonamy said, slowly stirring his tea. +“Not that you need think of that only. But you are not likely to know +many people who could make you more comfortable. I believe he is skilful in his +profession. It is a chance, girl, not to be lightly thrown away.” +</p> + +<p> +“I could not—I could not marry him,” Kate stammered, her +agitation now very apparent. “I do not like him. You would not have +me——” +</p> + +<p> +“I would not have you marry any one you do not like!” Mr. Bonamy +replied, almost sternly. “But are you sure that you know your own +mind?” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite,” Kate said, with a shudder. +</p> + +<p> +“Hum! Well, well; there is no more to be said, then,” he answered. +“Don’t cry, girl.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate managed to obey him. And in a moment, bravely steadying her voice, she +asked, “What is this about Mr. Lindo, father? I heard that he had turned +the sheep out of the churchyard.” +</p> + +<p> +The lawyer thought she asked the question in order to change the subject; and +he answered briskly, with less reserve perhaps than he might have exercised at +another time. “It is quite true,” he said. “He is making a +fool of himself, as I expected. You cannot put old heads on young shoulders. +However, what has happened has convinced me of one thing.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is that?” she asked in a low voice. +</p> + +<p> +“That he does not know himself that he has no right here.” +</p> + +<p> +“But has he none?” she murmured, in the same tone. He noticed that +her manner was conscious and embarrassed; but naturally he set this down to the +former topic. He thought she was trying to avoid a scene, and he admired her +for it. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I doubt if he has,” he answered, “though I am not +quite sure that people have not lit upon a mare’s nest. It is the talk of +the town that there was some mistake in his presentation, and there is a +disreputable fellow hanging on his heels, and apparently living on him, who is +said to be in the secret, and to be making the most of it. I do not believe +that now, however,” the lawyer continued, falling into a brown study and +speaking as much to himself as to her. “If he knew he were insecure he +would live more quietly than he does. All the same, he is likely to learn a +lesson he will not forget.” +</p> + +<p> +“How?” she asked, her spoon tinkling tremulously against the side +of the cup, and her head bent low over it, as though she saw something +interesting in the lees. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy laughed in his out-of-door manner. “How?” he said +grimly. “Well, if there be any mistake he is going the right way to +suffer by it. If he kept quiet, and went softly, and made no enemies, very +little might be said and nothing done when the mistake came out. But as it +is—well, he has made a good many enemies, and the chances are that he +will lose the best berth he will ever get into. It will be bad for him, but the +better for the parish.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t you think,” said Kate very gently, “that he +means well?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy grunted. “Perhaps so; but he does not go the right way to do +it,” he rejoined. “His good fortune has turned his head, and he has +put himself in the hands of the Hammond set, and that does not do at +Claversham.” The lawyer ended with a harsh laugh, which said more plainly +than any words, that it never would do while John Bonamy was church warden at +Claversham. +</p> + +<p> +“It seems a pity,” Kate said, almost under her breath. She had +never raised her eyes from the tea-tray since the subject was introduced, and +if her father had looked closely he would have seen that her very ears were +scarlet. “Could you not give him a word of warning?” +</p> + +<p> +“I!” said the lawyer, with asperity. “Certainly not; why +should I?” +</p> + +<p> +Kate did not say, and her father, with another impatient word or two, rose from +the table, and presently went out. She rang the bell mechanically and had the +table cleared, and in the same mood turned to the fire and, putting her feet on +the fender, began to brood over the coals, which were burning red and low in +the grate. +</p> + +<p> +Five times—five times only, counting the Oxford escapade as one, she had +spoken to him; and they—“they” meant Claversham, for it was +her chief misery to believe that the whole town was talking of her—had +made this of it! They had noticed his attentions, and had seen them scornfully +withdrawn when he learned who she was. Oh, it was cowardly of +him—cowardly! And yet—and yet—so her thoughts ran, taking a +fresh turn—had he ever said a word or cast a glance at her which meant +anything—which all the world might not have heard and seen? No, never. +And, with that, her anger changed its course and ran against Gregg. Him she +would never forgive. It was his evil imagination, his base suspicions, which +had built it all up; and Mr. Lindo was no more to blame—though she a +little despised him for his weakness and conventionality—than she was +herself. +</p> + +<p> +It seemed most sad that he should be ruined because no one would say a word to +warn him. Brooding over the fire, she felt a girl’s pity for the young +man’s ill-fortune. She forgot the last month, during which she had spoken +to him but once—and then he had seemed embarrassed and anxious to be +gone—and remembered only how frank and gay he had been in the first blush +of his hopes at Oxford, how pleasantly he had smiled, how well and yet how +quaintly his new dignity had sat upon him, and how naïvely he had shaken it off +at times and shown himself a boy, with a boy’s love of fun and mischief. +Or, again, she remembered how thoughtful he had been for them, how considerate, +how much at home in scenes new to them, with how lordly an air he had provided +for their comfort. Oh, it was a pity—a grievous pity, that his hopes +should end in such a disaster as Mr. Bonamy foretold! And all because no one +would say a friendly word to him! +</p> + +<p> +The next day (Tuesday) was a wet day—a sleety, blusterous winter day, and +she did not go out. But on the Wednesday, as the rector crossed the churchyard +after reading the Litany, he saw Miss Bonamy passing his door. He fancied, with +a little astonishment—for she had constantly evinced the same avoidance +of intimacy with him which had at first piqued him—that she slightly +checked her pace so as to meet him. And, to tell the truth, the rector was half +pleased and half annoyed. He had hardened his heart and set his face to crush +Mr. Bonamy. +</p> + +<p> +He had in his pocket a letter from the lawyer, warning him that, unless he +altered his course, a writ would be served upon him. And a dozen times to-day +he had in his mind called the church warden hard names. But yet he was not +absolutely ill-pleased to see Miss Bonamy. He felt a certain excitement in the +<i>rencontre</i> under the circumstances. He would meet her magnanimously, and +of course she would ignore the quarrel. He hated Mr. Bonamy for a puritanical +old pettifogger; but that was no reason why he should be rude to his daughter. +</p> + +<p> +Lindo saw, when he was a few paces from her and had raised his hat, that her +face expressed much more emotion, if not embarrassment, than seemed to be +called for by the occasion. And naturally this communicated itself to him. +“I have not seen you for a long time,” he said, as he shook hands. +Perhaps the worst thing he could have said under the circumstances. +</p> + +<p> +She assented, however. “No,” she said, sloping her umbrella behind +her so as to keep off the wind and a half-frozen drizzle with which it was +laden. And, as she did this, her eyes met his gallantly. “But I am glad, +Mr. Lindo,” she continued, “that I have met you to-day, because I +have something I want to say to you.” +</p> + +<p> +On the instant he vowed within himself that it would be in bad taste, in the +worst taste, if she referred to the quarrel or to parish matters. And he +answered very frigidly. “What is that, Miss Bonamy?” he said. +“Pray speak on.” +</p> + +<p> +She detected the change of tone, and for a second her gray eyes flashed. But +she had come to say something. She had counted the cost, and nothing he could +do should prevent her saying it. She had been awake all night, torturing +herself with imagining the things he would think of her. But she was not to be +deterred by the reality. “Do you know, Mr. Lindo,” she said +steadily, “what is being said of you in the town?” +</p> + +<p> +“A good many hard things.” he answered half lightly and half +bitterly. “So I have reason to believe. But I do not think that they will +affect me one way or the other, Miss Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +“And so,” she answered, with spirit, “you will not thank any +one for telling you of them? That is what you mean, is it not?” +</p> + +<p> +He was very sore, and her interference annoyed him excessively—possibly +because he valued her good opinion. He would not deny the feeling she imputed +to him. “Possibly I do mean something of that kind,” he said. +“Where ignorance is bliss—you know.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yet there is one thing,” she replied, “being said of you in +the town, which I think you should be told, Mr. Lindo. Your friends probably +will not hear it, or, if they do, they will not venture to tell you of +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed,” he answered. “You pique my curiosity.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is being commonly said,” she rejoined, looking down for the +first time, “that you have no right to the living, and were appointed by +some mistake, or—or fraud.” +</p> + +<p> +He did not answer her at once. He was so completely taken by surprise that he +stood looking at her with his mouth open. His first and better impulse was to +laugh heartily. But what he did was to say in a very quiet way, “Indeed. +That is being said, is it? It is quite true I had not heard it. May I ask, Miss +Bonamy, if you had it from your father?” +</p> + +<p> +If his tone had been cold before, it was freezing now. But she was not to be +daunted, and she answered with considerable presence of mind, “I heard +from my father that that was the report in the town, but I also heard him +express his disbelief in the greater part of it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am much obliged to him,” said the rector through his closed +teeth. “He did not think I had been guilty of fraud, then?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, he did not,” Kate muttered, her voice faltering for the first +time. +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed. I am much obliged to him.” +</p> + +<p> +He had received it even worse than she had expected. It was terrible to go on +in the face of such scorn and incredulity. But to stop there was to have done +only evil, as Kate knew, and she persevered. “I have one more thing I +wish to say, if you will permit me,” she continued steadying her voice +and striving to speak in as indifferent a manner as possible. +</p> + +<p> +He bowed, his face hard and contemptuous. +</p> + +<p> +The wind had shifted slightly, and, to protect herself from the small rain +which was falling, she changed her position, so as to face the churchyard. He +saw only her profile. If he looked proud, involuntarily he remarked how proud +she looked also—how pure and cold was the line of her features, softened +only by the roundness of her chin. “I am told,” she said in a low +voice, “that the fewer enemies you make, and the more quietly you +proceed, the greater will be the chance of your remaining when the mistake is +found out. Pray,” she said more sharply, for he had raised his hand, as +if to interrupt, “have patience for a moment, Mr. Lindo. I shall not +trouble you again. I only wish you to know that those who have cause to dislike +you—I do not mean my father, there are others—are congratulating +themselves that you are playing into their hands, and consider that every +disagreement between you and any part of the parish is a weapon given them, to +be used when the crisis comes.” +</p> + +<p> +“When the mistake is found out?” he said, grimly repeating her +words. “Or the fraud? But I forgot—Mr. Bonamy does not believe in +that!” +</p> + +<p> +“You understand me, I think,” she said, ignoring the latter part of +his speech. +</p> + +<p> +“And may I ask,” he continued, his eyes on her face, “who my +ill-wishers are?” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not think that matters,” she replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Then, at least, why am I indebted to you for this warning?” +</p> + +<p> +His tone as he asked the question was as contemptuous as before. And yet Kate +felt that this she must answer. To refuse to answer it, or to evade it, would +be to lay herself open to surmises of all kinds. +</p> + +<p> +“I thought it a pity that you should fall into a trap unwarned,” +she answered, looking away at the yew-trees. “And it seemed to me that, +for several reasons, your friends were not likely to warn you.” +</p> + +<p> +“There, I quite agree with you,” he retorted quickly. “My +friends would not have believed in the trap.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps not,” she said, outwardly unmoved. +</p> + +<p> +“I am astonished that you did; I am astonished that you should have +believed anything so absurd, Miss Bonamy!” he said severely. At that +moment, as it happened, two people came round the flank of the church. The one +was the curate; the other was Dr. Gregg. Kate looked at them, and her face +flamed. The rector looked, and felt only relief. They would afford him an +excuse to be gone. “Ah, there is Mr. Clode,” he said indifferently. +“I was just looking for him. I think, if you will excuse me, Miss Bonamy, +I will seize the opportunity of speaking to him now.” And raising his +hat, with a formality which one of the men took to be a pretence and a sham, he +left her and walked across to them. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap13"></a>CHAPTER XIII.<br/> +LAURA’S PROVISO.</h2> + +<p> +When a mine has been laid, and the fuse lit, and the tiny thread of smoke has +begun to curl upward, it is apt to seem a long time—so I am told by those +who have stood and watched such things—before the earth flies into the +air. So it seemed to Stephen Clode. The curate looked to see an explosion +follow immediately upon the rector taking the decisive step of turning out the +sheep. But week after week elapsed, until Christmas was some time gone, and +nothing happened. Mr. Bonamy, with a lawyer’s prudence, wrote another +letter, and for a time, perhaps out of regard to the season, held his hand. +There was talk of Lord Dynmore’s return, but no sign of it as yet. And +Dr. Gregg snapped and snarled among his intimates, but in public was pretty +quiet. +</p> + +<p> +It was noticeable, however, that the rector was invited to none of the +whist-parties which were a feature of the town life at this season; and to +those who looked closely into things and listened to the gossip of the place it +was plain that the breach between him and the bulk of his parishioners was +growing wider. The rector was much with the Hammonds, and carried his head +high—higher than ever, one of his parishioners thought since a talk she +had had with him in the churchyard. The habit of looking down upon a certain +section of the town, because they were not quite so refined as himself, because +they were narrow in their opinions, or because the Hammonds looked down upon +them, was growing upon him. And he yielded to it none the less because he was +all the time dissatisfied with himself. He was conscious that he was not acting +up to the standard he had set himself on coming to the town. He was not living +the life he had hoped to live. He visited his poor and gave almost too largely +in the hard weather, and was diligent at services and sermon-writing. But there +was a flaw in his life, and he knew it; and yet he had not the strength to set +it right. +</p> + +<p> +All this Mr. Clode might have observed—he was sagacious enough; but for +the time his judgment was clouded by his jealousy, and in his impatience he +fancied that the rector’s troubles were passing away. Each visit Lindo +paid to the Town House, each time his name was coupled with Laura +Hammond’s, as people were beginning to couple it, chafed the +curate’s sore afresh and kept it raw. So that even Stephen Clode’s +self-restraint and command of temper began to fail him, and more than once he +said sharp things to his commanding-officer, which made Lindo open his eyes in +unaffected surprise. +</p> + +<p> +Clode began to feel indeed that the position was becoming intolerable; and +though he had long ago determined that the waiting-game was the one he ought to +play, he presently—in the first week of the new year—changed his +mind. +</p> + +<p> +Lindo had announced his intention of devoting the afternoon—it was +Wednesday—to his district; and, taking advantage of this, the curate +thought he might indulge himself in a call at the Town House without fear of +unpleasant interruption. He would not admit that he had any other motive in +going there than just to pay a visit—which he certainly owed. But in +truth he was in a dangerous humor. And, alas! when he had been ushered along +the thickly carpeted passage and entered the drawing-room, there, comfortably +seated in the half-light before the fire, the tea-things gleaming beside them, +were Laura and the rector! +</p> + +<p> +The curate’s face grew dark. He almost felt that Lindo, who had really +been driven in by the rain, had betrayed him; and he shook hands with Laura and +sat down in complete silence, unable to trust himself to answer the +rector’s cheery greeting by so much as a word. It was all he could do to +answer “Thank you,” when Miss Hammond asked him if he would take +tea. She, of course, saw that something was amiss, and felt not a little +awkward between her two friends; but luckily the rector remained ignorant and +at his ease—he saw nothing, and went on talking. It was the best thing he +could have done, only, unfortunately, he had to do with a man whom nothing in +his present mood could please. +</p> + +<p> +“I am glad you have turned up at this particular moment,” Lindo +said. “Let me have your opinion. Miss Hammond says that I am pauperizing +the town by giving too much away.” +</p> + +<p> +“If you are half as generous at our bazaar on the 10th,” she +retorted, “you will do twice as much good.” +</p> + +<p> +“Or half as much evil!” he said lightly. +</p> + +<p> +“Have it that way, if you like,” she answered laughing. +</p> + +<p> +The curate set his teeth together in impotent rage. They were so easy, so +unconstrained, on such excellent terms with one another. When Laura, who was +secretly quaking, held out the toast to him and let her eyes dwell for an +instant on his, he looked away stubbornly. “Were you asking my +opinion?” he said in a voice he vainly strove to render cold and +dispassionate. +</p> + +<p> +“To be sure,” said the rector, stirring his tea and enjoying +himself. “Miss Hammond is not impartial. She is biassed by her +bazaar.” +</p> + +<p> +If he had known the strong passions that were at work on the other side of the +tea-table! But the curate had his back to the shaded lamp, and only a fitful +gleam of fire-light betrayed even to Laura’s suspicious eyes that he was +not himself. Yet, when he spoke, Lindo involuntarily started, so thinly veiled +was the sneer in his tone. “Well, there is one pensioner, I think, you +would do well to strike off your list,” he said. “He does not do +you much credit.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who is that? Old Martin at the Gas House?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, the gentleman at the Bull and Staff!” replied the curate +bluntly. +</p> + +<p> +“At the Bull and Staff? Who is that?” +</p> + +<p> +“Felton.” +</p> + +<p> +For a moment the rector looked puzzled. He had almost forgotten the name of +Lord Dynmore’s servant. Then he colored slightly. “Yes, I know whom +you mean,” he said, taken aback as much by the other’s unlooked-for +tone as by the mention of the man. “But I did not know he lived at the +Bull and Staff. It is not much of a place, is it?” +</p> + +<p> +“I should say that it was very nearly the worst house in the town!” +said the curate. +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed! I will speak to him about it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I would speak to him about getting drunk, if I were you!” Clode +replied with a short laugh. “He is drunk six days in the week; every day +except Saturday, when he comes to you and pulls a long face above a clean +neck-cloth. He is the talk of the town!” +</p> + +<p> +The rector stared; naturally wondering what on earth had come to the curate to +induce him to take that line. He was rather surprised than offended, however, +and merely answered, “I am sorry to hear it. I will speak to him about +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who is this person?” Miss Hammond asked hurriedly. “I do not +think that I know any one in the town of that name.” The subject seemed +to be a dangerous one, but anything was better than to leave the curate free to +conduct the discussion. +</p> + +<p> +He it was, however, who answered her. “He is a <i>protégé</i> of the +rector’s!” he said, with a laugh that was undisguisedly offensive. +“You had better ask him.” +</p> + +<p> +“He is a servant of Lord Dynmore’s,” Lindo said, speaking to +her with studious politeness, and otherwise ignoring Clode’s +interruption. +</p> + +<p> +“But why you find him in board and lodging at the Bull and Staff free, +gratis, and for nothing,” interposed the curate again with the same +rudeness, “passes my comprehension!” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps that is my business,” said the rector, losing patience. +</p> + +<p> +Both men stood up. Laura rose, too, with a scared face, and stood gazing at +them, amazed at the storm which had so suddenly arisen. The curate’s +height, as the two stood confronting one another, seemed to give him the +advantage; and his dark rugged face, kindling with long-repressed feelings, +wore the provoking smile of one who, confident in his own powers, has wilfully +thrown down the glove and is determined to see the matter through. The +rector’s face, on the other hand, was red; and, though he faced his man +squarely and threw back his head with the haughtiness of his kind, his anger +was mixed with wonder, and it was plain that he was at a loss to understand the +other’s ebullition or to decide how to deal with it. There was a +moment’s silence, which Laura had not the presence of mind, nor the +curate the will, to break. Then the rector said, “Perhaps we had better +let this drop for the moment, Mr. Clode.” +</p> + +<p> +“As you will,” replied the curate recklessly. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I do will,” Lindo rejoined, with some <i>hauteur</i>. And he +looked, still standing erect and expectant, as if he thought that Clode could +not do otherwise than take his leave. +</p> + +<p> +But that was just what the curate had not the slightest intention of doing. +Instead, with a cynical smile, he coolly sat himself down again. His +superior’s eyes flashed with redoubled anger at this, which seemed to +him, after what had passed, the grossest impertinence; but Mr. Clode in his +present mood cared nothing for that, and made it very plain that he did not. +“Will you think me exacting if I ask for another cup of tea, Miss +Hammond?” he said quietly. +</p> + +<p> +That was enough to make the rector’s cup run over. He did not wait to +hear Laura’s answer, but himself said. “Perhaps I had better say +good evening, Miss Hammond.” +</p> + +<p> +“You will not forget the bazaar?” she answered, making no demur, +but at once holding out her hand. +</p> + +<p> +There was a faint note of appeal in her voice which begged him not to be angry, +and yet he was angry. “The bazaar?” he said coldly. “Oh, yes, +I will not forget it.” +</p> + +<p> +And with that he took up his hat and went, feeling much as a man does who, +walking along a well-known road, has put his foot into a hole and fallen +heavily. He was almost more astonished and aggrieved than hurt. +</p> + +<p> +When he was gone there was silence in the room. I do not know whether Laura had +been conscious, while the two men wrangled before her, that she was the prize +of the strife, and so, like the maidens of old, had been content to stand by +passive and expectant, satisfied to see the best man win, or whether she had +been too much alarmed to interpose. But certain it is that, when she was left +alone with the curate, she felt almost as uncomfortable as she had ever felt in +her life. She tried to say something indifferent, but for once she was too +nervous to frame the words. And Mr. Clode, instead of assisting her, instead of +bridging over the awkwardness of the moment, as he should have done, since he +was the person to blame for it all, sat silent and morose, brooding over the +fire and sipping his tea. At last he spoke. “Well,” he said +abruptly, turning his dark eyes suddenly on hers. “Which is it to be, +Laura?” +</p> + +<p> +He had never spoken to her in that tone before, and had any one told her that +morning that she would submit to it, she would have laughed her informant to +scorn. But there was a new-born masterfulness in the curate’s manner +which cowed her. “I do not know what you mean,” she murmured, her +face hot, her heart beating. +</p> + +<p> +“I think you do,” he answered sternly, without removing his eyes +from her. “Is it to be the rector, or is it to be me, Laura? You must +choose between us.” +</p> + +<p> +She recovered herself with a kind of gasp. “Are you not going a little +too fast?” she said, trying to smile, and speaking with something of her +ordinary manner. “I did not know that my choice was limited to the two +you mention, Mr. Clode, or that I had to choose one at all.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think you must,” was his only answer. “You must choose +between us.” Then, with a sudden movement, he rose and stood over her. +“Laura!” he said in a different tone, in a low voice, which +thrilled through her and awoke feelings and emotions hitherto asleep. +“Laura, do not play with me! I am a man. Is he more? Is he as much? I +love you with all my being! He cares only to kill time with you! Will you throw +me over because he is a little richer, because I am the curate and he is the +rector? If so, well, tell me, and I shall understand you!” +</p> + +<p> +It was not the way she had thought he would end. The force, the abruptness, the +almost menace of the last four words took her by surprise and subdued her +afresh. If she had had any doubt before which of the two men had her liking, +she had none now. She knew that Clode’s little finger was more to her +than Lindo’s whole hand; for, like most women, she had a secret +admiration for force, even when exercised without much regard to good taste. +</p> + +<p> +“You need not speak to me like that,” she said, in gentle +deprecation of his manner. +</p> + +<p> +He stooped over her. “Laura,” he said, “do you really mean +it? Do you mean you will——” +</p> + +<p> +“Wait, please!” she answered, recovering a little of her +ascendency. “Give me a little time. I want to think something out.” +</p> + +<p> +But time to think was just what he feared—ignorant as yet of his true +position—to give her; and his face grew dark and sullen again. +“No,” he said, “I will not!” +</p> + +<p> +She rose suddenly. “You will do as I ask you now,” she said, +asserting herself bravely, “or I shall leave you.” +</p> + +<p> +He bowed silently, and she sat down again. “Sit down, please,” she +said to him. He obeyed her. “Now,” she continued, raising her hand +so as to shade her eyes from the fire, “I will be candid with you, Mr. +Clode. If I had no other alternative than the one you have mentioned—to +choose between you and Mr. Lindo—I—I should certainly prefer you. +No!” she continued sharply, bidding him with her hand to keep his seat, +“hear me out, please. You have not stated the case correctly. In the +first place—well, you put me in the awkward position of having to confess +that Mr. Lindo has made no such proposal as you seem to fancy; and, secondly, +there are others in the world.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not care,” the curate exclaimed, his deep voice trembling +with exultation—“I do not care though there be +millions—now!” +</p> + +<p> +She moved her hand, and for a second her eyes, full of a tenderness such as he +had never seen in them before, met his. The look drew him from his seat again, +but she sent him back to it by an imperious gesture. “I said I would be +candid,” she continued, “and I intend to be so, though until a few +minutes ago I never thought that I should speak to you as I am doing.” +</p> + +<p> +“You shall never repent it,” he answered fondly. +</p> + +<p> +“I hope not,” she rejoined. But then she paused and was silent. +</p> + +<p> +He sat waiting patiently for a while; but, as she still said nothing, he rose. +“Laura,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I know,” she answered, almost abruptly. “But candor +does not come very easily, sir, under certain circumstances. Don’t you +know you have made me afraid of you?” +</p> + +<p> +He showed that he would have reassured her in the most convincing and practical +manner. But, notwithstanding her words, she had regained her power and presence +of mind, and she repelled him. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait until you have heard what I have got to say,” she said. +“It is this. I would not marry Mr. Lindo because he is a rector with a +living and a position—not though he were six times a rector! But all the +same I will not marry a curate! No,” she added in a lower tone, and with +a glance which intoxicated him afresh—“not though he be you!” +</p> + +<p> +He stood silent, looking down at her, waiting for more. Neither by word nor +gesture did he express dissent. It is possible he already understood, and felt +with her. +</p> + +<p> +“To marry a curate,” she continued in a low voice, “is, for a +girl such as I am, failure. I have held my head rather high, and I have stood +by and seen other girls married. Therefore to marry a curate, after all, would +be an ignominious failure. Are you very angry with me?” she continued +quietly, “or do you understand?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think I understand,” he answered, with just a tinge of +bitterness in his tone. +</p> + +<p> +“And despise me? Well, you must. I told you I was going to be candid, and +perhaps it is as well—as well, I mean, that you should know me,” +she replied, apparently unmoved. +</p> + +<p> +“I am content,” he answered, catching her spirit. +</p> + +<p> +“And so am I,” she said. “To no one else in the world would I +have said as much as I have said to you. To no other man would I say, +‘Win a living, and I will be yours!’ But I say it to you. Do as +much as that for me and I will marry you, Stephen. If you cannot, I +cannot.” +</p> + +<p> +“You are very prosaic,” he replied, lapsing into bitterness again. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, if you are not content” she retorted. +</p> + +<p> +He did not let her finish the sentence. “You will marry me on the day I +obtain a living?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“I will,” she answered bravely. +</p> + +<p> +She was standing up now, and he too—standing where the rector had stood +an hour before. She let him pass his arm round her waist, but when he would +have drawn her closer to him, and bent his head to kiss her, she hung back. +“No,” she said, blushing hotly, “I think”—with a +shy laugh—“that you are making too certain, sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you wish me <i>not</i> to succeed?” he replied, looking down at +her; and it must be confessed the lover’s <i>rôle</i> became him better +than nine-tenths of those who knew his dark, rugged face would have believed. +</p> + +<p> +She shook her head, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“Then if you wish me success,” he replied, “you must send me +out with some guerdon of your favor.” And this time she did not resist. +He drew her to him and kissed her thrice. Then she escaped from him and took +refuge on the other side of the fireplace. +</p> + +<p> +“You must not do that again,” she said, biting her lip and trying +to look at him reproachfully. “At any rate, you have had your guerdon +now. When you come back a victor I will crown you. But until then we are +friends only. You understand, sir?” +</p> + +<p> +And, though he demurred, he presently said he understood. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap14"></a>CHAPTER XIV.<br/> +THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD.</h2> + +<p> +When Stephen Clode left the Town House after his interview with Laura, he was +in a state of exaltation—lifted completely out of his ordinary cool and +calculating self by what had happened. It was raining, but he had gone some +distance before he remarked it, and even then he did not at once put up his +umbrella, but strode along through the darkness, his thoughts in a whirl of +triumph and excitement. The crisis had come suddenly, but he had not been found +unequal to it. He had gone in through the gates despondent, and come out in +joy. He had pitted himself against his rival, and had had the best of it. He +had wooed, and, almost in spite of his mistress, had won! +</p> + +<p> +He did not for the first few moments consider whether his altercation with the +rector was likely to have unpleasant consequences, nor did he trouble himself +about the manner in which he was to do Laura’s bidding. Such +considerations would come later—with the reaction. For the present they +did not occur to him. It was enough that Laura might be his—that she +never could be the rector’s. +</p> + +<p> +He felt the need, in his present excited mood, of some one to speak to, and +instead of turning into his own lodgings he passed on to the reading-room, a +large, barely furnished room, looking upon the top of the town, and used as a +club by the leading townsfolk and a few of the local magnates who lived near. +He entered it, and, to his surprise, found the archdeacon seated under the +naked gas-burners, interested in the “Times.” The sight filled him +with astonishment, for it was seldom the county members used the room after +sunset. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, Mr. Archdeacon,” he said—his tongue naturally hung +loose at the moment, and a <i>bonhomie</i>, difficult to assume at another +time, came easily to him now—“what in the world brings you here at +this hour?” +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon laid down his paper. “Upon my word I think I was half +asleep,” he said. “I am in for the ‘Free +Foresters’’ supper. I thought the hour was half-past six, and came +into town accordingly, whereas I find it is half-past seven. I have been here +the best part of three-quarters of an hour killing time.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I thought that the rector always said grace for the ‘Free +Foresters,’ the curate answered in some surprise. +</p> + +<p> +“It has been the custom for them to ask him,” the archdeacon +replied cautiously. “By the way you did it last year, did you not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, for Mr. Williams. He was confined to his room.” +</p> + +<p> +“I thought so. Well, this year these foolish people seem to have taken a +fancy not to have the rector, and they came to me. I tried to persuade them to +have him, but it was no good. And so,” the archdeacon added, in a lower +tone, “I thought it would look less like a slight if I came than if any +other clergyman—you, for instance—were the clerical guest.” +</p> + +<p> +“To be sure,” said the curate warmly. “It was most thoughtful +of you.” +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon hitched his chair a little nearer the fire. He felt the +influence of the curate’s sympathy. The latter had said little, but his +manner warmed the old gentleman’s heart, and his tongue also grew more +loose. “I wonder whether you know,” he said genially, rubbing his +hands up and down his knees, which he was gently toasting, and looking +benevolently at his companion, “how near you were to having the living, +Clode?” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean Claversham?” replied the curate, experiencing a kind +of shock at this reference to the subject so near his heart. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, of course.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never thought I had a chance of it!” +</p> + +<p> +“You had so good a chance,” responded the archdeacon, nodding his +head wisely, “that only one thing stood between you and it.” +</p> + +<p> +“May I ask what that was?” the curate rejoined, his heart beating +fast. +</p> + +<p> +“A promise. The earl had promised his old friend that he should have this +living. Lord Dynmore told me so himself, the last time I saw him. That would be +nearly a year ago, when poor Williams was already ailing.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that I supposed to be the case,” Clode answered, his tone +one of disappointment. “But I do not quite see how I was affected by +it—more, I mean, than others, archdeacon.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is what I am going to tell you, only it must not go farther,” +the archdeacon answered. “Lord Dynmore told me of this promise <i>à +propos</i> of a resolution he had just come to—namely, that, subject to +it, he intended in future to give his livings (he has seven in all, you know) +to the curate, wherever the latter had been two years at least in the parish, +and stood well with it. I am not sure that I agree with him; but he is a +conscientious man, though an odd one, and he had formed the opinion that that +was the right course. So, come now, if anything should happen to Lindo you +would certainly drop into it. I am not quite sure,” added the archdeacon +confidentially, “though no one likes Lindo better than I do, that yours +would not have been the better appointment.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate disclaimed this so warmly and loyally that the archdeacon was more +than ever pleased with him; and, half-past seven striking, they parted at the +door of the reading-room on the best of terms with one another. The archdeacon +crossed to his supper and speech, and the curate turned into his rooms, and, +throwing himself into the big leather chair before the fire, fixed his eyes on +the glowing coals, and began to think—to apply what he had just heard to +what he had known before. +</p> + +<p> +A living? He had got to get a living. And without capital to invest in one, or +the favor of a patron, how was it to be done? The bishop? He had no claim +there. He had not been long enough in the diocese, and he knew nothing of the +bishop’s wife. There was only one living he could get, only one living +upon which he had a claim, and that was Claversham. It all came back to +that—with this added, that he had now a stronger motive than ever for +ejecting Lindo from it, and the absolute knowledge to boot that, Lindo ejected, +he would be his successor. +</p> + +<p> +Stephen Clode’s face grew dark and gloomy as he reached this stage in his +reflections. He believed that the rector was enjoying what he had no right to +enjoy, but still he would fain have had no distinct part in depriving him of +it. He would have much preferred to stand by and, save by a word here and +there, by little acts scarcely palpable, and quite incapable of proof—do +nothing himself to injure him. He knew what loyalty was, and would fain have +been loyal in big things at least. But he did not see how it could be done. He +fancied that the stir against the rector was dying away. Bonamy had not moved. +Gregg was a coward, and of this matter of the “Free Foresters” he +thought nothing. Probably they would return to their allegiance another year, +and among the poor the rector’s liberality would soon make friends for +him. Altogether, the curate, getting up and walking the room restlessly and +with a knitted brow, was forced to the conviction that, if he would be helped, +he must help himself, and that now was the time. The iron must be struck before +it cooled. Something must be done. +</p> + +<p> +But what? Clode’s mind reverted first to the discharged servant, and +discussed more than one way in which he might be used. There was an amount of +danger, however, in tampering with him which the thinker’s astuteness did +not fail to note, and which led him presently to determine to leave Felton +alone. Perhaps he had made as much capital out of him as could be made with +safety. +</p> + +<p> +From him the curate’s thoughts passed naturally to the packet of letters +in the cupboard at the rectory, the letters which he had once held in his hand, +and which he could not but believe would prove the rector’s knowledge of +the fraud he was committing. Those letters! Clode, walking up and down the +room, pishing and pshawing from time to time, could not disentangle his +thoughts from them. The narrow chance which had prevented him reading them +before somehow made him feel the more certain of their value now—the more +anxious to hold them again in his hands. +</p> + +<p> +Were they still in the cupboard, he wondered. He had retained, not with any +purpose, but in pure inadvertence, the key which he had mentioned to the +rector; and he had it now. He took it from the mantel-shelf, toyed with it, +dropped it into his pocket. Then he took up his hat, and was going abruptly +from the room when the little servant who waited on him met him. She was +bringing up his simple dinner. The curate’s first impulse was to order it +to be taken down and kept warm for him. His second, to resume his seat and eat +it hastily. When he had finished—he could not have said an hour later +what he had had—he took his hat again and went out. +</p> + +<p> +Two minutes saw him at the rectory door, where he was just in time to meet the +rector going out. Lindo’s face flushed as he saw who his visitor was, and +there was more than a suspicion of haughtiness in his tone as he greeted him. +“Good-evening,” he said. “Do you want to see me, Mr. +Clode?” +</p> + +<p> +“If you please,” the curate answered simply. “May I come +in?” +</p> + +<p> +For answer, Lindo silently held the door open, and Clode passed through the +hall into the library. He was in the habit of entering this room a dozen times +a week, but he never did so after leaving his own small lodgings without being +struck by its handsome proportions, by the grave harmonious color of its +calf-lined walls, and the air of studious quiet which always reigned within +them. Of all the rector’s possessions he envied him this room the most. +The very sight of the shaded lamp standing on the revolving bookcase at the +corner of the hearth, and of the little table beside it, which still bore the +rector’s coffee-cup and a tiny silver ewer and basin, aroused his spleen +afresh. But he gave no outward sign of this. He stood with his hat in one hand, +his other leaning on the table, and his head slightly bent. +“Rector,” he said, “I am afraid I behaved very badly this +afternoon.” +</p> + +<p> +“I certainly thought your manner rather odd,” replied the rector +shortly. But he was half disarmed already. +</p> + +<p> +“I was annoyed, much annoyed, about a private matter,” the curate +proceeded in an even, rather despondent tone. “It is a matter about which +I expect I shall presently have to take your opinion. But for the present I am +not at liberty to name it. However, I was in trouble, and I foolishly wreaked +my annoyance upon the first person I came across.” +</p> + +<p> +“That was, unfortunately, myself,” said Lindo, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“It would have been very unfortunate indeed for me, if you were as some +rectors I could name,” the curate replied gravely, still with his eyes +cast down. “As it is—well, I think you will accept my +apology.” +</p> + +<p> +“Say no more about it,” answered the rector hastily. There was +nothing he hated so much as a scene. “Have a cup of coffee, my dear +fellow. I will ring for a cup and saucer.” And, before the curate could +protest, Lindo was at the bell and had rung it, his manner almost the manner of +a boy. +</p> + +<p> +“Sit down, sit down!” he continued. “Sarah, a cup and saucer, +please.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you were going out,” protested the curate, as he complied. +</p> + +<p> +“Only to the post with some letters,” the rector explained. +“I will send Sarah instead.” +</p> + +<p> +Clode sprang up again, a peculiar flush on his dark cheek, and a glint as of +excitement in his eye. +</p> + +<p> +“No, no,” he said, “I am putting you out. If you were going +to the post, pray go. You can leave me here and come back to me, if that be +all.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector hesitated, his letters in his hand. He might send Sarah. But it +wanted a few minutes only of nine o’clock, and, besides, he did not +approve of the maids going out so late. “Well, I think I will do as you +say,” he answered, feeling that compliance was perhaps the truest +politeness; “if you are sure that you do not mind.” +</p> + +<p> +“I beg you will,” the curate said warmly. +</p> + +<p> +The cup and saucer being at that moment brought in, the rector nodded assent. +“Very well; I shall not be two minutes,” he said. “Take care +of yourself while I am away.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate, left alone, muttered, “No, you will be at least four minutes, +my friend!” and waited, with his cup poised, until he heard the outer +door closed. Then he set it down. Assuring himself by a steady look that the +windows were shuttered, he rose and, quietly crossing the room, as a man might +who wished to examine a book, he stood before the little cupboard among the +shelves. Perhaps, because he had done the thing before, he did not hesitate. +His hand was as steady as it had ever been. If it shook at all it was with +eagerness. His task was so easy and so devoid of danger, under the +circumstances, that he even smiled darkly, as he set the key in the lock, at +the thought of the more clumsy burglar whom he had detected there. He turned +the key and opened the door. Nothing could be more simple. The packet he wanted +lay just where he had looked to find it. He took it out and dropped it into his +breast-pocket, and, long before the time which he had given himself was up, was +back in his chair by the fire, with his coffee-cup on his knee. +</p> + +<p> +He might have been expected to feel some surprise at his own coolness. But, as +a fact, his thoughts were otherwise employed. He was longing, with intense +eagerness, for the moment when he might take the next step—when he might +open the packet and secure the weapon he needed. He fingered the letters as +they lay in their hiding place, and could scarcely refrain from taking them out +and examining them there and then. When Lindo returned, and broke into the room +with a hearty word about the haste he had made, the curate’s answer +betrayed no self-consciousness. On the contrary, he rather underplayed his +part, his eye and voice being for, a moment so absent as to surprise his host. +The next instant he was aware of this, and conducted himself so warily during +the half-hour he remained that he entirely erased from the rector’s mind +the unlucky impression of the afternoon. +</p> + +<p> +By half-past nine he was back in his own room, at his table, his hat thrown +this way, his umbrella that. It took him but a feverish moment to turn up the +lamp and settle himself in his chair. Then he took out the packet of letters, +and, untying the string which bound them together, he opened the +first—there were only six of them in all. This was the one which he had +partially read on the former occasion—Messrs. Gearns & Baker’s +first letter. He read it through now at his leisure, without interruption, +once, twice, thrice, and with a long breath laid it down again, and sat gazing, +with knitted brows, into the shadow beyond the lamp’s influence. There +was not a word in it, not an expression, which helped him; nothing to show the +recipient that he was not the Reginald Lindo for whom the living was intended. +</p> + +<p> +The curate sat awhile before he opened the second, and that one he read more +quickly. He dealt in the same way with the next, and the next. When, in a short +minute or two, he had read them all and they lay in a disordered pile before +him—some folded and some unfolded, just as they had dropped from his +hands—he leaned back in his chair, and, folding his arms, sat frowning +darkly into vacancy. There was not a word to help him in any one of them, not a +sentence which even tended to convict the rector. He had been at all his pains +for nothing. He had—— +</p> + +<p> +The sound of a raised voice asking for him below, and the hasty tread of a foot +mounting the stairs two at a time, roused him with a start from the dream of +disappointment. In a second he was erect, motionless, and listening, his hand +upon and half covering the letters. A hasty knock on the outside of his door, +and the touch of fingers on the handle, seemed at the last moment to nerve him +to action. It was all but too late. As the rector came hurriedly into the room, +the curate, his face pallid, and the drops of perspiration standing on his +brow, swept the letters aside and drew a newspaper partly over them. +“What—what is it?” he muttered, stooping forward, his hands +on the table. +</p> + +<p> +The rector was too full of the news he had brought to observe the other’s +agitation, the more as the lamp was between them, and his eyes were dazzled by +the light. “Why, what do you think Bonamy has done?” he answered +excitedly, as he closed the door behind him. He was breathing quickly with the +haste he had made, and, uninvited, he dropped into a chair. +</p> + +<p> +“What?” said the curate hoarsely. He dared not look down at the +table lest he should direct the other’s eyes to what lay there, but he +was racked as he stood there with the fear that some damning corner of the +paper, some scrap of the writing, should still be visible. The shame of +possible discovery poured like a flood over his soul. “What is it?” +he repeated mechanically. He had not yet recovered enough presence of mind to +wonder why the rector should have paid this untimely call. +</p> + +<p> +“He has served me with a writ!” Lindo replied, his face hot with +haste and indignation, his lips curling. “At this hour of the night, too! +A writ for trespass in driving out the sheep from the churchyard.” +</p> + +<p> +“A writ!” the curate echoed. “It is very late for serving +writs.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. His clerk, who handed it to me—he came five minutes after you +left—apologized, and took the blame for that on himself, saying he had +forgotten to deliver it on leaving the office.” +</p> + +<p> +“For trespass!” said the curate stupidly. What a fool he had been +to meddle with those letters! Why had he not had a little patience? Here, after +all, was the catastrophe for which he had been longing. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, in the Queen’s Bench Division, and all the rest of it!” +replied the rector; and then he waited to hear what the curate had to say. +</p> + +<p> +But Clode had nothing to say, except “What shall you do?” +</p> + +<p> +“Fight!” replied Lindo briskly, getting up and approaching the +table. “That of course. And it was about that I came to you. I do not +think there is any lawyer here I should like to employ. Did not you tell me the +other day who the archdeacon’s were? Some people in Birmingham, I +think?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think I did,” the curate answered. He had overcome his first +fear, and, as he spoke, looked down at the table, on which he was still +leaning. His hasty movement had disordered his own papers, but none of the +tell-tale letters were visible so far as he could see. But what if the rector +took up the newspaper? Or casually put it aside? The curate grew hot again, +despite his great self-control. He felt himself on the edge of a precipice down +which he dared not cast his eye. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, can you give me their address?” the rector continued. +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly!” the curate answered. Indeed he leapt at the +suggestion, for it seemed to offer some chance of escape—at least a way +by which he might rid himself of his visitor. +</p> + +<p> +“Just write it down, that is a good fellow, then,” said the rector, +unconscious of what was passing in his mind. +</p> + +<p> +The curate said he would, and tore off at random—-the rector was leaning +his hand on the newspaper, and might at any moment be taken with a fancy to +raise it—the back sheet of the first stray note that came to his fingers, +and wrote the address upon it. “There, that is it,” he said; and as +he gave it to Lindo—he had written it standing up and stooping—he +almost pushed him away from the table. “That will serve you, I think. +They may be trusted, I am told. The best you can do, I am sure, will be to +place the matter in their hands at once.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will write before I sleep!” the younger clergyman answered +heartily. “You cannot think how the narrowness of these people provokes +me! But I will not keep you now. I see you are busy. Come round early in the +morning, will you, and talk it over?” +</p> + +<p> +“I will come the moment I have had breakfast,” the curate answered, +making no attempt to detain his visitor. +</p> + +<p> +The rector thereupon going, he stood eyeing the newspaper askance until the +other’s footsteps died away on the pavement outside. Then he swept it off +and stood contemplating the half-dozen letters with abhorrence. He loathed and +detested them. They had suddenly become to him such an incubus as his +victim’s body becomes to the murderer. The desire which had tempted him +to the crime was gone, and he felt them only as a burden. They were the visible +proof of his shame. To keep them was to become a thief, and yet he shrank with +a nervous terror quite new and strange to him from the task of returning +them—of going to the study at the rectory and putting them back in the +cupboard. It had been easy to get possession of them; but to return them seemed +a task so thankless, and withal so perilous, that he quailed before it. With +shaking hands he bundled them together and locked them in the lowest drawer of +his writing table. He would return them to-morrow. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap15"></a>CHAPTER XV.<br/> +THE BAZAAR.</h2> + +<p> +Long before noon on the next day the service of the writ at the rectory was +pretty well known in the town, and the course which the churchwardens had taken +was freely canvassed in more houses than one. But they had on their side all +the advantages of prescription, while of the rector people said that there was +no smoke without fire, and that he would not have become the subject of so many +comments and strictures, and the centre of more than one dispute, without being +in fault. There had been none of these squabbles in old Mr. Williams’s +time, they said. Tongues had not wagged about him. But then, they added, he had +not aspired to drive tandem with the Homfrays! The town had been good enough +for him. He had not wanted to have everything his own way, or thought himself a +little Jupiter in the place. His head had not been turned by a little authority +conferred too early, and conferred, if all the town heard was true, in some +very odd and unsatisfactory manner. +</p> + +<p> +To know that all round you people are saying that your conceit has led you into +trouble is not pleasant. And in one way and another this impression was brought +home to the young rector more than once during these days, so that his cheek +flamed as he passed the window of the reading-room, or caught the +half-restrained sniggle in which Gregg ventured to indulge when in company. Nor +were these annoyances all Lindo had to bear. The archdeacon scolded him roundly +for placing the matter in the hands of the lawyers without consulting him. Mrs. +Hammond looked grave. Laura seemed less friendly than a while back. +Clode’s conduct was odd, too, and unsatisfactory. He was sometimes +enthusiastic and loyal enough, ready to back up his superior as warmly as could +be wished, and anon he would show himself the reverse of all this—sullen, +repellent, and absolutely unsympathetic. +</p> + +<p> +So that the rector was not having a very sunny time, albeit the heat of +conflict kept him warm; and he threw back his head and set his fair pleasant +face very hard as he strode about the town, his long-tailed black coat flapping +behind him. He hugged himself more than ever on the one thing which his +opponents could not take from him. When all was said and done, he must still be +rector of Claversham. If his promotion had not brought him as much happiness as +he had expected, if he had not been able to do in his new position all he had +hoped, the promotion and the position were yet undeniable. Knowing so well all +the circumstances of his appointment, he never gave two thoughts to the curious +story Kate Bonamy had told him. He was sorry that he had treated her so +cavalierly, and more than once he had thought with a regret almost tender of +the girl and the interview. But, for the rest, he treated it as the ignorant +invention of the enemy. Possibly on the strength of certain ’Varsity +prejudices he was a little too prone to exaggerate the ignorance of Claversham. +</p> + +<p> +On the day before the bazaar a visitor arrived in Claversham, in the shape of a +small, dark, sharp-featured man, with a peculiarly alert manner, whom the +reader will remember to have met in the Temple. Jack Smith, for he it +was—we parted from him last at Euston Station—may have come over on +his own motion, or acting upon a hint from Mr. Bonamy, who, since the refusal +of Gregg’s offer, had thought more and more of the future which lay +before his girls. The house had seemed more and more dull, not to him as +himself, but to him considering it in the night-watches through their eyes. +Hitherto the lawyer had not encouraged the young Londoner’s visits, +perhaps because he dreaded the change in his way of life he might be forced to +make. But now, whether he had given him a hint to come or not, he received him +with undoubted cordiality. +</p> + +<p> +Almost the first question Jack asked, Daintry hanging over the back of his +chair and Kate smiling in more subdued radiance opposite him, was about his +friend, the rector. Fortunately, Mr. Bonamy was not in the room. “And how +about Lindo?” he asked. “Have you seen much of him, Kate?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, we have not seen much of him,” she answered, getting up to put +something straight which was not much awry before. +</p> + +<p> +“Father has served him with a writ, though,” Daintry explained, +nodding her head seriously. +</p> + +<p> +Jack whistled. “A writ!” he exclaimed. “What about?” +</p> + +<p> +“About the sheep in the churchyard. Mr. Lindo turned them out,” +Kate explained hurriedly, as if she wished to hear no more upon the subject. +</p> + +<p> +But Jack was curious; and gradually he drew from them the story of the +rector’s iniquities, and acquired, in the course of it, a pretty correct +notion of the state of things in the parish. He whistled still more seriously +then. “It seems to me that the old man has been putting his foot in it +here,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“He has,” Daintry answered solemnly, nodding any number of times. +“No end!” +</p> + +<p> +“And yet he is the very best of fellows,” Jack replied, rubbing his +short black hair in honest vexation. “Don’t you like him?” +</p> + +<p> +“I did,” said Daintry, speaking for both of them. +</p> + +<p> +“And you do not now?” +</p> + +<p> +The child reddened, and rubbed herself shyly against Kate’s chair. +“Well, not so much!” she murmured, Jack’s eyes upon her. +“He is too big a swell for us.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that is it, is it?” Jack said contemptuously. +</p> + +<p> +He pressed it no farther, and appeared to have forgotten the subject; but +presently, when he was alone with Kate, he recurred to it. “So, Lindo has +been putting on airs, has he?” he observed. “Yet, I thought when +Daintry wrote to me, after you left us, that she seemed to like him.” +</p> + +<p> +“He was very kind and pleasant to us on our journey,” Kate +answered, compelling herself to speak with indifference. “But—well, +you know, my father and he have not got on well; so, of course, we have seen +little of him lately.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that is all, is it?” Jack answered, moving restlessly in his +chair. +</p> + +<p> +“That is all,” said Kate quietly. +</p> + +<p> +This seemed to satisfy Jack, for at tea he surprised her—and, for +Daintry, she fairly leapt in her seat—by calmly announcing that he +proposed to call on the rector in the course of the evening. “You have no +objection, sir, I hope,” he said, coolly looking across at his host. +“He has been a friend of mine for years, and though I hear you and he are +at odds at present, it seems to me that that need not make mischief between +us.” +</p> + +<p> +“N—no,” said Mr. Bonamy slowly. “I do not see why it +should.” Nevertheless, he was greatly astonished. He had heard that Jack +and Mr. Lindo were acquainted, but had thought nothing of it. It is possible +that the discovery of this friendship existing between the two led him to take +new views of the rector. He continued, “I dare say in private he is not +an objectionable man.” +</p> + +<p> +“Quite the reverse, I should say!” Jack answered stoutly. +</p> + +<p> +“You have known him well?” +</p> + +<p> +“Very well.” +</p> + +<p> +“Umph! Then it seems to me it was a pity he did not confine himself to +private life,” ejaculated the lawyer, with some scorn. “As a rector +I do not like him.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am sorry for that,” Jack answered cheerfully. “But I have +not known much of him as a rector, though indeed, as it happened, he brought +the offer of the living straight to me, and I was the first person who +congratulated him on his promotion.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy lifted his eyes slowly from the teacup he was raising to his lips, +and looked fixedly at his visitor, an expression much resembling strong +curiosity in his face. If a question was on the tip of his tongue he refrained +from putting it, however, and Jack, who by no means wished to hear the tale of +his friend’s shortcomings repeated, said no more until they rose from the +table. Then he remarked, “Lindo dines late, I expect.” +</p> + +<p> +He put the question to Kate, but the lawyer answered it. “Oh, yes, he +does everything which is fashionable,” he answered drily. And Jack, +putting this and that together, began to see still more clearly how the land +lay, and on what shoals his friend had wrecked his popularity. +</p> + +<p> +About half-past eight he went to the rectory, but found that Lindo was not at +home. The door was opened to him, however, by Mrs. Baker, who had often seen +the barrister in the East India Dock Road, and knew him well; and she pressed +him to walk in and wait. “He dined at home, sir,” she explained. +“I think he has only slipped out for a few minutes.” +</p> + +<p> +He followed her accordingly across the panelled hall to the study, where for a +moment a whimsical smile played upon his face as he viewed its spacious +comfort. The curtains were drawn, the fire was burning redly, and the lamp was +turned half down. The housekeeper made as if she would have turned it up, but +he prevented her. “I like it as it is,” he said genially. +“This is better than No. 383, Mrs. Baker?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, sir,” she answered, looking round with an air of modest +proprietorship, “it is a bit more like.” +</p> + +<p> +“What would you have, Mrs. Baker?” he asked, laughing. “The +bishop’s palace?” +</p> + +<p> +“We may come to that in time, sir,” she answered, folding her arms +demurely. “But I do not know that I would wish it! He has a peck of +troubles now, and there would be more in a palace, I doubt.” +</p> + +<p> +“I agree with you,” Jack replied, laughing. “Troubles come +thick about an apron, Mrs. Baker.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ay, the men see to that!” retorted the good lady, getting the last +word and going away delighted. +</p> + +<p> +Left alone, Jack lay back in an arm-chair, and, nursing his hat, wondered what +Mrs. Baker would say when she discovered his connection with the Bonamys. He +had not been seated in this posture two minutes before he heard the door of the +house open and shut, and a man’s tread cross the hall. The next moment +the study door opened, and a tall man appeared at it, and stood holding it and +looking into the room. The hall lamp was behind the newcomer, and Jack, seeing +that he was not the rector, sat still. +</p> + +<p> +The stranger, satisfied apparently that the room was empty, stepped in and +closed the door behind him; and, rapidly crossing the floor, stood before one +of the bookcases. He took something—a key Jack judged by what +followed—from his pocket, and with it he swiftly threw open a cupboard +among the books. +</p> + +<p> +There was nothing remarkable in the action; but the stranger’s manner was +hurried and nervous, and the looker-on leaned forward, curious to learn what he +was about. He expected to see him take something from the cupboard. Instead, +the man appeared to put something in. What it was, however, Jack could not +discern, for, leaning forward too far in his anxiety to do so, he upset his hat +with some noise on to the floor. +</p> + +<p> +The man turned on the instant as if he had been subjected to a galvanic shock, +and stood gazing in the direction of the sound. Jack heard him draw in his +breath with the sharp sound of sudden fear, and even by that light could see +that his face was drawn and white. The barrister rose quietly in the gloom, the +stranger at sight of him leaning back against the book-case as if his legs +refused to support him. Yet he was the first to speak. “Who is +there?” he said, almost in a whisper. +</p> + +<p> +“A visitor,” Jack answered simply. “I have been waiting to +see Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate—for he it was—drew a long breath, apparently of relief, +and in reality of such heartfelt thankfulness as he had never known before. +“What a start you gave me!” he murmured, his voice as yet scarcely +under his control. “I am Mr. Clode, Mr. Lindo’s curate. I was +putting up some parish papers, and thought the room was empty.” +</p> + +<p> +“So I saw,” Jack answered drily. “I am afraid your nerves are +a little out of order.” The curate muttered something which was +inaudible, and, raising his hand to the book-case, locked the cupboard door and +put the key in his pocket. Then he went to the lamp and turned it up. At the +same moment Jack, recovering his hat, advanced into the circle of light, and +the two men looked at one another. “I am afraid if you wish to see the +rector you will be disappointed,” the curate said, with something of +hauteur in his voice, assumed to hide his mistrust. “He was to spend the +evening at Mrs. Hammond’s. I doubt if he will be back before +midnight.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then I must call another time,” said Jack practically. +</p> + +<p> +“If I see him first, can I tell him anything for you?” the curate +persisted. Who was this man? Could he be a detective? he was wondering. +</p> + +<p> +But Jack was so far from being a detective that he had already dismissed the +suspicions he had at first entertained. “I think not, thank you,” +he answered; “I will call again.” +</p> + +<p> +“Can I give him any name?” Clode asked in despair. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, you might say Jack Smith called,” the barrister answered, +“if you will be so kind.” +</p> + +<p> +They parted at the door, and Clode went back into the house, where he speedily +learned all that Mrs. Baker knew of Mr. Smith. It dispelled his first fear. The +man was not a detective; still it sent him home gloomy and ill at ease. What if +so intimate a friend of the rector’s as this Smith seemed to be should +tell him of his curate’s visit to the cupboard and the excuse which on +the spur of the moment he had invented? It might go ill with him then. What +explanation could he give? He tried to consider such a mishap impossible, or at +all events unlikely; but not with complete success. More than ever he wished +that he had not interfered with the letters. +</p> + +<p> +To return to Jack. Such mild festivities as the bazaar were not uncommon in +Claversham, but the Bonamy household at any rate had not been wont to look +forward to them with anything approaching exhilaration. It is wonderful how +some children growing up in any kind of social shadow learn the fact; and +Daintry Bonamy, scarcely less than her sister, had come to regard the annual +flower-show, the school sports, and the regatta with distaste and repugnance, +as occasions of little pleasure and much humiliation. It was Mr. Bonamy’s +will, however, that they should attend, though he never went himself; and times +innumerable they had done so, outwardly in pretty dresses and becoming hats, +inwardly in sack-cloth and ashes. +</p> + +<p> +Jack’s presence changed all this, and for once the girls went up to dress +quite gaily. If Kate reflected that Jack’s intimacy with the rector would +be likely to bring them also into contact with him, she said nothing; and from +Jack—for the present at least—it was mercifully hidden that, with +all his kindness, his unfailing good-humor, his wit, his devotion to her, his +chief attraction in the girl’s eyes lay in the fact that he was another +man’s friend. +</p> + +<p> +When they entered the Assembly Room it was already well filled, the main +concourse being about the two stalls at the end of the room over which the +archdeacon’s wife and Mrs. Hammond respectively ruled. Here the great +people were mainly to be seen; and an acute observer would soon have discovered +that between those who habitually hung about this end and those who surrounded +the four lower stalls there was a great gulf fixed. Those on the one side of +this examined the dresses of those on the other with indulgent interest, and, +for the most part, through double eyeglasses; while those on the other hand +either returned the compliment and made careful notes, or looked about +deferentially for a glance of recognition. The man who should have bridged that +gulf, who should have been equally at home with Mrs. Archdeacon and the +hotel-keeper’s wife, was the rector. But as the rector had entered, the +unlucky word “writ” had caught his ears, and he was in his most +unpleasant humor. He felt that the whole room was talking of him—the +majority with a narrow dislike, a few with sympathy. Was it unnatural that, +forgetting his situation, he should throw in his lot with his friends, who were +ever so much the pleasanter, the wittier, the more amusing, and present a +smiling front of defiance to his opponents or those whom he thought to be such? +At any rate, that was what he was doing, and no one could remark the carriage +of his head or the direction of his eyes without feeling that there was +something in the town complaint that the new clergyman was above his work. +</p> + +<p> +Jack and his party did not at once come across him. They found enough to amuse +them at the lower end of the room—the more as to the barrister the great +and little with whom he rubbed shoulders were all one. Strange to say, he did +not discern any great difference even in their dress! With Daintry hanging on +his arm and Kate at his side he was content, until, turning suddenly in the +thick of the crowd to speak to the elder girl, he saw her face turn crimson. At +the same moment she bowed slightly to some one behind him. He looked round +quickly, with a sharp jealous pang at his heart, to see who had called forth +this show of emotion, and found himself face to face with the rector. +</p> + +<p> +Lindo had looked forward to this meeting; he had prepared himself for it; and +yet, occurring in this way, it shook him out of his self-possession. He colored +almost as deeply as the girl had, and, though he held out his hand with +scarcely a perceptible pause, the action was nervous and jerky. “By Jove! +is it you, Jack?” he exclaimed, his tone a mixture of old cordiality and +new antagonism. “How do you do, Miss Bonamy?” and he held out his +hand to the girl also, who just touched it with her fingers and drew back. +“It is pleasant to see your cousin’s face again,” he went on +more glibly, yet clearly not at his ease even now. “I was sorry that I +was not in last night when he called.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I was sorry to miss you,” Jack answered slowly, his eyes on +his friend’s face. He could not quite understand matters. The +girl’s embarrassment had been almost a revelation to him, and yet it +flashed across his mind now that the cause of it might have been only the +quarrel between her father and the rector. The same thing might account for +Lindo’s shy, ungenial manner. And yet—and yet he could not quite +understand it, and, whether he would or no, his face grew hard. “You +heard I had looked in?” he added. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; Mrs. Baker told me,” Lindo answered, moving to let some one +pass him, and glancing aside to smile a recognition. +</p> + +<p> +“She looks the better for the change, I think.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; she gets more fresh air now.” +</p> + +<p> +“It does not seem to have done you much good.” +</p> + +<p> +“No?” +</p> + +<p> +Certainly there was something amiss. These were old, tried college friends, or +had been so a few weeks back, and they had nothing more to say to one another +than this! The rector’s self-consciousness began to infect the other, +sowing in his mind he knew not what suspicions. So that, if ever words of +Daintry’s were welcome, they were welcome now. “Jack is going to +stay a week,” she said inconsequently, standing on one leg the while with +her arm through Jack’s and her big eyes on the rector’s face. +</p> + +<p> +“I am very glad to hear it,” Lindo rejoined. “He will find me +at home more than once in the week, I hope.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will come and try,” said Jack. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course you will!” replied the rector, with a flash of his old +manner. “I shall be glad if you will remind him of his promise, Miss +Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate murmured that she would. +</p> + +<p> +“You like your house?” said Jack. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, very much—very much indeed.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is an improvement on No. 383?” continued the barrister, rather +drily. +</p> + +<p> +“It is—very much so!” +</p> + +<p> +The words were natural. They were the words Jack would have expected. But, +unfortunately, Gregg at that moment passed the rector’s elbow, and the +latter’s manner was cold and shy—almost as if he resented the +reference to his old life. Jack thought he did, and his lip curled. +Fortunately, Daintry again intervened. “Here is Miss Hammond,” she +said. “She is looking for you, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector turned as Laura, threading her way through the press, came smiling +toward him. She glanced with some curiosity at Jack, and then nodded graciously +to Kate, whom she knew at the Sunday school and from meeting her on such +occasions as this. “How do you do, Miss Bonamy?” she said +pleasantly. “Will you pardon me carrying off the rector? We want him to +come to tea.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate bowed, and the rector took off his hat to the girls. Then he waved an +awkward farewell toward Jack, muttered “See you soon!” and went off +with his captor. +</p> + +<p> +And that was all! Jack turned away with his cousins to the nearest stall, and +bought and chatted. But he did both at random. His thoughts were elsewhere. He +was a keen observer, and he had seen too much for comfort, yet not enough for +comprehension. Nor did the occasional glance which he shot at Kate’s +preoccupied face, as she bent over the wool-work and “guaranteed +hand-paintings,” tend to clear up his doubts or render his mood more +cheerful. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile the rector’s frame of mind, as he rejoined his party, was not a +whit more enviable. He was angry with himself, angry with his friend. The sight +of Jack standing by Kate’s side had made his own conduct to the girl at +his last interview with her appear in a worse light than before—more +churlish, more ungrateful. He wished now—but morosely, not with any +tenderness of regret—that he had sought some opportunity of saying a word +of apology to her. And then Jack? He fancied he saw condemnation written on +Jack’s face, and that he too, to whom, in the old days, he had confided +his aspirations and resolves, was on the enemy’s side—was blaming +him for being on bad terms with his church wardens and for having already come +to blows with half the parish. +</p> + +<p> +It was not pleasant. But the more unpleasant things he had to face, the higher +he would hold his head. He disengaged himself presently—the Hammonds had +already preceded him—from the throng and bustle of the heated room, and +went down the stairs alone. Outside it was already dark, and small rain was +falling. The outlook was wretched, and yet in his present mood he found a tiny +satisfaction in the respect with which the crowd of ragamuffins about the door +fell back to give him passage. With it all, he was some one. He was rector of +the town. +</p> + +<p> +At the Hammond’s door he found a carriage waiting in the rain. It was not +one he knew, and as he laid down his umbrella he asked the servant whose it +was. +</p> + +<p> +“It is Lord Dynmore’s, sir,” the man answered, in his low +trained voice. “His lordship is in the drawing-room, sir.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap16"></a>CHAPTER XVI.<br/> +“LORD DYNMORE IS HERE.”</h2> + +<p> +When Lord Dynmore, a few minutes before the rector found his carriage at the +door, trotted at the heels of the servant into Mrs. Hammond’s +drawing-room, his entrance, unexpected as it was, caused a flutter among those +assembled there. Lords are still lords in the country, and in the case of his +hostess the sensation was wholly one of pleasure. She was pleased to see him. +She was still more pleased that he had chosen to call at so opportune a moment, +when his light would not be hidden, and James had on his best waistcoat. +Consequently she rose to meet him with a beaming smile, and a cordiality only +chastened by the knowledge that Mrs. Homfray and the archdeacon’s wife +were observing her with critical jealousy. “Why, Lord Dynmore,” she +exclaimed, “this is most kind of you!” +</p> + +<p> +“How d’ye do? how d’ye do?” said the peer as he +advanced. He was a slight, short man with bushy gray whiskers and grizzled hair +which, being rather long, strayed over the fur collar of his overcoat. A noble +aquiline nose and keen eyes helped to give him, despite his shortness, an air +of being somebody. “How d’ye do? Why,” he continued, locking +round, “you are quite <i>en fête</i> here.” +</p> + +<p> +“We have been at a bazaar, Lord Dynmore,” Laura answered. She was +rather a favorite with him and could “say things.” “I think +you ought to have been there too, to patronize it. We did not know that you +were in the country, but we sent you a card.” +</p> + +<p> +“Never heard a word of it!” replied his lordship positively. +</p> + +<p> +“But you must have had the card,” Laura persisted. +</p> + +<p> +“Never heard a word of it!” repeated his lordship, who had by this +time shaken hands with everyone in the room. When the company was not too large +he made a rule of doing this, thereby obviating the ill results of a bad +memory, and earning considerable popularity. “Archdeacon, you are looking +very well,” he continued. +</p> + +<p> +“I think I may say the same of you,” answered the clerical +dignitary. “You have had good sport?” +</p> + +<p> +“Capital! capital!” replied the peer in his jerky way. “But +it won’t last my time! In two years there will not be a head of buffalo +in the States! By the way, I saw your nephew.” +</p> + +<p> +“My nephew!” echoed the archdeacon. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. Had him up to dinner in Kansas city. A good fellow—a very +good fellow. He put me up to one or two things worth knowing.” +</p> + +<p> +“But, Lord Dynmore, you must be thinking of some one else!” replied +the archdeacon in a fretful tone. “It could not be my nephew: I have not +a nephew out there.” +</p> + +<p> +“No?” replied the earl. “Then it must have been the +dean’s. Or perhaps it was old Canon Frampton’s—I am not sure +now. But he was a good fellow, an excellent fellow!” And my lord looked +round and wagged his head knowingly. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon’s niece, a young lady who had not seen the peer before, +nor indeed any peers, and who consequently was busy making a study of him, +looked astonished. Not so the others who knew him and his ways. It was +popularly believed that Lord Dynmore could keep two things, and two only, in +his mind—the head of game he had killed in each and every year since he +first carried a gun, and the amount of his annual income from the time of the +property coming to him. +</p> + +<p> +“There have been changes in the parish since you were here last,” +said Mrs. Hammond, deftly intervening. She saw that the archdeacon looked a +little put out. “Poor Mr. Williams is gone.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! to be sure! to be sure!” replied the earl. “Poor old +chap. He was a friend of my fathers’, and now you have a friend of mine +in his place. From generation to generation, you know. I remember now,” +he continued, tugging at his whiskers peevishly, “that I meant to see +Lindo before I called here. I must look him up by-and-by.” +</p> + +<p> +“I hope he will save you the trouble,” Mrs. Hammond answered. +“I am expecting him every minute.” +</p> + +<p> +“Capital! capital! He is a good fellow now, isn’t he? A really good +fellow! I am sure you ought to be much obliged to me for sending you such a +cheery soul, Mrs. Hammond. And he is not so very old,” the earl added +waggishly. “Not too old, you know, Miss Hammond. Young for his years, at +any rate.” +</p> + +<p> +Laura laughed and colored a little—what would offend in a commoner is in +a peer pure drollery; and, as it happened, at this moment the rector came in. +The news of the earl’s presence had kindled a spark of elation in his +eye. He had not waited for the servant to announce him; and as he stood a +second at the door, closing it, he confronted the company with an air of modest +dignity which more than one remarked. His glance rested momentarily upon the +figure of the earl, who was the only stranger in the room, so that he had no +difficulty in identifying him; and he seemed in two minds whether he should +address him. On second thoughts he laid aside the intention, and advanced to +Mrs. Hammond. “I am afraid I scarcely deserve any tea,” he said +pleasantly, “I am so late.” +</p> + +<p> +Laura, who had risen, touched his arm. “Lord Dynmore is here,” she +said in a low voice, which was nevertheless distinctly heard by all. “I +do not think you have seen him.” +</p> + +<p> +He took it as an informal introduction, and turned to Lord Dynmore, who was +leaning against the fireplace, toying with his teacup and talking to Mrs. +Homfray. The young rector advanced a step and held out his hand, a slight flush +on his cheek. “There is no one whom I ought to be better pleased to see +than yourself, Lord Dynmore,” he said with some feeling. “I have +been looking forward for some time to this meeting.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, to be sure,” replied the peer, holding out his hand readily, +though he was somewhat mystified by the other’s earnestness. “I am +pleased to meet you, I am sure. Greatly pleased.” +</p> + +<p> +The listeners, who had heard what he had just said about his great friend, the +rector, stared. Only the person to whom the words were addressed saw nothing +odd in them. “You have not long returned to England, I think?” he +answered. +</p> + +<p> +“No; came back last Saturday night. And how is the rector? Where is he? +Why does he not show up? I understood Mrs. Hammond to say he was coming.” +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon, Mrs. Hammond, and the others were dumb with astonishment. Even +Lindo was surprised, thinking it very dull in the earl not to guess at once +that he was the new incumbent. So no one answered, and the peer, glancing +sharply round, discerned that every one was at a loss. “Eh! Oh, I +see,” he resumed in a different tone. “You are not one of his +curates? I made a mistake, I suppose. Took you for one of his curates, do you +see? That was all. Beg your pardon. Beg your pardon, I am sure. But where is +he?” +</p> + +<p> +“This <i>is</i> the rector, Lord Dynmore,” said the archdeacon in +an uncertain, puzzled way. +</p> + +<p> +“No, no, no, no,” replied the great man fretfully. “I mean +the old rector—my old friend.” +</p> + +<p> +“He has forgotten that poor Mr. Williams is dead,” Laura murmured +to her mother, amid the general pause of astonishment. +</p> + +<p> +He overheard her. “Nothing of the kind, young lady!” he answered +irritably. “Nothing of the kind. Bless my soul, do you think I do not +know whom I present to my own livings? My memory is not so bad as that! I +thought this gentleman was Lindo’s curate, that was all. That was +all.” +</p> + +<p> +They stared at one another in awkward silence. The rector was the first to +speak. “I am afraid we are somehow at cross purposes still, Lord +Dynmore,” he stammered, his manner constrained. “I am not my own +curate—well, because I am myself Reginald Lindo, whom you were kind +enough to present to this living.” +</p> + +<p> +“To Claversham, do you mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“And do you say you are Reginald Lindo?” The peer grew very red in +the face as he put this question. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, certainly I am.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then, sir, I say that certainly you are not!” was the rapid and +startling answer. “Certainly you are not! You are no more Reginald Lindo +than I am!” the peer repeated, striking his hand upon the table by his +side. “What do you mean by saying that you are, eh? What do you mean by +it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Lord Dynmore——” +</p> + +<p> +But the peer would not listen. “Who are you, sir? Answer me that question +first!” he cried. He was a choleric man, and he saw already that there +was something seriously amiss; so that the shocked, astonished faces round him +tended rather to increase than lessen his wrath. “Answer me that!” +</p> + +<p> +“I think, Lord Dynmore, that you must be mad,” replied the rector, +his lips quivering. “I am as certainly Reginald Lindo as you are Lord +Dynmore!” +</p> + +<p> +“But what are you doing here?” retorted the other, storming down +the interruption which the archdeacon would have effected. “That is what +I want to know. Who made you rector of Claversham?” +</p> + +<p> +“The bishop, my lord,” answered the young man sternly. +</p> + +<p> +“Ay, but on whose presentation?” +</p> + +<p> +“On yours.” +</p> + +<p> +“On mine?” +</p> + +<p> +“Most assuredly,” replied the clergyman doggedly—“as +the archdeacon here, who indicted me, can bear witness.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is false!” Lord Dynmore almost screamed. He turned to the +panic-stricken listeners, who had instinctively grouped themselves round the +two, and appealed to them. “I presented a man nearly thrice his age, do +you hear!—a man of sixty. As for this—this Reginald Lindo, I never +heard of him in my life! Never! If he had letters of presentation, I did not +give them to him.” +</p> + +<p> +The young clergyman’s eyes flashed, and his face grew hard as a stone. He +guessed already the misfortune which had happened to him, and his heart was +sore, as well as full of wrath. But in his pride he betrayed only the anger. +“Lord Dynmore,” he said fiercely, “you will have to answer +for these insinuations. If there has been any error, the fault has not lain +with me!” +</p> + +<p> +“An error, you call it, do you? Let me——” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Lord Dynmore!” Mrs. Hammond gasped. +</p> + +<p> +“One moment, Lord Dynmore, if you please.” This from the +archdeacon; and he pressed his interruption, placing himself between the two +men, and almost laying his hands on the excited peer. “If there has been +a mistake,” he urged, “a few words will make it clear. I fully +believe—nay, I feel sure, that my friend here is not in fault, whoever +is.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ask your questions,” grunted my lord, breathing hard, and eyeing +the young clergyman as a terrier eyes the taller dog it means to attack. +“He will not answer them, trust me!” +</p> + +<p> +“I think he will,” replied the archdeacon with decision. His +<i>esprit de corps</i> was rising. The earl’s rude insistance disgusted +him. He remarked, his eyes wandering for a moment while he considered how he +should frame his question, that another person, Mr. Clode, had silently entered +the room, and was listening with a darkly thoughtful face. It occurred to the +archdeacon to suggest that the ladies should withdraw, but then again it seemed +fair that, as they had heard the charges, they should hear what answer the +rector had to make; and he proceeded. “First, Lord Dynmore,” he +said, “I must ask you whom you intended to present.” +</p> + +<p> +“My old friend, Reginald Lindo, of course.” +</p> + +<p> +“His address, please,” continued the archdeacon rather curtly. +</p> + +<p> +“Somewhere in the East End of London,” the earl answered. +“Oh, I remember now, St. Gabriel’s, Aldgate.” +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon turned silently to the clergyman. “He was my uncle,” +Lindo explained gravely. “He died a year ago last October.” +</p> + +<p> +“Died!” The exclamation was Lord Dynmore’s. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, died,” the young man retorted bitterly. “Your lordship +keeps a watchful eye upon your friends!” +</p> + +<p> +The shaft went home. The earl caught a quick breath, and his face changed. The +words awoke a slumbering chord in his memory and recalled—not as might +have been expected, old days of frolic and sport spent with the friend whose +death was thus coldly flung in his face—but a scene in another world. He +saw upon the instant a rock-bound valley, inclosed by hills that rose in giant +steps to the snowy line of the Andes; and in its depths a tiny hunter’s +camp. He saw an Indian fishing in the brook, and near him a white man wandering +away—a letter in his hand. Then had come a shot, an alarm, a hasty +striking of the tent, and for many hours—even days—a rapid, +dangerous march. In the excitement the letter had been forgotten, to be +recalled with its tidings here—and now. +</p> + +<p> +He winced, and muttered, “Good heavens, and I had heard it.” The +clergyman caught the words, and his resentment waxed hot. “My +uncle’s death,” he continued grimly, in the tone of one rather +making than answering an accusation, “occurred a year before the +presentation was offered to me by your solicitors!” +</p> + +<p> +“Lord help us!” said the peer in a helpless, bewildered tone. +“But are you a clergyman, sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“That is a fresh insult, Lord Dynmore!” he replied warmly. +</p> + +<p> +“Hoity-toity!” retorted my lord, recovering himself, “you are +a fine man to talk of insults! And you in my living, without a shadow of title +to it! You must have had some suspicion, sir, that all was not right.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think I can answer for Mr. Lindo, there!” interposed the curate, +stepping forward for the first time. His face was deeply flushed, and he spoke +hurriedly, not looking up; perhaps, because all eyes were on him. “When +Mr. Lindo came here, I had reason to expect an older man. I heard by chance +from him—I think it was on the evening of his arrival—that he had +not long lost an uncle of the same name, and it occurred to me then as just +possible that there might have been a mistake. But I particularly observed that +he was perfectly free from any suspicion of that kind himself.” +</p> + +<p> +“Pooh! There is nothing in that!” replied the archdeacon +snappishly. +</p> + +<p> +“I think there is!” cried the earl in triumph. “A great deal +in it. If the idea occurred to a stranger, is it possible that the +incumbent’s own mind could be free from it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Is it possible,” the rector answered viciously, a ring as of steel +in his voice, “that a man who had had his dear friend’s death +announced to him could forget the news in a year, and think of him as still +alive?” +</p> + +<p> +The earl gasped with passion. By a tremendous effort he refrained from using +bad words, and even forbore, in view of the alarmed looks of the ladies and the +archdeacon’s hasty expostulation, to call his opponent, a villain or a +scoundrel. He stammered only, “You—you—are you going to give +up my living?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” was the answer. +</p> + +<p> +“You are not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly I am not!” the rector answered. “If you had +treated me differently, Lord Dynmore,” he continued, speaking with his +arms crossed and his lip curling with scorn and defiance, “my answer +might have been different! Now, though the mistake has been with yourself or +your people, you have accused me of fraud! You have treated me as an impostor! +You have dared to ask me, though I have been ministering to the people in this +parish for months, whether I am a clergyman! You have insulted me grossly, and, +so doing, have put it out of my power to resign had I been so minded! And you +may be sure I shall not resign.” +</p> + +<p> +He looked handsome enough as he flung down his defiance. But the earl cared +nothing for his looks. “You will not?” he stuttered. +</p> + +<p> +“No! I acknowledge no authority whatever in you,” was the answer. +“You are <i>functus officio</i>. I am subject to the bishop, and to him +only.” +</p> + +<p> +“Give me my hat,” mumbled the peer, turning abruptly away; and, +tugging up the collar of his fur coat, he began to grope about in a manner +which at another time would have been laughable. “Give me my hat, some +one,” he repeated. “Let me get out before I swear. I am <i>functus +officio</i>, am I? I have never been so insulted in my life! Never, so help me +heaven! Never! Let me get out!” +</p> + +<p> +His murmurs died away in the hall, Mr. Clode with much presence of mind opening +the door for him and letting him out. When they ceased, in the room he had left +there was absolute silence. The men avoided one another’s eyes. The +women, their lips parted, looked each at her neighbor. Mrs. Homfray, the young +wife of an old husband, was the first to speak. “Well, I never!” +she sighed. +</p> + +<p> +That broke the spell. The rector, who had hitherto gazed darkly, with flushed +brow and compressed lips, at the hearth-rug, roused himself. “I think I +had better go,” he said, his tone hard and ungracious, “You will +excuse me, I am sure, Mrs. Hammond. Good-night. Good-night.” +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon took a step forward, with the intention of intercepting him, but +thought better of it, and stopped, seeing that the time was not propitious. So, +save to murmur an answer to his general farewell, no one spoke, and he left the +room under the impression, though he himself had set the tone, that he stood +alone among them; that he had not their sympathies. Afterward he remembered +this, and it added to his unhappiness, and to the pride with which he endured +it. But at the moment he was scarcely aware of the impression. The blow had +fallen so swiftly, it was so unexpected and so crushing, that he went out into +the darkness stunned and bewildered, conscious only, as are men whom some +sudden accident has befallen, that in a moment all was changed with him. +</p> + +<p> +An hour later Mrs. Hammond and her daughter alone remained. The last of the +visitors had departed, the dinner hour was long past, but they still sat on, +fascinated by the topic, reproducing for one another’s benefit the +extraordinary scene they had witnessed, and discussing its probable +consequences. “I am sure, quite sure, poor fellow, that he knew nothing +about it,” Mrs. Hammond declared for the twentieth time. +</p> + +<p> +“So the archdeacon seemed to think, mamma,” Laura answered. +“And yet he said that probably Mr. Lindo would have to go.” +</p> + +<p> +“Because of the miserable attacks these people have made upon him!” +her mother rejoined with indignation. “But think of the pity of it! Think +of the income! And such a house as it is!” +</p> + +<p> +“It <i>is</i> a nice house,” Laura assented, thoughtfully gazing +into the fire, a slight access of color in her cheeks. +</p> + +<p> +“I think it is abominable!” +</p> + +<p> +“And then,” Laura said, continuing her chain of reflection, +“there is the view from the drawing-room windows.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, it is too bad! It is really too bad! I declare I am quite upset, I +am so sorry for him. Lord Dymnore ought to be ashamed of himself!” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” Laura assented rather absently, “I quite agree with +you. And as for the hall, with a Persian rug or two it would be quite as good +as another room.” +</p> + +<p> +“What hall? Oh, at the rectory?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Hammond rose with a quick, pettish air of annoyance. “Upon my word, +Laura,” she exclaimed, drawing a little shawl about her comfortable +shoulders, “you seem to think more of the house than of the poor fellow +himself! Let us go to dinner. It is half-past eight, and more.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap17"></a>CHAPTER XVII.<br/> +THE LAWYER AT HOME.</h2> + +<p> +If Mr. Clode, when he stepped forward to open the door for Lord Dynmore, had +any thought beyond that of facilitating his departure—if, for instance, +as is just possible, he had set his mind on having a little private talk with +the peer—he was disappointed. Lord Dynmore, after what had happened, was +in no mood for conversation. As, still muttering and mumbling, he seized his +hat from the hall table, he did indeed notice his companion, but it was with +the red angry glare of a bull about to charge. The next moment he plunged +headlong into his brougham, and roared “Home.” +</p> + +<p> +The carriage plunged away into the darkness of the drive, as if it would reach +the Park at a leap. But it had barely cleared Mrs. Hammond’s gates, and +was still rattling over the stony pavement of the top of the town, when the +footman heard his master lower the window and shout “Stop!” The +horses were pulled up as suddenly as they had been started, and the man got +down and went to the door. “Do you know where Mr. Bonamy the +lawyer’s offices are?” Lord Dynmore said curtly. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, my lord.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then drive there!” +</p> + +<p> +The footman got upon the box again. “What has bitten him now, I +wonder?” he grumbled to his companion as he passed on the order. +“He is in a fine tantrum in there!” +</p> + +<p> +“Who cares?” retorted the coachman, with a coachman’s fine +independence. “If old Bonamy is in, there will be a pair of them!” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy was in. In that particular Lord Dynmore had better luck than he +perhaps deserved. Late as it was for business—it was after +seven—the gas was still burning in the lawyer’s offices, +illuminating the fanlight over the door and the windows of one of the rooms on +the ground floor—the right-hand room. The servant jumped down and rapped, +and his summons was answered almost immediately by Mr. Bonamy himself, who +jerked open the door, and stood holding it ajar, with the air of a man +interrupted in the middle of his work, and bent on sending the intruder off +with a flea in his ear. Catching sight of the earl’s carriage, however, +and the servant murmuring that my lord wished to see him on business, the +lawyer stepped forward, his expression changing to one of extreme surprise. +</p> + +<p> +The Dynmore business had been hitherto monopolized by the London solicitors to +the estate. In cases where a country agent had been necessary they had +invariably employed a firm in Birmingham. Neither Mr. Bonamy nor the other +Claversham lawyer had ever risen to the dignity of being concerned for Lord +Dynmore, nor could Mr. Bonamy recall any occasion in the past on which the +great man had crossed the threshold of his office. +</p> + +<p> +His appearance now, therefore, was almost as welcome as it was unexpected. Yet +from some cause, probably the lateness of the hour, though that seems +improbable, there was a visible embarrassment in the lawyer’s manner as +he recognized him; and Mr. Bonamy only stepped aside to make way for him to +enter upon hearing from his own lips that he desired to speak with him. +</p> + +<p> +Then he opened the door of the room on the left of the hall. “If your +lordship will take a seat here,” he said, “I will be with you in a +moment.” +</p> + +<p> +The room was in darkness, but he struck a match and lit the gas, placing a +chair for Lord Dynmore, who, fretting and fuming and more than half inclined as +he took it to walk out again, said sharply that he had only a minute to spare. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall not be a minute, my lord,” the lawyer answered. He retired +at once with that, closing the door behind him, and went, as his visitor could +hear, into the opposite room. Lord Dynmore looked round impatiently. He had not +so high as opinion of his own importance as have some who are no peers. But he +was choleric and accustomed to have his own way, and he thought that at least +this local man whom he was going to patronize might receive him with more +respect. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy, however, was as good as his word. In less than a minute he was +back. Closing the door carefully behind him, he sat down at the table. “I +am entirely at your lordship’s service now,” he said, bowing +slightly. +</p> + +<p> +The earl laid his hat on the table. “Very well,” he answered +abruptly. “I have heard that you are a sharp fellow, Mr. Bonamy, and a +good lawyer, and that is why I have come to you—that and the fact that my +business will not wait and I have a mind to punish those confounded London +people who have let me into this mess!” +</p> + +<p> +That it was rather impatience than anything else which had brought him he +betrayed by getting up and striding across the room. Meanwhile the lawyer, +golden visions of bulky settlements and interminable leases floating before his +eyes, murmured his anxiety to be of service, and waited to hear more. +</p> + +<p> +“It is about that confounded sneak of a rector of yours!” my lord +exclaimed, coming to a stand before the table. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy started, his visions fading rapidly away. “What rector?” +he replied, gazing at his client in great astonishment. “Our rector, my +lord?” +</p> + +<p> +“The man who calls himself your rector!” the earl growled. +“He is no more a rector than I am, and pretty fools you were to be taken +in by him!” +</p> + +<p> +“Now that is odd!” the lawyer answered. He spoke absently, his eyes +resting on the peer’s face as if his thoughts were far away. +</p> + +<p> +“Odd or not,” Lord Dynmore replied, stamping on the floor with +undiminished irritation, “it is the fact, sir! And now if you will listen +to me I will tell you what I want you to do.” +</p> + +<p> +The lawyer bowed slightly again, and the earl proceeded to tell his tale. +Passing lightly over his own forgetfulness and negligence, he laid stress on +all the facts which seemed to show that Lindo could not have accepted the +living in good faith. He certainly made out a plausible case, but his animus in +telling it was so apparent that, when he had finished and wound up by +announcing his firm resolve to eject the young man from his cure, Mr. Bonamy +only shook his head with a doubtful smile. “You will have to prove guilty +knowledge on his part, my lord,” he said gravely. +</p> + +<p> +“So I will!” quoth the earl roundly. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy seemed for a moment inclined to shake his head again, but he thought +better of it. “Well, you may be right, my lord,” he answered. +“At any rate—without going further into the matter at this moment, +or considering what course your lordship, could or should adopt—I think I +can do one thing. I can lay some information on this point before you at +once.” +</p> + +<p> +“What! To show that he knew?” cried the earl eagerly. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I think so. But as to its weight——” +</p> + +<p> +“What is it? What is it? Let me hear it!” was the impatient +interruption. The earl was on his feet in a moment. “Why, gadzooks, we +may have him in a corner before the day is out, Mr. Bonamy,” he +continued. “True? I will be bound it is true!” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy looked as if he very much doubted that, but he offered no further +opposition. Begging Lord Dynmore—who could not look upon him with +sufficient admiration, so much was he struck with this strange +preparedness—to excuse him for a moment, he left the room. He returned +almost immediately, however, followed by a man whom the earl at once +recognized, and recognized with the utmost astonishment. “Why, you +confounded rascal!” he gasped. “What are you doing here?” +</p> + +<p> +It was Felton. Yet not the same Felton whose surreptitious visit to the rectory +had been cut short by Mr. Clode. A few weeks of idleness and drinking, a month +or two at the Bull and Staff had much changed the once sleek and respectable +servant. Had he gone to the rectory for help now, his tale could not have +passed muster even for a moment. His coat had come to hang loosely about him, +and he wore no tie. His hands were dirty and tremulous, his eyes shifty and +bloodshot. His pasty face had grown puffy and was stained with blotches which +it was impossible to misinterpret. He had gone down the hill fast. +</p> + +<p> +Seeing his old master before him he began to whimper, but the lawyer cut him +short. “This man, who says he was formerly your servant, has come to me +with a strange story, Lord Dynmore,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“Ten to one it’s a lie!” replied the peer, scowling darkly at +the poor wretch. +</p> + +<p> +“So I think likely!” Mr. Bonamy rejoined with the utmost dryness. +“However, what he says is this: that when he landed in England without a +character he considered what he should do, and, remembering that he had heard +you say that Mr. Lindo the elder, whom he knew, had been appointed to this +living, he came down here to see what he could get out of him.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is likely enough!” cried the peer scornfully. +</p> + +<p> +“When he called at the rectory, however, he found Mr. Lindo, the younger, +in possession. He had an interview with him, and he states that Mr. Lindo, to +purchase his silence, undertook to pay him ten shillings a week until your +return.” +</p> + +<p> +“Phaugh!” my lord exclaimed in astonishment. +</p> + +<p> +The servant mistook his astonishment for incredulity. “He did, my +lord!” he cried passionately. “It is heaven’s own truth I am +telling! I can bring half a dozen witnesses to prove it.” +</p> + +<p> +“You can?” +</p> + +<p> +“I can, my lord.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, but to prove what?” said the lawyer sharply. +</p> + +<p> +“That he paid me ten shillings a week down to last week, my lord.” +</p> + +<p> +“That will do! That will do!” cried the earl in great glee. +“Set a thief to catch a thief—that is the plan!” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy looked displeased. “I think you are a little premature, my +lord,” he said with some sourness. +</p> + +<p> +“Premature? How?” +</p> + +<p> +“At present you have only this man’s word for what is on the face +of it a very improbable story.” +</p> + +<p> +“Improbable? I do not see it,” replied the peer quickly, but with +less heat. “He says that he has witnesses to prove that this fellow paid +him the money. If that be so, explain the payment if you can. And, mark you, +Mr. Bonamy, the allowance stopped last week—on my arrival, that +is.” +</p> + +<p> +The man cried eagerly that that was so; the earl at once bidding him be silent +for a confounded rascal as he was. Mr. Bonamy stood rubbing his chin +thoughtfully and looking on the floor, but said nothing; so that the great man +presently lost patience. “Don’t you agree with me?” he cried +irascibly. +</p> + +<p> +“I think we had better get rid of our friend here before we discuss the +matter, my lord,” the lawyer answered bluntly. “Do you hear, +Felton?” he continued, turning to the servant. “You may go now. +Come to me to-morrow morning at ten o’clock, and I will tell you what +Lord Dynmore proposes to do.” +</p> + +<p> +The ex-valet would have demurred to being thus set aside, but the earl roaring +“Go, you scoundrel!” in a voice he had been accustomed to obey, and +Mr. Bonamy opening the door for him, he submitted and went. The streets were +wet and gloomy, and he was more sober than he had been for a week. In other +words, his nerves were shaky, and he soon began, as he slunk homeward, to +torment himself with doubts. Had he made the best of his story? Might it not +have been safer to make a last appeal to the rector? Above all, would Mr. +Clode, whose game he did not understand, hold his hand, or play the trump by +disclosing that little burglary we know of? Altogether Felton was not happy, +and saw before him but one resource—to get home as quickly as possible +and get drunk. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile the lawyer, left alone with his client, seemed as much averse as +before to speaking out. Lord Dynmore had again to take the initiative. +“Well, it is good enough, sir, is it not?” he said, frowning +impatiently on his new adviser. “There is a clear case, I suppose!” +</p> + +<p> +“I think your lordship had better hear first,” Mr. Bonamy answered, +“how your late servant came to bring his story to me.” He proceeded +to explain the course which the young clergyman had pursued in the parish from +the first, and the opposition and ill-will it had provoked. He told the story +from his own point of view, but with more fairness than might have been +expected, although, as was natural, when he came to the matter of the +sheep-grazing and the writ he took care to make his own case good. The earl +listened and chuckled, and at last interrupted him. +</p> + +<p> +“So you have been at him already?” he said, grinning. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” the lawyer answered slowly. “I may say, indeed, that I +have been in constant opposition to him since his arrival. Felton (the man who +has just left us) knew that, and it led him to bring his tale to me this +evening.” +</p> + +<p> +“When he could get no more money out of the parson!” the earl +replied with a sneer. “But, now, what is to be done, Mr. Bonamy?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy did not at once answer, but stood looking much disturbed. His doubt +and uneasiness, in fact, visibly increased as the seconds flew by, and still +Lord Dynmore’s gaze, bent on him at first in impatience and later in +surprise, seemed to be striving to probe his thoughts. He looked down at the +table and frowned, as if displeased by the scrutiny; and when he at length +spoke, his voice was harsher than usual. “I do not think, my lord,” +he said, “that I can answer that question.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you want to take counsel’s opinion?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, my lord,” Mr. Bonamy answered curtly. “I mean something +different. I do not think, in fact, that I can act for your lordship in this +matter.” +</p> + +<p> +“Cannot act for me?” the earl gasped. +</p> + +<p> +“That is what I mean,” Mr. Bonamy answered doggedly, a slight flush +as of shame on his sallow cheek. “I have explained, my lord, that I have +been constantly opposed to this young man, but my opposition has been of a +public nature and upon principle. I have no doubt that he and others consider +me his chief enemy in the place, and to that I have no objection. But I am +unwilling that he or others should think that private interest has had any part +in my opposition, and therefore, being churchwarden, I would prefer, though I +must necessarily offend your lordship, to decline undertaking the +business.” +</p> + +<p> +“But why? Why?” cried the earl, between anger and astonishment. +</p> + +<p> +“I have tried to explain,” Mr. Bonamy rejoined with firmness. +“I am afraid I cannot make my reasons clearer.” +</p> + +<p> +The earl swore softly and took up his hat. He really was at a loss to +understand; principally because, knowing that Mr. Bonamy had risen from the +ranks, he did not credit him with any fineness of feeling. He had heard only +that he was a clever and rather sharp practitioner, and a man who might be +trusted to make things unpleasant for the other side. So he took up his hat and +swore softly. “You are aware,” he said, turning at the door and +looking daggers at the solicitor, “that by taking this course you are +throwing away a share of my work?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy, wearing a rather more gaunt and grim air than usual, simply bowed. +</p> + +<p> +“You will act for the other side, I suppose?” my lord snarled. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall not act professionally for any one, my lord!” +</p> + +<p> +“Then you are a damned quixotic fool—that is all I have to +say!” was the earl’s parting shot. Having fired it, he flung out of +the room and in great amaze roared for his carriage. +</p> + +<p> +A man is seldom so much inclined—on the surface, at any rate—to +impute low motives to others as when he has just done something which he +suspects to be foolish and quixotic. When Mr. Bonamy, a few minutes later, +entered his rarely used drawing-room and discovered Jack and the two girls +playing at Patience, he was in his most cynical mood. He stood for a moment on +the hearth-rug, his coat-tails on his arms, and presently he said to Jack, +“I am surprised to see you here.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack looked up. The girls looked up also. “I wonder you are not at the +rectory,” Mr. Bonamy continued ironically, “advising your friend +how to keep out of jail!” +</p> + +<p> +“What on earth do you mean, sir?” Jack exclaimed, laying down his +cards and rising from the table. He saw that the lawyer had some news and was +anxious to tell it. +</p> + +<p> +“I mean that he is in very considerable danger of going there!” was +Mr. Bonamy’s answer. “There has been a scene at Mrs. +Hammond’s this afternoon. By this time the story must be all over the +town. Lord Dynmore turned up there and met him—denounced him as a +scoundrel, and swore he had never presented him to the living.” +</p> + +<p> +For a brief moment no one spoke. Then Daintry found her voice. “My +goody!” she exclaimed, her eyes like saucers. “Who told you, +father?” +</p> + +<p> +“Never you mind, young lady!” Mr. Bonamy retorted with good-humored +sharpness. “It is true. What is more, I am informed that Lord Dynmore has +evidence that Mr. Lindo has been paying a man, who was aware of this, a certain +sum every week to keep his mouth shut.” +</p> + +<p> +“My goody!” cried Daintry again. “I wonder, now, what he paid +him! What do you think, Jack?” And she turned to Jack to learn what he +was doing that he did not speak. +</p> + +<p> +Poor Jack! Why did he not speak? Why did he stand silent, gazing hard into the +fire? Because he resented his friend’s coldness? Because he would not +defend him? Because he thought him guilty? No, but because in the first moment +of Mr. Bonamy’s disclosure he had looked into Kate’s face—his +cousin’s face, who the moment before had been laughing over the cards at +his side, in all things so near to him—and he had read in it, with the +keen insight, the painful sympathy which love imparts, her secret. Poor Kate! +No one else had seen her face fall or discovered her embarrassment. A few +seconds later even her countenance had regained its ordinary calm composure, +even the blood had gone back to her heart. But Jack had seen and read aright. +He knew, and she knew that he knew. When at last—but not before Mr. +Bonamy’s attention had been drawn to his silence—he turned and +spoke, she avoided his eyes. “That is rather a wild tale, sir, is it +not?” he said with an effort and a pale smile. +</p> + +<p> +If Mr. Bonamy had not been a man of great shrewdness, he would have been +tempted to think that Jack had been in the secret all the time. As it was, he +only answered, “I have reason to think that there is something in it, +wild as it sounds. At any rate, the man in question has himself told the story +to Lord Dynmore.” +</p> + +<p> +“The pensioner?” +</p> + +<p> +“Precisely.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I should like to ask him a few questions,” Jack answered +drearily. But for the chill feeling at his heart, but for the knowledge he had +just gained, he would have treated the matter very differently. He would have +thought of his friend only—his feelings, his possible misery. He would +not have condescended in this first moment to the evidence. But he could not +feel for his friend. He could not even pity him. He needed all his pity for +himself. +</p> + +<p> +“I do not answer for the story,” Mr. Bonamy continued. “But +there is no doubt of one thing—that Mr. Lindo was appointed in error, +whether he was aware of the mistake or not. I do not know,” the lawyer +added thoughtfully, “that I shall pity him greatly. He has been very +mischievous here. And he has held his head very high.” +</p> + +<p> +“He is the more likely to suffer now,” Jack answered almost +cynically. +</p> + +<p> +“Possibly,” the lawyer replied. Then he added, “Daintry, +fetch me my slippers, there is a good girl. Or, stay. Get me a candle and take +them to my room.” +</p> + +<p> +He went out after her, leaving the cousins alone. Neither spoke. Jack stood +near the corner of the mantel-shelf, gazing rigidly, almost sullenly, into the +fire. What was Lindo to him? Why should he be sorry for him? A far worse thing +had befallen himself. He tried to harden his heart, and to resolve that nothing +of his suffering should be visible even to her. But he had scarcely formed the +resolution when, his eyes wandering despite his will to the pale set face on +the other side of the hearth, he sprang forward and, almost kneeling, took her +hand in both his own. “Kate,” he whispered, “is it so? Is +there no hope for me, then?” +</p> + +<p> +She, too, had been looking into the fire. She could feel for him now. She no +longer thought his attentions “nonsense” as at the station a while +back. But she could not speak. She could only shake her head, the tears in her +eyes. +</p> + +<p> +Jack laid down the hand and rose and went back to the fire, and stood looking +into it sorrowfully; but his thoughts were no longer wholly of himself. Brave +heart, the rarest of gentlemen, though he was neither six feet high nor an +Adonis, he had scarcely felt the weight of the blow which had fallen on +himself, before he began to think what he could do to help her. Presently he +put his thought into words. “Kate,” he said, in a voice scarcely +above a whisper, “can I do anything?” +</p> + +<p> +She had made no attempt to deny the inference he had drawn. She seemed content, +indeed, that he should have her secret, though the knowledge of it by another +would have covered her with shame. But at the sound of his question she only +shook her head with a sorrowful smile. +</p> + +<p> +It was all dark to him. He knew nothing of the past—only that the faint +suspicion he had felt at the bazaar was justified, and that Kate had given away +her heart. He did not dare to ask whether there was any understanding between +her and his friend; and, not knowing that, what could he do? Nothing, he was +afraid. +</p> + +<p> +Then a noble thought came into his head. “I am afraid,” he said +slowly, looking at his watch, “that Lindo is in great trouble. I think I +will go to him. It is not ten o’clock.” +</p> + +<p> +He tried not to look at her as he spoke, but all the same he saw the crimson +tide rise slowly over cheek and brow, which his prayer had left so pure and +pale. Her lip trembled and she rose hurriedly, muttering something inaudible. +Poor Jack! +</p> + +<p> +For a moment self got the upper hand, and he stood still, frowning. Then he +said gallantly, “Yes, I think I will go. Will you let my uncle know in +case I should be late.” +</p> + +<p> +He did not look at her again, but hurried out of the room. It was a stiff, +formal room, we know—a set, comfortless, middle-class room, which had +given the rector quite a shock on his first introduction to it—but if it +had grafted all the grace of the halls of Abencerrages upon the stately comfort +of a sixteenth-century dining-hall it would have been no more than worthy of +the man who quitted it. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap18"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.<br/> +A FRIEND IN NEED.</h2> + +<p> +I have heard that the bitterest pang a boy feels on returning to school after +his first holidays is reserved for the moment when he opens his desk and +recalls the happy hour, full of joyous anticipation, when he had closed that +desk with a bang. Oh, the pity of it! The change from that boy to this, from +that morning to this evening! How meanly, how inadequately—so it seems to +the urchin standing with smudged cheeks before the well-remembered +grammar—did the lad who turned the key estimate his real happiness! How +little did he enter into it or deserve it! +</p> + +<p> +Just such a pang shot through the young rector’s heart as he passed into +the rectory porch after that momentous scene at Mrs. Hammond’s. His rage +had had time to die down. With reflection had come a full sense of his +position. As he entered the house he remembered—remembered only too well, +grinding his teeth over the recollection—how secure, how free from +embarrassments, how happy had been his situation when he last issued from that +door a few, a very few, hours before. Such troubles as had then annoyed him +seemed trifles light as air now. Mr. Bonamy’s writ, the dislike of one +section in the parish—how could he have let such things as these make him +miserable for a moment? +</p> + +<p> +How, indeed? Or, if there were anything grave in his situation then, what was +it now? He had held his head high; henceforward he would be a by-word in the +parish, a man under a cloud. The position in which he had placed himself would +still be his, perhaps, but only because he would cling to it to the last. Under +no circumstances could it any longer be a source of pride to him. He had posed, +will he, nill he, as the earl’s friend; he must submit in the future to +be laughed at by the Greggs and avoided by the Homfrays. It seemed to him +indeed that his future in Claversham could be only one long series of +humiliations. He was a proud man, and as he thought of this he sprang from his +chair and strode up and down the room, his cheeks flaming. Had there ever been +such a fall before! +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Baker, as yet ignorant of it all, though the news was by this time +spreading through the town, brought him his dinner, and he ate something in the +dining-room. Then he went back to the study and sat idle and listless before +his writing-table. There was a number of “Punch” lying on it, and +he took this up and read it through drearily, extracting a faint pleasure from +its witticisms, but never for an instant forgetting the cloud of trouble +brooding over him. Years afterward he could recall some of the jokes in that +“Punch”—with a shudder. Presently he laid it down and began +to think. And then, before his thoughts became quite insufferable, they were +interrupted by the sound of a voice in the hall. +</p> + +<p> +He rose and stood with his back to the fire, and as he waited, his eyes on the +door, his face grew hot, his brow defiant. He had little doubt that the visitor +was Clode. He had expected the curate before, and even anticipated the relief +of pouring his thoughts into a friendly ear. None the less, now the thing had +come, he dreaded the first moment of meeting, scarcely knowing how to bear +himself in these changed circumstances. +</p> + +<p> +It was not Clode, however, who entered, but Jack Smith. The rector started, +and, uncertain whether the barrister had heard of the blow which had fallen on +him or no, stepped forward awkwardly, and held out his hand in a constrained +fashion. Jack, on his side, had his own reasons for being ill at ease with his +friend. But the moment the men’s hands met they somehow closed on one +another in the old hearty fashion, and the grip told the rector that the other +knew all. “You have heard?” he muttered. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Bonamy told me,” the barrister answered. “I came across +almost at once.” +</p> + +<p> +“You do not believe that I was aware of the earl’s mistake, +then?” Lindo said, with a faint smile. +</p> + +<p> +“I should as soon believe that I knew of it myself!” Jack replied +warmly. He was glad beyond measure now that he had come. As he and Lindo stood +half facing one another, each with an elbow on the mantel-shelf, he felt that +he could defy the chill at his own heart—that, notwithstanding all, his +old friend was still dear to him. Perhaps if the rector had been prospering as +before, if no cloud had arisen in his sky, it might have been different. But as +it was, Jack’s generous heart went out to him. “Tell me what +happened, old fellow,” he said cheerily—“that is, if you have +no objection to taking me into your confidence.” +</p> + +<p> +“I shall be only too glad of your help,” Lindo answered thankfully, +feeling indeed—so potent is a single word of sympathy—happier +already. “I would ask you to sit down, Jack,” he continued, in a +tone of rather sheepish raillery, “and have a cup of coffee or some +whiskey, but I do not know whether I ought to do so, now that Lord Dynmore says +the things are not mine.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will take the responsibility,” Jack answered, briskly ringing +the bell. “Was my lord very rude?” +</p> + +<p> +“Confoundedly!” the rector answered, and proceeded to tell his +story. Jack was surprised to find him at first more placable than he had +expected, but presently he learned that this moderation was only assumed. The +rector rose as he went on, and began to pace the room, and, the motion freeing +his tongue, he gradually betrayed the indignation and resentment which he +really felt. Jack asked him, with a view to clearing the ground, whether he had +quite made up his mind not to resign, and was astonished by the force and anger +with which he repudiated the thought of doing so. “Resign? No +never!” he cried, standing still, and almost glaring at his companion. +“Why should I? What have I done? Was it my mistake, that I am to suffer +for it? Was it my fault, that for penalty I am to have the tenor of my life +broken? Do you think I can go back to the Docks the same man I left them? I +cannot. Nor is that all, or nearly all,” he added still more +warmly—“I have been called a swindler and an impostor. Am I by +resigning to plead guilty to the charge?” +</p> + +<p> +“No!” said Jack, himself catching fire, “certainly not! I did +not intend for a moment to advise that course. I think you would be acting very +foolishly if you resigned under these circumstances.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am glad of that,” the rector said, sitting down with a sigh of +relief. “I feared you did not quite enter into my feelings.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do thoroughly,” the barrister answered, with feeling, “but +I want to do more—I want to help you. You must not go into this business +blindly, old man. And, first, I think you ought to take the archdeacon or some +other clergyman into your confidence. Show him the whole of your case, I mean, +and——” +</p> + +<p> +“And act upon his advice?” said the young rector, rebellion already +flashing in his eye. +</p> + +<p> +“No, not necessarily,” the barrister answered, skilfully adapting +his tone to the irritability of his patient. “Of course your <i>bona +fides</i> at the time you accepted the living is the point of importance to +you, Lindo. You did not see their solicitors—the earl’s people, I +mean—did you?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” the rector answered somewhat sullenly. +</p> + +<p> +“Then their letter conveyed to you all you knew of the living and the +offer?” +</p> + +<p> +“Precisely.” +</p> + +<p> +“Let us see them, then,” replied Jack, rising briskly from his +chair. He had already determined to say nothing of the witness whom Mr. Bonamy +had mentioned to him as asserting that the rector had bribed him. He knew +enough of his friend to utterly disbelieve the story, and he considered it as +told to him in confidence. “There is no time like the present,” he +continued. “You have kept the letters, of course?” +</p> + +<p> +“They are here,” Lindo answered, rising also, and unlocking as he +spoke the little cupboard among the books; “I made them into a packet and +indorsed them soon after I came. They have been here ever since.” +</p> + +<p> +He found them after a moment’s search and without himself examining them, +pitched them to Jack, who had returned to his seat. The barrister untied the +string and glancing quickly at the dates of the letters, arranged them in order +and flattened them out on his knee. “Now,” he said, “number +one! That I think I have seen before.” He mumbled over the opening +sentences, and turned the page. “Hallo!” he exclaimed, holding the +letter from him, and speaking in a tone of surprise—almost of +consternation—“how is this?” +</p> + +<p> +“What?” said the rector. +</p> + +<p> +“You have destroyed the latter part of this letter! Why on earth did you +do that?” +</p> + +<p> +“I never did,” Lindo answered incredulously. Obeying Jack’s +gesture he came, and, standing by his chair, looked over his shoulder. Then he +saw that part of the latter half of the sheet had been torn off. The signature +and the last few words of the letter, were gone. He looked and wondered. +“I never did it,” he said positively, “whoever did. You may +be sure of that.” +</p> + +<p> +“You are certain?” +</p> + +<p> +“Absolutely certain,” the rector answered with considerable warmth. +“I remember arranging and indorsing the packet. I am quite sure that this +letter was intact then, for I read over every one. That was a few evenings +after I came here.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you ever shown the letters to any one?” Jack asked +suspiciously. +</p> + +<p> +“Never,” said the rector; “they have never been removed from +this cupboard, to my knowledge, since I put them there.” +</p> + +<p> +“Think! I want you to be quite sure,” Jack rejoined, pressing his +point steadily; “you see this letter is rendered utterly worthless by the +mutilation. Indeed, to produce it would be to raise a natural suspicion that +the last sentence of the letter was not in our favor, and we had got rid of it. +Of course the chances are that the earl’s solicitors have copies, but for +the present that is not our business.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said the rector somewhat absently—he had been rather +thinking than listening—“I do remember now a circumstance which may +account for this. A short time after I came a man broke into the house and +ransacked this cupboard. Possibly he did it.” +</p> + +<p> +“A burglar, do you mean? Was he caught?” the barrister asked, +figuratively pricking up his ears. +</p> + +<p> +“No—or, rather, I should say yes,” the rector answered. And +then he explained that his curate, taking the man red-handed, had let him go, +in the hope that, as it was his first offence, he would take warning and live +honestly. +</p> + +<p> +“But who was the burglar?” Jack inquired. “You know, I +suppose? Is he in the town now?” +</p> + +<p> +“Clode never told me his name,” Lindo answered. “The man made +a point of that, and I did not press for it. I remember that Clode was somewhat +ashamed of his clemency.” +</p> + +<p> +“He had need to be,” Jack snorted. “It sounds an +extraordinary story. All the same, Lindo, I am not sure it has any connection +with this.” He held the letter up before him as though drawing +inspiration from it. “This letter, you see,” he went on presently, +“being the first in date would be inside the packet. Why should a man who +wanted perhaps a bit of paper for a spill or a pipe-light unfasten this packet +and take the innermost letter? I do not believe it.” +</p> + +<p> +“But no one else save myself,” Lindo urged, “has had access +to the letter. And there it is torn.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, here it is torn,” Jack admitted, gazing thoughtfully at it; +“that is true.” +</p> + +<p> +For a few moments the two sat silent, Jack fingering the letter, Lindo with his +eyes fixed gloomily on the fire. Suddenly the rector broke out without warning +or preface. “What a fool I have been!” he exclaimed, his tone one +of abrupt overwhelming conviction. “Good heavens, what a fool I have +been!” +</p> + +<p> +His friend looked at him in surprise, and saw that his face was crimson. +“Is it about the letter?” he asked, leaning forward, his tone sharp +with professional impatience. “You do not mean to say, Lindo, that you +really——” +</p> + +<p> +“No, no!” replied the young clergyman, ruthlessly interrupting him. +“It has nothing to do with the letter.” +</p> + +<p> +He said no more, and Jack waited for further light, but none came, and the +barrister reapplied his thoughts to the problem before him. He had only just +hit upon a new idea, however, when he was again diverted by an interruption +from Lindo. “Jack,” said the latter impressively, “I want you +to give a message for me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not a cartel to Lord Dynmore, I hope?” the barrister muttered. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” Lindo answered, getting up and poking the fire +unnecessarily—what a quantity of embarrassment has been liberated before +now by means of pokers—“no, I want you to give a message to your +cousin—Miss Bonamy, I mean.” The rector paused, the poker still in +his hand, and stole a sharp glance at his companion; but, reassured by the +discovery that he was to all appearance buried in the letter, he continued: +“Would you mind telling her that I am sorry I misjudged her a short time +back—she will understand—and behaved, I feel, very ungratefully to +her? She warned me that there was a rumor afloat that something was amiss with +my title, and I am afraid I was very rude to her. I should like you to tell +her, if you will, that I—that I am particularly ashamed of myself,” +he added, with a gulp. +</p> + +<p> +He did not find the words easy of utterance—far from it; but the effort +they cost him was slight and trivial compared with that which poor Jack found +himself called upon to make. For a moment, indeed, he was silent, his heart +rebelling against the task assigned to him. To carry his message to her! Then +his nobler self answered to the call, and he spoke. His words, “Yes, +I’ll tell her,” came, it is true, a little late, in a voice a +trifle thick, and were uttered with a coldness which Lindo would have remarked +had he not been agitated himself. But they came—at a price. The Victoria +Cross for moral courage can seldom be gained by a single act of valor. Many a +one has failed to gain it who had strength enough for the first blow. +“Yes, I will tell her,” Jack repeated a few seconds later, folding +up the letter and laying it on the table, but so contriving that his face was +hidden from his friend. “To-morrow will do, I suppose?” he added, +the faintest tinge of irony in his tone. He may be pardoned if he thought the +apology he was asked to carry came a little late. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, to-morrow will do,” Lindo answered with a start; he had +fallen into a reverie, but now roused himself. “I am afraid you are very +tired, old fellow,” he continued, looking gratefully at his friend. +“A friend in need is a friend indeed, you know. I cannot tell +you”—with a sigh—“how very good I think it was of you +to come to me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nonsense!” Jack said briskly. “It was all in the day’s +work. As it is, I have done nothing. And that reminds me,” he continued, +facing his companion with a smile—“what of the trouble between my +uncle and you? About the sheep, I mean. You have put it in some lawyer’s +hands, have you not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” Lindo answered reluctantly. +</p> + +<p> +“Quite right, too,” said the barrister. “Who are they?” +</p> + +<p> +“Turner & Grey, of Birmingham.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I will write,” Jack answered, “if you will let me, and +tell them to let the matter stand for the present. I think that will be the +best course. Bonamy won’t object.” +</p> + +<p> +“But he has issued a writ,” the rector explained. A writ seemed to +him a formidable engine. As well dally before the mouth of a cannon. +</p> + +<p> +But Jack knew better. The law’s delays were familiar to him. He was aware +of many a pleasant little halting-place between writ and judgment. “Never +mind about that,” he answered, with a confident laugh. “Shall I +settle it for you? I shall know better, perhaps, what to say to them.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector assented gladly; adding: “Here is their address.” It was +stuck in the corner of a picture hanging over the fireplace. He took it down as +he spoke and gave it to Jack, who put it carelessly into his pocket, and, +seizing his hat, said he must go at once—that it was close on twelve. The +rector would have repeated his thanks; but Jack would not stop to hear them, +and in a moment was gone. +</p> + +<p> +Reginald Lindo returned to the study after letting him out, and, dropping into +the nearest chair, looked round with a sigh. Yet, the sigh notwithstanding, he +was a hundredfold less unhappy now than he had been at dinner or while looking +over that number of “Punch.” His friend’s visit had both +cheered and softened him. His thoughts no longer dwelt on the earl’s +injustice, the desertion of his friends, or the humiliations in store for him; +but went back again to the warning Kate Bonamy had given him. Thence it was not +unnatural that they should revert to the beginning of his acquaintance with +her. He pictured her at Oxford, he saw her scolding Daintry in the stiff +drawing-room, or coming to meet him in the Red Lane; and, the veil of local +prejudice torn from his eyes by the events of the day, he began to discern that +this girl, with all the drawbacks of her surroundings, was the fairest, +bravest, and noblest girl he had met at Claversham, or, for aught he could +remember, elsewhere. His eyes glistened. He was sure—so sure that he +would have staked his life on the result—that for all the earls in +England Kate Bonamy would not have deserted him! +</p> + +<p> +He had reached this point, and Jack had been gone some five minutes or more, +when he was startled by a loud rap at the house door. He stood up and, +wondering who it could be at this hour, took a candle and went into the hall. +Setting the candlestick on a table, he opened the door, and there, to his +astonishment, was Jack come back again! +</p> + +<p> +“Capital!” said the barrister, slipping in and shutting the door +behind him, as though his return were not in the least degree extraordinary, +“I thought it was you. Look here; there is one thing I forget to ask you, +Lindo. Where did you get the address of those lawyers?” +</p> + +<p> +He asked the question so earnestly, and his face, now it could be seen by the +strong light of the candle at his elbow, wore so curious an expression, that +the rector was for a moment quite taken aback. “They are good people, are +they not?” he said, wondering much. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, the firm is good enough,” Jack answered impatiently. +“But who gave you their address?” +</p> + +<p> +“Clode,” the rector answered. “I went round to his lodgings +and he wrote it down for me.” +</p> + +<p> +“At his lodgings?” cried the barrister. +</p> + +<p> +“To be sure.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! then look here,” Jack replied, laying his hand on +Lindo’s sleeve and looking up at him with an air of peculiar +seriousness—“just tell me once more, so that I may have no doubt +about it: Are you sure that from the time you docketed those letters until now +you have never removed them—from this house, I mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“Never!” +</p> + +<p> +“Never let them go out of the house?” +</p> + +<p> +“Never!” answered the rector firmly. “I am as certain of it +as a man can be certain of anything.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thanks!” Jack cried. “All right. Good night.” And that +was all; for, turning abruptly, in a twinkling he had the door open and was +gone, leaving the rector to go to bed in such a state of mystification as made +him almost forget his fallen fortunes. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap19"></a>CHAPTER XIX.<br/> +THE DAY AFTER.</h2> + +<p> +Oddly enough, the rector’s first thought on rising next morning was of +his curate. He had expected, as we have seen, that Clode would call before +bedtime. Disappointed in this, he still felt so certain that the curate would +hasten as soon as possible to offer his sympathy and assistance that after +breakfast he repaired to his study for the express purpose of receiving him. To +find one friend in need is good, but to find two is better. The young clergyman +felt, as people in trouble of a certain kind do feel, that though he had told +Jack all about it, it would be a relief to tell Stephen all about it also; the +more as Jack, whom he had told, was his personal friend, while Clode was +identified with the place and his unabated confidence and esteem—of +retaining which the rector made no doubt—would go some way toward +soothing the latter’s wounded pride. +</p> + +<p> +It was well, however, that Lindo, sitting down at his writing-table to await +his visitor, found there some scattered notes upon which he could employ his +thoughts, and which without any great concentration of mind he could form into +a sermon. For otherwise his time would have been wasted. Ten o’clock +came, and eleven, and half-past eleven; but no curate. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Clode, in fact, was engaged elsewhere. About half-past ten he turned +briskly into the drive leading to Mrs. Hammond’s house and walked up it +at a good pace, with the step of a man who has news to tell, and is going to +tell it. The morning was bright and sunny, the air crisp and fresh, yet not too +cold. The gravel crunched pleasantly under his feet, while the hoar-frost +melting on the dark green leaves of the laurels bordered his path with a +million gems as brilliant as evanescent. Possibly the pleasure he took in these +things, possibly some thought of his own, lent animation to the curate’s +face and figure as he strode along. At any rate, Miss Hammond, meeting him +suddenly at a turn in the approach, saw a change in him, and, reading the signs +aright, blushed. +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” she said, smiling a question as she held out her hand. They +had scarcely been alone together since the afternoon when the rector’s +inopportune call had brought about an understanding between them. +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” he answered, retaining her hand. “What is it, +Laura?” +</p> + +<p> +“I thought you were going to tell me,” she said, glancing up with +shy assurance. The morning air was not fresher. She was so bright and piquant +in her furs and with her dazzling complexion, that other eyes than her +lover’s might have been pardoned for likening her to the frost drops on +the laurels. At any rate, she sparkled as they did. +</p> + +<p> +He looked down at her, fond admiration in his eyes. Had he not come up on +purpose to see her? +</p> + +<p> +“I think it is all right,” he said, in a slightly lower tone. +“I think I may answer for it, Laura, that we shall not have much longer +to wait.” +</p> + +<p> +She gazed at him, seeming for the moment startled and taken by surprise. +“Have you heard of a living, then?” she murmured, her eyes wide, +her breath coming and going. +</p> + +<p> +He nodded. +</p> + +<p> +“Where?” she asked, in the same low tone. “You do not +mean—here!” +</p> + +<p> +He nodded again. +</p> + +<p> +“At Claversham!” she exclaimed. “Then will he have to go, +really?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think he will,” Clode replied, a glow of triumph warming his +dark face and kindling his eyes. “When Lord Dynmore left here yesterday +he drove straight to Mr. Bonamy’s. You hardly believe it, do you? Well, +it is true, for I had it from a sure source. And, that being so, I do not think +Lindo will have much chance against such an alliance. It is not as if he had +many friends here, or had got on well with the people.” +</p> + +<p> +“The poor people like him,” she urged. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” Clode answered sharply. “He has spent money among +them. It was not his own, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +It was a brutal thing to say, and she cast a glance of gentle reproof at him. +She did not remonstrate, however, but, slightly changing the subject, asked, +“But even if Mr. Lindo goes, are you sure of the living?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think so,” he answered, smiling confidently down at her. +</p> + +<p> +She looked puzzled. “How do you know?” she asked. “Did Lord +Dynmore promise it to you?” +</p> + +<p> +“No; I wish he had,” he answered. “All the same, I think I am +fairly sure of it without the promise.” And then he related to her what +the archdeacon had told him as to Lord Dynmore’s intention of presenting +the curates in future. “Now do you see, Laura?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I see,” she answered, looking down and absently poking a hole +in the gravel with the point of her umbrella. +</p> + +<p> +“And you are content?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she answered, looking up brightly from a little dream of the +rectory as it should be, when feminine taste had transformed it with the aid of +Persian rugs and old china and the hundred knickknacks which are half a +woman’s life—“Yes, I am content, Mr. Clode.” +</p> + +<p> +“Say ‘Stephen.’” +</p> + +<p> +“I am quite content, Stephen,” she answered obediently, a bright +blush for a moment mingling with her smile. +</p> + +<p> +He was about to make some warm rejoinder, when the sound of footsteps +approaching from the house diverted his attention, and he looked up. The +new-comer was Mrs. Hammond, also on her way into the town. She waved her hand +to him. “Good morning,” she cried in her cheery +voice—“you are just the person I wanted to see, Mr. Clode. This is +good luck. Now, how is he?” +</p> + +<p> +“Who? Mrs. Hammond,” said the curate, quite taken by surprise. +</p> + +<p> +“Who?” she replied warmly, reproach in her tone. She was a +kind-hearted woman, and the scene in her drawing-room had really cost her a few +minutes’ sleep. “Why, Mr. Lindo, to be sure. Whom else should I +mean? I suppose you went in last night at once and told him how much we all +sympathized with him? Indeed, I hope you did not leave him until you saw him +well to bed, for I am sure he was hardly fit to be left alone, poor +fellow!” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Clode stood silent, and looked troubled. Really, if it had occurred to him, +he would have called to see Lindo. But it had not occurred to him, after what +had happened—perhaps because he had been busied about things which +“seemed worth while.” He regretted now, since Mrs. Hammond seemed +to think it so much a matter of course, that he had not done so; the more as +the omission compelled him to choose his side earlier than he need have done. +However, it was too late now. So he shook his head. “I have not seen him, +Mrs. Hammond,” he said gravely. “I have not been to the +rectory.” +</p> + +<p> +“What! you have not seen him?” she cried in amazement. +</p> + +<p> +“No, I have not,” he answered, a slight tinge of hauteur in his +manner. After all, he reflected that he would have found it painful to play +another part before Laura after disclosing so much of his mind to her. +“What is more, Mrs. Hammond,” he continued, “I am not anxious +to see him; for, to tell you the truth, I fear that the meeting could only be a +painful one.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, you do not mean to say,” the lady answered in a low, +awe-stricken voice, “that you think he knew anything about it, Mr. +Clode?” +</p> + +<p> +“At any rate,” the curate replied firmly, “I cannot acquit +him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not acquit him!—Mr. Lindo!” she stammered. +</p> + +<p> +“No, I cannot,” Clode replied, striving to express in his voice and +manner his extreme conscientiousness and the gloomy sense of responsibility +under which he had arrived at his decision. “I cannot get out of my +head,” he continued, “Lord Dynmore’s remark that, if the +circumstances aroused suspicion in my mind, they could scarcely fail to apprise +Mr. Lindo, who was more nearly concerned, of the truth, or something like the +truth. Mind!” the curate added with a great show of candor, “I do +not say, Mrs. Hammond, that Mr. Lindo knew. I only say I think he +suspected.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, <i>that</i> is very good of you!” Mrs. Hammond exclaimed, +displaying a spirit and a power of sarcasm he had not expected. “I dare +say Mr. Lindo will be much obliged to you for <i>that!</i> But, for my part, I +think it is a distinction without a difference!” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no!” the curate protested hastily. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I think it is, at any rate!” retorted the lady, very red in +the face, and with all the bugles in her bonnet shaking. “However, +everyone to his opinion. But that is not mine, and I am sorry it is yours. Why, +you are his curate!” she added in a tone of indignant wonder, which +brought the blood to Clode’s cheeks, and made him bite his lip in +impotent anger. “You ought to be the last person to doubt him!” +</p> + +<p> +“Can I help it if I do?” he answered sullenly. +</p> + +<p> +“Mother,” said Laura quickly, intercepting the angry reply which +was on Mrs. Hammond’s lips, “if Mr. Clode thinks in that way, can +he be blamed for telling us? We are not the town. What he has told us he has +told us in confidence.” +</p> + +<p> +“A confidence Mrs. Hammond has made me bitterly regret,” he +rejoined, taking skilful advantage of her intervention. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Hammond grunted. She was still angry, but she felt herself baffled. +“Well, I do not understand these things, perhaps,” she said. +“But I do not agree with Mr. Clode, and I am not going to pretend +to.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am sure he does not wish you to,” said Laura sweetly. +“Only you did not quite understand, I think, that he was only giving us +his private opinion. Of course he would not tell it to the town.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that makes a difference, of course,” Mrs. Hammond allowed. +“But now, however, I will say good-morning! I shall go straight to the +rectory now and inquire. Are you coming, Laura?” +</p> + +<p> +Laura thought it better to go and with a bright little nod, tripped off after +her mother. Mr. Clode, thus deserted, walked slowly down the drive, wondering +whether he had been premature in his revolt. He did not think so; and yet he +wished he had not been so hasty—that he had not shown his hand quite so +early. The truth was, he had been a little carried away by the events of the +previous afternoon. But, even now, the more he thought of it, the more hopeless +seemed the rector’s position. Openly denounced by his patron as an +impostor, at war with his church-warden, disliked by a powerful section of the +parish, one action already commenced against him and another +threatened—what else could he do but resign? “He may say he will +not to-day and to-morrow,” the curate thought, smiling darkly to himself, +“but they will be too much for him the day after.” +</p> + +<p> +And whether Mr. Clode told this opinion of his in the town or not, it was +certainly a very common one. Never had Claversham been treated to such a dish +of gossip as this. On the evening of the bazaar, before the unsold goods had +been cleared from the tables, the wildest rumors were already afloat in the +town. The rector had been arrested; he had decamped; he was to be tried for +fraud; he was not in holy orders at all; Mrs. Bedford would have to be married +over again! With the morning these reports died away, and something like the +truth came to be known—to the inexpressible satisfaction of Dr. Gregg and +his like. The doctor was in and out of half the houses in the town that day. +“Resign!” he would say with a shriek—“of course he will +resign! And glad to escape so easily!” Dr. Gregg, indeed, was in his +glory now. The parts were reversed. It was for him now to meet the rector with +a patronizing nod; only, for some reason best known to himself, and perhaps +connected with an essential distinction between the two men, he preferred to +celebrate his triumph figuratively, and behind Lindo’s back. +</p> + +<p> +What was said, and how it was said, can well be imagined. When a man who for +some cause has held his head a little above his neighbors stumbles and falls, +we know what is likely to be said of him. And the young rector knew, and in his +heart and in his study suffered horribly. All the afternoon of the day after +the bazaar he walked the town with a smile on his face, ostensibly visiting in +his district, really vindicating his pride and courage. He carried his head as +high as ever, and the skirts of his long black coat fluttered as bravely as +before. Dr. Gregg, who saw him from the reading-room window, gave it as his +opinion that he did not know what shame meant. But at heart the young man was +unutterably miserable. He knew that inquisitive eyes were upon his every +gesture; that he was watched, jeered at, worst of all—pitied. He guessed, +as the day wore on, drawing the inference from the curate’s avoidance of +him, that even Clode had deserted him; and this, perhaps, almost as much as the +resentment he harbored against Lord Dynmore, hardened him in his resolve not to +resign or abate one tittle of his rights. +</p> + +<p> +He fancied he stood alone. But, of course, there were some who sympathized with +him, and some who held their tongues and declined to commit themselves to any +opinion. Among the latter Mr. Bonamy was conspicuous—to the intense +disgust of Dr. Gregg, whose first expression, indeed, on hearing the news had +been, “What nuts for Bonamy!” As a fact, however, the snappish +little doctor had never found his friend so morose and unpleasant as when he +tried to sound him on this subject. He espied him on the other side of the +street, and rushed across, stuttering almost before he reached him, +“Well? He will have to resign, won’t he?” +</p> + +<p> +“Who?” said Mr. Bonamy, standing still, and fixing his cold gray +eyes on the excited little man. “Who will have to resign?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, the rector, to be sure!” rejoined Gregg, feeling the check +unpleasantly. +</p> + +<p> +“Will he?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I should say so,” urged the doctor, now quite taken aback, +and gazing at the other with eyes of surprise. “But I suppose you know +best, Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then I am going to keep my knowledge to myself!” snarled the +lawyer; and, rattling a handful of silver in his pocket, he stalked away, his +hat on the back of his head, and his lank figure more ungainly than usual. He +was in the worst of tempers; angry with Lord Dynmore and dissatisfied with +himself—given to calling himself, half a dozen times in an hour, a +quixotic fool for having thrown away the earl’s business for the sake of +a scruple that was little more than a whim. It is all very well to have a queer +rugged code of honor of one’s own, and to observe it; but when the +observance sends away business—such business as brings with it the social +considerations which men prize most highly when they most affect to despise +it—why then a man is apt to take out his self-denial in ill-temper. Mr. +Bonamy did so. +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg went away calling the lawyer a bear and an ill-bred fellow who did +not know his own friends. Alas! the same thing might have been said, and with +greater justice, of the rector. The archdeacon sat an hour in his study, +waiting patiently for him to return from his district, and after all got but a +sorry reception. The elder man expressed, and expressed very warmly—he +had come to do so—his full belief in Lindo’s honesty and good +faith, and was greatly touched by the effect his words produced upon the young +fellow, who had come into the room, after learning his visitor’s +presence, with set lips and eyes of challenge, but had by-and-by to turn his +back on his friend and look out of the window, while in a very low tone he +murmured his thanks. But, alas! the archdeacon went farther, and let drop +something about concession, and then the boat was over! +</p> + +<p> +“Concession!” said the young man, turning as on a pivot, with every +hair of his whiskers bristling, and his voice clear enough now. “What +kind of concession do you mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said the archdeacon persuasively, “the earl is a +choleric man—a most passionate man, I know; and, when excited, utterly +foolish and wrong-headed. But in his cooler moments I do not know any one more +just or, indeed, more generous. And I feel sure that if you could prevail on +yourself to meet him half-way——” +</p> + +<p> +“By resigning?” snapped the rector, interrupting him point-blank +with the question. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no, no,” said the archdeacon, “I do not mean +that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then in what way? How?” +</p> + +<p> +But as the archdeacon really meant by resigning, he could not answer the +question, and the interview ended in Lindo roundly declaring, as he walked up +and down the room, “I will not resign! Understand that, archdeacon! I +will not resign! If Lord Dynmore can put me out, well and good—let him. +If not, I stay. He may be just or generous,” continued the young man +scornfully—“all I know is that he insulted me grossly, and as no +gentleman would have insulted another.” +</p> + +<p> +“He is passionate, and was taken by surprise,” the archdeacon +ventured to say. But Lindo would not listen; and his visitor had presently to +go, fearing that he had done more harm than good by his mediation. As for the +rector, he was severely scolded later in the evening by Jack Smith for having +omitted to lay the letters offering him the living before the archdeacon, or to +explain to him the precise circumstances under which he had accepted it. +</p> + +<p> +“But he said he did not doubt me,” the rector urged rather +fractiously. +</p> + +<p> +“Pooh! that is not the point,” the barrister retorted. “Of +course he does not. He knows you. But I want to put him in possession of such a +case as he may lay before others who do not know you. Look here, you are +acquainted with a man called Felton, are you not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” Lindo answered, with a slight start. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, perhaps you are not aware that he has been to Lord +Dynmore—so the tale runs in the town, and I know it is true—and +stated that you have been for weeks bribing him to keep the secret.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector sat motionless, staring at his friend. “I did not know +it,” he said at last, quite quietly. He was becoming accustomed to +surprises of this kind. “It is a wicked lie, of course.” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course,” Jack assented tossing one leg easily over the other, +and thrusting his hands deep into his trousers’ pockets. “But what +do you say to it?” +</p> + +<p> +“The man came to me,” Lindo answered steadily, “and told me +that he was Lord Dynmore’s servant, and that, crossing from America, he +had foolishly lost his money at play. He begged me to assist him until Lord +Dynmore’s return, and I did so. Some ten days ago I discovered that he +was leading a disreputable life, and I stopped the allowance.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thanks,” said Jack, nodding his head. “That is precisely +what I thought. But the mischief of it is, you see, that the man’s tale +may be true in his eyes. He may have believed that he was blackmailing you. And +therefore, since we cannot absolutely refute his story, it is the more +important that we should show as good a case as possible <i>aliunde</i>. Nor +does it make any difference,” Jack continued drily, “that the man, +after seeing Lord Dynmore last night, has taken himself quietly off this +morning.” +</p> + +<p> +“What! Felton?” the rector exclaimed, coming suddenly upright. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. There is no doubt he has absconded. Bonamy’s clerk has been +after him all day, and has discovered that he begged half-a-crown from your +curate, to whom he was seen speaking at the Top of the Town about ten this +morning. Since that time he has not been seen.” +</p> + +<p> +“He may turn up yet,” said the rector. +</p> + +<p> +“I do not think he will,” the barrister replied, with a shrewd +gleam in his eyes. “But you must not flatter yourself that his +disappearance will do you any good. Of course some people will say that he was +afraid to remain and support a false statement. But more, I fear, will lean to +the opinion that he was got out of the way by some one—you, for +instance.” +</p> + +<p> +“I see,” said Lindo slowly, after a long pause. “Then it is +the more imperative that I should not dream of resigning.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think so,” said Jack. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap20"></a>CHAPTER XX.<br/> +A SUDDEN CALL.</h2> + +<p> +“Kate,” said Daintry, looking up from a lesson book as her sister +entered the dining-room a few mornings after the bazaar, “are you +<i>never</i> going to see old Peggy Jones again? I am sure that you have not +been near her for a fortnight?” +</p> + +<p> +“I ought to go, I know,” Kate answered, pausing by the sideboard, +with a big bunch of keys dangling from her fingers and an absent expression in +her gray eyes. “I have not been for some time.” +</p> + +<p> +“I should think you had not!” quoth Daintry severely. “You +have hardly been out of the house the last four days.” +</p> + +<p> +A faint color stole into the elder girl’s face, and, seeming suddenly to +recollect what she wanted, she turned and began to search in the drawer behind +her. She knew quite well that what Daintry said was true—that she had not +been out for four days. Jack had delivered the rector’s message to her, +and she had listened with downcast eyes and a grave composure—a composure +so perfect that even the messenger who held the clue in his hand was almost +deceived by it. All the same, it had made her very happy. The young rector +appreciated at last the motive which had led her to give him that strange +warning. He was grateful to her, and anxious to make her understand his +gratitude. And while she dwelt on this with pleasure, she foresaw with a +strange mingling of joy and fear, of anticipation and shrinking, that the first +time she met him abroad he would strive to make it still more clear to her. +</p> + +<p> +So for four days, lest she should seem even to herself to be precipitating the +meeting, she had refrained from going out. Now, when Daintry remarked upon the +change in her habits, she blushed at the thought that she might all the time +have been exaggerating a trifle; and, though she did not go out at once, in the +course of the afternoon she did issue forth, and called upon old Peggy. Coming +back she had to pass through the churchyard, and there, on the very spot where +she had once forced herself to address him, she met the rector. +</p> + +<p> +She saw him while he was still some way off, and before he saw her, and she +looked eagerly for any trace of the trouble of the last few days. It had not +changed him, at any rate. It had rather accentuated him, she thought. He looked +more boyish, more impetuous, more independent than ever, as he came swinging +along, his blond head thrown back, his eyes roving this way and that, his long +skirts flapping behind him. Of defeat or humiliation he betrayed not a trace; +and the girl wondered, seeing him so calm and strong, if he had really sent her +that message—which seemed to have come from a man hard pressed. +</p> + +<p> +A glance told her all this; and then he saw her, and, a flash of recognition +sweeping across his face, quickened his steps to meet her. He seemed to be +shaking hands with her before he had well considered what he would say, for +when he had gone through that ceremony, and said “Good morning.” he +stood awkwardly silent. Then he said hurriedly, “I have been waiting for +some time to speak to you, Miss Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed?” she said calmly. She wondered at her own self-control. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he answered, his color rising. “And I could not have +met you in a better place.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” she asked. As if she did not know! The simplest woman is an +actress by nature. +</p> + +<p> +“Because,” he answered, “it is well that I should do penance +where I sinned, Miss Bonamy,” he continued impetuously, yet in a low +voice, and with his eyes on the ground. “I owe you a deep apology for my +rude thanklessness when I met you here last. You were right and I was wrong; +but if it had been the other way, still I ought not to have behaved to you as I +did. I thought—that is—I——” +</p> + +<p> +He faltered and stopped. He meant that he had thought that she was playing into +her father’s hands, but he could hardly tell her that. She understood, +however, or guessed, and for the first time she blushed. “Pray, do not +say any more about it,” she said hurriedly. +</p> + +<p> +“I did send you a message,” he answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, yes,” she replied, anxious only to put an end to his +apologies. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” he rejoined with a smile which did not completely veil his +earnestness, “I do find it a little more pleasant to look farther back to +our Oxford visit. But you are going this way. May I turn with you?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am only going home,” Kate answered coldly. He had been humble +enough to her. He had said and looked all she had expected. But he was not at +all the crushed, beaten man whom she had looked to meet. He was, outwardly at +least, the same man who had once sought her society for a few weeks and had +then slighted her and shunned her to consort with the Homfreys and their class. +He had not said he was sorry for <i>that</i>. +</p> + +<p> +He read her tone aright, and he colored furiously, growing in a second a +thousand times more confused than before. It was on the cards that he would +accept the rebuff, and leave her in resentment. Indeed, that was his first +impulse. But the consciousness, which the next moment filled his mind, that he +had deserved this, and perhaps the charm of her gray eyes and proud downturned +face, overcame him. “I will come a little way with you, if you will let +me,” he said, turning and walking by her side. +</p> + +<p> +Kate’s heart gave a great leap. She understood both the first thought and +the second, the weaker impulse and the stronger one which mastered it, and she +would not have been a woman had she not felt her triumph. She hastened to find +something to say, and could think only of the bazaar. She asked him if it had +been a success. +</p> + +<p> +“The bazaar?” he said. “To tell you the truth, I am afraid I +hardly know. I should say so, now you ask me, but I have not given much thought +to it since. I have been too fully occupied with other things,” he added, +a note of bitterness in his voice. “Ah! Miss Bonamy,” with a fresh +change of tone, “what a good fellow your cousin is!” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, he is indeed!” she answered heartily. +</p> + +<p> +“I cannot tell you,” he continued, “what generous help and +support he has given me during the last few days. He has been the greatest +possible comfort to me.” +</p> + +<p> +She looked up at him impulsively. “He is Daintry’s hero,” she +said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he answered laughing, “I remember that her praise made +me almost jealous of him. That was when I first knew you—when I was +coming to Claversham, you remember, Miss Bonamy, full of pleasant anticipations +and hopes. The reality has been different. Jack has told you, of course, of +Lord Dynmore’s strange attack upon me? But perhaps,” he added, +checking himself, and glancing at her, “I ought not to speak to you about +it, as your father is acting for him.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not think he is,” she murmured, looking straight before her. +</p> + +<p> +“But—it is true the only communication I have had since has been +from London—still I thought—I mean I was under the impression that +Lord Dynmore had at once gone to your father.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think he saw him at the office,” Kate answered, “but I +believe my father is not acting for him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know why?” said the rector bluntly. “Why he is not, I +mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” she said—that and nothing more. She was too proud to +defend her father, though he had let drop enough in the family circle to enable +her to come to a conclusion, and she might with truth have made out a story +which would have set the lawyer in a light differing much from that in which +the rector was accustomed to view him. +</p> + +<p> +Reginald Lindo walked on considering the matter. Suddenly he said, “The +archdeacon thinks I ought to resign. What do you think, Miss Bonamy?” +</p> + +<p> +Her heart began to beat quickly. He was seeking her advice!—asking her +opinion in this matter so utterly important to him, so absolutely vital! For a +moment she could not speak, she was so filled with surprise. Then she said +gently, her eyes on the pavement, “I do not think I can judge.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you must have heard—more I dare say than I have!” he +rejoined with a forced laugh. “Will you tell me what you think?” +</p> + +<p> +She looked before her, her face troubled. Then she spoke bravely. +</p> + +<p> +“I think you should judge for yourself,” she said in a low tone, +full of serious feeling. “The responsibility is yours. I do not think +that you should depend entirely on any one’s advice, but should try to do +right according to your conscience—not acting hastily, but coolly, and on +reflection.” +</p> + +<p> +They were almost at Mr. Bonamy’s door when she said this, and he +traversed the remainder of the distance without speaking. At the steps he +halted and held out his hand. “Thank you,” he said simply. “I +hope I shall use this advice to better purpose than the last you gave me. +Please remember me to your sister. Good-by.” +</p> + +<p> +She bowed silently and went in, and he turned back and walked up the street. +The dusk was falling. A few yards in front of him the lame lamplighter was +going his rounds, ladder on shoulder. In every other shop the gas was beginning +to gleam. The night was coming, was almost come, yet still above the houses the +sky, a pale greenish-blue, was bright with daylight, against which the great +tower of the church stood up bulky and black. The young man was in a curious +mood. Though he walked the common pavement, he felt himself, as he gazed +upward, alone with his thoughts which went back, will he nill he, to his first +evening in Claversham. He remembered how free from reproach or stumbling-blocks +his path had seemed then, to what blameless ends he had in fancy devoted +himself. What works of thanksgiving, small but beneficent as the tiny rills +which steal downward through the ferns to the pasture, he had planned. And in +the centre of that past dream of the future he pictured now—Kate Bonamy. +Well, the reality had been different. +</p> + +<p> +He was just beginning to wonder when he would be likely to meet her again, and +to dwell with curious pleasure on some of the details of her dress and +appearance, when the sudden clatter of hoofs behind him caused him to turn his +head. Far down the street a rider had just turned the corner, and was now +galloping up the middle of the roadway, the manner in which he urged on his +pony speaking loudly of disaster and ill news. Opposite the rector he pulled up +and cried out, “Where is the doctor’s, sir?” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo turned sharply round and rang the bell of the house behind him, which +happened to be Gregg’s. +</p> + +<p> +“Here,” he said briefly. “What is it, my man?” +</p> + +<p> +“An explosion in the Big Pit at Baerton,” the man replied, almost +blubbering with excitement and the speed at which he had come. “There is +like to be fifty killed and as many hurt, I was told. But I came straight +off.” +</p> + +<p> +“When did it happen?” Lindo asked, a wave of wild excitement +following his first impulse of horror. +</p> + +<p> +“About an hour and a quarter ago, as near as I can say,” the +messenger, a farm laborer called from the plough, answered. +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg was out, and the clergyman walked by the side of the horse, a crowd +gathering behind him as the news spread, to the house of Mr. Keogh the other +doctor, who fortunately lived close by. He was at home, and, the messenger +going in to tell him the particulars, in five minutes his gig was at the door, +The rector, who had gone in too, came out with him, and, without asking leave, +climbed to the seat beside him. +</p> + +<p> +“Hallo!” said the surgeon, an elderly man, stout and white-haired, +“are you coming, too, Mr. Lindo?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think,” the rector answered, “that there may be cases in +which you can do little and I much. Mr. Walker, the vicar of Baerton, is ill in +bed, I know; and as the news has come to me first, I think I ought to +go.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right you are!” said Mr. Keogh gruffly. “Let go!” +</p> + +<p> +In another moment the fast trotting cob was whirling the two men down the +street. They turned the corner sharply, and as the breeze met them on the +bridge, compelling Lindo to turn up the collar of his coat and draw the rug +more closely round him, the church clock in the town behind them struck the +half-hour. “Half-past five,” said the rector. The surgeon did not +answer. They were in the open country now, the hedges speeding swiftly by them +in the light of the lamps, and the long outline of Bear Hill, a huge misshapen +hump which rose into a point at one end, lying dim and black before them. A +night drive is always impressive. In the gloom, in the sough of the wind, in +the sky serenely star-lit, in a tumult of hurrying clouds, in the rattle of the +wheels, in the monotonous fall of the hoofs, there is an appeal to the sombre +side of a man. How much more when the sough of the wind seems to the +imagination a cry of pain, and the night is a dark background on which the +fancy paints dying faces! At such a time the cares of life, which day by day +rise one beyond another and prevent us dwelling over-much on the end, sink into +pettiness, leaving us face to face with weightier issues. +</p> + +<p> +“There have been accidents here before?” the clergyman asked, after +a long silence. +</p> + +<p> +“Thirty-five years ago there was one!” his companion answered, with +a groan which betrayed his apprehensions. “Good heavens, sir, I remember +it now! I was young then and fresh from the hospitals; but it was almost too +much for me!” +</p> + +<p> +“I hope that this one has been exaggerated,” Lindo replied, +entering fully into the other’s feelings. “I did not quite +understand the man’s account; but, as far as I could follow it, one of +the two shafts—the downcast shaft I think it was—-was jammed full +of rubbish and rendered quite useless.” +</p> + +<p> +“Just what I expected!” ejaculated his companion. +</p> + +<p> +“And they could now communicate with the workings only through the upcast +shaft, in which they had rigged up some temporary lifting gear.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ay, and it is the deepest pit here,” the surgeon chimed in, as the +horse began to breast the steeper part of the ascent, and the furnace fires, +before and above them, began to flicker and glow, now sinking into darkness, +now flaming up like beacon-fires. “The workings are two thousand feet +below the surface, man!” +</p> + +<p> +“Stop!” Lindo said. “Here is some one looking for us, I +think.” +</p> + +<p> +Two women with shawls over their heads came to the side of the gig. “Be +you the doctors?” said one of them; and then in another minute the two +were following her up the side of the cutting which here confined the road. The +hillside gained, they were hurried round pit-banks and slag-heaps, and under +cranes and ruinous sinking walls, and over and under mysterious obstacles, +sometimes looming large in the gloom and sometimes lying unseen at their +feet—until they emerged at length with startling abruptness into a large +circle of dazzling light. Four great fires were burning close together, and +round them, motionless and for the most part silent, in appearance almost +apathetic, stood hundreds of dark shadows—men and women waiting for news. +</p> + +<p> +The silence and inaction of so large a crowd struck a chill to Lindo’s +heart. When he recovered himself, he was standing in the midst of a dozen rough +fellows, some half-stripped, some muffled up in pilot-jackets or coarse shiny +clothes. The crowd seemed to be watching them, and they spoke now and then to +one another in a desultory expectant fashion, from which he judged they were in +authority. +</p> + +<p> +“It is a bad job—a very bad job!” his companion was saying +nervously. “Is there anything I can do yet?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that depends, doctor,” answered one of the men, his manner +of speaking proving that he was not a mere working collier. “There is no +one up yet,” he added, eyeing the doctor dubiously. “But it does +not exactly follow that you can do nothing. Some of us have just come up, and +there is a shift of men exploring down there now. Three bodies have been +recovered, and they are at the foot of the shaft; and three poor fellows have +been found alive, of whom one has since died. The other two are within fifty +yards of the shaft, and as comfortable as we can make them. But they are +bad—too bad to come up in a bucket; and we can rig up nothing bigger at +present so there they are fixed. The question is, will you go down to +them?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Keogh’s face fell, and he shook his head. He was no longer young, and +to descend a sheer depth of five hundred yards in a bucket dangling at the end +of a makeshift rope was not in his line. “No, thank you,” he said, +“I could not do it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come, doctor,” the man persisted—he was the manager of a +neighboring colliery—“you will be there in no time.” +</p> + +<p> +“Just so,” said the surgeon drily. “It is the coming back is +the rub, you see, Mr. Peat. No, thank you, I could not.” +</p> + +<p> +The other still urged him. “These poor fellows are about as bad as they +can be, and you know if the mountain will not go to Mahomet, Mahomet must go to +the mountain.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know; and if it were a mountain, well and good,” Mr. Keogh +answered, smiling in sickly fashion as his eye strayed to a black well-like +hole close at hand—a mere hole in some loose planks surmounted by a +windlass and fringed with ugly wreckage. “But it is not. It is quite the +other thing, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Peat, the manager, shrugged his shoulders, and glanced at his companions +rather in sorrow than surprise. Lindo, standing behind the doctor, saw the +look. Till then he had stood silent. Now he pressed forward. “Did I hear +you say that one of the injured men died after he was found?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, that is so,” the manager answered, looking keenly at him, and +wondering who he was. +</p> + +<p> +“The others that are hurt—are their lives in danger?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am afraid so,” the man replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Then I have a right to be with them,” the rector answered quickly. +“I am a clergyman, and I have hastened here, fearing this might be the +case. But I have also attended an ambulance class, and I can dress a burn. +Besides, I am a younger man than our friend here, and, if you will let me down, +I will go.” +</p> + +<p> +“By George, sir!” exclaimed the manager, looking round for approval +and smiting his thigh heavily, “you are a man as well as a parson, and +down you shall go, and thank you! You may make the men more comfortable, and +any way you will put heart into them, for you have some to spare yourself. As +for danger, there is none!—Jack!”—this in a louder voice to +some one in the background—“just twitch that rope! And get that tub +up, will you? Look slippery now.” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo felt a hand on his arm and, obeying the silent gesture of the nearest +gaunt figure, stepped aside. In a twinkling the man stripped off the +parson’s long coat and put on him the pilot jacket from his own +shoulders; a second man gave Lindo a peaked cap of stiff leather in place of +his soft hat and a third fastened a pit lamp round his neck, explaining to him +how to raise the wick without unlocking the lamp, and also showing him that, if +it hung too much on one side or were upset, its flame would expire of itself. +And upon one thing Lindo was never tired of dwelling afterward—the kindly +tact of these rough men, and how by seemingly casual words, and even touches, +the roughest sought to encourage him, while ignoring the possibility of his +feeling alarm. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile Mr. Keogh, standing in a state of considerable perplexity and +discomfiture where the rector had left him, heard a well-known voice at his +elbow, and turned to find that Gregg had arrived. The younger doctor was not +the man to be awed into silence, and, as he came up, was speaking loudly. +“Hallo, Mr. Keogh!” he said. “Heard you were before me. Have +you got them all in hand? Cuts or burns mostly, eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“They are not above ground yet,” Mr. Keogh answered. He and Gregg +were not on speaking terms, but such an emergency as this was allowed to +override their estrangement. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, then we shall have to wait,” Gregg answered, looking round on +the scene with a mixture of curiosity and professional <i>aplomb</i>. “I +wish I had spared my horse. Any other medical man here?” +</p> + +<p> +“No; and they want one of us to go down in the bucket,” Keogh +explained. “There are some injured men at the foot of the shaft. I have a +wife and children, and I thought that perhaps you——” +</p> + +<p> +“Would not mind breaking my neck!” Gregg retorted with decision. +“No, thank you, not for me I hope to have a wife and children some day, +and I will keep my neck for them. Go down!” he repeated, looking round +with extreme scorn. “Pooh! No one can expect us to do it! It is these +people’s business, and they are used to it; but there is not a sane man +in the kingdom, besides, would go down that place after what has just happened. +It is a quarter of a mile as a stone falls, if it is an inch!” +</p> + +<p> +“It is all that,” assented the other, much relieved. +</p> + +<p> +“And a height makes me giddy,” Dr. Gregg added. +</p> + +<p> +“I feel the same now,” said his elder. +</p> + +<p> +“No; every man to his trade,” Gregg concluded, settling the matter +to his satisfaction. “Let them bring them up, and we will doctor them. +But while they are below ground—— Hallo!” +</p> + +<p> +His last word was an oath of surprise and anger. Happening to glance round, the +doctor saw Lindo coming forward to the shaft, and recognized him in spite of +his disguise. One look, and Gregg would cheerfully have given ten pounds either +to have had the rector away, or to have arrived a little later himself. He had +reckoned already in his own mind that, if no outsider went down, he could +scarcely be blamed for taking care of himself. But, if the rector went down, +the matter would wear a different aspect. And Dr. Gregg saw this so clearly +that he turned pale with rage and chagrin, and swore more loudly than before. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap21"></a>CHAPTER XXI.<br/> +IN PROFUNDIS.</h2> + +<p> +The young clergyman’s face, as he walked forward to the shaft, formed no +index to his mind, for while it remained calm and even wore a faint smile, he +was inwardly conscious of a strong desire to take hold of anything which +presented itself, even a straw. He stepped gravely into the tub amid a low +murmur, and, clutching the iron bar above it, felt himself at a word of command +lifted gently into the air, and swung over the shaft. For an uncomfortable five +seconds or so he remained stationary; then there was a +jerk—another—and the dark figures, the lines of faces, and the +glare of the fires leapt suddenly above his head. He found himself dropping +through space with a swift, sickening motion, as of one falling away from +himself. His heart rose into his throat. There was a loud buzzing in his ears, +and yet above this he heard the dull rattling sound of the rope being paid out. +Every other sense was spent in the stern clutch of his hands on the bar above +his head. +</p> + +<p> +In a few seconds the horrible sensation of falling passed away. He was no +longer in space with nothing stable about him, but in a small tub at the end of +a tough rope. Except for a slight swaying motion, he hardly knew that he was +still descending; and presently a faint light, more diffused than his own lamp, +grew visible. Then he came gently to a standstill, and some one held up a +lantern to his face. With difficulty he made out two huge figures standing +beside him, who laid hold of his tub and pulled it toward them until it rested +on something solid. “You are welcome,” growled one, as, aided by a +hand of each, Lindo stepped out. “You will be the doctor, I suppose, +master? Well, this way. Catch hold of my jacket.” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo obeyed, being only too glad of the help thus given him; for though the +men seemed to move about with ease and certainty, he could make out nothing but +shapeless gloom. “Now you sit right down there,” continued the +collier, when they had moved a few yards, “and you will get the sight of +your eyes in a bit.” +</p> + +<p> +He did as he was bid, and one by one the objects about him became visible. His +first feeling was one of astonishment. He had put a quarter of a mile of solid +earth between himself and the sunlight, and yet, for all he could see, he might +be merely in a cellar under a street. He found himself seated on a rough bench, +in a low-roofed, windowless, wooden cabin, strangely resembling a very dirty +London office in a fog. True, everything was black—very black. On another +bench, opposite him, sat the two colliers who had received him, their lamps +between their knees. His first impulse was to tell them hurriedly that he was +not the doctor. “I am afraid you must be disappointed,” he added, +“but I hope one will follow me down. I am a clergyman, and I want to do +something for those poor fellows, if you will take me to them.” +</p> + +<p> +The two men betrayed no surprise, but he who had spoken before quietly poked up +the wick of his lamp and held the lantern up so as to get a good view of his +face. “Ay, ay,” he said, nodding, as he lowered it again. “I +thought you weren’t unbeknown to me. You are the parson we fetched to +poor Lucas a while ago. Well, Jim will have a rare cageful of his friends with +him to-night.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector shuddered. Such apathy, such matter-of-factness was new to him. But +though his heart sank as the collier rose and, swinging his lamp in his hand, +passed through the doorway, he made haste to follow him; and the man’s +next words, “You had best look to your steps, master, for there is a deal +of rubbish come down”—pointing as they did to a material +danger—brought him, in the diversion of his thoughts, something like +relief. +</p> + +<p> +The road on which he found himself, being the main heading or highway of the +pit, was a good wide one. It was even possible to stand upright in it. Here and +there, however, it was partially blocked by falls of coal caused by the +explosion, and over one of these his guide put out his hand to assist him. +Lindo’s lamp was by this time burning low. The pitman silently took it +and raised the wick, a grim smile distorting his face as he handed it back. +“You will be about the first of the gentry,” he muttered, “as +has been down this pit without paying his footing.” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo took the words for a hint, and was shocked by the man’s +insensibility. “My good fellow,” he answered, “if that is +all, you shall have what you like another time. But for heaven’s sake let +us think of these poor fellows now.” +</p> + +<p> +The man turned on him and swore furiously. “Do you think I meant +that?” he cried, with another violent oath. +</p> + +<p> +The rector recoiled, not at the sound of the man’s profanity, but in +disgust at his own mistake. Then he held out his hand. “My man,” he +said, “I beg your pardon. It was I who was wrong.” +</p> + +<p> +The giant looked at him with another stare, but made no answer, and a dozen +steps brought them to another cabin. Across the doorway—there was no +door—hung a rough curtain of matting. This the man raised, and, holding +his lamp over the threshold, invited the rector to look in. “I +guess,” he added significantly, “that you would not have made that +mistake, master, after seeing this.” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo peered in. On the floor, which was little more than six feet square, lay +four quiet figures, motionless, and covered with coarse sacking. No human eye +falling on them could have taken them for anything but what they were. The +visitor shuddered, as his guide let the curtain fall again and muttered with a +backward jerk of the head, “Two of them I came down with this +morning—in the cage.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector had nothing to answer, and the man, preceding him to a cabin a few +yards farther on, invited him by a sign to enter, and himself turned back the +way they had come. A faint moaning warned Lindo, before he raised the matting, +what he must expect to see. Instinctively, as he stepped in, his eyes sought +the floor; and although three pitmen crouching upon one of the benches rose and +made way for him, he hardly noticed them, so occupied was he with pitiful +looking at the two men lying on coarse beds on the floor. They were bandaged +and muffled almost out of human form. One of them was rolling his sightless +face monotonously to and fro, pouring out an unceasing stream of delirious +talk. The other, whose bright eyes met the newcomer’s with eager longing, +paused in the murmur which seemed to ease his pain, and whispered, +“Doctor!” so hopefully that the sound went straight to +Lindo’s heart. +</p> + +<p> +To undeceive him, and to explain to the others that he was not the expected +surgeon, was a bitter task with which to begin his ministrations; but he was +greatly cheered to find that, even in their disappointment, they took his +coming as a kindly thing, and eyed him with surprised gratitude. He told them +the latest news from the bank—that a cage would be rigged up in a few +hours at farthest—and then, conquering his physical shrinking, he knelt +down by the least injured man and tried to turn his surgical knowledge to +account. It was not much he could do, but it certainly eased the poor +man’s present sufferings. A bandage was laid more smoothly here, a little +cotton-wool readjusted there, a change of posture managed, a few hopeful words +uttered which helped the patient to fight against the shock—so that +presently he sank into a troubled sleep. Lindo tried to do his best for the +other also, terrible as was the task; but the man’s excitement and +unceasing restlessness, as well as his more serious injuries, made help here of +little avail. +</p> + +<p> +When he rose, he found one of the watchers holding a cup of brandy ready for +him; and, sitting down upon the bench behind, he discovered a coat laid there +to make the seat more comfortable, though no one seemed to have done it, or to +be conscious of his surprise. They talked low to him, and to one another, in a +disjointed taciturn fashion, with immense gaps and long intervals of silence. +He learned that there were twenty-seven men yet missing, but it was thought +that the afterdamp had killed them all. Those already found alive had been in +the main heading, where the current of air gave them a better chance. +</p> + +<p> +One or other of the workers was continually going out to listen for the return +of the party who were exploring the workings near the foot of the other shaft; +and once or twice a member of this party, exhausted or ill, looked in for a +dose of tea or brandy, and then stumbled out again to get himself conveyed to +the upper air. These looked curiously at the stranger, but, on some information +being muttered in their ears, made a point on going out of giving him a nod +which was full of tacit acknowledgment. +</p> + +<p> +In a quiet interval he looked at his watch and wound it up, finding the time to +be half-past two. The familiar action carried his mind back to his neat, +spotless bedroom at the rectory and the cares and anxieties of everyday life, +which had been forgotten for the last five hours. Could it be so short a time, +he asked himself, since he was troubled by them? It seemed years ago. It seemed +as if a gulf, deep as the shaft down which he had come, divided him from them. +And yet the moment his thoughts returned to them the gulf became less, and +presently, although his eyes were still fixed upon the poor collier’s +unquiet head and the murky cabin with its smoky lamp, he was really back in +Claversham, busied with those thoughts again, and pondering on the time when he +should be above ground. The things that had been important before rose into +importance again, but their relative values among themselves were altered, in +his eyes at any rate. With what he had seen and heard in the last few hours +fresh in his mind, with the injured men lying still in his sight—one of +them never to see the sun again—he could not but take a different, a +wider, a less selfish view of life and its aims. His ideal of existence grew +higher and purer, his notion of success more noble. In the light of his own +self-forgetting energy and of others’ pain he saw things as they affected +his neighbor rather than himself and so presently—not in haste, but +slowly in the watches of the night—he formed a resolution which shall be +told presently. The determinations to which men come at such times are, in nine +cases out of ten, as transitory as the emotions on which they are based. But +this time, and with this man, it was not to be so. Kate Bonamy’s words, +bringing before his mind the responsibility which rested upon him, had in a +degree prepared him to examine his position gravely and from a lofty +standpoint; so that the considerations which now assailed him could scarcely +fail to have due and lasting weight with him, and to leave impressions both +deep and permanent. +</p> + +<p> +He was presently roused from his reverie by a sound which caused his companions +to rise to their feet with the first signs of excitement they had betrayed in +their manner. It was the murmur of voices in the heading, which, beginning far +away, rapidly approached and gathered strength. Going to the door of the cabin, +he saw lights in the gallery becoming each instant more clear. Then the forms +of men coming on by twos and threes rose out of the darkness. And so the +procession wound in, and Lindo found himself suddenly surrounded—where a +moment before no sounds but painful ones had been heard—by the hum and +bustle, the quick question and answers, of a crowd. For the men brought good +news. The missing were found; and though many of them were burned or scorched, +and others were suffering from the effects of the afterdamp, the explorers +brought back with them no still, ominous burden, nor even any case of hopeless +injury, such as that of the poor fellow in delirium over whom his mates bent +with the strange impassive patience which seems to be a quality peculiar to +those who get their living underground. +</p> + +<p> +Not that Lindo at the time had leisure to consider their behavior. The injured +were brought to him as a matter of course, and he did what he could with simple +bandages and liniment to keep the air from their wounds, and to enable the men +to reach the surface with as little pain as possible. For more than an hour, as +he passed from one to the other, his hands were never empty; he could think +only of his work. The deputy-manager, who had been leading the rescue party, +was thoroughly prostrated. The rest never doubted that the stranger was a +surgeon, and it was curious to see their surprise when the general taciturnity +allowed the news to spread that he was only a parson. They were like savants +with a specimen which, known to belong to a particular species, has none of the +class attributes, and sets at defiance all preconceived ideas upon the subject. +He, too, when he was at length free to look about him, found matter for +astonishment in his own sensations. The cabin and the roadway outside, where +the men sat patiently waiting their turns to ascend, had become almost homelike +in his eyes. The lounging figures here thrown into relief by a score of lamps, +there lost in the gloom of the background, had grown familiar. He knew that +this was here and that was there, and had his receptacles and conveniences, his +special attendants and helpers. In a word, he had made the place his own, yet +without forgetting old habits—for more than once he caught himself +looking at his watch, and wondering when it would be day. +</p> + +<p> +Toward seven o’clock a message directed to him by name came down. A cage +would be rigged up within the hour. Before that period elapsed, however, he was +summoned to see the poor fellow die who had been delirious ever since he was +found and who now passed away in the same state. It was a trying scene coming +just when the clergyman’s wrought-up nerves were beginning to feel a +reaction—the more trying as all looked to him to do anything that could +be done. But that was nothing; and he felt gravely thankful when the poor +man’s sufferings were over and the throng of swarthy faces melted from +the open doorway. +</p> + +<p> +He sat apart a little after that until a commotion outside the cabin and a +cheery voice asking for Mr. Lindo summoned him to the door, where he found the +same manager who had sent him down the night before, and who now greeted him +warmly. “It is not for me to thank you,” Mr. Peat +said—“I have nothing to do with this pit—the owner, to whom +what has happened will be reported, will do that; but personally I am obliged +to you, Mr. Lindo, and I am sure the men are.” +</p> + +<p> +“I wanted only to be of help,” the clergyman answered simply. +“There was not much I could do.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that is a matter of opinion,” the manager replied. “I +have mine, and I know that the men who have come up have theirs. However, here +is the cage; perhaps you will not mind going up with poor Edwards?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not at all,” said the rector; and, following the manager to the +cage, he stepped into it without any suspicion that this was a trick on the +part of Mr. Peat to insure his volunteer’s services being recognized. +</p> + +<p> +He found the ascent a very different thing from the descent. The steady upward +motion was not unpleasant, and long before the surface was reached his eyes, +accustomed to darkness, detected a pale gleam of light stealing downward, and +could distinguish the damp brickwork gliding by. Presently the light grew +stronger—grew dazzling in its wonderful whiteness. “We are going up +nicely,” his companion murmured, remembering in his gratitude that the +ascent, which was a trifle to him even with shattered nerves, might be +unpleasant to the other—“we are nearly there.” +</p> + +<p> +And so they were; and slowly and gently they rose into the broad daylight and +the sunshine which seemed to proclaim to the rector’s heart that sorrow +may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning. +</p> + +<p> +Standing densely packed round the pit’s mouth was a great crowd—a +crowd, at any rate, of many hundreds. They greeted the appearance of the cage +with a quick drawing-in of the breath and a murmur of pity. Lindo’s face +and hands were as black as any collier’s; his dress seemed at the first +glance as theirs. But as he helped to lift his injured companion out and carry +him to the stretcher which stood at hand, the word who he was ran round; and, +though no one spoke, the loudest tribute could scarcely have been more eloquent +than the respect with which the rough assemblage fell away to right and left +that he might pass out to the trap which had been thoughtfully +provided—first to carry him to the vicarage for a wash, and afterward to +take him home. His heart was full as he walked down the lane, every man +standing uncovered, and the women gazing on him with unspoken blessings in +their eyes. +</p> + +<p> +A very few hours before he had felt at war with the world. He had said, not +perhaps that all men were liars, but that they were unjust, full of prejudice +and narrowness, and ill-will; that, above all, they judged without charity. +Now, as the pony-cart rattled down the road through the cutting, and the sunny +landscape, the winding river, and the plain round Claversham opened before him, +he felt far otherwise. He longed to do more for others than he had done. He +dwelt with wonder on the gratitude which services so slight had evoked from men +so rough as those from whom he had just parted; and unconsciously he placed the +balance in their favor to the general account of the world, and acknowledged +himself its debtor. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap22"></a>CHAPTER XXII.<br/> +THE RECTOR’S DECISION.</h2> + +<p> +The church clock was striking nine as the rector, jogging along behind the +little pony, came in sight of the turnpike-house outside the town. He had no +overcoat, and the drive had chilled him; and, anxious at once to warm himself +and to reach the rectory as quietly as possible, he bade the driver stop at the +gate and set him down. The lad had been strictly charged to see the parson +home, and would have demurred, but Lindo persisted good-humoredly, and had his +way. In two minutes he was striding briskly along the road, his shoulders +squared, and the night’s reflections still running like a rich purple +thread through the common stuff of his every-day thoughts. +</p> + +<p> +In this mood, which the pure morning air and crisp sunshine tended to favor and +prolong, he came at a corner plump upon Mr. Bonamy, who, like all angular, +uncomfortable men, was an early riser, and had this morning chosen to extend +his before-breakfast walk in the direction of Baerton. The lawyer’s +energy had already been rewarded. He had met Mr. Keogh, and learned not only +the earlier details of the accident—which were, indeed, known to all +Claversham, for the town had sat up into the small hours listening for wheels +and discussing the catastrophe—but had further received a minute +description of the rector’s conduct. Consequently his thoughts were +already busy with the clergyman when, turning a corner, he came unexpectedly +upon him. +</p> + +<p> +Lindo met his glance and looked away hastily. The rector had been anxious to +avoid, by going home at once, any appearance of parading what he had done, and +he would have passed on with a brief good-morning. But the lawyer seemed to be +differently disposed. He stopped short in the middle of the path, so that the +clergyman could not pass him without rudeness, and nodded a jerky greeting. +“You have not walked all the way, I suppose, Mr. Lindo?” he said, +his keen small eyes reading the other’s face like a book. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” the rector answered, coloring uncomfortably under his gaze. +“I drove as far as the turnpike, Mr. Bonamy.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, you may think yourself lucky to be well out of it,” the +lawyer rejoined, with a dry smile. “To be here at all, indeed,” he +continued, with a gesture of the hand which seemed meant to indicate the +sunshine and the upper air. “When a man does a foolhardy thing he does +not always escape, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +The younger man reddened. But this morning he had his temper well under control +and he merely answered, “I thought I was called upon to do what I did, +Mr. Bonamy. But of course that is a matter of opinion. Perhaps I was wrong, +perhaps right. I did what I thought best at the moment, and I am +satisfied.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy shrugged his shoulders. “Oh, well, every man to his +notion,” he said. “I do not approve, myself, of people running +risks which do not lie within the scope of their business. And as nothing has +happened to you——” +</p> + +<p> +“The risk of anything happening,” the rector rejoined, with warmth, +“was so small that the thing is not worth discussing, Mr. Bonamy. There +is a matter, however,” he continued, changing the subject on a sudden +impulse, “which I think I may as well mention to you now as later. You, +as churchwarden, have in fact, a right to be informed of it. +I——” +</p> + +<p> +“You are cold,” said Mr. Bonamy abruptly. “Allow me to turn +with you.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector bowed and complied. The request, however, had checked the current of +his speech, even the current of his thoughts, and he did not finish his +sentence. He felt, indeed, for a moment a temptation as sudden as it was +strong. He saw at a glance what his resolve meant. He discerned that what had +appeared to him in the isolation of the night an act of dignified +self-surrender must, and would, seem to others an acknowledgment of +defeat—almost an acknowledgment of dishonor. He recalled, as in a flash, +all the episodes of the struggle between himself and his companion. And he +pictured the latter’s triumph. He wavered. +</p> + +<p> +But the events of the night had not been lost upon him, and, after a brief +hesitation, he set the seal on his purpose. “You are aware, I know, Mr. +Bonamy,” he said, “of the circumstances under which, in Lord +Dynmore’s absence, I accepted the living here.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perfectly,” said the lawyer drily. +</p> + +<p> +“He has made those circumstances the subject of a grave charge against +me,” the rector continued, a touch of hauteur in his tone. “That +you have heard also, I know. Well, I desire to say once more that I repudiate +that charge in the fullest and widest sense.” +</p> + +<p> +“So I understand,” Mr. Bonamy murmured. He walked along by his +companion’s side, his face set and inscrutable. If he felt any surprise +at the communication now being made to him he had the skill to hide it. +</p> + +<p> +“I repudiate it, you understand!” the clergyman repeated, stepping +out more quickly in his excitement, and glaring angrily into vacancy. “It +is a false and wicked charge! But it does not affect me. I do not care a jot +for it. It does not in any sense force me to do what I am going to do. If that +were all, I should not dream of resigning the living, but, on the contrary, +would hold it, as a few days ago I had determined to hold it, in the face of +all opposition. However,” he continued, lowering his tone, “I have +now examined my position in regard to the parish rather than the patron, and I +have come to a different conclusion, Mr. Bonamy—namely, to place my +resignation in the proper hands as speedily as possible.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy nodded gently and silently. He did not speak, he did not even look +at the clergyman; and this placid acquiescence irritated the young man into +adding a word he had not intended to say. “I tell you this as my +church-warden, Mr. Bonamy,” he continued stiffly, “and not as +desiring or expecting any word of sympathy or regret from you. On the +contrary,” he added, with some bitterness, “I am aware that my +departure can be only a relief to you. We have been opposed to one another +since my first day here.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very true,” said Mr. Bonamy. “I suppose you have +considered——” +</p> + +<p> +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +“The effect which last night’s work may have on the relations +between you and Lord Dynmore?” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not understand you,” the rector answered haughtily, and yet +with some wonder. What did the man mean? +</p> + +<p> +“You know, I suppose,” Mr. Bonamy retorted, turning slightly so as +to command a view of his companion’s face, “that he is the owner of +the Big Pit at Baerton from which you have just come?” +</p> + +<p> +“Lord Dynmore is?” +</p> + +<p> +“To be sure.” +</p> + +<p> +A flush of crimson swept over the rector’s brow and left him red and +frowning. “I did not know that!” he said, his teeth set together. +</p> + +<p> +“So I perceive,” the lawyer replied, with a nod. “But I can +reassure you. It is not at all likely to affect the earl’s plans. He is +an obstinate man, though in some points a good-natured one, and he will most +certainly accept your resignation if you send it in. But here you are at +home.” He paused, standing awkwardly by the clergyman’s side. Then +he added, “It is a comfortable house. I do not think that there is a more +comfortable house in Claversham.” +</p> + +<p> +He retired a few steps into the churchyard as he spoke, and stood looking up at +the massive old-fashioned front of the rectory, as if he had never seen the +house before. The clergyman, anxious to be indoors and alone, shot an impatient +glance at him, and waited for him to go. But he did not go, and presently +something in his intent gaze drew Lindo, too, into the churchyard, and the two +ill-assorted companions looked up together at the old gray house. The early sun +shone aslant on it, burnishing the half-open windows. In the porch a robin was +hopping to and fro. “It is a comfortable, roomy house,” the lawyer +repeated. +</p> + +<p> +“It is,” the rector answered slowly, as if the words were wrung +from him. And he, too, stood looking up at it as if he were fascinated. +</p> + +<p> +“A man might grow old in it,” murmured Mr. Bonamy. There was a +slight, but very unusual, flush on his parchment-colored face, and his eyes, +when he turned with an abrupt movement to his companion, did not rise above the +latter’s waistcoat. “Comfortably too, I should say,” he added +querulously, rattling the money in his pockets. “I think if I were you I +would reconsider my determination. I think I would, do you know? As it is, what +you have told me will not go any farther. You did one foolish thing last night. +I would not do another to-day, if I were you, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +And he turned abruptly away—his head down, his coat-tails swinging, and +both his hands thrust deep into his trouser-pockets—such a shrewd, +angular, ungainly figure as only a small country town can show. He left the +rector standing before his rectory in a state of profound surprise and +bewilderment. The young man felt something very like a lump in his throat as he +turned to go in. He discerned that the lawyer had meant to do a kind, nay, a +generous action; and yet if there was a man in the world whom he had judged +incapable of such magnanimity it was Mr. Bonamy! He went in not only touched, +but ashamed. Here, if he had not already persuaded himself that the world was +less ill-conditioned than he had lately thought it, was another and a +surprising lesson! +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile Mr. Bonamy went home, and finding his family already at breakfast, +sat down to the meal in a very snappish humor. The girls were quick to detect +the cloud on his brow, and promptly supplied his wants, forbearing, whatever +their curiosity, to make any present attempt to satisfy it. Jack was either +less observant or more hardy. He remarked that Mr. Bonamy was late, and +elicited only a grunt. A further statement that the morning was more like April +than February gained no answer at all. Still undismayed, Jack tried again, +plunging into the subject which the three had been discussing before the lawyer +entered. “Did you hear anything of Lindo, sir?” he asked, buttering +his toast. +</p> + +<p> +“I saw him,” the lawyer said curtly. +</p> + +<p> +“Was he all right?” +</p> + +<p> +“More right than he deserved to be!” Mr. Bonamy snarled. +“What right had he down the pit at all? Gregg did not go.” +</p> + +<p> +“More shame to Gregg, I think!” Jack said. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy prudently shifted his ground, and got back to the rector. +“Well, all I can say is that a more foolish, reckless, useless piece of +idiocy I never heard of in my life!” he declared in a tone of scorn. +</p> + +<p> +“I call it glorious!” said Daintry, looking dreamily across the +table and slowly withdrawing an egg-spoon from her mouth. “I shall never +say anything against him again.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy looked at her for an instant as if he would annihilate her. And then +he went on with his breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +Apparently, however, the outburst had relieved him, for presently he began on +his own account. +</p> + +<p> +“Has your friend any private means?” he asked, casting an +ungracious glance at the barrister, and returning at once to his buttered +toast. +</p> + +<p> +“Who? Lindo, do you mean?” Jack replied in surprise. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Something, I should say. Perhaps a hundred a year. Why?” +</p> + +<p> +“Because, if that is all he has,” the lawyer growled, buttering a +fresh piece of toast and frowning at it savagely, “I think that you had +better see him and prevent him making a fool of himself. That is all.” +</p> + +<p> +His tone meant more than his words expressed. Kate’s eyes sought +Jack’s in alarm, only to be instantly averted. Though she had the urn +before her, she turned red and white, and had to bury her face in her cup to +hide her discomposure. Yet she need not have feared. Mr. Bonamy was otherwise +engaged, and as for Jack, her embarrassment told him nothing of which he was +not already aware. He knew that his service was and must be a thankless and +barren service—that to him fell the empty part of the slave in the +triumph. Had he not within the last few hours—when the news that the +rector had descended the Big Pit to tend the wounded and comfort the dying +first reached the town, and a dozen voices were loud in his praise—had he +not seen Kate’s face now bright with triumph and now melting with tender +anxiety. Had he not felt a bitter pang of jealousy as he listened to his +friend’s praises? and had he not crushed down the feeling manfully, +bravely, heroically, and spoken as loudly, ay, and as cordially after an +instant’s effort, as the most fervent? +</p> + +<p> +Yes, he had done all this and suffered all this, being one of those who believe +that +</p> + +<div class="poem2"> +<p class="t0"> +Loyalty is still the same,<br/> +Whether it win or lose the game:<br/> +True as the dial to the sun,<br/> +Although it be not shone upon. +</p> +</div> + +<p class="continue"> +And he was not going to flinch now. He put no more questions to Mr. Bonamy, +but, when breakfast was finished, he got up and went out. It needed not the +covert glance which he shot at Kate as he disappeared, to assure her that he +was going about her unspoken errand. +</p> + +<p> +Five minutes saw him face to face with the rector on the latter’s +hearth-rug. Or, rather, to be accurate, five minutes saw him staring irate and +astonished at his host while Lindo, with one foot on the fender and his eyes on +the fire, seemed very willing to avoid his gaze. “You have made up your +mind to resign!” Jack exclaimed, in accents almost awe-stricken. +“You are joking!” +</p> + +<p> +But the rector, still looking down, shook his head. “No, Jack, I am +not,” he said slowly. “I am in earnest.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then may I ask when you came to this extraordinary resolution?” +the barrister retorted. “And why?” +</p> + +<p> +“Last night; and because—well, because I thought it right,” +was the answer. +</p> + +<p> +“You thought it right?” +</p> + +<p> +Jack’s tone was a fine mixture of wonder, contempt, and offence. It made +Lindo wince, but it did not shake his resolution. “Yes,” he said +firmly. “That is so.” +</p> + +<p> +“And that is all you are going to tell me, is it? You put yourself in my +hands a few days ago. You took my advice and acted upon it, and now, without a +word of explanation, you throw me over! Good heavens! I have no patience with +you!” Jack added, beginning to walk up and down the room. “Is not +the position the same to-day as yesterday? Tell me that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” the rector began, turning and speaking slowly, “the +truth is——” +</p> + +<p> +“No!” cried the barrister, interrupting him ruthlessly. “Tell +me this first. Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday?” +</p> + +<p> +“It is, but the view I take of it is different,” the young +clergyman answered earnestly. “Let me explain, Jack. When I agreed with +you a few days ago that the proper course for me to follow, the course which +would most fitly assert my honesty and good faith, was to retain the living in +spite of threats and opposition, I had my own interests and my own dignity +chiefly in view. I looked upon the question as one solely between Lord Dynmore +and myself; and I felt, rightly as I still think, that, as a man falsely +accused by another man, I had a right to repel the charge by the only practical +means in my power—by maintaining my position and defying him to do his +worst.” +</p> + +<p> +He paused. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Jack drily. +</p> + +<p> +But the rector did not continue at once, and when he did speak it was with +evident effort. He first went back to the fire, and stood gazing into it in the +old attitude, with his head slightly bowed and his foot on the fender. The +posture was one of humility, and so unlike the man, that it struck Jack and +touched him strangely. At last Lindo did continue. “Well,” he said +slowly, “that was all right as far as it went. My mistake lay in taking +too narrow a view. I thought only of myself and Lord Dynmore, when I should +have been thinking of the parish and of—a word I know you are not very +fond of—the Church. I should have remembered that with this accusation +hanging over me I could not hope to do much good among my people; and that to +many of them I should seem an interloper, a man clinging obstinately to +something not his own nor fairly acquired. In a word, I ought to have +remembered that for the future I should be useless for good and might, on the +other hand, become a stumbling-block and occasion for scandal—both inside +the parish and outside. You see what I mean, I am sure.” +</p> + +<p> +“I see,” quoth Jack contemptuously, “that you need a great +many words to make out your case. What I do not think you have considered is +the inference which will be drawn from your resignation—you will be taken +to have confessed yourself in the wrong.” +</p> + +<p> +“I cannot help that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Will not that be a scandal?” +</p> + +<p> +“It will, at any rate, be one soon forgotten.” +</p> + +<p> +“Now, I tell you what!” Jack exclaimed, standing still and +confronting the other with the air of a man bent on speaking his mind though +the heavens should fall. “This is just a piece of absurd Quixotism, +Lindo. You are a poor man, without means and without influence; and you are +going, for the sake of a foolish idea—a mere speculative scruple—to +give up an income and a house and a useful sphere of work such as you will +never get again! You are going to do that, and go back—to what? To a +miserable curacy—don’t wince, my friend, for that is what you are +going to do—and an income one-fifth of that which you have been spending +for the last six months! Now the sole question is, are you quite an +idiot?” +</p> + +<p> +“You are pretty plain-spoken,” said the rector, smiling feebly. +</p> + +<p> +“I mean to be!” was Jack’s uncompromising retort. “I +have asked you, and I want an answer—are you a fool?” +</p> + +<p> +“I hope not.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then you will give up this fool’s notion?” Jack replied +viciously. +</p> + +<p> +But the rector’s only answer was a shake of the head. He did not look +round. Had he done so, he would have seen that, though Jack’s keen face +was flushed with anger and annoyance, his eyes were moist and wore an +expression at variance with his tone. +</p> + +<p> +He missed that, however; and Jack made one more attempt. “Look +here,” he said bluntly; “have you considered that if you stop you +will find your path a good deal smoothed by last night’s work?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, I have not,” the rector answered stubbornly. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, you will find it so, you may be sure of that! Why, man +alive!” Jack continued with vehemence, “you are going to be the +hero of the place for the time. No one will believe anything against you, +except, perhaps, Gregg and a few beasts of his kind. Whereas, if you go now, do +you know who will get your berth?” +</p> + +<p> +“No.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack rapped out the name. “Clode! Clode, and no one else, I will be +bound!” he said. “And you do not love him.” +</p> + +<p> +The rector had not expected the reply. He started, and, removing his foot from +the fender, turned sharply so as to face his friend. “No,” he said +slowly, “I do not think I do like him. I consider that he has behaved +badly, Jack. He has not stood by me as he should have done, or as I would have +stood by him had our positions been reversed. I do not think he has called here +once since the bazaar, except on business, and then I was out. I had planned, +indeed, to see him to-day and ask him what it meant, and, if I found he had +come to an adverse opinion in my matter, to give him notice. But +now——” +</p> + +<p> +“You will make him a present of the living instead,” Jack said +grimly. +</p> + +<p> +“I do not know why he should get it,” the rector answered, with a +frown, “more than any one else.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is the common report that he will,” Jack retorted. “As +for that, however——” +</p> + +<p> +But why follow him through all the resources of his art? He put forth every +effort—perhaps against his own better judgment, for a man will do for his +friend what he will not do for himself—to persuade the rector to recall +his decision. And he failed. He succeeded, indeed, in wringing the young +clergyman’s heart and making him wince at the thought of his barren +future and his curate’s triumph; but there his success ended. He made no +progress toward inducing him to change his mind; and presently he found that +all the arguments he advanced were met by a set formula, to which the rector +seemed to cling as in self-defence. +</p> + +<p> +“It is no good, Jack,” he answered—and if he said it once, he +said it half a dozen times—“it is no good! I cannot take any +one’s advice on this subject. The responsibility is mine, and I cannot +shift it! I must try to do right according to my own conscience!” +</p> + +<p> +Jack did not know that the words were Kate’s, and that every time the +rector repeated them he had Kate in his mind. But he saw that they were +unanswerable; and when he had listened to them for the sixth time he took up +his hat in a huff. “Well, have our own way!” he said. “After +all, you are right. It is your business and not mine. Give Clode the living if +you like!” +</p> + +<p> +And he went out sharply. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap23"></a>CHAPTER XXIII.<br/> +THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS.</h2> + +<p> +Seldom, if ever, had the curate passed a week so harassing as that which was +ushered in by the bazaar, and was destined to end—though he did not know +this—in the colliery accident. During these seven days he managed to run +through a perfect gamut of feelings. He rose each day in a different mood. One +day he was hopeful, confident, assured of success; the next fearful, +despondent, inclined to give up all for lost. One day he went about telling +himself that the rector would not resign; that he would not resign himself in +his place; that people were mad to say he would; that men do not resign livings +so easily; that the very circumstances of the case must compel the rector to +stand his ground. The next he saw everything in a different light. He +appreciated the impossibility of a man attacked on so many sides maintaining +his position for any length of time. One hour he bitterly regretted that he had +cut himself off from his chief, the next he congratulated himself as sincerely +on being untrammelled by any but a formal bond. Why, people might even have +expected him, had he strongly supported the rector, to refuse the living! +</p> + +<p> +He saw Laura several times during the week, but he did not open to her the +extent of his hopes and fears. He shrank from doing so out of a natural prudent +reticence; which after all meant only the refraining from putting into words +things perfectly understood. To some extent he kept up between them the thin +veil of appearances, which many who go through life in closest companionship, +preserve to the end, though each has long ago found it transparent. But though +he said nothing, confining the tumult of his feelings to his own breast, he was +not blind, and he soon perceived that Laura shared his suspense, and was +watching the rector’s fortunes with an interest as selfish and an eye as +cold as his own. Which, far from displeasing him, rather increased his ardor. +</p> + +<p> +As the days passed by, however, bringing only the sickness of hope deferred and +tidings of the rector’s sturdy determination to hold what he had got, the +curate began, not in a mere passing mood, but, on grounds of reason and +calculation, to lose hope. Every tongue in the town was wagging about Lindo. My +lord was, or was supposed to be, setting the engines of the law in motion. Mr. +Bonamy was believed, probably with less reason, to be contemplating an appeal +to the bishop and the Court of Arches. In a word, all the misfortunes which +Clode had foreseen were accumulating about the devoted head; and yet—and +yet it was a question whether the owner of the head was a penny the worse! +Perhaps some day he might be. The earl was a great man, with a long purse, and +he might yet have his way. But this was not likely to happen, as the curate now +began to see, until long after the Rev. Stephen Clode’s connection with +the parish and claim upon the living should have become things of the past. +</p> + +<p> +On the top of this conviction, which sufficiently depressed him, came the news +of the colliery accident—news which did not reach him until late at +night. It plunged him into the depth’s of despair. He cursed the ill-luck +which had withheld from him the opportunity of distinguishing himself, and had +granted it to the rector. He saw how fatally the affair would strengthen the +latter’s hands. And in effect he gave up. He resigned himself to despair. +He had not the spirit to go out, but sat until long after noon, brooding +miserably over the fire, his table littered with unremoved breakfast things, +and his mind in a similar state of slovenly disorder. That was a day, a +miserable day, he long remembered. +</p> + +<p> +About half-past two he made an effort to pull himself together. Mechanically +putting a book in his pocket, he took his hat and went out, with the intention +of paying two or three visits in his district. He had pride enough left to +excite him to the effort, and sufficient sense to recognize its supreme +importance. But, even so, before he reached the street he was dreaming +again—the old dreary dreams. He started when a voice behind him said +brusquely, “Going your rounds, I see! Well, there is nothing like +sticking to business, whatever is on foot. Shall I have to congratulate you +this time?” +</p> + +<p> +He knew the voice and turned round, a scowl on his dark face. The speaker was +Gregg—Gregg wearing an air of unusual jauntiness and gaiety. It fell from +him, however, as he met the other’s eyes, leaving him, metaphorically +speaking, naked and ashamed. The doctor stood in wholesome dread of the +curate’s sharp tongue and biting irony, nor would he have accosted him in +so free-and-easy a manner now, had he not been a little lifted above himself by +something he had just learned. +</p> + +<p> +“Congratulate me? What do you mean?” Clode replied, turning on him +with the uncompromising directness which is more “upsetting” to a +man uncertain of himself than any retort, however discourteous. +</p> + +<p> +“What do I mean?” the doctor answered, striving to cover his +discomfiture with a feeble smile. “Well, no harm, at any rate, Clode. I +hope I shall have to congratulate you. But if you are going +to——” +</p> + +<p> +“On what?” interrupted the curate sternly. “On what are you +going to congratulate me?” +</p> + +<p> +“Haven’t you heard the news?” Gregg said in surprise. +</p> + +<p> +“What news? Of the pit accident?” Clode answered, restraining with +difficulty a terrible outburst of passion. “Why I should think there is +not a fool within three counties has not heard it by this time!” +</p> + +<p> +He almost swore at the man, and was turning away, when something in the +doctor’s “No, no!” struck him, excited as he was, as +peculiar. “Then what is it?” he said, hanging on his heel, half +curious and half in scorn. +</p> + +<p> +“You have not heard about the rector?” +</p> + +<p> +The curate glared. “About the rector?” he said in a mechanical way. +A sudden stillness fell on his face and tone at mention of the name. “No, +what of him?” he continued, after another pause. +</p> + +<p> +“You have not heard that he is resigning?” Gregg asked. +</p> + +<p> +The curate’s eyes flashed with returning anger. “No,” he said +grimly. “Nor any one else out of Bedlam!” +</p> + +<p> +“But it is so! It is true, I tell you!” the doctor answered in the +excitement of conviction. “I have just seen a man who had it from the +archdeacon, who left the rectory not an hour ago. He is going to resign at +once.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate did not again deny the truth of the story. But he seemed to Gregg, +watching eagerly for some sign of appreciation, to take the news coolly, +considering how important it was to him. He stood silent a moment, looking +thoughtfully down the street, and then shrugged his shoulders. That was all. +Gregg did not see the little pulse which began to beat so furiously and +suddenly in his cheek, nor hear the buzzing which for a few seconds rendered +him deaf to the shrill cries of the schoolboys playing among the pillars of the +market hall. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Lindo has changed his mind since yesterday, then,” Clode said +at last, speaking in his ordinary rather contemptuous tone. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I heard he was talking big then,” replied the doctor, +delighted with his success. “Defying the earl, and all the rest of it. +That was quite in his line. But I never heard that much came of his talking. +However, you are bound to stick up for him, I suppose.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate frowned a little at that—why, the doctor did not +understand—and then the two parted. Gregg went on his way to carry the +news to others, and Clode, after standing a moment in thought, turned his steps +toward the Town House. The sky had grown cloudy, the day cold and raw. The +leafless avenue and silent shrubberies through which he strode presented but a +wintry prospect to the common eye, but for him the air was full of sunshine and +green leaves and the songs of birds. From despair to hope, from a prison to a +palace, he had leapt at a single bound. In the first intoxication of confidence +he could even spare a moment to regret that his hands were not <i>quite</i> +clean. He felt a passing remorse for the doing of one or two things, as +needless, it now turned out, as they had been questionable. Nay, he could +afford to shudder, with a luxurious sense of danger safely passed, at the risks +he had been so foolish as to run; thanking Providence that his folly had not +landed him, as he now saw that it easily might have landed him, in such trouble +as would have effectually tripped up his rising fortunes. +</p> + +<p> +He reached the Town House in a perfect glow of moral worth and +self-gratulation; and he was already half-way across the drawing-room before he +perceived that it contained, besides Mrs. Hammond and her daughter, a third +person. The third person was the rector. Except in church the two men had not +met since the day of the bazaar, and both were unpleasantly surprised. Lindo +rose slowly from a seat in one of the windows, and, without stepping forward, +stood silently looking at his curate, as one requiring an explanation, not +offering a greeting; while Clode felt something of a shock, for he discerned at +once that the situation would admit of no half measures. In the presence of +Mrs. Hammond, to whom he had expressed his view of the rector’s conduct, +he could not adopt the cautious apologetic tone which he would probably have +used had he met Lindo alone. He was fairly caught. But he was not a coward, and +before the tell-tale flush had well mounted to his brow he had determined on +his <i>rôle</i>. +</p> + +<p> +Half-way across the room he stopped, and looked at Mrs. Hammond. “I +thought you were alone,” he said with an air of constraint, partly real, +partly assumed. +</p> + +<p> +“There is only the rector here,” she answered bluntly. And then she +added, with a little spice of malice, for Mr. Clode had not been a favorite +with her since his defection, “I suppose you are not afraid to meet +him?” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly not,” the curate answered, thus challenged. And he +turned haughtily to meet the rector’s angry gaze. “I am not aware +that I have any need to be. I am glad to see that you are none the worse for +your gallant conduct last night,” he added with perfect <i>aplomb</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you,” Lindo answered, choking down his indignation with an +effort. For a week—for a whole week—this, his chosen lieutenant, +had not been near him in his trouble! “I am much obliged to you,” +he continued, “but I am rather surprised that your anxiety on my account +did not lead you to come and see me at the rectory.” +</p> + +<p> +“I called, and failed to find you,” Clode answered, sitting +resolutely down. +</p> + +<p> +Lindo followed his example. “I believe you did once,” he replied +contemptuously. Had a friend been about to succeed him, he could have borne +even to congratulate him. But the thought of this man entering on the enjoyment +of all the good things he was resigning was well-nigh unendurable. Though he +knew that it would best consort with his dignity to be silent, he could not +refrain from pursuing the subject. “You thought,” he went on, the +same gibe in his tone, “that a non-committal policy was best, I +suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +The curate for a moment sat silent, his dark face glowing with resentment. +“If you mean,” he said at last, neither Mrs. Hammond nor her +daughter venturing to interfere—the former because she thought he was +only getting his deserts, and the latter because she felt no call to champion +him at present—“if you mean that I did not wish to publish my +opinion, you are right, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think you published it sufficiently for your purpose’” the +young rector retorted with bitterness. +</p> + +<p> +“Then why throw my non-committal policy in my teeth?” replied the +curate deftly. Thereby winning at least a logical victory. +</p> + +<p> +Lindo sneered and grew, of course, twice as angry as before. “Very neatly +put!” he said. “I do not doubt that you would have got out of your +confession of faith—or lack of faith—as cleverly, if circumstances +had required it.” +</p> + +<p> +The words were scarcely out of his mouth before Miss Hammond rose in a marked +way and left the room; while Clode for a moment glared at him as though he +would resent the insult—for it was little less—in a practical +manner. Fortunately the curate’s, calculating brain told him that nothing +could be gained by this, and with an admirable show of patience and forbearance +he waved the words aside. “I really do not understand you,” he said +with a maddening air of superiority. “I cannot be blamed for having +formed an opinion of my own on a subject which affected me. Then, having formed +it, what was I to do? Publish it, or keep it to myself? As a fact, I did not +publish it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Except by your acts,” said the rector. +</p> + +<p> +“Take it that way, then,” the curate replied, still with patience. +“Do I gather that you would have had me, though I held an opinion adverse +to you, come to you as before, be about you, treat you in all respects as if I +were on your side? Is that your complaint? That I did not play the +hypocrite?” +</p> + +<p> +The rector felt that he was fairly defeated and out-manœuvred; so much so that +Mrs. Hammond, whose sympathies were entirely on his side, expected him to break +into a furious passion. But the very skill and coolness of his adversary acted +as a warning and an example, and by a mighty effort he controlled himself. He +rose from his chair with outward calmness, and, saying contemptuously, +“Well, I am glad that I know what your opinion is—an open foe is +less dangerous than a secret one,” he turned from Clode. Holding out his +hand to his hostess, he muttered some form of leave-taking, and walked out of +the room with as much dignity as he could muster. He had certainly had the +worst of the encounter. +</p> + +<p> +And he felt very bitter about it, as he crossed the top of the town. Whether +the curate knew of his intention of resigning or not, his conduct in turning +upon him and openly expressing his disbelief in his honesty was alike cruel and +brutal. The man was false. The rector felt sure of it. But the pain which he +experienced on this account—the pain of a generous man misunderstood and +ill-requited—soon gave way to self-reproach. He had brought the thing on +himself by his indiscreet passion. He had acted like a boy! He was not fit to +be in a responsible position. +</p> + +<p> +While he was still full of this, chewing the cud of his imprudence, he saw a +slender figure, which he recognized, crossing the street a little way before +him. He knew it at the first glance. In a moment he recognized the graceful +lines, the half-proud, half-gentle carriage of the head, the glint of the cold +February sun in the fair hair. It was Kate Bonamy; and the rector, as he +increased his pace, became conscious, with something like a shock, of the +pleasure it gave him to see her, though he had parted from her not twenty-four +hours before. In a moment he was at her side, and she, turning suddenly, saw +him with a start of glad surprise. “Mr. Lindo!” she stammered, +holding out her hand before he offered his, and uttering the first words which +rose to her lips, “I am so glad!” +</p> + +<p> +She was thinking of the pit accident, of the risk and his safety, and perhaps a +little of his good name. And he understood. But he affected not to do so. +“Are you indeed, Miss Bonamy?” he answered. “Glad that I am +going?” +</p> + +<p> +His eyes met hers, and then both his and hers fell. “No,” she said +gently and slowly. “But I am very glad, Mr. Lindo, that you have done +what seemed right to you without considering your own advantage.” +</p> + +<p> +“I have done a great deal since I saw you yesterday,” he answered, +taking refuge in a jest. +</p> + +<p> +“You have, indeed.” +</p> + +<p> +“Including taking your advice.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am quite sure you had made up your mind before you asked my +opinion,” she answered earnestly. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” he said, “I am sure I had not. It was your hint which +led me to think the position out from the beginning. When I did so it struck me +that, irritated by Lord Dynmore’s words and manner, I had considered the +question only as it affected him and myself. Going on to think of the parish, I +came to the conclusion, that I was quite unfit for the position.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate started. The end of his sentence was a surprise to her. They were walking +along side by side now—very slowly—and she looked at him, mute +interrogation in her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“I am too young,” he said. “Your father, you know, was of +that opinion from the first.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, but”—she answered hurriedly, +“I——” +</p> + +<p> +“You do not think so?” he said with a droll glance. “Well, I +am glad of that. What? You were not going to say that, Miss Bonamy?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” she answered, blushing. “I was going to say that my +father’s opinion might not now be the same, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +“I expect it is. However, the opinion on which I acted was my own. I have +a very hasty temper, do you know. This very afternoon I have been quarrelling, +and have put my foot into it! I confess I thought when I came here that I could +manage. Now I see I am not fit for it—for the living, I mean.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps,” she answered slowly and in a low voice, “you are +the more fit because you feel unfit.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I do not think I dare act on that,” he cried gaily. +“So you now see before you, Miss Bonamy, a very humble personage—a +kind of clerical man-of-all-work out of place! You do not know an incumbent of +easy temper who wants a curate, do you?” +</p> + +<p> +He spoke lightly, without any air of seeking or posing for admiration. Yet +there was a little inflection of bitterness in his voice which did not escape +her ear, and perhaps spoke to it—and to her heart—more loudly, +because it was not intended for either. She suddenly looked at him, and her +face quivered, and then she looked away. But he had seen and understood. He +marked the color rising to the roots of her hair, and was as sure as if he had +seen them that her eyes were wet with tears. +</p> + +<p> +And then he knew. He felt a sudden answering yearning toward her, a +forgetfulness of all her surroundings, and of all his surroundings save herself +alone. What a fool, what an ingrate, what a senseless clod he had been, not to +have seen months before—when it was in his power to win her, when he +might have asked for something besides her pity, when he had something to offer +her—that she was the fairest, purest, noblest of women! Now, when it was +too late, and he had sacrificed all to a stupid conventionality, a social +prejudice—what was her father to her save the natural crabbed foil of her +grace and beauty—now he felt that he would give all, only he had nothing +to give, to see her wide gray eyes grow dark with tenderness, and—and +love. +</p> + +<p> +Yes, love. That was it. He knew now. “Miss Bonamy,” he said +hurriedly. “Will you——” +</p> + +<p> +Kate started. “Here is my cousin,” she said quietly, and yet with +suspicious abruptness. “I think he is looking for me, Mr. Lindo.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap24"></a>CHAPTER XXIV.<br/> +THE CUP AT THE LIP.</h2> + +<p> +The ten days which followed the events just described were long remembered in +Claversham with fondness and regret. The accident at Baerton, and the strange +position of affairs at the rectory, falling out together, created intense +excitement in the town. The gossips had for once as much to talk about as the +idlest could wish, and found, indeed, so much to say on the one side and the +other that the grocer, it was rumored, ordered in a fresh supply of tea, and +the two bakers worked double tides at making crumpets and Sally Lunns, and +still lagged behind the demand. Old Peggy from the almshouse hung about the +churchyard half the day, noting who called at the rector’s, and took as +much interest in her task as if her weekly dole had depended on Mr. +Lindo’s fortunes; while every one who could lay the least claim to +knowing more than his neighbors became for the time the object of as many +attentions as a London belle. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon drove in and out daily. Once the rumor got abroad that he had +gone to see Lord Dynmore; and more than once it was said that he was away at +the palace conferring with the bishop. Those most concerned walked the streets +with the faces of sphinxes. The curate and the rector were known to be on the +most distant terms; and to put an edge on curiosity, already keen, Mrs. Hammond +was twice seen talking to Mr. Bonamy in the street. +</p> + +<p> +Even the poor colliers’ funeral, though a great number of the townsmen +trooped out to the bleak little churchyard on Baer Hill to witness it—and +to be rewarded by the sight of the young rector reading the service in the +midst of a throng of bareheaded pitmen such as no Claversham eye had ever seen +before—even this, which in ordinary times would have furnished food for +talk for a month, at least, went for little now. It was discussed, indeed, for +an evening, and then recalled only for the sake of the light which it was +supposed to throw upon the rector’s fate. +</p> + +<p> +That gentleman, indeed, continued to present to the public an unmoved face. But +in private, in the seclusion of his study—the lordly room which he had +prized and appreciated from the first, taking its spacious dignity as the +measure of his success—he wore no mask. There he had—as all men +have, the man of destiny and the conscript alike—his solitary hours of +courage and depression, anxiety and resignation. Of hope also; for even +now—let us not paint him greater than he was—he clung to the +possibility that Lord Dynmore, whom every one agreed in describing as irascible +and hasty, but generous at bottom, would refuse to receive his resignation of +the living, and this in such terms as would enable him to remain without +sacrificing his self-respect. There would be a victory indeed, and at times he +could not help dwelling on the thought of it. +</p> + +<p> +Consequently, when Mrs. Baker, four days after the funeral, ushered in the +archdeacon, and the young rector, turning at his writing-table, read his fate +in the old gentleman’s eyes, the news came upon him with crushing weight. +Yet he did not give way. He rose and welcomed his visitor with a brave face. +“So the bearer of the bow-string has come at last!” he said +lightly, as the two met on the hearth-rug. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon held his hand a few seconds longer than was necessary. +“Yes,” he said, “I am afraid that is about what I am. I am +sorry to bring you such news, Lindo—more sorry than I can tell +you.” And, having got so far, he dropped his hat and picked it up again +in a great hurry, and for a moment did not look at his companion. +</p> + +<p> +“After all,” the rector said manfully, “it is the only news I +had a right to expect.” +</p> + +<p> +“There is something in that,” the archdeacon admitted, sitting +down. “That is so, perhaps. All the same,” he went on, looking +about him unhappily, and rubbing his head in ill-concealed irritation, +“if I had known how the earl would take it, I should not have advised you +to make any concessions. No, I should not. But, there, he is an odd +man—odder than I thought.” +</p> + +<p> +“He accepts my offer to resign, of course?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“And that is all?” the rector said, a little huskiness in his tone. +“That is all,” the archdeacon replied, rubbing his head again. It +was plain that he had hard work to keep his vexation within bounds. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I must not complain because he has taken me at my word,” the +rector said, recovering himself a little. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I hoped the bishop might have had a word to say to it,” the +archdeacon grumbled. “But he had not, and I could not get to see his +wife. He spoke very highly of your conduct, but he did not see his way clear, +he said, to interfering.” +</p> + +<p> +“I scarcely see how he could,” Lindo answered slowly. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I do not know. Bonamy’s representation in the +church-wardens’ names was very strong—very strong indeed, coming +from them, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +Lindo reddened. “There is an odd man for you, if you like,” he said +impulsively. He was glad, perhaps, to change the subject. “He has +scarcely said a civil word to me since I came. He even began an action against +me. Yet when this happened he turned round and in his way fought for me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that is Bonamy all over!” the archdeacon answered, almost +with enthusiasm. “He is rough and crabbed, but he has the instincts of a +gentleman, which are the greater credit to him, since he is a self-made man. I +think I can tell you something about him, though, which you do not know.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed?” said Lindo mechanically. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. It has to do with your letter, too. I had it from Lord Dynmore. In +the first flush of his anger, it seems, he went to Bonamy and directed him to +take the necessary steps to eject you. He is not the earl’s solicitor, +and he must have seen an excellent opportunity of getting hold of the Dynmore +business through this. He could not but see it. Nevertheless, he +declined.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” asked the rector shortly. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders. “Ah! that I cannot say,” he +answered. “I only know that he did, putting forward some scruple or other +which sent the earl off almost foaming with rage; and, of course, sent off with +him Bonamy’s chance of his business.” +</p> + +<p> +“He is a strange man!” Lindo sighed as he spoke. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon took a turn up the room. “Now,” he said, coming +back, “I want to talk to you about another man.” +</p> + +<p> +“Clode?” muttered the rector. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, yes; you have guessed it,” the elder clergyman assented. +“The truth is, I am to offer him the living if you report well of +him.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not like him,” Lindo said briefly. +</p> + +<p> +“To be candid,” replied the other as briefly, “neither do I, +now.” +</p> + +<p> +To that Lindo for a moment said nothing. The young man had fallen into an old +attitude, and stood with his foot on the fender, his head bent, his eyes fixed +on the fire. He was passing through a temptation. Here was a brave vengeance +ready to his hand. The man who had behaved badly, heartlessly, disloyally to +him, who had taken part against him, and been hard and unfriendly from the +moment of Lord Dynmore’s return, was now in his power. He had only to say +that he distrusted Clode, that he suspected him of being unscrupulous, even +that their connection had not been satisfactory to himself—and the thing +was done. Clode would not have the living. +</p> + +<p> +Yet he hesitated to say those words. He felt that the thing was a temptation. +</p> + +<p> +He remembered that Clode had worked well in the parish, and that his only +offence was a private one. And, not at once, but after a pause, he gulped down +the temptation, and, looking up with a flushed face, spoke. “Yes,” +he said, “I must report well of him—in the parish, that is. He is a +good worker. I am bound to say as much as that, I think.” +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders once more. “Right!” he said, +with a certain curtness which hid his secret disgust. “I suppose that is +all, then. Will you come with me and tell him?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” the rector answered very decidedly, “certainly I will +not.” +</p> + +<p> +“It will look well,” the other still suggested. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” Lindo replied again, almost in anger, “I cannot +sincerely congratulate the man, and I will not!” +</p> + +<p> +Nor would he budge from that resolve; and when the archdeacon called at the +curate’s lodgings a few minutes later, he called alone. The man he sought +was out, however. “Mr. Clode is at the Reading-Room, I think, sir,” +the landlady said, with her deepest courtesy. And thither, accordingly, after a +moment’s hesitation, the archdeacon went. +</p> + +<p> +The gas in the big, barely-furnished room, which we have visited more than +once, had just been lit, but the blinds still remained up; and in this mingling +of lights the place looked less home-like and more uncomfortable than usual. +There were three people in the room when the archdeacon entered. Two sat +reading by the fire, their backs to the door. The third—the future +rector—was standing up near one of the windows, taking advantage of the +last rays of daylight to read the <i>Times</i>, which he held open before him. +The archdeacon cast a casual glance at the others, and then stepped across to +him and touched him on the shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +Clode turned with a start. He had not heard the approaching footstep. One +glance at the newcomer’s face, however, set his blood in a glow. It told +him, or almost told him, all; and instinctively he dropped his eyes, that the +other might not read in them his triumph and exultation. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon’s first words confirmed him in his hopes. “I have +some good news for you, Mr. Clode,” he said, smiling benevolently. He had +of late distrusted the curate, as we have seen; but he was a man of kindly +nature, and such a man cannot convey good tidings without entering into the +recipient’s feelings. “I saw Lord Dynmore yesterday,” he +continued. +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed,” said the curate a little thickly. His face had grown hot, +but the increasing darkness concealed this. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” the archdeacon resumed, in a confidential tone which was yet +pretty audible through the room. “You have heard, no doubt, that Mr. +Lindo has resigned the living?” +</p> + +<p> +The curate nodded. At that moment he dared not speak. A dreadful thought was in +his mind. What if the archdeacon’s good news was news that the earl +declined to receive the resignation? Some people might call that good news! The +mere thought struck him dumb. +</p> + +<p> +The archdeacon’s next words resolved his doubts. “Frankly,” +the elder man said in a genial tone, “I am sorry—sorry that +circumstances have forced him to take so extreme a step. But having said that, +Mr. Clode, I have done for the present with regret, and may come to pleasanter +matter. I have to congratulate you. I am happy to say that Lord Dynmore, whom I +saw yesterday, has authorized me to offer the living to you.” +</p> + +<p> +The newspaper rustled in the curate’s grasp, and for a moment he did not +answer. Then he said huskily, “To me?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” the archdeacon answered expansively—it was certainly a +pleasant task he had in hand, and he could not help beaming over it. “To +you, Mr. Clode. On one condition only,” he continued, “which is +usual enough in all such cases, and I venture to think is particularly natural +in this case. I mean that you have your late rector’s good word.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Lindo’s good word?” the curate stammered. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course,” the unconscious archdeacon answered. +</p> + +<p> +The curate’s jaw dropped; but by an effort he forced a ghastly smile. +“To be sure,” he said. “There will be no difficulty about +that, I think.” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” replied the other, “for I have just seen him, and can +say at once that he is prepared to give it you. He has behaved throughout in a +most generous manner, and the consequence is that I have nothing more to do +except to offer you my congratulations on your preferment.” +</p> + +<p> +For a moment Clode could scarcely believe in his happiness. In the short space +of two minutes he had tasted to the full both the pleasure of hope and the pang +of despair. Could it be that all that was over already? That the period of +waiting and uncertainty was past and gone? That the prize to which he had +looked so long—and with the prize the woman he loved—was his at +last?—was actually in his grasp? +</p> + +<p> +His head reeled, great as was his self-control, and a haze rose before his +eyes. As this passed away he became conscious that the archdeacon was shaking +his hand with great heartiness, and that the thing was real! He was rector, or +as good as rector, of Claversham. The object of his ambition was his! He was +happy: perhaps it was the happiest moment of his life. He had even time to +wonder whether he could not do Lindo a good turn—whether he could not +somehow make it up to him. +</p> + +<p> +“You are very good,” he muttered, gratefully pressing the +archdeacon’s hand. +</p> + +<p> +“I am glad it is not a stranger,” that gentleman replied heartily. +“Oh,” he continued, turning and speaking in a different tone, +“is that you, Mr. Bonamy? Well, there can be no harm in your hearing the +news also. You are people’s warden, of course, and have a kind of claim +to hear it early. To be sure you have.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is the news?” Mr. Bonamy asked rather shortly. He had risen +and drawn near unnoticed, Jack Smith behind him. “Do I understand that +Lord Dynmore has accepted the rector’s resignation?” +</p> + +<p> +“That is so.” +</p> + +<p> +“And that he proposes to present Mr. Clode?” the lawyer continued, +looking at the curate as he named him. +</p> + +<p> +“Precisely,” replied the archdeacon, without hesitation. +</p> + +<p> +“I hope you have no objection, Mr. Bonamy,” said the curate, bowing +slightly with a gracious air. He could afford to be gracious now. He even felt +good—as men in such moments do. +</p> + +<p> +But in the lawyer’s response there was no graciousness, nor much apparent +goodness. “I am afraid,” he said, standing up gaunt and stiff, with +a scowl on his face, “that I must take advantage of that saving clause, +Mr. Clode. I am people’s warden, as the archdeacon says, and frankly I +object to your appointment—to your appointment as rector here.” +</p> + +<p> +“You object!” the curate stammered, between wrath and wonder. +</p> + +<p> +“Bless me!” exclaimed the archdeacon in unmixed astonishment. +“What do you mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“Just what I say. I object,” repeated the lawyer firmly. This time +Clode said nothing, but his eyes flashed, and he drew himself up, his face dark +with passion. “Shall I state my objection now?” Mr. Bonamy +continued, with the utmost gravity. “It is not quite formal, +but—very well, I will do so. I have rather a curious story to tell, and I +must go back a short time. When Mr. Lindo’s honesty in accepting the +living was called in question about a month ago, he referred to the letters in +which Lord Dynmore’s agents conveyed the offer to him. He had those +letters by him. Naturally, he had preserved them with care, and he began to +regard them in the light of valuable evidence on his behalf, since they showed +the facts brought to his knowledge when he accepted the living. I have said +that he had preserved them with care; and, indeed, he is prepared to say +to-day, that from the time of his arrival here until now, they have never, with +his knowledge or consent, passed out of his possession.” +</p> + +<p> +The lawyer’s rasping voice ceased for a moment. Stephen Clode’s +face was a shade paler, but away from the gas-jets this could not be +distinguished. He was arming himself to meet whatever shock was to come, while +below this voluntary action of the brain his mind ran in an undercurrent of +fierce, passionate anger against himself—anger that he had ever meddled +with those fatal letters. Oh, the folly, the uselessness, the danger of that +act, as he saw them now! +</p> + +<p> +“Nevertheless,” Mr. Bonamy resumed in the same even, pitiless tone, +“when Mr. Lindo referred to these letters—which he kept, I should +add, in a locked cupboard in his library—he found that the first in date, +and the most important of them all, had been mutilated.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate’s brow cleared. “What on earth,” he broke out, +“has this to do with me, Mr. Bonamy?” And he laughed—a laugh +of relief and triumph. The lawyer’s last words had lifted a weight from +his heart. They had found a mare’s nest after all. +</p> + +<p> +“Quite so!” the archdeacon chimed in with good-natured fussiness. +“What has all this to do with the matter in hand, or with Mr. Clode, Mr. +Bonamy? I fail to see.” +</p> + +<p> +“In a moment I will show you,” the lawyer answered. Then he paused, +and, taking a letter-case form his pocket, leisurely extracted from it a small +piece of paper. “I will first ask Mr. Clode,” he continued, +“to tell us if he supplied Mr. Lindo with the names of a firm of +Birmingham solicitors.” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly I did,” replied the curate haughtily. +</p> + +<p> +“And you gave him their address, I think?” +</p> + +<p> +“I did.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps you can tell me, then, whether that is the address you wrote for +him,” continued the lawyer smoothly, as he held out the paper for the +curate’s inspection. +</p> + +<p> +“It is,” Clode answered at once. “I wrote it for Mr. Lindo, +in my own room, and gave it him there. But I fail to see what all this has to +do with the point you have raised,” he continued with considerable heat. +</p> + +<p> +“It has just this to do with it, Mr. Clode,” the lawyer answered +drily, a twinkle in his eyes—“that this address is written on the +reverse side of the very piece of paper which is missing from Mr. Lindo’s +letter—the important letter I have described. And I wish to ask you, and +I think it will be to your interest to give as clear an answer to the question +as possible, how you came into possession of this scrap of paper.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate glared at his questioner. “I do not understand you,” he +stammered. And he held out his hand for the paper. +</p> + +<p> +“I think you will when you look at both sides of the sheet,” +replied the lawyer, handing it to him. “On one side there is the address +you wrote. On the other are the last sentence and signature of a letter from +Messrs. Gearns & Baker to Mr. Lindo. The question is a very simple one. How +did you get possession of this piece of paper?” +</p> + +<p> +Clode was silent—silent, though he knew that the archdeacon was looking +at him, and that a single hearty spontaneous denial might avert suspicion. He +stood holding the paper in his hand, and gazing stupidly at the damning words, +utterly unable to comprehend for the moment how they came to be there. Little +by little, however, as the benumbing effects of the surprise wore off, his +thoughts went back to the evening when the address was written, and he +remembered how the rector had come in and surprised him, and how he had huddled +away the letters. In his disorder, no doubt, he had left one lying among his +own papers, and made the fatal mistake of tearing from it the scrap on which he +had written the address. +</p> + +<p> +He saw it all as he stood there, still gazing at the piece of paper, while his +rugged face grew darkly red and then again a miserable sallow, and the +perspiration sprang out upon his forehead. He felt that the archdeacon’s +eyes were upon him, that the archdeacon was waiting for him to speak. He saw +the mistake he had made, but his brain, usually so ready, failed to supply him +with the explanation he required. +</p> + +<p> +“You understand?” Mr. Bonamy said slowly. “The question is, +how this letter came to be in your room that evening, Mr. Clode. That is the +question.” +</p> + +<p> +“I cannot say,” he answered huskily. He was so shaken by the +unexpected nature of the attack, and by the strange and ominous way in which +the evidence against him had arisen, that he had not the courage to look up and +face his accuser. “I think—nay, I am sure, indeed—that the +rector must have given me the paper,” he explained, after an awkward +pause. +</p> + +<p> +“He is positive he did not,” Mr. Bonamy answered. +</p> + +<p> +Then Clode recovered himself and looked up. After all, it was only his word +against another’s. “Possibly he is,” he said, “and yet +he may be mistaken. I cannot otherwise see how the paper could have come into +my hands. You do not really mean,” he continued with a smile, which was +almost easy, “to charge me with stealing the letter, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, to be quite candid, I do,” Mr. Bonamy replied curtly. Nor +was this unexpected slap in the face rendered more tolerable by the +qualification he hastened to add—“or getting it stolen.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate started. “This is not to be borne,” he cried hotly. He +looked at the archdeacon as if expecting him to interfere. But he found that +gentleman’s face grave and troubled, and, seeing he must expect no help +from him at present, he continued, “Do you dare to make so serious an +accusation on such evidence as this, Mr. Bonamy?” +</p> + +<p> +“On that,” the lawyer replied, pointing to the paper, “and on +other evidence besides.” +</p> + +<p> +The curate flinched. Had they found Felton, the earl’s servant? Had they +any more scraps of paper—any more self-wrought damning evidence of that +kind? It was only by an effort, which was apparent to one at least of his +hearers, that he gathered himself together, and answered, with a show of +promptitude and ease, “Other evidence? What, I ask? Produce it!” +</p> + +<p> +“Here it is,” said Mr. Bonamy, pointing to Jack Smith, who had been +standing at his elbow throughout the discussion. +</p> + +<p> +“What has he to do with it?” Clode muttered with dry lips. +</p> + +<p> +“Only this,” the barrister said quietly, addressing himself to the +archdeacon. “That some time ago I saw Mr. Clode replace a packet in the +cupboard in the rector’s library. He only discovered my presence in the +room when the cupboard door was open, and his agitation on observing me struck +me as strange. Afterward I made inquiries of Mr. Lindo, without telling him my +reason, and learned that Mr. Clode had no business at that cupboard—which +was, in fact, devoted to the rector’s private papers.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps, Mr. Clode, you will explain that,” said the lawyer with +quiet triumph. +</p> + +<p> +He might have denied it had he spoken out at once. He might have given Jack the +lie. But he saw with sudden and horrible clearness how this thing fitted that +other thing, and this evidence corroborated that; and he lost his presence of +mind, and for a moment stood speechless, glaring at his new accuser. He did not +need to look at the archdeacon to be sure that his face was no longer grave +only, but stern and suspicious. The gas-jets flared before his eyes and dazzled +him. The room seemed to be turning. He could not answer. It was only when he +had stood for an age, as it seemed to him, dumb and self-convicted before those +three faces, that he summoned up courage to mutter, “It is false. It is +all false, I say!” and to stamp his foot on the floor. +</p> + +<p> +But no one answered him, and he quailed. His nerves were shaken. He, who on +ordinary occasions prided himself on his tact and management, dared not now +urge another word in his own defence lest some new piece of evidence should +arise to give him the lie. The meaning silence of his accusers and his own +conscience were too much for him. And, suddenly snatching up his hat, which lay +on a chair beside him, he rushed from the room. +</p> + +<p> +He had not gone fifty yards along the pavement before he recognized the mad +folly of this retreat—the utter surrender of all his hopes and ambitions +which it meant. But it was too late. The strong man had met a stronger. His +very triumph and victory had gone some way toward undoing him, by rendering him +more open to surprise and less prepared for sudden attack. Now it was too late +to do more than repent. He saw that. Hurrying through the darkness, heedless +whither he went, he invented a dozen stories to explain his conduct. But always +the archdeacon’s grave face rose before him, and he rejected the clever +fictions and the sophisms in support of them, which his ingenuity was now so +quick to suggest. +</p> + +<p> +How he cursed the madness, the insensate folly, which had wrecked him! Had he +only let matters take their own course and stood aside, he would have gained +his ends! For a minute and a half he had been as good as rector of Claversham. +And now! +</p> + +<p> +Laura Hammond, crossing the hall after tea, heard the outer door open behind +her, and, feeling the cold gust of air which entered, stopped and turned, and +saw him standing on the mat. He had let himself in in this way on more than one +occasion before, and it was not that which in a moment caused her heart to +sink. She had been expecting him all day, for she knew the crisis was imminent, +and had been hourly looking for news. But she had not been expecting him in +this guise. There was a strange disorder in his air and manner. He was wet and +splashed with mud. He held his hat in his hand, as if he had been walking +bareheaded in the rain. His eyes shone with a wild light, and he looked at her +oddly. She turned and went toward him. “Is it you?” she said +timidly. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, it is I,” he answered, with a forced laugh. “I want +to speak to you.” And he let drop the <i>portière</i>, which he had +hitherto held in his hand. +</p> + +<p> +There was a light in the breakfast-room, which opened on the hall, and she led +the way into that room. He followed her and closed the door behind him. She +pointed to a chair, but he did not take it. “What is it?” she said, +looking up at him in real alarm. “What is the matter, Stephen?” +</p> + +<p> +“Everything!” he answered, with another laugh. “I am leaving +Claversham.” +</p> + +<p> +“You are leaving?” she said incredulously. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, leaving!” he answered. +</p> + +<p> +“To-night?” she stammered. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, not to-night,” he answered, with rude irony. +“To-morrow. I have been within an ace of getting the living, and +I—I have lost it. That is all.” +</p> + +<p> +Her cheek turned a shade paler, and she laid one hand on the table to steady +herself. “I am so sorry,” she murmured. +</p> + +<p> +He did not see her tremor; he heard only her words, and he resented them +bitterly. “Have you nothing more to say than that?” he cried. +</p> + +<p> +She had much more to say—or, rather, had she said all that was in her +mind she would have had. But his tone helped her to recover +herself—helped her to play the part on which she had long ago decided. In +her way she loved this man, and her will had melted at sight of him, standing +downcast and defeated before her. Had he attacked her on the side of her +affections he might have done much—he might have prevailed. But his hard +words recalled her to her natural self. “What would you have me +say?” she answered, looking steadily across the table at him. Something, +she began to see, had happened besides the loss of the living—something +which had hurt him sorely. And as she discerned this, she compared his +dishevelled, untidy dress with the luxury of the room, and shivered at the +thought of the precipice on the brink of which she had paused. +</p> + +<p> +He did not answer. +</p> + +<p> +“What would you have me say?” she repeated more firmly. +</p> + +<p> +“If you do not know, I cannot teach you,” he retorted, with a +sneer. +</p> + +<p> +“You have no right to say that,” she replied bravely. “You +remember our compact.” +</p> + +<p> +“You intend to keep to it?” he answered scornfully. +</p> + +<p> +She had no doubt about that now, and she summoned up her courage by an effort. +“Certainly I do,” she murmured. “I thought you understood me. +I tried to make my meaning clear.” +</p> + +<p> +Clode did not answer her at once. He stood looking at her, his eyes glowing. He +knew that his only hope, if hope there might be, lay in gaining some word from +her now—now, before any rumor to his disadvantage should get abroad in +the town. But his temper, long restrained, was so infuriated by disappointment +and defeat, that for the moment love did not prevail with him. He knew that a +tender word might do much, but he could not frame it. When he did at last find +tongue it was only to say, “And that is your final decision?” +</p> + +<p> +“It is,” she answered in a low voice. She did not dare to look up +at him. +</p> + +<p> +“And all you have to say to me?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. Except that I wish you well. I shall always wish you well, Mr. +Clode,” she muttered. +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you,” he answered coldly. +</p> + +<p> +So coldly, and with so much composure, that she did not guess the gust of +hatred of all things and all men which was in his heart. He was beside himself +with love, rage, disappointment. For a moment longer he stood gazing at her +downcast face. But she did not look up at him; and presently, in a strange +silence, he turned and went out of the room. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap25"></a>CHAPTER XXV.<br/> +HUMBLE PIE.</h2> + +<p> +The success of reticence is great. Mr. Bonamy and his nephew, as they went home +to tea after their victory, plumed themselves not a little upon the proof of +this which they had just given Mr. Clode. They said little, it is true; even to +one another, but more than once Mr. Bonamy chuckled in a particularly dry +manner, and at the top of the street Jack made an observation “You think +the archdeacon was satisfied?” he asked, turning to his companion for a +moment. +</p> + +<p> +“Absolutely,” quoth Mr. Bonamy; and he strode on with one hand in +his pocket, his coat-tails flying, and his money jingling in a manner +inimitable by any other Claversham person. +</p> + +<p> +At tea they were both silent upon the subject, but the lawyer presently let +drop the fact that the earl had accepted the rector’s resignation. Jack, +watchfully jealous, poor fellow, yet in his jealousy loyal to the core, glanced +involuntarily at Kate to see what effect the news produced upon her; and then +glanced swiftly away again. Not so swiftly, however, that the change in the +girl’s face escaped him. He saw it flush with mingled pride and alarm, +and then grow grave and thoughtful. After that she kept her eyes averted from +him, and he talked busily to Daintry. “I must be leaving you +to-morrow,” he said by-and-by, as they rose from the table. +</p> + +<p> +“You will be coming back again?” Mr. Bonamy answered, interrupting +a loud wail from Daintry. It should be explained that Jack had not stayed +through the whole of these weeks at Claversham, but had twice left for some +days on circuit business. Mr. Bonamy thought he was meditating another of these +disappearances. +</p> + +<p> +“I should like to do so,” Jack answered quietly, “but I must +get back to London now.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, your room will be ready for you whenever you like to come to +us,” Mr. Bonamy replied with crabbed graciousness. And he fully meant +what he said. He had grown used to Jack’s company. He saw, too, the +change his presence had made in the girls’ lives, and possibly he +entertained some thoughts of a greater change which the cousin might make in +the life of one of them. +</p> + +<p> +So he was sorry to lose Jack. But Daintry was inconsolable. When she and Kate +were alone together she made her moan, sitting in a great chair three sizes too +big for her, with her legs sprawling before her, her hands on the chair-arms, +and her eyes on the fire. “Oh, dear, what shall we do when he is gone, +Kate?” she said disconsolately. “Won’t it be +miserable?” +</p> + +<p> +Kate, who was bending over her work, and had been unusually silent for some +time, looked up with a start and a rush of color to her cheeks. “When who +is gone—oh, you mean Jack!” she said rather incoherently. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course I do,” Daintry answered crossly. “But you never +did care for Jack.” +</p> + +<p> +“You have no right to say that,” Kate answered quickly, letting her +work drop for the moment. “I think Jack is one of the noblest, the most +generous—yes,” she continued quickly, “the bravest man I have +ever known, Daintry.” +</p> + +<p> +Her voice trembled, and Daintry saw with surprise that her eyes were full of +tears. “I never thought you felt like that about him,” the younger +girl answered penitently. +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps I did not a little while back,” Kate answered gently, as +she took up her work again. “I know him better now, that is all.” +</p> + +<p> +It was quite true. She knew him better now. A fellow-feeling makes us wondrous +kind. Love, which blinds our eyes to some things, opens them to others. Had +Jack offered Kate “Their Wedding Journey” now she might still have +asked him to change the book for another, but assuredly she would not have told +him it sounded silly, nor hurt his feelings by so much as a look. +</p> + +<p> +It was quite true that she thought him all she said, that her eyes grew moist +for his sake. But his was the minute only; the hour was another’s. +Daintry, proceeding to speculate gloomily on the dulness of Claversham without +Jack, thought her sister was attending to her, whereas Kate’s thoughts +were far away now, centred on a fair head and a bright boyish face, and a +solitary room in which she pictured Reginald Lindo sitting alone and +despondent, the short-lived brilliance of his Claversham career already +extinguished. What were his thoughts, she wondered. Was he regretting—for +the strongest have their hours of weakness—the step he had taken? Was he +blaming her for the advice she had given? Was he giving a thought to her at +all, or only planning the new life on which he must now enter—forming the +new hopes which must henceforth cheer him on? +</p> + +<p> +Kate let her work drop and looked dreamily before her. Assuredly the prospect +was a dull and uninviting one. Before <i>his</i> coming there had always been +the unknown something, which a girl’s future holds—a possibility of +change, of living a happier, fuller life. But now she had nothing of this kind +before her. He had come and robbed her even of this, and given her in return +only regret and humiliation, and a few—a very few—hours of strange +pleasure and sunshine and womanly pride in a woman’s influence nobly +used. Yet would she have had it otherwise? No, not for all the unknown +possibilities of change, not though Claversham life should stretch its dulness +unbroken through a century. +</p> + +<p> +She was sitting alone in the dining-room next morning, Mr. Bonamy being at the +office, and Daintry out shopping, when the maid came in and announced that Mr. +Lindo was at the door and wished to see her. “Are you sure that he did +not ask for Mr. Bonamy?” Kate said, rising and laying down her work with +outward composure and secret agitation. +</p> + +<p> +“No; he asked particularly for you, miss,” the servant answered, +standing with her hand on the door. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well; you can show him in here,” Kate replied, casting an eye +round her, but disdaining to remove the signs of domestic employment which met +its scrutiny. “He has come to say good-by,” she thought to herself; +and she schooled herself to play her part fitly and close the little drama with +decency and reserve. +</p> + +<p> +He came in looking very thoughtful. She need not have feared for her +father’s papers, her sister’s dog’s-eared Ollendorf, or her +own sewing. He did not so much as glance at them. She thought she saw business +in his eye, and she said as he advanced, “Did you wish to see me or my +father, Mr. Lindo?” +</p> + +<p> +“You, Miss Bonamy,” he answered, shaking hands with her. “You +have heard the news, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she replied soberly. “I am so very sorry. I +fear—I mean I regret now, that when you——” +</p> + +<p> +“Asked for advice”—he continued, helping her out with a grave +smile. He had taken the great leather-covered easy-chair on the other side of +the fireplace, and was sitting forward in it, toying with his hat. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she said, coloring—“if you like to put it in +that very flattering form—I regret now that I presumed to give it, Mr. +Lindo.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am sorry for that,” he answered, looking up at her as he spoke. +</p> + +<p> +She felt herself coloring anew. “Why?” she asked rather +tremulously. +</p> + +<p> +“Because I have come to ask your advice again. You will not refuse to +give it me?” +</p> + +<p> +She looked at him in surprise; with a little annoyance even. It was absurd. Why +should he come to her in this way? Why, because on one occasion, when +circumstances had impelled him to speak and her to answer, she had presumed to +advise—why should he again come to her of set purpose? It was ridiculous +of him. “I think I must refuse,” she said gravely and a little +formally. “I know nothing of business.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is not upon a matter of business,” he answered. +</p> + +<p> +She uttered a sigh of impatience. “I think you are very foolish, Mr. +Lindo. Why do you not go to my father?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, because it is—because it is on a rather delicate +matter,” he answered impulsively. +</p> + +<p> +“Still I do not see why you should bring it to me,” she objected, +with a flash in her gray eyes, and many memories in her mind. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I will tell you why I bring it to you,” he answered bluntly. +“Because I acted on your advice the other day; and that, you see, Miss +Bonamy, has put me in this fix; and—and, in fact, made other advice +necessary, don’t you see?” +</p> + +<p> +“I see you are inclined to be somewhat ungenerous,” she answered. +“But if it must be so, pray go on.” +</p> + +<p> +He rose slowly and stood leaning against the mantel-shelf in his favorite +attitude, his foot on the fender. “I will be as short as I can,” he +said, a nervousness she did not fail to note in his manner. “Perhaps you +will kindly hear me to the end before you solve my problem for me. It will help +me a little, I think, if I may put my case in the third person. Miss +Bonamy”—he paused on the name and cleared his throat, and then went +on more quickly—“a man I know, young and keen, and at the time +successful—successful beyond his hopes, so that others of his age and +standing looked on him with envy, came one day to know a girl, and, from the +moment of knowing her, to admire and esteem her. She was not only very +beautiful, but he thought he saw in her, almost from the first hour of their +acquaintance, such noble and generous qualities as all men, even the weakest, +would fain imagine in the woman they love.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate moved suddenly in her chair as if to rise. Then she sat back again, and he +went on. +</p> + +<p> +“This was a weak man,” he said in a low voice. “He had had +small experience; let that be some excuse for him. He entered at this time on a +new field of work in which he found himself of importance and fancied himself +of greater importance. There he had frequent opportunities of meeting the woman +I have mentioned, who had already made an impression on him. But his head was +turned. He discovered that for certain small and unworthy reasons her goodness +and her fairness were not recognized by those among whom he mixed, and he had +the meanness to swim with the current and to strive to think no more of the +woman to whom his heart had gone out. He acted like a cur, in fact, and +presently he had his reward. Evil times came upon him. The position he loved +was threatened. Finally he lost it, and found himself again where he had +started in life—a poor curate without influence or brilliant prospects. +Then—it seems an ignoble, a mean, and a miserable thing to say—he +found out for certain that he loved this woman, and could imagine no greater +honor or happiness than to have her for his wife.” +</p> + +<p> +He paused a moment, and stole a glance at her. Kate sat motionless and still, +her lips compressed and her eyes hidden by their long lashes, her gaze fixed +apparently on the fire. Save that her face was slightly flushed, and that she +breathed quickly, he might have fancied that she did not understand, or even +that she had not heard. When he spoke again, after waiting anxiously and vainly +for any sign, his voice was husky and agitated. “Will you tell me, Miss +Bonamy, what he should do?” he said. “Should he ask her to forgive +him and to trust him, or should he go away and be silent?” +</p> + +<p> +She did not speak. +</p> + +<p> +“Kate, will you not tell me? Can I not hope to be forgiven?” He was +stooping beside her now, and his hand almost touched her hair. +</p> + +<p> +Then, at last, she looked up at him. “Will not my advice come a little +late?” she whispered tremulously and yet with a smile—a smile which +was at once bright and tearful and eloquent beyond words. +</p> + +<p> +Afterward she thought of a dozen things she should have said to him—about +his certainty of himself, about her father; but at the time none of these +occurred to her. If he had come to her with his hands full, it would certainly +have been otherwise. But she saw him poor through his own act, and her pride +left her. When he took her in his arms and kissed her, she said not a word. And +he said only, “My darling!” +</p> + +<p class="center" style="letter-spacing:20pt">* * * * * +</p> + +<p> +The rich can afford to be niggardly. Lindo did not stay long, the question he +had to put once answered, his claim to happiness once allowed. When Mr. Bonamy +came in half an hour later, he found Kate alone. There was an austere elation +in his eye which for a moment led her to think that he had heard her news. His +first words, however, dispelled the idea. “I have just seen Lord +Dynmore,” he said, taking his coat-skirts on his arms and speaking with a +geniality which showed that he was moved out of his every-day self. “He +has—he has considerably surprised me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed?” said Kate, blushing and conscious, half-attentive and +half given up to thinking how she should tell her own tale. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. He has very much surprised me. He has asked me to undertake the +agency of his property in this part of the country.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate dropped her sewing in genuine surprise “No?” she said. +“Has he, indeed?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Bonamy, pursing up his lips to keep back the smile of complacency which +would force its way, let his eyes rove round the room. “Yes,” he +said, “I do not mind saying here that I am rather flattered. Of course I +should not say as much out of doors.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, papa, I am so glad,” she cried, rising. An unwonted softness +in her tone touched and pleased him. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he continued, “I am to go over to the park to-morrow +to lunch with him and talk over matters. He told me something else which will +astonish you. He has behaved very handsomely to Mr. Lindo. It seems he saw him +early this morning, after having an interview with the archdeacon, and offered +him the living of Pocklington, in Oxfordshire—worth, I believe, about +five hundred a year. He is going to give the vicar of Pocklington the rectory +here.” +</p> + +<p> +Kate’s face was scarlet. “But I thought—I understood,” +she stammered, “that Mr. Clode was to be rector here?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not at all,” said Mr. Bonamy, with some asperity. “The whole +thing was settled before ten o’clock this morning. Mary told me at the +door that Lindo had been here since, so I supposed he had told you something +about it.” +</p> + +<p> +“He did not tell me a word of it!” Kate answered impulsively, the +generous trick her lover had played breaking in upon her mind in all its +fulness. “Not a word of it! But papa”—with a pause and then a +rush of words—“he asked me to be his wife, and I—I told him I +would.” +</p> + +<p> +For a moment Mr. Bonamy stared at his daughter as if he thought she had lost +her wits. Probably since his boyhood he had never been so much astonished. +“I was talking of Mr. Lindo,” he said at length, speaking with +laborious clearness. “You are referring to your cousin, I fancy.” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” Kate said, striving with her happy confusion. “I mean +Mr. Lindo, papa.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed! indeed!” Mr. Bonamy answered after another pause, speaking +still more slowly, and gazing at her as if he had never seen her before, nor +anything at all like her. “You have a good deal surprised me. And I am +not easily surprised, I think. Not easily, I think.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you are not angry with me, papa?” she murmured rather +tearfully. +</p> + +<p> +For a moment he still stared at her in silence, unable to overcome his +astonishment. Then by a great effort he recovered himself. “Oh, +no,” he said, with a smack of his old causticity, “I do not see why +I should be angry with you, Kate. Indeed, I may say I foretold this. I always +said that young man would introduce great changes, and he has done it. He has +fulfilled my words to the letter, my dear!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap26"></a>CHAPTER XXVI.<br/> +LOOSE ENDS.</h2> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg was one of the first persons in the town to hear of the late +rector’s engagement. His reception of the news was characteristic. +“I don’t believe it!” he shrieked. “I don’t +believe it! It is all rubbish! What has he got to marry upon, I should like to +know?” +</p> + +<p> +His informant ventured to mention the living of Pocklington. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t believe it!” the little doctor shrieked. “If +he had got that he would see her far enough before he would marry her. Do you +think I am such a fool as to believe that?” +</p> + +<p> +“But you see, Bonamy—the earl’s agency will be rather a lift +in the world for him. And he has money.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t believe it!” shrieked Gregg again. But, alas! he +did. He knew that these things were true, and when he next met Bonamy he smiled +a wry smile, and tried to swallow his teeth, and grovelled, still with the +native snarl curling his lips at intervals. The doctor, indeed, had to suffer a +good deal of unhappiness in these days. Clode, about whom he had boasted +largely, was conspicuous by his absence. Lord Dynmore’s carriage might be +seen any morning in front of the Bonamy offices. And rumor said that the earl +had taken a strange fancy to the young clergyman whom he had so belabored. +Things seemed to Gregg and to some other people in Claversham to be horribly +out of joint at this time. +</p> + +<p> +Among others, poor Mrs. Hammond found her brain somewhat disordered. To the +curate’s unaccountable withdrawal, as to the translation of the late +rector to Pocklington, she could easily reconcile herself. But to Mr. +Lindo’s engagement to the lawyer’s daughter, and to the surprising +intimacy between the earl and Mr. Bonamy, she could not so readily make up her +mind. Why, it was reported that the earl had walked into town and taken tea at +Mr. Bonamy’s house! Still, facts are stubborn things, nor was it long +before Mrs. Hammond was heard to say that the lawyer’s conduct in +supporting Mr. Lindo in his trouble had produced a very favorable impression on +her mind, and prepared her to look upon him in a new light. +</p> + +<p> +And Laura? Laura, during these changes, showed herself particularly bright and +sparkling. She was not of a nature to feel even defeat very deeply, or to +philosophize much over past mistakes. Her mother saw no change in +her—nay, she marvelled, recalling her daughter’s intimacy with Mr. +Clode and the obstinacy she had exhibited in siding with him, that Laura could +so completely put him out of her mind and thoughts. But the least sensitive +feel sometimes. The most thoughtless have their moments of care. Even the cat, +with its love of home and comfort, will sometimes wander on a wet night. And +there are times when Laura, doubting the future and weary of the present, +wishes she had had the courage to do as her heart bade her, and make the +plunge, careless what the world, and her rivals, might say of her marriage to a +curate. For Clode’s rugged face and masculine will dominate her still. +Though a year has elapsed, and she has not heard of him, nor probably will hear +of him now, she thinks of him with regret and soreness. She had not much to +give, but to her sorrow she knows now that she gave it to him, and that in that +struggle for supremacy both were losers. +</p> + +<p> +The good wine last. Kate broke the news to Jack herself, and found it no news. +“Yes, I have just seen Lindo,” he answered quietly, taking her +hand, and looking her in the face with dry eyes. “May he make you very +happy, Kate, and—well, I can wish you nothing better than that.” +Then Kate broke down and cried bitterly. When she recovered herself Jack was +gone. +</p> + +<p> +If you were to describe that scene to Jack Smith’s friends in the Temple +they would jeer at you. They would cover you with ridicule and gibes. There is +no one so keen, so sharp, so matter-of-fact, so certain to succeed as he, they +say. They have only one fault to find with him, that he works too hard; that he +bids fair to become one of those legal machines which may be seen any evening +taking in fuel at solitary club tables, and returning afterward to dusty +chambers, with the regularity of clockwork. But there is one thing even in his +present life which his Temple friends do not know, and which gives me hope of +him. Week by week there comes to him a letter from the country from a +long-limbed girl in short frocks, whose hero he is. Time, which, like +Procrustes’ bed, brings frocks and legs to the same length at last, heals +wounds also. +</p> + +<p> +When a day not far distant now shall show him Daintry in the bloom of budding +womanhood, is it to be thought that Jack will resist her? I think not. But, be +that as it may, with no better savor than that of his loyalty, the silent +loyalty of an English friend, could the chronicle of a Bayard—much less +the tale of a country town—come to an end. +</p> + +<h3>THE END.</h3> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..57fa2d7 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #39215 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39215) diff --git a/old/39215-8.txt b/old/39215-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0c6b0ea --- /dev/null +++ b/old/39215-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9895 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The New Rector, by Stanley J. Weyman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The New Rector + +Author: Stanley J. Weyman + +Release Date: March 20, 2012 [EBook #39215] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the +Web Archive (Harvard University) + + + + + +no gutcheck/jeebies/gutspell + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + 1. Page scan source: + http://www.archive.org/details/newrector00weymgoog + (Harvard University) + + 2. Table of Contents added. + + 3. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. + + + + + + + THE NEW RECTOR + + + + + + BY + + STANLEY J. WEYMAN + + + + + + NEW YORK + + AMERICAN PUBLISHERS CORPORATION + + 310-318 Sixth Avenue + + + + + + + Copyright 1891, + BY + UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY. + + * * * + + _All rights reserved_ + + + + + + + CONTENTS. + + CHAPTER + + I. "LE ROI EST MORT!" + + II. "VIVE LE ROI!" + + III. AN AWKWARD MEETING. + + IV. BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS. + + V. "REGINALD LINDO, 1850." + + VI. THE BONAMYS AT HOME. + + VII. THE HAMMONDS' DINNER PARTY. + + VIII. TWO SURPRISES. + + IX. TOWN TALK. + + X. OUT WITH THE SHEEP. + + XI. THE DOCTOR SPEAKS. + + XII. THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL. + + XIII. LAURA'S PROVISO. + + XIV. THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD. + + XV. THE BAZAAR. + + XVI. "LORD DYNMORE IS HERE." + + XVII. THE LAWYER AT HOME. + + XVIII. A FRIEND IN NEED. + + XIX. THE DAY AFTER. + + XX. A SUDDEN CALL. + + XXI. IN PROFUNDIS. + + XXII. THE RECTOR'S DECISION. + + XXIII. THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS. + + XXIV. THE CUP AT THE LIP. + + XXV. HUMBLE PIE. + + XXVI. LOOSE ENDS. + + + + + + + THE NEW RECTOR. + + + + + CHAPTER I. + + "LE ROI EST MORT!" + + +The king was dead. But not at once, not until after some short +breathing-space, such as was pleasant enough to those whose only +concern with the succession lay in the shouting, could the cry of +"Long live the king!" be raised. For a few days there was no rector of +Claversham. The living was during this time in abeyance, or in the +clouds, or in the lap of the law, or in any strange and inscrutable +place you choose to name. It may have been in the prescience of the +patron, and, if so, no locality could be more vague, the whereabouts +of Lord Dynmore himself, to say nothing of his prescience, being as +uncertain as possible. Messrs. Gearns & Baker, his solicitors and +agents, should have known as much upon this point as any one; yet it +was their habit to tell one inquirer that his lordship was in the +Cordilleras, and another that he was on the slopes of the Andes, +and another that he was at the forty-ninth parallel--quite +indifferently--these places being all one to Messrs. Gearns & Baker, +whose walk in life had lain for so many years about Lincoln's Inn +Fields that Clare Market had come to be their ideal of an uncivilized +country. + +And more, if the whereabouts of Lord Dynmore could only be told in +words rather far-sounding than definite, there was room for a doubt +whether his prescience existed at all. For, according to his friends, +there never was a man whose memory was so notably eccentric--not weak, +but eccentric. And if his memory was impeccable, his prescience-- But +we grow wide of the mark. The question being merely where the living +of Claversham was during the days which immediately followed Mr. +Williams's death, let it be said at once that we do not know. + +Mr. Williams was the late incumbent. He had been rector of the little +Warwickshire town for nearly forty years; and although his people were +ready enough to busy themselves with the question of his successor, he +did not lack honor in his death. His had been a placid life, such as +suited an indolent and easy-going man. "Let me sit upon one chair and +put up my feet on another, and there I am," he was once heard to say; +and the town repeated the remark and chuckled over it. There were some +who would have had the parish move more quickly, and who talked with a +sneer of the old port-wine kind of parson. But if he had done little +good, he had done less evil. He was kindly and open-handed, and he had +not an enemy in the parish. He was regretted as much as such a man +should be. Besides, people did not die commonly in Claversham. It was +but once a year, or twice at the most, that any one who was any one +passed away. And so, when the event did occur the most was made of it +in an old-fashioned way. When Mr. Williams passed for the last time +into his churchyard, there was no window which did not, by shutter or +blind, mark its respect for him, not a tongue which wagged foul of his +memory. And then the shutters were taken down and the blinds pulled +up, and every one, from Mr. Clode, the curate, to the old people at +Bourne's Almhouses, who, having no affairs of their own, had the more +time to discuss their neighbors', asked, "Who is to be the new +rector?" + +On the day of the funeral two of these old pensioners watched the +curate's tall form as he came gravely along the opposite side of the +street, to fall in at the door of his lodgings with two ladies, one +elderly, one young, who were passing so opportunely that it really +seemed as if they might have been waiting for him. He and the elder +lady--she was so plump of figure, so healthy of eye and cheek, and was +dressed besides with such a comfortable richness that it did one good +to look at her--began to talk in a subdued, decorous fashion, while +the girl listened. He was telling them of the funeral, how well the +archdeacon had read the service, and what a crowd of Dissenters had +been present, and so on: and at last he came to the important +question. + +"I hear, Mrs. Hammond," he said, "that the living will be given to Mr. +Herbert of Easthope, whom you know, I think? To me? Oh, no, I have +not, and never had, any expectation of it. Please do not," he added, +with a slight smile and a shake of the head, "mention such a thing +again. Leave me in my content." + +"But why should you not have it?" said the young lady, with a pleasant +persistence. "Every one in the parish would be glad if you were +appointed. Could we not do something or say something--get up a +petition or anything? Lord Dynmore ought, of course, to give it to +you. I think some one should tell him what are the wishes of the +parish. I do indeed!" + +She was a very pretty young lady, with bright brown eyes and hair and +rather arch features, and the gentleman she was addressing had long +found her face pleasant to look upon; but at this moment it really +seemed to him as the face of an angel. Yet he only answered with a +kind of depressed gratitude. "Thank you, Miss Hammond," he said. "If +good wishes could procure me the living, I should have an excellent +reason for hoping. But as things are, it is not for me." + +"Pooh! pooh!" said Mrs. Hammond cheerily, "who knows?" And then, after +a few more words, they went on their way, and he turned into his +rooms. + +The old women were still watching. "I don't well know who'll get it, +Peggy," said one, "but I be pretty sure of this, as he won't! It isn't +his sort as gets 'em. It's the lord's friends, bless you!" + +So it appeared that she and Mr. Clode were of one mind on the matter. +But was that really Mr. Clode's opinion? It was when the crow opened +its beak that it dropped the piece of cheese; and so to this day the +wise man has no chance or expectation of this or that until he gets +it. And if a patron or a patron's solicitor has for some days had +under his paperweight a letter written in a hand that bears a strange +likeness to the wise man's--a letter setting forth the latter's claims +and wisdom--what of that? That is a private matter, of course. + +Be that as it may, there was scarcely a person in Claversham who did +not give some time that evening, and on subsequent evenings too, to +the interesting question who was to be the new rector. The rector was +a big factor in the town-life. Girls wondered whether he would be +young, and hoped he would dance. Their mothers were sanguine that he +would be unmarried, and their fathers that he would play whist. And +one questioned whether he would buy Mr. Williams's stock of port, and +another whether he would dine late. And some trusted that he would let +things be, and some hoped that he would cleanse the stables. And only +one thing was certain and sure and immutably fixed--that, whoever he +was, he would not be able to please everybody. + +Nay, the ripple of excitement spread far beyond Claversham. Not only +at the archdeacon's at Kingsford Carbonel, five miles away among the +orchards and hopyards, was there much speculation upon the matter, but +even at the Homfrays', of Holberton, ten miles out beyond the Baer +Hills, there was talk about it, and bets were made across the +billiard-table. And in more distant vicarages and curacies, where the +patron was in some degree known, there were flutterings of heart and +anxious searchings of the "Guardian" and Crockford. Those who seemed +to have some chance of the living grew despondent, and those who had +none talked the thing over with their wives after the children had +gone to bed, until they persuaded themselves that they would die at +Claversham Rectory. Middle-aged men who had been at college with Lord +Dynmore remembered that they had on one occasion rowed in the same +boat with him; and young men who had danced with his niece thought +secretly that, dear little woman as Emily or Annie was, they might +have done better. And a hundred and eleven letters, written by people +who knew less than Messrs. Gearns & Baker of the Andes, seeing that +they did not know that Lord Dynmore was there or thereabouts, were +received at Dynmore Park and forwarded to London, and duly made up +into a large parcel with other correspondence by Messrs. Gearns & +Baker, and so were despatched to the forty-ninth parallel--or +thereabouts. + + + + + CHAPTER II. + + "VIVE LE ROI!" + + +It was at the beginning of the second week in October that Mr. +Williams died; and, the weather in those parts being peculiarly fine +and bright for the time of year, men stood about in the churchyard +with bare heads, and caught no colds. And it continued so for some +days after the funeral. But not everywhere. Upon a morning, some three +perhaps after the ceremony at Claversham, a young gentleman sat down +to his breakfast, only a hundred and fifty miles away, under such +different conditions--a bitter east wind, a dense fog, and a general +murkiness of atmosphere--that one might have supposed his not +over-plentiful meal to be laid in another planet. + +The air in the room--a meagrely furnished, much littered room, was +yellow and choking, and the candles burned dimly in the midst of +yellow halos. The fire seemed to be smouldering, and the owner of the +room had to pay some attention to it before he sat down and found a +letter lying beside his plate. He glanced at it doubtfully. "I do not +know the handwriting," he muttered, "and it is not a subscription, for +they never come in an east wind. I am afraid it is a bill." + +The letter was addressed to the Rev. Reginald Lindo, St. Barnabas +Mission House, 383 East India Dock Road, London, E. After scrutinizing +it for a moment, he pulled a candle toward him and tore open the +envelope. + +He read the letter slowly, his teacup at his lips, and, though he was +alone, his face grew crimson. When he had finished it he turned back +and read it again, and then flung it down and, starting up, began to +walk the room. "What a boy I am!" he muttered. "But it is almost +incredible. Upon my honor it is almost incredible!" + +He was still at the height of his excitement, now sitting down to take +a mouthful of breakfast and now leaping up to pace the room, when his +housekeeper entered and said that a woman from Tamplin's Rents wanted +to see him. + +"What does she want, Mrs. Baxter?" he asked. + +"Husband is dying, sir," the old lady replied briefly. + +"Do you know her at all?" + +"No, sir. She is as poor a piece as I have ever seen. She says that +she could not have come out, for want of clothes, if it had not been +for the fog. And they are not particular here, as I know--the +hussies!" + +"Say that I shall be ready to go with her in less than five minutes," +the young clergyman answered. "And here! Give her some tea, Mrs. +Baxter. The pot is half full." + +He bustled about; but nevertheless the message and the business he was +now upon had sobered him, and as he buttoned up the letter in his +breast-pocket, his face was grave. He was a tall young man, fair, +with regular features, and curling hair cut rather short. His eyes +were blue and pleasantly bold; and in his every action and in +his whole carriage there was a great appearance of confidence and +self-possession. Taking a book and a small case from a side-table, he +put on his overcoat and went out. A moment, and the dense fog +swallowed him up, and with him the tattered bundle of rags, which had +a husband, and very likely had nothing else in the world of her own. +Tamplin's Rents not affecting us, we may skip a few hours, and then go +westward with him as far as the Temple, which in the East India Dock +Road is considered very far west indeed by those who have ever heard +of it. + +Here he sought a dingy staircase in Fig-tree Court, and, mounting to +the second floor, stopped before a door which was adorned by about a +dozen names, painted in white on a black ground. He knocked loudly, +and, a small boy answering his summons with great alacrity and +importance, our friend asked for Mr. Smith, and was promptly ushered +into a room about nine feet square, in which, at a table covered with +papers and open books, sat a small, dark-complexioned man, very keen +and eager in appearance, who looked up with an air of annoyance. + +"Who is it, Fred?" he said impatiently, moving one of the candles, +which the fog still rendered necessary, although it was high noon. "I +am engaged at present." + +"Mr. Lindo to see you, sir," the boy announced, with a formality very +funny in a groom of the chambers about four feet high. + +The little man's countenance instantly changed, and he jumped up +grinning. "Is it you, old boy?" he said. "Sit down, old fellow! I +thought it might be my own solicitor, and it is well to be prepared, +you know." + +"But you are not really busy?" said the visitor, looking at him +doubtfully. + +"Well, I am and I am not," replied Mr. Smith; and, deftly tipping +aside the books, he disclosed some slips of manuscript. "It is an +article for the 'Cornhill,'" he continued; "but whether it will ever +appear there is another matter. You have come to lunch, of course? And +now, what is your news?" + +He was so quick and eager that he reminded people who saw him for the +first time of a rat. When they came to know him better, they found +that a stauncher friend than Jack Smith was not to be found in +the Temple. With this he had the reputation of being a clever, +clear-headed man, and his sound common-sense was almost a proverb. +Observing that Lindo did not answer him, he repeated, "Is anything +amiss, old fellow?" + +"Well, not quite amiss," Lindo answered, his face flushing a little. +"But the fact is"--taking the letter from the breast-pocket--"that I +have had the offer of a living, Jack." + +Smith leaped up and clapped his friend on the shoulder. "By Jove! old +man," he exclaimed heartily, "I am glad of it! Right glad of it! You +must have had enough of that slumming. But I hope it is a better +living than mine," he continued, with a comical glance round the tiny +room. "Let us have a look! What is it? Two hundred and a house?" + +Lindo handed the letter to him. It was written from Lincoln's Inn +Fields, and was dated the preceding day. It ran thus: + + +"Dear Sir:--We are instructed by our client, the Right Honorable the +Earl of Dynmore, to invite your acceptance of the living of Claversham +in the county of Warwick, vacant by the death on the 15th instant of +the Rev. John Williams, the late incumbent. The living, of which his +lordship is the patron, is a town rectory, of the approximate value of +810_l_ per annum and a house. Our client is travelling in the United +States, but we have the requisite authorities to proceed in due form +and without delay, which in this matter is prejudicial. We beg to have +the pleasure of receiving your acceptance at as early a date as +possible, + + "And remain, dear Sir, + + "Your obedient servants, + + "Gearns & Baker. + +"To the Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A." + + +The barrister read this letter with even greater surprise than seemed +natural, and, when he had done, looked at his companion with wondering +eyes. "Claversham!" he ejaculated. "Why, I know it well!" + +"Do you? I have never heard you mention it." + +"I knew old Williams!" Jack continued, still in amaze. "Knew him well, +and heard of his death, but little thought you were likely to succeed +him. My dear fellow, it is a wonderful piece of good fortune! +Wonderful! I shake you by the hand! I congratulate you heartily! But +how did you come to know the high and mighty earl? Unbosom yourself, +my dear boy!" + +"I do not know him--do not know him from Adam!" replied the young +clergyman gravely. + +"You don't mean it?" + +"I do. I have never seen him in my life." + +Jack Smith whistled. "Are you sure it is not a hoax?" he said, with a +serious face. + +"I think not," the rector-elect replied. "Perhaps I have given you a +wrong impression. I have had nothing to do with the earl; but my uncle +was his tutor." + +"Oh!" said Smith slowly, "that makes all the difference. What uncle?" + +"You have heard me speak of him. He was vicar of St. Gabriel's, +Aldgate. He died about a year ago--last October, I think. Lord Dynmore +and he were good friends, and my uncle used often to stay at his place +in Scotland. I suppose my name must have come up some time when they +were talking." + +"Likely enough," assented the lawyer. "But for the earl to remember +it, he must be one in a hundred!" + +"It is certainly very good of him," Lindo replied, his cheek flushing. +"If it had been a small country living, and my uncle had been alive to +jog his elbow, I should not have been so much surprised." + +"And you are just twenty-five!" Jack Smith observed, leaning back in +his chair, and eyeing his friend with undisguised and whimsical +admiration. "You will be the youngest rector in the Clergy List, I +should think! And Claversham! By Jove, what a berth!" + +A queer expression of annoyance for a moment showed itself in Lindo's +face. "I say, Jack, stow that!" he said gently, and with a little +shamefacedness. "I mean," he continued, smoothing down the nap on his +hat, "that I do not want to look at it altogether in that way, and I +do not want others to regard it so." + +"As a berth, you mean?" Jack said gravely, but with a twinkle in his +eyes. + +"Well, from the loaves and fishes point of view," Lindo commenced, +beginning to walk up and down the room. "I do not think an officer, +when he gets promotion, looks only at the increase in his pay. Of +course I am glad that it is a good living, and that I shall have a +house, and a good position, and all that. But I declare to you, Jack, +believe me or not as you like, that if I did not feel that I could do +the work as I hope, please God, to do it, I would not take it up--I +would not, indeed. As it is, I feel the responsibility. I have been +thinking about it as I walked down here, and upon my honor for a while +I thought I ought to decline it." + +"I would not do that!" said Gallio, dismissing the twinkle from his +eye, and really respecting his old friend, perhaps, a little more than +before. "You are not the man, I think, to shun either work or +responsibility. Did I tell you," he continued in a different tone, +"that I had an uncle at Claversham?" + +"No," said Lindo, surprised in his turn. + +"Yes, and I think he is one of your church wardens. His name is +Bonamy, and he is a solicitor. His London agent is my only client," +Jack said jerkily. + +"And he is one of the church wardens! Well, that is strange--and +jolly!" + +"Umph! Don't you be too sure of that!" retorted the barrister sharply. +"He is a--well, he has been very good to me, and he is my uncle, and I +am not going to say anything against him. But I am not quite sure that +I should like him for my church warden. _Your_ church warden! Why, it +is like a fairy tale, old fellow!" + +And so it seemed to Lindo when, an hour later, the small boy, with the +same portentous gravity of face, let him out and bade him good-day. As +the young parson started eastward, along Fleet Street first, he looked +at the moving things round him with new eyes, from a new standpoint, +with a new curiosity. The passers-by were the same, but he was +changed. He had lunched, and perhaps the material view of his position +was uppermost, for those in the crowd who specially observed the tall +young clergyman noticed in his bearing an air of calm importance and a +strong sense of personal dignity, which led him to shun collisions, +and even to avoid jostling his fellows, with peculiar care. The truth +was that he had all the while before his eyes, as he walked, an +announcement which was destined to appear in the "Guardian" of the +following week: + +"The Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A., St. Barnabas' Mission, London, to be +Rector of Claversham. Patron, the Earl of Dynmore." + + + + + CHAPTER III. + + AN AWKWARD MEETING. + + +A fortnight after this paragraph in the "Guardian" had filled +Claversham with astonishment and Mr. Clode with a modest thankfulness +that he was spared the burden of office, a little dark man--Jack +Smith, in fact--drove briskly into Paddington Station, and, +disregarding the offers of the porters, who stand waiting on the +hither side of the journey like Charon by the Styx, and see at a +glance who has the obolus, sprang from the hansom without assistance, +and bustled on to the platform. + +Here he looked up and down as if he expected to meet some one, and +then, glancing at the clock, found that he had a quarter of an hour to +spare. He made at once for the bookstall, and, with a lavishness which +would have surprised some of his friends, bought "Punch," a little +volume by Howells, the "Standard," and finally, though he blushed as +he asked for it, the "Queen." He had just gathered his purchases +together and was paying for them, when a high-pitched voice at his +elbow made him start. "Why, Jack! what in the world are you buying all +those papers for?" The speaker was a girl about thirteen years old, +who in the hubbub had stolen unnoticed to his side. + +"Hullo, Daintry," he answered. "Why did you not say that you were here +before? I have been looking for you. Where is Kate? Oh, yes, I see +her," as a young lady turning over books at the farther end of the +stall acknowledged his presence by a laughing nod. "You are here in +good time," he went on, while the younger girl affectionately slipped +her arm through his. + +"Yes," she said. "Your mother started us early. And so you have come +to see us off, after all, Jack?" + +"Just so," he answered drily. "Let us go to Kate." + +They did so, the young lady meeting them halfway. "How kind of you to +be here, Jack!" she said. "As you have come, will you look us out a +comfortable compartment? That is the train over there. And please to +put this, and this, and Daintry's parcel in the corners for us." + +This and this were a cloak and a shawl, and a few little matters in +brown paper. In order to possess himself of them, Jack handed Kate the +papers he was carrying. + +"Are they for me?" she said, gratefully indeed, but with a placid +gratitude which was not perhaps what the donor wanted. "Oh, thank you. +And this too? What is it?" + +"'Their Wedding Journey,'" said Jack, with a shy twinkle in his eyes. + +"Is it pretty?" she answered dubiously. "It sounds silly; but you are +supposed to be a judge. I think I should like 'A Chance Acquaintance' +better, though." + +Of course the little book was changed, and Jack winced. But he had not +time to think much about it, for he had to bustle away through the +rising babel to secure seats for them in an empty compartment of the +Oxford train, and see their luggage labelled and put in. This done, he +hurried back, and pointed out to them the places he had taken. "Oh, +dear, they are in a through carriage," Kate said, stopping short and +eyeing the board over the door. + +"Yes," he answered. "I thought that that was what you wanted." + +"No, I would rather go in another carriage, and change. We shall get +to Claversham soon enough without travelling with Claversham people." + +"Indeed we shall," Daintry chimed in. "Let us go and find seats, and +Jack will bring the things after us." + +He assented meekly--very meekly for sharp Jack Smith--and presently +came along with his arms full of parcels, to find them ensconced in +the nearer seats of a compartment, which contained also one gentleman +who was already deep in the "Times." Jack, standing at the open door, +could not see his face, for it was hidden by the newspaper, but he +could see that his legs wore a youthful and reckless air; and he +raised his eyebrows interrogatively. "Pooh!" whispered Daintry in +answer. "How stupid you are! It is all right. I can see he is a +clergyman by his boots!" + +Jack smiled at this assurance, and, putting in the things he was +holding, shut the door and stood outside, looking first at the +platform about him, on which all was flurry and confusion, and then at +the interior of the carriage, which seemed in comparison peaceful and +homelike. "I think I will come with you to Westbourne Park," he said +suddenly. + +"Nonsense, Jack!" Kate replied, with crushing decision. "We shall be +there in five minutes, and you will have all the trouble of returning +for nothing." + +He acquiesced meekly--poor Jack! "Well," he said, with a new effort at +cheerfulness, "you will soon be at home, girls. Remember me to the +governor. I am afraid you will be rather dull at first. You will have +one scrap of excitement, however." + +"What is that?" said Kate, very much as if she were prepared to +depreciate it before she knew what it was. + +"The new rector!" + +"He will make very little difference to us!" the girl answered, with +an accent almost of scorn. "Papa said in his letter that he thought it +was a great pity a local man had not been appointed--some one who knew +the place and the old ways. You say he is clever and nice; but either +way it will not affect us much." + +No one noticed that the "Times" newspaper in the far corner of the +compartment rustled suspiciously, and that the clerical boots became +agitated on a sudden, as though their wearer meditated a move; and, in +ignorance of this, "I expect I shall hate him!" said Daintry calmly. + +"Come, you must not do that," Jack remonstrated "You must remember +that he is not only a very good fellow, but a great friend of mine." + +"Then we ought indeed to spare him!" Kate said frankly, "for you have +been very good to us and made our visit delightful." + +His face flushed with pleasure even at those simple words of praise. +"And you will write and tell me," he continued eagerly, "that you have +reached your journey's end safely." + +"One of us will," was the answer. "Daintry," Kate went on calmly, +"will you remind me to write to Jack to-morrow evening?" + +His face fell sadly. So little would have made him happy. He looked +down and kicked the step of the carriage, and made his tiny moan to +himself before he spoke again. "Good-bye," he said then. "They are +coming to look at your tickets. You are due out in one minute. +Good-bye, Daintry." + +"Good-bye, Jack. Come and see us soon," she cried earnestly, as she +released his hand. + +"Good-bye, Kate." Alas! Kate's cheek did not show the slightest +consciousness that his clasp was more than cousinly. She uttered her +"Good-bye, Jack, and thank you so much," very kindly, but her color +never varied by the quarter of a tone, and her grasp was as firm and +as devoid of shyness as his own. + +He had not much time to be miserable, however, then, for, the +ticket-collector coming to the window, Jack had to fall back, and in +doing so made a discovery. Kate, hunting for her ticket in one of +those mysterious places in which ladies will put tickets, heard him +utter an exclamation, and asked, "What is it, Jack?" + +To her surprise, the collector having by this time disappeared, he +stretched out his hand through the window to some one beyond her. +"Why, Lindo!" he cried, "is that you? I had not a notion of your +identity. Of course you are going down to take possession." + +Kate, trembling already with a horrible presentiment, turned her head. +Yes, it was the clergyman in the corner who answered Jack's greeting +and rose to shake hands with him, the train being already in motion. +"I did not recognize your voice out there," he said, looking rather +hot. + +"No? And I did not know you were going down to-day," Jack answered, +walking beside the train. "Let me introduce you to my cousins, Miss +Bonamy and Daintry. I am sorry that I did not see you before. Good +luck to you! Good-bye, Kate!" + +The train was moving faster and faster, and Jack was soon left behind +on the platform gazing pathetically at the black tunnel which had +swallowed it up. In the carriage there was silence, and in the heart +of one at least of the passengers the most horrible vexation. Kate +could have bitten out her tongue. She was conscious that the clergyman +had bowed in acknowledgment of Jack's introduction and had muttered +something. But then he had sunk back in his corner, his face wearing, +as it seemed to her, a frown of scornful annoyance. Even if nothing +awkward had been said, she would still have shunned, for a certain +reason, such a meeting as this with a new clergyman who did not yet +know Claversham. But now she had aggravated the matter by her +heedlessness. So she sat angry, and yet ashamed, with her lips pressed +together and her eyes fixed upon the opposite cushion. + +For the Rev. Reginald, he had been by no means indifferent to the +criticisms he had unfortunately overheard. Always possessed of a +fairly good opinion of himself, he had lately been raising his +standard to the rectorial height; and, being very human, he had come +to think himself something of a personage. If Jack Smith had +introduced him under the same circumstances to his aunt, there is no +saying how far the acquaintance would have progressed or how long the +new incumbent might have fretted and fumed. But presently he stole a +look at Kate Bonamy and melted. + +He saw a girl, slightly above the middle height, graceful and rounded +of figure, with a grave stateliness of carriage which oddly became +her. Her complexion was rather pale, but it was clear and healthy, and +there was even a freckle here and a freckle there which I never heard +a man say that he would have had elsewhere. If her face was a trifle +long, with a nose a little aquiline and curving lips too wide, yet it +was a fair and dainty face, such as Englishmen love. The brown hair, +which strayed on to the broad white brow and hung in a heavy loop upon +her neck, had a natural waviness--the sole beauty on which she prided +herself. For she could not see her eyes as others saw them--big gray +eyes that from under long lashes looked out upon you, full of such +purity and truth that men meeting their gaze straightway felt a desire +to be better men and went away and tried--for half an hour. Such was +Kate outwardly. Inwardly she had faults of course, and perhaps pride +and a little temper were two of them. + +The rector was still admiring her askance, surprised to find that Jack +Smith, who was not very handsome himself, had such a cousin, when +Daintry roused him abruptly. For some moments she had been gazing at +him, as at some unknown specimen, with no attempt to hide her +interest. Now she said suddenly, "You are the new rector?" + +He answered stiffly that he was; being a good deal taken aback at +being challenged in this way. Remonstrance, however, was out of the +question, and Daintry for the moment said no more, though her gaze +lost none of its embarrassing directness. + +But presently she began again. "I should think the dogs would like +you," she said deliberately, and much as if he had not been there to +hear; "you look as if they would." + +Silence again. The rector smiled fatuously. What was a beneficed +clergyman, whose dignity was young and tender, to do, subjected to the +criticism of unknown dogs? He tried to divert his thoughts by +considering the pretty sage-green frock and the gray fur cape and hat +to match which the elder girl was wearing. Doubtless she was taking +the latest fashions down to Claversham, and fur capes and hats, +indefinitely and mysteriously multiplying, would listen to him on +Sundays from all the nearest pews. And Daintry was silent so long that +he thought he had done with her. But no. "Do you think that you will +like Claversham?" she asked, with an air of serious curiosity. + +"I trust I shall," he said, a flush rising to his cheek. + +She took a moment to consider the answer conscientiously, and, +thinking badly of it, remarked gravely, "I don't think you will." + +This was unbearable. The clergyman, full of a nervous dread lest the +next question should be, "Do you think that they will like you at +Claversham?" made a great show of resuming his newspaper. Kate, +possessed by the same fear, shot an imploring glance at Daintry; but, +seeing that the latter had only eyes for the stranger, hoped +desperately for the best. + +Which was very bad. "It must be jolly," remarked the unconscious +tormentor, "to have eight hundred pounds a year, and be a rector!" + +"Daintry!" Kate cried in horror. + +"Why, what is the matter?" asked Daintry, turning suddenly to her +sister with wide-open eyes. Her look of aggrieved astonishment at once +overcame Lindo's gravity, and he laughed aloud. He was not without a +charming sense, still novel enough to be pleasing, that Daintry was +right. It was jolly to be a rector and have eight hundred a year! + +That laugh came in happily. It seemed to sweep away the cobwebs of +embarrassment which had lain so thickly about two of the party. Lindo +began to talk pleasantly, pointing out this or that reach of the +river, and Kate, meeting his cheery eyes, put aside a faint idea of +apologizing which had been in her head, and replied frankly. He told +them tales of summer voyages between lock and lock, and of long days +idly spent in the Wargrave marshes; and, as the identification of +Mapledurham and Pangbourne and Wittenham and Goring rendered it +necessary that they should all cross and recross the carriage, they +were soon on excellent terms with one another, or would have been if +the rector had not still detected in Kate's manner a slight stiffness +for which he could not account. It puzzled him also to observe that, +though they were ready, Daintry more particularly, to discuss the +amusements of London and the goodness of cousin Jack, they both grew +reticent when the conversation turned toward Claversham and its +affairs. + +At Oxford he got out to go to the bookstall. + +"Jack was right," said Daintry, looking after him. "He _is_ nice." + +"Yes," her sister allowed, rising and sitting down again in a restless +fashion. "But I wish we had not fallen in with him, all the same." + +"It cannot be helped now," said Daintry, who was evidently prepared to +accept the event with philosophy. + +Not so her sister. "We might go into another carriage," she suggested. + +"That would be rude," said Daintry calmly. + +The question was decided for them by the young clergyman's return. He +came along the platform, an animated look in his face. "Miss Bonamy," +he said, stopping at the open door with his hand extended, "there is +some one in the refreshment-room whom I think that you would like to +see. Mr. Gladstone is there, talking to the Duke of Westminster, and +they are both eating buns like common mortals. Will you come and take +a peep at them?" + +"I don't think that we have time," she objected. + +"There is sure to be time," Daintry cried. "Now, Kate, come!" And she +was down upon the platform in a moment. + +"The train is not due out for five minutes yet," Lindo said, as he +piloted them through the crowd to the doorway. "There, on the left by +the fireplace," he added. + +Kate glanced, and turned away satisfied. Not so Daintry. With rapt +attention in her face, she strayed nearer and nearer to the great men, +her eyes growing larger with each step. + +"She will be talking to them next," said Kate, in a fidget. + +"Perhaps asking him if he likes Downing Street," Lindo suggested +slyly. "There, she is coming now," he added, as Miss Daintry turned +and came to them at last. + +"I wanted to make sure," she said simply, seeing Kate's impatience, +"that I should know them again. That was all." + +"Quite so; I hope you have succeeded," Kate answered drily. "But, if +we are not quick, we shall miss our train." And she led the way back +with more speed than dignity. + +"There is plenty of time--plenty of time," Lindo answered, following +them. He could not bear to see her pushing her way through the mixed +crowd, and accepting so easily a footing of equality with it. He was +one of those men to whom their womenkind are sacred. He took his time, +therefore, and followed at his ease; only to see, when he emerged from +the press, a long stretch of empty platform, three porters, and the +tail of a departing train. "Good gracious!" he stammered, with dismay +in his face. "What does it mean?" + +"It means," Kate said, in an accent of sharp annoyance--she did not +intend to spare him--"that you have made us miss our train, Mr. Lindo. +And there is not another which reaches Claversham today!" + + + + + CHAPTER IV. + + BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS. + + +"There! That was your fault!" said Daintry, turning from the departing +train. + +The young rector could not deny it. He would have given anything for +at least the appearance of being undisturbed; but the blood came into +his cheek, and in his attempt to maintain his dignity he only +succeeded in looking angry as well as confused and taken aback. He had +certainly made a mess of his escort duty. What in the world had led +him to go out of his way to make a fool of himself? he wondered. And +with these Claversham people! + +"There may be a special train to-day," Kate suggested suddenly. She +had got over her first vexation, and perhaps repented that she had +betrayed it so openly. "Or we may be allowed to go on by a +luggage-train, Mr. Lindo. Will you kindly see?" + +He snatched at the relief which her proposal held out to him, and went +away to inquire. But almost at once he was back again. "It is most +vexatious!" he said loudly. "It is only three o'clock, and yet there +is no way of getting to Claversham to-night! I am very sorry, but I +never dreamed the company managed things so badly. Never!" + +"No," said Kate drily. + +He winced and looked at her sharply, his vanity hurt again. But then +he found that he could not keep it up. No doubt it was a ridiculous +position for a beneficed clergyman, on his way to undertake the work +of his life, to be delayed at a station with two girls; but, after +all, for a young man to be angry with a young woman who is also +pretty--well, the task is difficult. "I am afraid," he said shyly, and +yet with a kind of frankness, "that I have brought you into trouble, +Miss Bonamy. As your sister says, it was my fault. Is it a matter of +great consequence that you should reach home tonight?" + +"I am afraid that my father will be vexed," she answered. + +"You must telegraph to him," he rejoined. "I am afraid that is +all I can suggest. And that done, you will have only one thing to +consider--whether we shall stay the night here or go on to +Birmingham." + +Kate looked at him, her gray eyes very doubtful, and did not at once +answer. He had clearly made up his mind to join his fortunes to +theirs, while she, on her side, had reasons for shrinking from +intimacy with him. But he seemed to consider it so much a matter of +course that they should remain together and travel together, that she +scarcely saw how to put things on a different footing. She knew, too, +that she would get no help from Daintry, who already regarded their +detention in the light of a capital joke. + +"What are you going to do yourself, Mr. Lindo?" she said at last, her +manner rather chilling. + +He opened his eyes and smiled. "You discard me, then?" he said. "You +have lost all faith in me, Miss Bonamy? Well, I deserve it after the +scrape into which I have led you." + +"I did not mean that," she answered. "I wished to know if you had made +any plans." + +"Yes," he replied--"to make amends, if you will let me take command of +the party. We will stay in Oxford, and I will show you round the +colleges." + +"No?" exclaimed Daintry. "Will you? How jolly! And then?" + +"We will dine at the Mitre," he answered, smiling, "if Miss Bonamy +will permit me to manage everything. And then, if you leave here at +nine-thirty to-morrow you will be at Claversham soon after twelve. +Will that suit you?" + +Daintry's face answered sufficiently for her. As for Kate, she was in +a difficulty. She knew little of hotels: yet they must stop somewhere, +and no doubt Mr. Lindo would take a great deal of trouble off her +hands. But would it be proper to do as he proposed? She really did not +know--only that it sounded odd. That it would not be wise she knew. +She could answer that question at once. But how could she explain, and +how tell him to go his way and leave them? And, after all, to see +Oxford would be delightful; and he really was very pleasant, very +different from the men she knew at home. + +"You are very good," she said at length, with a grateful sigh--"if we +have no choice but between Oxford and Birmingham." + +"And no choice of guides at all," he said, smiling, "you will take +me." + +"Yes," she answered, looking away primly. + +Her reserve, however, did not last. Once through the station gates, +that free holiday feeling which we have all experienced on being set +down in an unknown town, with no duty before us save to explore it, +soon possessed her; while he wished nothing better than to play the +showman--a part we love. The day was fine and bright, though cold. She +had eyes for beauty and a soul for the past, and soon forgot herself; +and he, piloting the sisters through Magdalen Walks, now strewn with +leaves, or displaying with pride the staircase of Christ Church, the +quaint library of Merton, or the ancient front of John's, forgot +himself also, and especially his new-born dignity, in which he had +lived rather too much, perhaps, during the last three weeks. He +showed himself in his true colors--the colors known to his intimate +friends--and was so bright and cheery that Kate found herself talking +to him in utter forgetfulness of his position and theirs. The girl +frankly sighed when darkness fell and they had to go into the house, +their curiosity still unsated. + +She thought it was all over. But, lo! there was a cheery fire awaiting +them in the "house" room (he had looked in for a few minutes on their +first arrival and given his orders), and before it a little table laid +for three was sparkling with plate and glass. Nay, there were two cups +of tea ready on a side-table, for it wanted an hour yet of dinnertime. +Altogether, as Daintry navely told him, "even Jack could not have +made it nicer for us." + +"Jack is a favorite of yours?" he said, laughing. + +"I should think so!" Daintry answered, in wonder. "There is no one +like Jack." + +"After that I shall take myself off," he replied. "I really want to +call on a friend, Miss Bonamy. But if I may join you at dinner----" + +"Oh, do!" she said impulsively. Then, more shyly, she added, "We shall +be very glad if you will, Mr. Lindo." + +He felt singularly pleased with himself as he turned the windy corner +of the Broad. It was pleasant to be in Oxford again, a beneficed +clergyman. Pleasant to have such a future to look forward to, such a +holiday moment to enjoy. Pleasant to anticipate the cheery meal and +the girl's smile, half shy, half grateful. And Kate?--she remained +before the fire, saying little because Daintry's tongue gave few +openings, but thinking a good deal. Once she did speak. "It won't +last," she said pettishly. + +"Why, Kate? Do you think he will be different at Claversham?" Daintry +protested. + +"Of course he will!" She spoke with a little scorn in her voice, and +that sort of decision which we use when we wish to crush down our own +unwarranted hopes. + +"But he is nice," Daintry persisted. "You do think so, Kate, don't +you?" + +"Oh, yes, he is very nice," she said drily. "But he will be in the +Hammond set at home, and we shall see nothing of him." + +But presently he was back, and Kate found it impossible to resist the +charm. He ladled the soup and dispensed the mutton-chops with a gaiety +and boyish glee which were really the stored-up effervescence of +weeks, the ebullition of the long-repressed delight which he took in +his promotion. He learned casually that the girls had been in London +for more than a month staying with Jack's mother in Bayswater, and +that they were very sorry to be upon their road home. + +"And yet," he said--this was toward the end of dinner--"I have been +told that your town is a very picturesque one. But I fancy that we +never appreciate our home as we do a place strange to us." + +"Very likely that is so," Kate answered quietly. And then a little +pause ensued, such as he had observed several times before, and come +to connect with any mention of Claversham. The girls' tongues would +run on frankly and pleasantly enough about their London visit, or Mr. +Gladstone; but let him bring the talk round to his parish and its +people, and forthwith something of reserve seemed to come between him +and them until the conversation strayed afield again. + +After the others had finished, he still toyed with his meal, partly in +lazy enjoyment of the time, partly as an excuse for staying with them. +They were sitting in a momentary silence, when a boy passed the window +chanting a ditty at the top of his voice. The doggrel came clearly to +their ears---- + + + Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, + Birds in the wilderness, birds in the wilderness; + Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, + Samuel asking for more. + + +As the sound passed on the young man looked up, a mischievous twinkle +in his eyes, and met their eyes, and all three burst into a merry peal +of laughter. They were the birds in the wilderness, sitting there in +the circle of light, in the strange room in the strange town, almost +as intimate as if they had known one another for years, or had been a +week at sea together. + +But Kate, having acknowledged by that pleasant outburst her sense of +the oddity of the position, rose from the table, and the rector had to +say good-night, explaining at the same time that he should not travel +with them next morning, but intended to go on by a later train, as his +friend wished to see more of him. Nevertheless, he said he should be +up to breakfast with them and should see them off. And in this +resolution he persisted, notwithstanding Kate's protest, which perhaps +was not very violent. + +Notwithstanding, he was a little late next morning. When he came down +he found them already seated in the coffee-room. There were others +breakfasting here and there in the room, chiefly upon toast-racks and +newspapers, and he did not at once observe that the gentleman standing +with his back set negligently against the mantelpiece was talking to +Kate. Arrived at the table, however, he saw that it was so; and the +cheery greeting on his lips faded into a commonplace "Good-morning, +Miss Bonamy." He took no apparent notice of the stranger as he added, +"I am afraid I am rather late." + +The intruder, a short dark-whiskered man between thirty and forty, +seemed to the full as much surprised by the clergyman's appearance as +Lindo was by his, and as little able to hide the feeling as Kate +herself to control the color which rose in her cheeks. She gave Mr. +Lindo his tea in silence, and then with an obvious effort introduced +the two men. "This is Dr. Gregg of Claversham--Mr. Lindo," she said. + +Lindo rose and shook hands. "Mr. Lindo the younger, I presume?" said +the doctor, with a bow and a swagger intended to show that he was +quite at his ease. + +"The only one, I am afraid," replied the rector, smiling. Though he by +no means liked the look of the man. + +"Did I rightly catch your name?" was the answer--"'Mr. Lindo?'" + +"Yes," said the rector again, opening his eyes. + +"But--you are not--you do not mean to say that you are the new +rector?" pronounced the dark man abruptly, and with a kind of +aggressiveness which seemed his most striking quality--"the rector of +Claversham, I mean?" + +"I believe so," said Lindo quietly. "You want some more water, do you +not, Miss Bonamy?" he continued. "Let me ring the bell." He rose and +crossed the room to do so. The truth was, he hated the newcomer +already. His first sentence had been enough. His manner was not the +manner of the men with whom Lindo had mixed, and the rector felt +almost angry with Kate for introducing Gregg---albeit his +parishioner--to him, and quite angry with her for suffering the doctor +to address her with the familiarity he seemed to affect. + +And Kate, her eyes downcast, knew by instinct how it was with him, and +what he was thinking. "I have been telling Dr. Gregg," she said +hurriedly, when he returned, "how we missed our train yesterday." + +"Rather how I missed it for you," Lindo answered gravely, much engaged +apparently with his breakfast. + +"Ah, yes, it was very funny!" fired off the doctor, watching each +mouthful they ate. Daintry had finished, and was sitting back in her +chair kicking the leg of the table monotonously; not in the best of +tempers apparently. "Very funny indeed!" the doctor continued. "An +accident, I hope?" with a little sniggling laugh. + +"Yes!" said the rector, looking up at him with a black brow and +steadfast eyes--"it was an accident." + +Gregg was a little cowed by the look, and in a moment, with a +muttered word or two, fidgeted himself away, cursing the general +superciliousness of parsons and the quiet airs of this one in +particular. He was a little dog-in-the-mangerish man, ill-bred, and, +like most ill-bred men, resentful of breeding in others. The fact that +he had a sneaking liking for Kate did not tend to lessen his +disgustful wonder how the Bonamy girls and the new rector came to be +travelling together--which, indeed, to any Claversham person would +have seemed a portent. But, then, Lindo did not know that. + +The objectionable item removed, and the temptation to remark upon him +overcome, Lindo soon recovered his good temper, and rattled away so +pleasantly that the train time seemed to all of them to come very +quickly. "There," he said, as he handed the last of Kate's books into +the railway-carriage, "now I have done something to make amends for my +fault, I trust. One thing more I can do. When you get home you need +not spare me. You can put it all on my shoulders, Miss Bonamy." + +"Thank you," Kate answered demurely. + +"You are going to do so, I see," he said, laughing. "I fear my +character will reach Claversham before me." + +"I do not think we shall spread it very widely," she answered in a +peculiar tone, which he naturally misunderstood. + +The train was already in motion then, and he shook hands with her as +he walked beside it. "Goodbye," he said. And then he added in a lower +tone--he was such a very young rector--"I hope to see very much of you +in the future, Miss Bonamy." + +Kate sank back in her seat, her cheek a shade warmer. And in a moment +he was alone upon the platform. + + + + + CHAPTER V. + + "REGINALD LINDO, 1850." + + +Long before the later train by which the rector came on arrived at the +Claversham station, the Rev. Stephen Clode was waiting on the +platform. The curate was a tall, dark man, somewhat over thirty, with +a strong rugged face and a bush of stiff black hair standing up from +his forehead. He had been at Claversham three years, enjoying all the +importance which old Mr. Williams's long illness naturally gave to his +curate and _locum tenens_; and, though the town was agreed that his +chagrin at having a new rector set over his head was great, it must be +admitted that he concealed it with admirable skill. More than one +letter had passed between him and the new incumbent, and, in securing +for the latter Mr. Williams's good old-fashioned furniture, and in +other ways, he had made himself very useful to Lindo. But the two had +not met, and consequently the curate viewed the approaching train with +lively, though secret, curiosity. + +It came, the bell rang, the porter cried, "Claversham! Claversham!" +and the curate walked down it, past the carriage-windows, looking for +the man he had come to meet. Half-a-dozen people stepped out, and for +a moment there was a mimic tumult on the little platform; but nowhere +amid it all could Clode see any one like the new rector. "He has +missed another train!" he muttered to himself in contemptuous wonder; +and he was already casting a last look round him before turning on his +heel, when a tall, fair young man, in a clerical overcoat, who had +been one of the first to alight, stepped up to him. "Am I speaking to +Mr. Clode?" said the stranger pleasantly. And he lifted his hat. + +"Certainly," the curate answered. "I am Mr. Clode. But I fear I have +not the----" + +"No, I know," replied the other, smiling, and at the same time holding +out his hand. "Though, indeed, I hoped that you might have been here +on purpose to meet me. My name is Lindo." + +The curate uttered an exclamation of surprise; and, hastily returning +the proffered grip, fixed his black eyes curiously on his new friend. +"Mr. Lindo did not mention that you were with him," he answered in a +tone of some embarrassment. "But, there, let me see to your luggage. +Is it all here?" + +"Yes, I think so," Lindo answered, tapping one article after another +with his umbrella, and giving the stationmaster a pleasant "Good-day!" +"Is there an omnibus or anything?" + +"Yes," Clode said; "it will be all right. They know where to take it. +You will walk up with me, perhaps. It is about a quarter of a mile to +the rectory." + +The new comer assented gladly, and the two passed out of the station +together. Lindo let his eye travel up the wide steep street before +him, until it rested on the noble tower which crowned the little hill +and looked down now, as it had looked down for five centuries, on the +red roofs clustering about it. His tower! His church! Even his +companion did not remark, so slight was the action, that, as he passed +out of the station and looked up, he lifted his hat for a second. + +"And where is your father?" Clode asked. "Was he delayed by business? +Or perhaps," he added, dubiously scanning him, "you are Mr. Lindo's +brother?" + +"I _am_ Mr. Lindo!" said our friend, turning in astonishment and +looking at his companion. + +"The rector?" + +"Yes." + +It was the curate's turn to stare now, and he did so--his face +flushing darkly and his eyes wide opened for once. He even seemed for +a moment to be stricken dumb with surprise and emotion. "Indeed!" he +said at last, in a half stifled voice which he vainly strove to +control. "Indeed! I beg your pardon. I had thought--I don't know +why--I mean that I had expected to see an older man." + +"I am sorry you are disappointed," the rector replied, smiling +ruefully. "I am beginning to think I am rather young, for you are not +the first to-day who has made that mistake." + +The curate did not answer, and the two walked on in silence, feeling +somewhat awkward. Clode, indeed, was raging inwardly. By one thing and +another he had been led to expect a man past middle life, and the only +Clergy List in the parish, being three years old and containing the +name of Lindo's uncle only, had confirmed him in the error. He had +never conceived the idea that the man set over his head would be a +fledgling, scarcely a year in priest's orders, or he would have gone +elsewhere. He would never have stayed to be at the beck and call of +such a puppy as this! He felt now that he had been entrapped, and he +chafed inwardly to such an extent that he did not dare to speak. To +have this young fellow, six or seven years his junior, set over him +would humiliate him in the eyes of all those before whom he had long +played a different part! + +In a minor degree Lindo was also vexed--not only because he was +sufficiently sensitive to enter into the other's feelings, but also +because he foresaw trouble ahead. It was annoying, too, to be received +at each new _rencontre_ as a surprise--as the reverse of all that had +been expected and all that had been, as he feared, hoped. + +"You will find the rectory a very comfortable house," said the curate +at last, his mind fully made up now that he would leave at the +earliest possible date. "Warm and old-fashioned. Rough-cast outside. +Many of the rooms are panelled." + +"It looks out on the churchyard, I believe," replied the rector, with +the same labored politeness. + +"Yes, it stands high. The view from the windows at the back is +pleasant. The front is perhaps a little gloomy--in winter at least." + +Near the top of the street a quaint, narrow flight of steps conducted +them to the churchyard--an airy, elevated place, surrounded on three +sides by the church and houses, but open on the fourth, where a +terraced walk, running along the summit of the old town wall, admitted +the southern sun and afforded a wide view of plain and hill. The two +men crossed the churchyard, the new rector looking about him with +curiosity and a little awe, his companion marching straight onward, +his strongly-marked face set ominously. He would go! He would go at +the earliest possible minute! he was thinking. + +It did not affect him nor alter his resolution that in the wooden +porch of the old rectory the new rector turned to him and shyly, yet +with real feeling, besought his help and advice in the work before +him. The young clergyman, commonly so self-confident, was moved, and +moved deeply, by the evening light and his strange and solemn +surroundings. Stephen Clode's answer was in the affirmative--it could +hardly have been other; and it was spoken becomingly, if a little +coldly, in view of the rector's advances; but, even while the curate +spoke it, he was considering how he might best escape from Claversham. +Still his Yea, yea, comforted his companion and lightened his +momentary apprehensions. + +Nor was the curate, when he had recovered from the first shock of +surprise and disgust, so foolish as to betray his feelings by wanton +churlishness. He parted from his companion at the door, leaving him to +the welcome of Mrs. Baker, the rector's London housekeeper, who had +come down two days before; but at the same time he consented readily +to return at half-past six and share his dinner, and gave him in the +course of the meal all the information in his power. Left to himself, +the rector went over the house under Mrs. Baker's guidance, and, +as he trod the polished floors, could not but feel some access of +self-importance. The panelled hall, with its wide oak staircase, fed +this, and the spacious sombrely-furnished library, with its books +and busts, its antique clock and one good engraving, and its lofty +windows opening upon the garden. So, in a less degree, did the long +oak-panelled dining-room and a smaller sitting-room which looked to +the front and the churchyard; and the drawing-room, which was situated +over the library, and seemed the larger because Mr. Williams had +furnished it but scantily and lived in it less. Then there were six or +seven bedrooms, and in the garden a stone basin and fountain. +Altogether, when the rector descended after washing his hands, and +stood on the library hearth-rug looking about him, he would have been +more than human if he had not, with a feeling of thankfulness, +entertained also some faint sense of self-congratulation and personal +desert. Nor, probably, would Mr. Clode have been human if, coming in +and finding the younger man standing on that hearth-rug, and betraying +in his face and attitude something of his thoughts, he on his part had +not felt a degree of envy and antagonism. The man was so prosperous, +so self-contented, so conscious of his own merit and success. + +But the curate was too wise to betray this feeling; and, laying +himself out to be pleasant, he had, before the little meal was over, +so far ingratiated himself with his entertainer that the rector was +greatly surprised when he presently learned that Clode had not been to +a university. "You astonish me," he said, "for you have so completely +the manner of a 'varsity-man!" + +The observation was a little too gracious, a little wanting in tact, +but it would not have hurt the curate had he not been at the moment in +a state of irritation. As it was, Clode treasured it up, and never got +rid of the feeling that the Oxford man looked down upon him because he +had been only at Wells; whereas Lindo, with some prejudices and +sufficiently prone to judge his fellows, had far too high an opinion +of himself to be bound by such distinctions, but was just as likely to +make a friend of a ploughboy, if he liked him, as of a Christchurch +man. After that speech, however, the curate was more than ever +resolved to go, and go quickly. + +But, when dinner was over and he was about to take his leave, he +happened to pick up, as he moved about the room, a small prayer-book +which Lindo had just unpacked, and which was lying on the +writing-table. Clode idly looked into it as he talked, and, seeing on +the flyleaf "Reginald Lindo, 1850," took occasion, when he had done +with the subject in hand, to discuss it. "Surely," he said, holding it +up, "you did not possess this in 1850, Mr. Lindo!" + +"Hardly," Lindo answered, laughing. "I was not born until '54." + +"Then who?" + +"It was my uncle's," the rector explained. "I was his god-son, and his +name was mine also." + +"Is he alive, may I ask?" the curate pursued, looking at the +title-page as if he saw something curious there--though, indeed, what +he saw was not new to him; only from it he had suddenly deduced a +thought. + +"No, he died about a year ago--nearly a year ago, I think," Lindo +answered carelessly, and without the least suspicion. "He was always +particularly kind to me, and I use that book a good deal. I must have +it rebound." + +"Yes," Clode said mechanically; "it wants rebinding If you value it." + +"I shall have it done. And a lot of these books," the rector +continued, looking at old Mr. Williams's shelves, "want their clothes +renewing. I shall have them all looked to, I think." He had a pleasant +sense that this was in his power. The cost of the furniture and +library had made a hole in his not very large private means; but that +mattered little now. Eight hundred a year, paid quarterly, will bind a +book or two. + +Had the curate been attending, he would have read Lindo's thoughts +with ease. But Clode was pursuing a train of reflections of his own, +and so was spared this pang. "Your uncle was an old man, I suppose," +he said. "I think I observed in the Clergy List that he had been in +orders about forty years." + +"Not quite so long as that," Lindo replied. "He was sixty-four when he +died. He had been Lord Dynmore's private tutor you know, though they +were almost of an age." + +"Indeed," the curate rejoined, still with that thoughtful look on his +face. "You knew Lord Dynmore through him, I suppose, then, Mr. Lindo?" + +"Well, I got the living through him, if that what you mean," Lindo +said frankly. "But I do not think that I ever met Lord Dynmore. +Certainly I should not know him from Adam." + +"Ah!" said the curate, "ah! indeed!" He smiled as he gazed into the +fire, and stroked his chin. In the other's place, he thought, he would +have been more reticent. He would not have disclaimed, though he might +not have claimed, acquaintance with Lord Dynmore. He would have left +the thing shadowy, to be defined by others as they pleased. Thinking +thus, he got up somewhat abruptly, and wished Lindo good-night. A cool +observer, indeed, might have noticed--but the rector did not--a change +in his manner as he did so--a little accession of familiarity, which +did seem not far removed from a delicate kind of contempt. The change +was subtle, but one thing was certain. Stephen Clode had no longer any +intention of leaving Claversham in a hurry. That resolve was gone. + +Once out of the house, he passed quickly from the churchyard by a +narrow lane leading to an irregular open space quaintly called "The +Top of the Town." Here were his own lodgings, on the first-floor over +a stationer's; but he did not enter them. Instead, he strode on toward +the farther and darker side of the square, where were no buildings, +but a belt of tall trees stood up, gaunt and rustling in the night +wind above a line of wall. Through the trees the lights of a large +house were visible. He walked up the avenue which led to the door and, +ringing loudly, was at once admitted. + +The sound of the bell came to the ears of two ladies who had been for +some time placidly expecting it. They were seated in a small but +charming room filled with soft, shaded light and warmth and color, +an open piano and dainty pictures and china, and a well-littered +writing-table all contributing to the air of accustomed luxury which +pervaded it. The elder lady--that Mrs. Hammond whom we saw talking to +the curate on the day of the old rector's funeral--looked up +expectantly as Mr. Clode entered, and, extending to him a podgy white +hand covered with rings, began to chide him in a rich full voice for +being so late. "I have been dying," she said cheerfully, "to hear what +is the fate before us, Mr. Clode. What is he like?" + +"Well," he answered, taking with a word of thanks the cup of tea which +Laura offered him, "I have one surprise in store for you. He is +comparatively young." + +"Sixty?" said Mrs. Hammond interrogatively. + +"Forty?" said Laura, raising her eyebrows. + +"No," Clode replied, smiling and stirring his tea, "you must guess +again. He is twenty-six." + +"Twenty-six! You are joking," exclaimed the elder lady. While Laura +opened her eyes very wide, but said nothing yet. + +"No," said the curate. "He told me himself that he was not born until +1854." + +The two ladies were loud in their surprise then, while for a moment +the curate sipped his tea in silence. The brass kettle hissed and +bubbled on the hob. The tea-set twinkled cheerfully on the wicker +table, and faint scents of flowers and fabrics filled the room with an +atmosphere which he had long come to associate with Laura. It was +Laura Hammond, indeed, who had introduced him to this new world. The +son of an accountant living in a small Lincolnshire town, he owed his +clerical profession to his mother's ardent wish that he should rise in +the world. His father was not wealthy, and, before he came as curate +to Claversham, Mr. Clode had had no experience of society. Then, +alighting: on a sudden in the midst of much such a small town as his +native place, he found himself astonishingly transmogrified into a +person of social importance. He found every door open to him, and +among them the Hammonds', who were admitted to be the first people in +the town. He fell in easily enough with the "new learning," but the +central figure in the novel pleasant world of refinement continued +throughout to be Laura Hammond. + +Much petting had somewhat spoiled him, and it annoyed him now, as he +sat sipping his tea, to observe that the ladies were far from +displeased with his tidings. "If he is a young man, he is sure not to +be evangelical," said Mrs. Hammond decisively. "That is well. That is +a comfort, at any rate." + +"He will play tennis, I dare say," said Laura. + +"And Mr. Bonamy will be kept in some order now," Mrs. Hammond +continued. "Not that I am blaming you, Mr. Clode," she added +graciously--indeed, the curate was a great favorite with her, "but in +your position you could do nothing with a man so impracticable." + +"He really will be an acquisition," cried Laura gleefully, her brown +eyes shining in the firelight. And she made her tiny lace handkerchief +into a ball and flung it up--and did not catch it, for, with all her +talk of lawn-tennis, she was no great player. Her _rle_ lay rather in +the drawing-room. She was as fond of comfort as a cat, and loved the +fire with the love of a dog, and was, in a word, pre-eminently +feminine, delighting to surround herself with all such things as +tended to set off this side of her nature. "But now," she continued +briskly, when the curate had recovered her handkerchief for her, "tell +me what you think of him. Is he nice?" + +"Certainly; I should say so," the curate answered, smiling. + +But, though he smiled, he became silent again. He was reflecting, with +well-hidden bitterness, that Lindo would not only override him in the +parish, but would be his rival in the particular inner clique which he +affected--perhaps his rival with Laura. The thought awoke the worst +nature of the man. Up to this time, though he had not been true, +though he had kept back at Claversham details of his past history +which a frank man would have avowed, though in the process of +assimilating himself to his new surroundings he had been over-pliant, +he had not been guilty of any baseness which had seemed to him a +baseness, which had outraged his own conscience. But, as he reflected +on the wrong which this young stranger was threatening to do him, he +felt himself capable of much. + +"Mrs. Hammond," he said suddenly, "may I ask if you have destroyed +Lord Dynmore's letter which you showed me last week?" + +"Destroyed Lord Dynmore's letter!" Laura answered, speaking for her +mother in a tone of comic surprise. "Do you think, sir, that we get +peers' autographs every day of the week?" + +"No," Mrs. Hammond said, waving aside her daughter's flippancy and +speaking with some stateliness. "It is not destroyed, though such +things are not so rare with us as Laura pretends. But why do you ask?" + +"Because the rector was not sure when Lord Dynmore meant to return to +England," Clode explained readily. "And I thought he mentioned the +date in his letter to you, Mrs. Hammond." + +"I do not think so," said Mrs. Hammond. + +"Might I look?" + +"Of course," was the answer. "Will you find it, Laura? I think it is +under the malachite weight in the other room." + +It was, sitting there in solitary majesty. Laura opened it, and took +the liberty of glancing through it first. Then she gave it to him. +"There, you unbelieving man," she said, "you can look. But he does not +say a word about his return." + +The curate read rapidly until he came to one sentence, and on this his +eye dwelt a moment. "I hear with regret," it ran, "that poor Williams +is not long for this world. When he goes I shall send you an old +friend of mine. I trust he will become an old friend of yours also." +Clode barely glanced at the rest of the letter, but, as he handed it +back, he informed himself that it was dated in America two days before +Mr. Williams's death. + +"No," he admitted, "I was wrong. I thought he had said when he would +return." + +"And you are satisfied?" said Laura. + +"Perfectly," he answered. "Perfectly!" with a little unnecessary +emphasis. + +He lingered long enough to give them a personal description of the +new-comer--speaking always of him in words of praise--and then he took +his leave. As his hand met Laura's, his face flushed ever so slightly +and his dark eyes glowed; and the girl, as she turned away, smiled +furtively, knowing well, though he had never spoken, that she was the +cause of this. So she was, but in part only. At that moment the curate +saw something besides Laura--he saw across a narrow strait of trouble +the fairer land of preferment, his footing on which once gained he +might pretend to her and to many other pleasant things at present +beyond his reach. + + + + + CHAPTER VI. + + THE BONAMYS AT HOME. + + +Lindo made his first exploration of the neighborhood, not on the day +after his arrival, which was taken up with his induction by the +archdeacon and with other matters, but on the day after that. He chose +to avoid the streets, in which he felt somewhat shy, so polite were +the attentions and so curious the glances of his parishioners; and he +selected instead a lane which, starting from the churchyard, seemed to +plunge at once into the country. It was a pleasant lane. It lay deep +sunk in a cutting through the sandstone rock--a cutting first formed, +perhaps, when the great stones for the building of the church were +dragged up that way. He paused halfway down the slope to look about +him curiously, and was still standing when some one came round the +corner before him. It was Kate Bonamy. He saw the girl's cheek--she +was alone--flush ever so slightly as their eyes met; and he noticed, +too, that to all appearance she would have passed him with a bow had +he not placed himself in her way. "Come," he said, laughing frankly as +he held out his hand, "you must not cut me, Miss Bonamy! Let me tell +you, you have quite the aspect of an old friend, for until now I have +not seen one face since I came here that was not absolutely new to +me." + +"It must feel strange, no doubt," she murmured. + +"It is. _I_ feel strange!" he replied. "I want you to tell me where +this road goes to, if you please. I am so strange, I do not even know +that." + +"Kingsford Carbonel," she answered briefly. + +"Ah! The archdeacon lives there, does he not?" + +"Yes." + +"And the distance, please, is----?" + +"Three miles." + +"Thank you," he said. "Really you are as concise as a mile-stone, Miss +Bonamy. And now let me remind you," he continued--there was an air of +"I am going on this moment" about her, which provoked him to detain +her the longer--"that you have not yet asked me what I think of +Claversham." + +"I would rather ask you in a month's time," Kate answered quietly, +holding out her hand to take leave. "Though it is already reported in +the town that you will only stay a year, Mr. Lindo." + +"I shall only stay a year!" the rector repeated in astonishment. + +"Certainly," she answered, smiling, and relapsing for a moment into +the pleasant frankness of that day at Oxford--"only a year; your days +are already numbered." + +"What do you mean?" he said point-blank. + +"Have you never heard the old tradition that as many times as a +clergyman sounds the bell at his induction, so many years will he +remain in the living? And the report in Claversham is that you rang it +only once." + +"You did not hear it yourself?" he said, catching her eyes suddenly, a +lurking smile in his own. + +Her color rose faintly. "I am not sure," she said. Then, meeting his +eyes boldly, she added in a different tone, "Yes, I did hear it." + +"Only once?" + +She nodded. + +"Oh, that is sad," he answered. "Well, the tradition is new to me. If +I had known it," he added, laughing, "I should have tolled the bell at +least fifty times. Clode should have instructed me; but I suppose he +thought I knew. I remember now that the archdeacon did say something +afterward, but I did not understand the reference. You know the +archdeacon, Miss Bonamy, I suppose?" + +"No," said Kate, growing stiff again. + +"Do you not? Well, at any rate you can tell me where Mrs. Hammond +lives. She has kindly asked me to dine with her on Tuesday. I put my +acceptance in my pocket, and thought I would deliver it myself when I +came back from my walk." + +"Mrs. Hammond lives at the Town House," Kate answered. "It is the +large house among the trees by the top of the town. You cannot mistake +it." + +"Shall I have the pleasure of meeting you there?" he asked, holding +out his hand at last. + +"No; I do not know Mrs. Hammond," Miss Bonamy said with decision. +"Good-day, Mr. Lindo." And she was gone; rather abruptly at last. + +"That is odd--very odd," Lindo reflected as, continuing his walk, he +turned to admire her graceful figure and the pretty carriage of her +head. "I fancied that in these small towns every one knew every one. +What sort of people are the Hammonds, I wonder? New, rich, and vulgar +perhaps. It may be, and that would account for it. Yet Clode spoke +highly of them." + +Something which he did not understand in the girl's manner continued +to pique the young man's curiosity after he had parted from her, and +led him to dwell more intently upon her than upon the scenery, novel +as this was to him. She had shown herself at one moment so frank, and +at another so stiff and constrained, that it was equally impossible to +ascribe the one attitude to shyness or the other to a naturally candid +manner. The rector considered the question so long, and found it so +puzzling--and interesting--that on his return to town he had come to +one conclusion only--that it was his immediate duty to call upon his +church wardens. He had made the acquaintance of Mr. Harper, his own +warden, at his induction. It remained therefore to call upon Mr. +Bonamy, the peoples' warden. When he had taken his lunch, it seemed to +him that there was no time like the present. + +He had no difficulty in finding Mr. Bonamy's house, which stood in the +middle of the town, about halfway down Bridge Street. It was a +substantial, respectable residence of brick, not detached nor +withdrawn from the roadway. It had nothing aristocratic in its +appearance, and was known by a number. Its eleven windows, of which +the three lowest rejoiced in mohair blinds, were sombre, its doorway +was heavy. In a word, it was a respectable middle-class house in a +dull street in a country town--a house suggestive of early dinners and +set teas. The rector felt chilled by its very appearance; but he +knocked, and presently a maid-servant opened the door about a foot. +"Is Mr. Bonamy at home?" he said. + +"No, sir," the girl drawled, holding the door as if she feared he +might attempt to enter by force, "he is not." + +"Ah, I am sorry I have missed him," said the clergyman, handling his +card-case. "Do you know at what time he is likely to return?" + +"No, sir, I don't," replied the girl, who was all eyes for the strange +rector; "but I expect Miss Kate does. Will you walk up-stairs, sir? +and I will tell her." + +"Perhaps I had better," he answered, pocketing his card-case. +Accordingly he walked in, and followed the servant to the +drawing-room, where she poked the sinking fire and induced a sickly +blaze. + +Left to himself--for Kate was not there--he looked round curiously, +and as he looked the sense of disappointment which he had felt at +sight of the house grew upon him. It was a cold, uncomfortable room. +It had a set, formal look, which was not quaintness, nor harmony, and +which was strange to the Londoner. It was so neat: every article in it +had a place, and was in its place, and apparently never had been out +of its place. There was a vase of chrysanthemums on the large centre +table, but the rector thought they must be wax, they were so prim. +There were other wax flowers--which he hated. He almost shivered as he +looked at the four walls. He felt obliged to sit upright on his chair, +and to place his hat exactly in the middle of a square of the carpet, +and to ponder over the question of what the maid had done with the +poker. For she had certainly not stirred the fire with the bright and +shining thing which lay in evidence in the fender. + +He was in the act of rising cautiously with the intention of solving +this mystery, when the door opened and the elder sister came in, +Daintry following her. "My father is not in, Mr. Lindo," Kate said, +advancing to meet him, and shaking hands with him. + +"No; so I learned down-stairs," he answered. "But I----" + +The girl--she had scarcely turned from him--cut him short with an +exclamation of dismay. "Oh, Daintry, you naughty girl!" she cried. +"You have brought Snorum up." + +"Well," said Daintry simply--a large white dog, half bull-dog, half +terrier, with red-rimmed eyes and projecting teeth, had crept in at +her heels--"he followed me." + +"You know papa would be so angry if he found him here." + +"But I only want him to see Mr. Lindo. You are unkind, Kate! You know +he never gets a chance of seeing a stranger." + +"You want to know if he likes me?" the rector said, laughing. + +"That is it," she answered, nodding. + +But Kate, though she laughed, was inexorable. She bundled the big dog +out. "Do you know, she has two more like that, Mr. Lindo?" she said, +apologetically. + +"Snip and Snap," said Daintry. "But they are not like that. They are +smaller. Jack gave me Snorum, and Snip and Snap are Snorum's sons." + +"It is quite a genealogy," the rector said, smiling. + +"Yes, and Jack was the Genesis. Genesis means beginning, you know," +Daintry explained. + +"Daintry, you must go down-stairs if you talk nonsense," Kate said +imperatively. She was looking, the young man thought, prettier than +ever in a gray and blue plaid frock and the neatest of collars and +cuffs. As for Daintry, she shrugged her shoulders under the rebuke, +and lolled in one of the stiff-backed chairs, her attitude much like +that of a vine clinging to a telegraph-post. + +Her wilfulness had one happy effect, however. The rector in his +amusement forgot the chill formality of the room and the dull +respectability of the house's exterior. For half an hour he talked on +without a thought of the gentleman whom he had come to see. Some +inkling of the circumstances of the case which had entered his head +before the sisters' appearance faded again, and in gazing on the pure +animated faces of the two girls he quickly lost sight of the evidences +of lack of taste which appeared in their surroundings. If Kate, on her +side, forgot for a moment certain chilling realities and surrendered +herself to the pleasure of the moment, it must be remembered that +hitherto--in Claversham, at least--her experience of men had been +confined to Dr. Gregg and his fellows, and also that none of us, even +the wisest and proudest, are always on guard. + +Mr. Bonamy not appearing, Reginald left at last, perfectly assured +that the half-hour he had just spent was the pleasantest he had spent +in Claversham. He went out of the house in a gentle glow of +enthusiasm. The picture of Kate Bonamy, trim and neat, with her hair +in a bright knot, and laughter softening her eyes, remained with him, +and he walked half-way down the street lost in a delightful reverie. + +He was aroused by the approach of a tall, elderly man who had just +turned the corner before him, and was now advancing along the pavement +with long, rapid strides. The stranger, who seemed about sixty, wore a +wide-skirted black coat, and had a tall silk hat, from under which the +gray hairs straggled thinly, set far back on his head. His figure was +spare, his face sallow, his features prominent. His mouth was peevish, +his eyes sharp and saturnine. As he walked he kept one hand in his +trousers'-pocket, the other swung by his side. The rector looked at +him a moment in doubt, and then stopped him. "Mr. Bonamy, I am sure?" +he said, holding out his hand. + +"Yes, I am," replied the other, fixing him with a penetrating glance. +"And you, sir?" + +"May I introduce myself? I have just called at your house, and, +unluckily, failed to find you at home. I am Mr. Lindo." + +"Oh, the new rector!" said Mr. Bonamy, putting out a cold hand, while +the chill glitter of his eye lost none of its steeliness. + +"Yes, and I am glad to have intercepted you," Lindo continued, with a +little color in his cheek, and speaking quickly under the influence of +his late enthusiasm, which as yet was proof against the lawyer's +reserve. "For I have been extremely anxious to make your acquaintance, +and, indeed, to say something particular to you, Mr. Bonamy." + +The elder man bowed to hide a smile. "As church warden, I presume?" he +said smoothly. + +"Yes, and--and generally. I am quite aware, Mr. Bonamy," continued the +rash young man in a fervor of frankness, "that you were not disposed +to look upon my appointment--the appointment of a complete stranger, I +mean--with favor." + +"May I ask who told you that?" said Bonamy abruptly. + +The young clergyman colored. "Well, I--perhaps you will excuse me +saying how I learned it," he answered, beginning to see that he would +have done better to be more reticent. There is no mistake which youth +more often makes than that of arousing sleeping dogs, and trying to +explain things which a wiser man would pass over in silence. Mr. +Bonamy had his own reasons for regarding the parson with suspicion, +and had no mind to be addressed in the indulgent vein. Nor was he +propitiated when Lindo added, "I learned your feeling, if I may say +so, by an accident." + +"Then I think you should have kept knowledge so gained to yourself!" +the lawyer retorted. + +The rector started and turned crimson under the reproof. His dignity +was new and tender, and the other's tone was offensive in the last +degree. Yet the young man tried to control himself, and for the moment +succeeded. "Possibly," he said, with some stiffness. "My only motive +in mentioning the latter, however, was this, that I hope in a short +time, by appealing to you for your hearty co-operation, to overcome +any prejudices you may have entertained." + +"My prejudices are rather strong," the lawyer answered grimly. "You +are quite at liberty to try, however, Mr. Lindo. But I may as well +warn you of one thing now, as frankness seems to be in fashion. I have +just been told that you are meditating considerable changes in our +church here. Now, I must tell you this, that I object to anything +new--anything new, and not only to new incumbents!" with a smile which +somewhat softened his last words. + +"But who informed you," cried the rector in angry surprise, "that I +meditated changes, Mr. Bonamy?" + +"Ah!" the lawyer answered in his dryest and thinnest voice. "That is +just what I cannot tell you. Let us say that I learned it--by +accident, Mr. Lindo!" And his sharp eyes twinkled. + +"It is not true, however!" the rector exclaimed. + +"Is it not? Well," with a slight cough, "I am glad to hear it!" + +Mr. Bonamy's tone as he made this admission, however, was such that it +only irritated Lindo the more. "You mean that you do not believe me!" +he cried, speaking so fiercely that Clowes the bookseller, who had +been watching the interview from his shop-door, was able to repeat the +words to a dozen people afterward. "I can assure you that it is so. I +am not thinking of making any changes whatever--unless you consider +the mere removal of the sheep from the churchyard a change!" + +"I do. A great change," replied the church warden with grimness. + +"But surely you do not object to it!" Lindo exclaimed in astonishment. +"Every one must agree that in these days, and in town churchyards at +any rate, the presence of sheep is unseemly." + +"I do not agree to that at all!" Mr. Bonamy answered calmly. "Neither +did Mr. Williams, the late rector, who had had long experience, act as +if he were of that mind." + +The present rector threw up his hands in disgust--in disgust and +wonder. Remember, he was very young. The thing seemed to him so clear +that he was assured the other was arguing for the sake of argument--a +thing we all hate in other people--and he lost patience. "I do not +think you mean what you say, Mr. Bonamy," he blurted out at last. He +was much discomposed, yet he made an attempt to assume an air of +severity which did not sit well upon him at the moment. + +Mr. Bonamy grinned. "That you will see when you turn out the sheep, +Mr. Lindo," he said. "For the present I think I will bid you good +evening." and taking off his hat gravely--to the rector the gravity +seemed ironical--he went his way. + +Men take these things differently. To the lawyer there was nothing +disturbing in such a passage of arms as this. He was never so +happy--Claversham knew it well--as in and after a quarrel. "Master +Lindo thought to twist me round his finger, did he?" he muttered to +himself as he stopped on his own doorstep and thrust the key into the +lock. "He has found out his mistake now. We will have nothing new +here--nothing new while John Bonamy is warden, at any rate, my lad! It +is well, however," continued Mr. Bonamy with a backward glance, "that +Clode gave me a hint in time. Set a beggar on horseback and he will +ride--we know whither!" And the lawyer went in and slammed the door +behind him. + +Meanwhile, what is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the +gander. The younger man turned away, at the moment, indeed, in a white +heat, full of wrath at the other's unreasonableness, folly, +churlishness. But the comfortable warmth which this engendered passed +away quickly--alas! much too quickly--and long before Lindo reached +the rectory, though the walk through the gray streets, where the shops +were just being lighted, did not take him two minutes, a chill +depression had taken its place. This was a fine beginning! This was a +happy augury of his future administration of the parish! To have begun +by quarrelling with his church warden--could anything have been worse? +And the check had come so suddenly, so unexpectedly, and at a time +when he had been on such good terms with himself, that he felt it the +more sorely. He went into the house with his head bent, and was not +best pleased to find Stephen Clode inquiring after him in the hall. He +would rather have been alone. + +The curate, as he came forward, did not fail to note that something +was amiss, and a gleam of intelligence flashed for an instant across +his dark face. "Come into the study," said the rector curtly. Since +Clode was here, and could not be avoided, he felt it would be a relief +to tell him all. And he did so, the curate listening and making no +remark whatever, so that the rector presently looked at him in +surprise. "What do you think of it?" he said, some impatience in his +one. "It is unfortunate, is it not?" + +"Well, I don't know," the curate answered, leaning forward in his +chair, with his elbows on his knees and his eyes cast down upon the +hat which he was slowly revolving between his hands. "I am not +astonished, you know. What can you expect from a pig but a grunt?" + +The rector got up, and, leaning his arm on the mantel-shelf, felt, if +the truth be told, rather uncomfortable. "I do not understand you," he +said at length. + +"It is what I should have expected from Bonamy. That is all." + +"Then you must think him a very ill-conditioned man!" Lindo retorted +warmly, scarcely knowing whether the annoyance he felt was a +reminiscence of his late conflict or caused by his companion's manner. + +"Well, again, what else can you expect?" Clode replied sagely, looking +up and shrugging his shoulders. "You know all about him, I suppose?" + +"I know nothing," said the rector, frowning slightly. + +"He is not a gentleman, you know," the curate answered, still looking +up and speaking with languid indolence as if what he said must be +known to everyone. "You have heard his history?" + +"No, I have not." + +"He was an office-boy with Adams & Rooke, the old solicitors here, +swept out the office, and brought the coal, and so forth. He had his +wits about him, and old Adams gave him his articles, and finally took +him into partnership. Then the old men died off and it all came to +him. He is well off, and has power of a sort in the town; but, of +course," the curate added, getting up lazily and yawning--"well, +people like the Hammonds do not visit with him." + +There was silence in the room for a full minute. The rector had left +the fireplace and, with his back to the speaker, was raising the +lamp-wick. "Why did you not tell me this before?" he said at length, +his voice hard. + +"I did not see why I should prejudice you against the man before you +saw him," replied the curate, with much reason. "Besides, I really was +not sure whether you knew his history or not. I am afraid I did not +give much thought to the matter." + +"Umph!" + + + + + CHAPTER VII. + + THE HAMMONDS' DINNER PARTY. + + +The new top, the new book, the bride--the first joy in the possession +of each one of these fades, not gradually, but at a leap, as day fades +in the tropics. A chip in the wood, the turning of the last page, the +first selfish word, and the thing is done; ecstasy becomes sober +satisfaction. It was so with the rector. The first glamour of his good +fortune, of his new toy, died abruptly with that evening--with the +quarrel with his church warden, and the discovery of the cause of that +constraint which he had remarked in Kate Bonamy's manner from the +first. + +He was a conscientious man, and the failure of his good resolutions, +his aspirations to be the perfect parish priest, fretted him. +Moreover, he had to think of the future. He soon learned that Mr. +Bonamy might not be a gentleman, and was indeed reputed to be a +stubborn, queer-tempered curmudgeon; but he learned also that he had +great influence in the town, though, except in the way of business, he +associated with few, and that he, Reginald Lindo, would have to reckon +with him on that footing. The certainty of this and of the bad +beginning he had made naturally depressed the young man, his customary +good opinion of himself not coming to his aid at once. And, besides, +he carried about with him--sometimes it came between him and his book, +sometimes he saw it framed by the autumn landscape--the picture of +Kate's pure proud face. At such moments he felt himself humiliated by +the slights cast upon her. The Hammonds did not think her fit company +for them! The Hammonds! + +Not that he knew the Hammonds yet, or many others, the days which +intervened between his induction and the dinner at the Town House +being somewhat lonely days, during which he was much thrown back upon +himself, and only felt by slow degrees the soothing influence of the +routine work of his position. Of his curate, and of him only, he +naturally saw much, and found it small comfort to learn from the +Reverend Stephen that the fracas with Mr. Bonamy had not escaped the +attention of the town, but was being made the subject of comment by +many who were delighted to have so novel a subject as the new rector +and his probable conduct. + +He was sitting at breakfast a few days later--on the morning of the +Hammonds' party--when Mrs. Baker announced an early visitor. "No, he +is not a gentleman, sir," she said, "though he has on a black coat. A +stranger to the town, I think, but he will not say what he wants, +except to see you." + +"I will come to him in the study," replied her master. + +The housekeeper, however, going out, and taking a second glance at the +caller, did not show him into the study, but instead, gave him a seat +in the hall on the farther side from the coatstand. There the rector, +when he came out, found him--a pale fat-faced man, dressed neatly and +decorously, though his clothes were threadbare. He took him into the +study, and asked him his business. "But first sit down," the rector +added pleasantly, desiring to set the man at his ease. + +The stranger sat down gingerly on the edge of a chair. For a +moment there was a pause of seeming embarrassment, and then, "I am +body-servant, sir," he said abruptly, passing his tongue across his +lips, and looking up furtively to learn the effect of his +announcement, "to the Earl of Dynmore." + +"Indeed!" the rector replied, with a slight start. "Has Lord Dynmore +returned to England, then?" + +Again the man looked up slyly. "No, sir," he answered with +deliberation, "I cannot say that he has, sir." + +"You have brought some letter or message from him, perhaps?" the +clergyman hazarded. The stranger seemed to have a difficulty in +telling his own story. + +"No, sir, if you will pardon me, I have come about myself, sir," the +man explained, speaking a little more freely. "I am in a little bit of +trouble, and I think you would help me, sir, if you heard the story." + +"I am quite willing to hear the story," said the rector gravely. +Looking more closely at the man, he saw that his neatness was only on +the surface. His white cravat was creased, and his wrists displayed no +linen. An air of seediness marked him in the full light of the +windows, and, pale as his face was, it wore here and there a delicate +flush. Perhaps the man's admission that he was in trouble helped the +rector to see this. + +"Well, sir, it was this way," the servant began. "I was not very +well out there, sir, and his lordship--he is an independent kind of +man--thought he would be better by himself. So he gave me my +passage-money and board wages for three months, and told me to come +home and take a holiday until he returned to England. So far it was +all right, sir." + +"Yes?" said the rector. + +"But on board the boat--I am not excusing what I did, sir; but there +are others have done worse," continued the man, with another of his +sudden upward glances--"I was led to play cards with a set of +sharpers, and--and the end of it was that I landed at Liverpool +yesterday without a halfpenny." + +"That was bad." + +"Yes, it was, sir. I do not know that I ever felt so bad in my life," +replied the servant earnestly. "And now you know my position, sir. +There are several people in the town--but they have no means to help +me--who can tell you I am his lordship's valet, and my name Charles +Felton." + +"You want help, I suppose?" + +"I have not a halfpenny, sir! I want something to live on until his +lordship comes back." + +His tone changed as he said this, growing hard and almost defiant. The +rector noted the alteration, and did not like it. "But why come to +me?" he said, more coldly than he had yet spoken. "Why do you not go +to Lord Dynmore's steward, or agent, or his solicitor, my man?" + +"They would tell of me," was the curt answer. "And likely enough I +should lose my place." + +"Still, why come to me?" Lindo persisted--chiefly to learn what was in +the man's mind, for he had already determined what he would do. + +"Because you are rector of Claversham, sir," the applicant retorted at +last. And he rose suddenly and confronted the parson with an +unpleasant smile on his pale face--"which is in my lord's gift, as you +know, sir," he continued, in a tone rude and almost savage--a tone +which considerably puzzled his companion, who was not conscious of +having said anything offensive to the man. "I came here, sir, +expecting to meet an older gentleman, a gentleman of your name, a +gentleman known to me, and I find you--and I see you, do you see, +where I expected to find him." + +"You mean my uncle, I suppose?" said Lindo. + +"Well, sir, you know best," was the odd reply, and the man's look was +as odd as his words. "But that is how the case stands; and, seeing it +stands so, I hope you will help me, sir. I do hope, on every account, +sir, that you will see your way to help me." + +The rector looked at the speaker with a slight frown, liking neither +the man nor his behavior. But he had already made up his mind to help +him, if only in gratitude to his patron, whose retainer he was; and +this, though the earl would never know of the act, nor possibly +approve of it. The man had at least had the frankness to own the folly +which had brought him to these straits, and Lindo was inclined to set +down the oddity of his present manner to the fear and anxiety of a +respectable servant on the verge of disgrace. "Yes," he said coldly, +after a moment's thought, "I am willing to help you. Of course I shall +expect you to repay me if and when you are able, Felton." + +"I will do that," replied the man rather cavalierly. + +"You might have added, 'and thank you, sir,'" the rector said, with a +keen glance of reproof. He turned, as he spoke, to a small cupboard +constructed between the bookshelves near the fireplace, and, opening +it, took out a cash-box. + +The man colored under his reproach, and muttered some apology, +resuming, as by habit, the tone of respect which seemed natural to +him. All the same he watched the clergyman's movements with great +closeness, and appraised, even before it was placed in his hand, the +sum which Lindo took from a compartment set apart apparently for gold. +"I will allow you ten shillings a week--on loan, of course," Lindo +said after a moment's thought. "You can keep yourself on that, I +suppose? And, besides, I will advance you a sovereign to supply +yourself with anything of which you have pressing need. That should be +ample. There are three half sovereigns." + +This time the man did thank him with an appearance of heartiness. But +before he had said much the study door opened, and Stephen Clode came +in, his hat in his hand. "Oh, I beg your pardon," the curate said, +taking in at a glance the open cash-box and the stranger's +outstretched hand, and preparing to withdraw. "I thought you were +alone." + +"Come in, come in!" said the rector, closing the money-box hastily, +and with some embarrassment, for he was not altogether sure that he +had not done a foolish and quixotic thing. "Our friend here is going. +You can send me your address, Felton. Good-day." + +The man thanked him and, taking up his hat, went. "Some one out of +luck?" said Clode. + +"Yes." + +"I did not much like his looks," the curate remarked. "He is not a +townsman, or I should know him." The rector felt that his discretion +was assailed, and hastened to defend himself. "He is respectable +enough," he said carelessly. "As a fact, he is Lord Dynmore's valet." + +"But has Lord Dynmore come back?" the curate exclaimed, his hand +arrested in the act of taking down a book from a high shelf, and his +head turning quickly. If he expected to learn anything, however, from +his superior's demeanor he was disappointed. Lindo was busy locking +the cupboard, and had his back to him. + +"No, he has not come back," Reginald explained, "but he has sent the +man home, and the foolish fellow lost his money on the boat coming +over, and wants an advance until his master's return." + +"But why on earth does he come to you for it?" cried the curate, with +undisguised, astonishment. + +The rector shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, I do not know," he said, a +trifle of irritation in his manners. "He did, and there is an end of +it. Is there any news?" + +Mr. Clode seemed to find a difficulty in at once changing the +direction of his thoughts. But he did so with an effort, and, after a +pause, answered, "No, I think not. There is a good deal of interest +felt in the question of the sheep out there, I fancy--whether you will +take your course or comply with Mr. Bonamy's whim." + +"I do not know myself," said the young rector, turning and facing the +curate, with his feet apart and his hands thrust deep into his +pockets. "I do not, indeed. It is a serious matter." + +"It is. Still you have the responsibility," said the curate with +diffidence, "and, without expressing any view of my own on the +subject, I confess----" + +"Well?" + +"I think if I bore the responsibility, I should feel called upon to do +what I myself thought right in the matter." + +The younger man shook his head doubtfully. "There is something in +that," he said; "but, on the other hand, one cannot look on the point +as an essential, and, that being so, perhaps one should prefer peace. +But, there, enough of that now, Clode. I think you said you were not +going to the Hammonds' this evening?" + +"No, I am not." + +The rector almost wished he were not. However sociable a man may be, a +few days of solitude and a little temporary depression will render him +averse from society if he be sensitive. Lindo as a man was not very +sensitive; he held too good an opinion of himself. But as rector he +was, and as he walked across to the Town House he anticipated anything +but enjoyment. + +In a few minutes, however--has it not some time or other happened to +all of us?--everything was changed with him. He felt as if he had +entered another world. The air of culture and refinement which +surrounded him from the hall inward, the hearty kindness of Mrs. +Hammond, the pretty rooms, the music and flowers, Laura's light +laughter and pleasant badinage, all surprised and delighted him. The +party might almost have been a London party, it was so lively. The +archdeacon, a red-faced, cherry, white-haired man, whose acquaintance +Lindo had already made, and his wife, who was a mild image of himself, +were of the number, which was completed by their daughter and four or +five county people, all prepared to welcome and be pleased with the +new rector. Lindo, sprung from gentlefolk himself, had the ordinary +experience of society; but here he found himself treated as a stranger +and a dignitary to a degree of notice and a delicate flattery of which +he had not before tasted the sweets. Perhaps he was the more struck by +the taste displayed in the house, and the wit and liveliness of his +new friends, because he had so little looked for them--because he had +insensibly judged his parish by his experience of Mr. Bonamy, and had +come expecting this house to be as his. + +If, under these circumstances, the young fellow had been unaffected by +the incense offered to him he would have been more than mortal. But he +was not. He began, before he had been in the house an hour, to change, +all unconsciously of course, his standpoint. He began to wonder +especially why he had been so depressed during the last few days, and +why he had troubled himself so much about the opinions of people whose +views no sensible man would regard. + +Perhaps the girl beside him--he took in Laura--contributed as much as +anything to this. It was not only that she was bright and sparkling, +in the luxury of her pearls and evening dress even enchanting, nor +only that the femininity which had enslaved Stephen Clode began to +have its effects on her new neighbor. But Laura had a way while she +talked to him, while her lustrous brown eyes dwelt momentarily on his, +of removing herself and himself to a world apart--a world in which +downrightness seemed more downright and rudeness an outrage. And so, +while her manner gently soothed and flattered her companion, it led +him almost insensibly to--well, to put it in the concrete--to think +scorn of Mr. Bonamy. + +"You have had a misunderstanding," she said softly, as they stood +together by the piano after dinner, a feathering plant or two fencing +them off in a tiny solitude of their own, "with Mr. Bonamy, have you +not, Mr. Lindo?" + +From anyone else, perhaps from her half an hour before, he would have +resented mention of the matter. Now he did not seem to mind. +"Something of the kind," he said, laughing. + +"About the sheep in the churchyard, was it not?" she continued. + +"Yes." + +"Well, will you pardon me saying something?" Resting both her hands on +the raised lid of the piano, she looked up at him, and it must be +confessed that he thought he had never seen eyes so soft and brilliant +before. "It is only this," she said earnestly. "That I hope you will +not give way to him. He is a wretched, cross-grained, fidgety man and +full of crotchets. You know all about him, of course?" she added, a +slight ring of pride in her voice. + +"I know that he is my church warden," said the rector, half in +seriousness. + +"Yes!" she replied. "That is just what he is fit for!" + +"You think so?" Lindo retorted, smiling. "Then you really mean that I +should be guided by him? That is it?" + +She looked brightly at him for a moment. "I think you will be guided +only by yourself," she murmured; and, blushing slightly, she nodded +and left him to go to another guest. + +They were all in the same tale. "He is a rude overbearing man, Mr. +Lindo," Mrs. Hammond said roundly, even her good nature giving place +to the _odium theologicum_. "And I cannot imagine why Mr. Williams put +up with him so long." + +"No indeed," said the archdeacon's wife, complacently smoothing down +her skirt. "But that is the worst of a town parish. You have this sort +of people." + +Mrs. Hammond looked for the moment as if she would have liked to deny +it. But under the circumstances this was impossible. "I am afraid we +have," she admitted gloomily. "I hope Mr. Lindo will know how to deal +with him." + +"I think the archdeacon would," said the other lady, shaking her head +sagely. + +But, naturally enough, the archdeacon was more guarded in his +expressions. "It is about removing the sheep from the churchyard, is +it not?" he said, when he and Lindo happened to be left standing +together and the subject came up. "They have been there a long time, +you know." + +"That is true, I suppose," the rector answered. "But," he continued +rather warmly--"you do not approve of their presence there, +archdeacon?" + +"No, certainly not." + +"Nor do I. And, thinking the removal right, and the responsibility +resting upon me, ought I not to undertake it?" + +"Possibly," replied the older man. "But pardon me making a suggestion. +Is not the thing of so little importance that you may, with a good +conscience, prefer quiet to the trouble of raising it?" + +"If the matter were to end there, I think so," replied the new rector, +with perhaps too strong an assumption of wisdom in his tone. "But what +if this be only a test case?--if to give way here means to encourage +further trespass on my right of judgment? The affair would bear a +different aspect then, would it not?" + +"Oh, no doubt. No doubt it would." + +And that was all the archdeacon, who was a cautious man and knew Mr. +Bonamy, would say. But it will be observed that the rector had both +altered his standpoint and done another thing which most people find +easy enough. He had discovered an answer to his own arguments. + + + + + CHAPTER VIII. + + TWO SURPRISES. + + +On the evening of the Hammonds' party, Mr. Clode sat alone in his +room, trying to compose himself to work. His lamp burned brightly, and +his tea kettle--he had already sent down his frugal dinner an hour or +more--murmured pleasantly on the hob. But for some reason Mr. Clode +could do no work. He was restless, gloomy, ill-satisfied. The +suspicions which had been aroused in his breast on the evening of the +rector's arrival had received, up to to-day at least, no confirmation; +but they had grown, as suspicions will, feeding on themselves, and +with them had grown the jealousy which had fostered them into being. +The curate saw himself already overshadowed by his superior, socially +and in the parish; and this evening felt this the more keenly that, as +he sat in his little room, he could picture perfectly the gay scene at +the Town House, where, for nearly two years, not a party had taken +place without his presence, no festivity had been arranged without his +co-operation. The omission to invite him to-night, however natural it +might seem to others, had for him a tremendous significance; so that +from a jealousy that was general he leapt at once to a jealousy more +particular, and conjured up a picture of Laura--with whose disposition +he was not unacquainted--smiling on the stranger, and weaving about +him the same charming net which had caught his own feet. + +At this thought Clode sprang up with a passionate gesture and began to +walk to and fro, his brow dark. He felt sure that Lindo had no right +to his cure, but he knew also that the cure was a freehold, and that +to oust the rector from it something more than a mere mistake would +have to be shown. If the rector should turn out to be very +incompetent, if he should fall on evil times in the parish, then +indeed he might find his seat untenable when the mistake should be +discovered; and with an eye to this the curate had already dropped a +word here and there--as, for instance, that word which had reached Mr. +Bonamy. But Clode was not satisfied with that now. Was there no +shorter, no simpler course possible? There was one. The rector might +be shown to have been aware of the error when he took advantage of it. +In that case his appointment would be vitiated, and he might be +compelled to forego it. + +Naturally enough, the curate had scarcely formulated this to himself +before he became convinced--in his present state of envy and +suspicion--of the rector's guilt. But how was he to prove it? As he +walked up and down the room, chafing and hot-eyed, he thought of a way +in which proof might be secured. The letters which had passed between +Lindo and Lord Dynmore's agents in regard to the presentation, must +surely contain some word, some expression sufficient to have apprised +the young man of the truth--that the living was intended not for him +but for his uncle. A look at those letters, if they were in existence, +might give Stephen Clode, mere curate though he was, the whip-hand of +his rector! + +He had another plan in his mind, of which more presently, and probably +he would have pursued the idea which has just been mentioned no +farther if his eye had not chanced to light at the moment on a small +key hanging upon a nail by the fireplace. Clode looked at the key, and +his face flushed. He stood thinking and apparently hesitating, the +lamp throwing his features into strong relief, while a man might count +twenty. Then he sat down with an angry exclamation and plunged into +his work. But in less than a minute he lifted his head. His glance +wandered again to the key; and, getting up suddenly, he took it down, +put on his hat, and went out. + +His lodgings were over the stationer's shop, but he could go in and +out through a private passage. He saw, as he passed, however; that +there was a light in the shop, and he opened the side door. "I am +going to the rectory to consult a book, Mrs. Wafer," he said, seeing +his landlady dusting the counter. "You can leave my lamp alight. I +shall want nothing more to-night, thank you." + +She bade him good-night, and he closed the door again and rushed into +the street. Crossing the top of the town, he had to pass the Market +Hall, where he spoke to the one policeman on night duty; and here he +saw that it was five minutes to ten, and hastened his steps, in the +fear that the rector's household might have retired. "He will not be +home himself until eleven, at the earliest," the curate muttered as he +turned rapidly into the churchyard, which was very dark, the night +being moonless. "I have a clear hour. It was well that I looked in +late the other night." + +But, whatever his design, it received a sudden check. The rectory was +closed! The front of the house stood up dark and shapeless as the +great church which towered in front of it. The servants had gone to +bed, and, as they slept at the back, he would have found it difficult +to arouse them, had it suited his plans to do so. As it was, he did +not dream of such a thing, and with a slight shiver--for the night was +cold, and now that his project no longer excited him he felt it so, +and felt too the influence of the night wind soughing in sad fashion +through the yews--he was turning away, when something arrested his +attention, and he paused. + +The something he had seen, or fancied he had seen, was a momentary +glimmer of light shining through the fanlight over the door. It could +not affect him, for, if the servants had really closed the house for +the night, even if they had not all gone to bed, he could scarcely go +in. And yet some impulse led him to step softly into the porch and +grope for the knocker. + +His hand lit instead on the iron-studded surface of the old oak door, +and, to his surprise, he felt it move slightly under his touch. He +pushed, and the door slid slowly and silently open, disclosing the +dusky outline of the hall, faintly illuminated by a thin shaft of +light which proceeded apparently from the study, the door of which was +a trifle ajar. + +The sight recalled to the curate's mind the errand on which he had +come, and he stole across the hall on tiptoe, listening with all his +ears. He heard nothing, however, and presently he stood on the mat at +the study door intercepting the light. Then he did hear the dull +footsteps of some one moving in the room, and suddenly it occurred to +him that the rector had stepped home to fetch something--a song, +music, or a book possibly--and was now within searching for it. That +would explain all. + +The curate was seized with panic at the thought, and, fearful of being +discovered in his present position--for though he might have done all +he had done in perfect innocence, conscience made a coward of him--he +crept across the hall again and passed out into the churchyard. There +he stood in the darkness, waiting and watching, expecting the rector +to bustle out each minute. + +But five minutes passed, and even ten, as it seemed to the curate in +his impatience, and no one came out, nor did the situation alter. Then +he made up his mind that the person moving in the study could not be +the owner of the house, and he went in again and, crossing the hall, +flung the study door wide open and entered. + +There was a ringing sound as of coins falling on the floor, and a man +who had been kneeling low over something sprang to his feet and gazed +with wide, horror-stricken eyes at the intruder. A moment only the man +looked, and then he fell again on his knees. "Oh, mercy! mercy!" he +cried, almost grovelling before the curate. "Don't give me up! I have +never been took! I have never been in jail or in trouble in my life! I +did not know what I was doing, sir! I swear I did not! Don't give me +up!" + +This cry, which was low and yet piercing, ended in hysterical sobbing. +On the table by his side stood a single candle, and by its light Clode +saw that the little cupboard among the books was open. The curate +started at the sight, and the words which he had been about to utter +to the shrinking wretch begging for mercy on the floor before him died +away in his husky throat. His eyes, however, burned with a gloomy +rage, and when he recovered himself his voice was pitiless. "You +scoundrel!" he said, in the low rich tone which had been so much +admired in the church when he first came to Claversham, "what are you +doing here? Get up and speak!" And he made as if he would spurn the +creature with his foot. + +"I am a respectable man," the rogue whined. "I am--that is I was, I +mean, sir--don't be hard on me--Lord Dynmore's own valet. I will tell +you all, sir." + +"I know you!" rejoined Clode, looking harshly at him. "You were here +this morning. And Mr. Lindo gave you money." + +"He did, sir. I confess it. I am a----" + +"You are an ungrateful scoundrel!" Stephen Clode answered, cutting the +man short. "That is what you are! And in a few days you will be a +convicted felon, with the broad-arrow on your clothes, my man!" + +To hear his worst anticipations thus put into words was too much for +the poor wretch. He fell on his knees, feebly crying for mercy, mercy! +"You are a minister of the gospel. Give me this one more chance, sir!" +he prayed. + +"Stop that noise!" growled the curate fiercely, his dark face rendered +more rugged by the light and shadow cast by the single candle. "Be +silent! do you hear? and get up and speak like a man, if you can. Tell +me all--how you came here, and what you came for, and perhaps I may +let you escape. But the truth, mind, the truth!" he added truculently. + +The knave was too thoroughly terrified to think of anything else. +"Lord Dynmore dismissed me," he muttered, his breath coming quickly. +"He missed some money in Chicago, and he gave me enough to carry me +home, and bade me go to the devil! I landed in Liverpool without a +shilling--sir, it is God's truth--and I remembered the gentleman Lord +Dynmore had just put in the living here. I had known him, and he had +given me half a sovereign more than once. And I thought I would come +to him. So I pawned my clothes, and came on." + +"Yes, yes!" exclaimed the curate, leaning forward, with fierce +impatience in his tone. "And then?" + +"Sir?" + +"Well? When you came here? What happened? Go on, fool!" He could +scarcely control himself. + +"I found a stranger," whimpered the man--"another Mr. Lindo. He had +got in here somehow." + +"Well? But there," added the curate with a sudden change of manner, +"how do you know that Lord Dynmore meant to put the clergyman you used +to know in here?" + +"Because I heard him read a letter from his agents about it," the +fellow replied at once. "And from what his lordship said I knew it was +his old pal--his old friend, sir, I mean, begging your pardon humbly, +sir." + +"And when did you learn," said the curate more quickly, "that the +gentleman here was not your Mr. Lindo?" + +"I heard in the town that he was a young man. And, putting one thing +and another together, and keeping a still tongue myself, I thought he +would serve me as well as the other, and I called----" + +"What did you say?" + +"Not much, sir," answered the valet, a twinkle of cunning in his eye. +"The less said the sooner mended. But he understood, and he promised +to give me ten shillings a week." + +"To hold your tongue?" + +"Well, so I took it, sir." + +The curate drew a long breath. This was what he had expected. It was +to information which might be drawn from this man that his second +scheme had referred. And here was the man at his service, bound by a +craven fear to do his bidding--bound to tell all he knew. "But why," +Clode asked suspiciously, a thought striking him, "if what you say be +true, are you here now--doing this, my man?" + +"I was tempted, sir," the servant answered, his tone abject again. "I +confess it truly, sir. I saw the money in the box here this morning, +sir, and I thought that my ten shillings a week would not last long, +and a little capital would set me up comfortably. And then the devil +put it into my head that the young gentleman would not persecute me, +even if he caught me." + +"You did not think of me catching you?" said the curate grimly. + +The man uttered a cry of anguish. "That I did not, sir," he sobbed. +"Oh, Lord! I have never had a policeman's hand on me. I have been +honest always." + +"Until you took his lordship's money," replied the curate quietly. +"But I understand. You have never been found out before, you mean." + +No doubt when people of a certain class, for which respectability has +long spelled livelihood, do fall into the law's clutch they suffer +very sharply. Master Felton continued to pour forth heartrending +prayers; but he might have saved his breath. The curate's thoughts +were elsewhere. He was thinking that a witness so valuable must be +kept within reach at any cost and it did flash across his brain that +the best course would be to hand him over now to the police, and trust +to the effect which his statements respecting the rector should +produce upon the inquiry. But the reflection that the allegations of a +man on his trial for burglary would not obtain much credence led Clode +to reject this simple course and adopt another. "Look here!" he said +curtly. "I am going to deal mercifully with you, my man. But--but," +he continued, frowning impatiently, as he saw the other about to +speak--"on certain conditions. You are not to leave Claversham. That +is the first. If you leave the town before I give you the word, I +shall put the police on your track without an instant's delay. Do you +hear that?" + +"I will stop as long as you like, sir," said the servant submissively, +but with wonder apparent both in his voice and face. + +"Very well. I wish it for the present, no matter why. Perhaps because +I would see that you lead an honest life for awhile." + +"And--how shall I live, sir?" said the culprit timidly. + +"For the present you may continue to draw your half-sovereign a week," +the curate answered hastily, his face reddening, he best knew why. +"Possibly I may tell Mr. Lindo at once. Possibly I may give you +another chance, and tell him later, if I find you deserving. What is +your address?" + +"I am at the Bull and Staff," muttered Felton. It was a small public +house of no very good repute. + +"Well, stay there," Stephen Clode answered after a moment's thought. +"But see you get into no harm. And since you are living on the +rector's bounty, you may say so." + +The man looked puzzled as well as relieved, but, stealing a doubtful +glance at the curate's dark fate, he found his eyes still upon him, +and cowered afresh. "Yes, take care," said Clode, smiling unpleasantly +as he saw the effect his look produced. "Do not try to evade me or it +will be the worse for you, Felton. And now go! But see you take +nothing from here." + +The detected one cast a sly glance at the half-rifled box which still +lay on the carpet at his feet, a few gold coins scattered round it; +then he looked up again. "It is all there, sir," he said, cringing. "I +had but just begun." + +"Then go!" said the curate, pointing with emphasis to the door. "Go, I +tell you!" + +The man's presence annoyed and humiliated him so that he felt a +positive relief when the valet's back was turned. Left alone he stood +listening, a cloud on his brow, until the faint sound of the outer +door being pulled to reached his ear, and then, stooping hastily, he +gathered up the sovereigns and half-sovereigns, which lay where they +had fallen, and put them into the box. This done, he rose and laid the +box itself upon the table by his side. And again he stood still, +listening, a dark shade on his face. + +Long ago, almost at the moment of his entrance, he had seen the pale +shimmer of papers at the back of the little cupboard. Now, still +listening stealthily, he thrust in his hand and drew out one of the +bundles and opened it. The papers were parish accounts in his own +handwriting! With a gesture of fierce impatience he thrust them back +and drew out others, and, disappointed again in these, exchanged them +hastily for a third set. In vain! The last were as worthless to him as +the first. + +He was turning away baffled and defeated, when he saw lying at the +back of the lower compartment of the cupboard, whence the cash-box had +come, two or three smaller packets, consisting apparently of letters. +The curate reached hastily for one of these, and the discovery that it +contained some of Lindo's private accounts, dated before his +appointment, made his face flush and his fingers tremble with +eagerness. He glanced nervously round the room and stopped to listen; +then, moving the candle a little nearer, he ran his eye over the +papers. But here, too, though the scent was hot, he took nothing, and +he exchanged the packet for one of the others. Looking at this, he saw +that it was indorsed in Lindo's handwriting, "Letters relating to the +Claversham Living." + +"At last," Clode muttered, his eyes burning, "I have it now." The +string which bound the packet was knotted tightly, and his fingers +seemed all thumbs as he labored to unfasten it. But he succeeded at +last, and opening the uppermost letter (they were all folded across), +saw that it was written from Lincoln's Inn Fields. "My dear sir," he +read; and then--with a mighty crash sounding awfully in his ears--the +door behind him was flung open just as he had flung it open himself an +hour before, and, dropping the letter, he sprang round, to find the +rector confronting him with a face of stupid astonishment. + + + + + CHAPTER IX. + + TOWN TALK. + + +He was a man, as the reader will perhaps have gathered, of many +shifts, and cool-headed; but for a moment he felt something of the +anguish of discovery which had so tortured the surprised servant. The +table shook beneath his hand, and it was with difficulty he repressed +a wild impulse to overturn the candle, and escape in the darkness. He +did repress it, however; nay, he forced his eyes to meet the rector's, +and twisted his lips into the likeness of a smile. But when he thought +of the scene afterward he found his chief comfort in the reflection +that the light had been too faint to betray his full embarrassment. + +Naturally the rector was the first to speak. "Clode!" he ejaculated +softly, his surprise above words. "Is it you? Why, man," he +continued, still standing with his hand on the door and his eyes +devouring the scene, "what is up?" + +The money-box stood open at the curate's side, and the letters lay +about his feet where they had fallen. The little cupboard yawned among +the books. No wonder Lindo's amazement, as he gradually took it all +in, rather increased than diminished, or that the curate's tongue was +dry and his throat husky when he at last found his voice. "It is all +right. I will explain it," he stammered, almost upsetting the table in +his agitation. "I expected you before," he added fussily, moving the +light. + +"The dickens you did!" slipped from the rector. It was difficult for +him not to believe that his arrival had been the last thing expected. + +"Yes," returned the curate, with a little snap of defiance. He was +recovering himself, and could look the other in the face now. "But I +am glad you did not come before, all the same." + +"Why?" + +"I will explain." + +The light which the one candle gave was not so meagre that Clode's +embarrassment had altogether escaped Lindo; and had the latter been a +suspicious man he might have had queer thoughts, and possibly +expressed them. As it was, he was only puzzled, and when the curate +said he would explain, answered simply, "Do." + +"The truth is," said Stephen Clode, beginning with an effort, "I have +taken a good deal on myself, and I am afraid you will blame me, Mr. +Lindo. If so, I cannot help it." His face flushed, and he beat a +tattoo on the table with his fingers. "I came across," he continued, +"to borrow a book a little before ten. The lights here were out; but, +to my surprise, your house-door was open." + +"As I found it myself!" the rector exclaimed. + +"Precisely. Naturally I had misgivings, and I looked into the hall. I +saw a streak of light proceeding from the doorway of this room, and I +came in softly to see what it meant. I heard a man moving about in +here, and I threw open the door much as you did." + +"Did you?" said Lindo eagerly. "And who was it--the man, I mean?" + +"That is just what I cannot tell you," replied the curate. His face +was pale, but there was a smile upon it, and he met the other's gaze +without flinching. He had settled his plan now. + +"He got away, then?" said the rector, disappointed. + +"No. He did not try either to escape or to resist," was the answer. + +"But was he really a burglar?" + +"Yes." + +"Then where is he?" The rector looked round as if he expected to see +the man lying bound on the floor. "What did you do with him?" + +"I let him go." + +Lindo whistled; and when he had done whistling still stood with his +mouth open and a face of the most complete mystification. "You let him +go?" he repeated mechanically, but not until after a pause of half a +minute or so. "Why, may I ask?" + +"You have every right to ask," the curate answered with firmness, +and yet despondently. "I will tell you why--why I let him go, and +why I cannot tell you his name. He is a parishioner of yours. It was +his first offence, and I believe him to be sincerely penitent. I +believe, too, that he will never repeat the attempt, and that the +accident of my entrance saved him from a life of crime. I may have +been wrong--I dare say I was wrong," continued the curate, growing +excited--excitement came very easily to him at the moment--"but I +cannot go back from my word. The man's misery moved me. I thought what +I should have felt in his place, and I promised him, in return for his +pledge that he would live honestly in the future, that he should go +free, and that I would not betray his name to any one--to any one!" + +"Well!" exclaimed the rector, his tone one of unbounded admiration in +every sense of the word. "When you do a thing nobly, my dear fellow, +you do do it nobly, and no mistake! I wonder who it was! But I must +not ask you." + +"No." said Clode. "And now," he continued, still beating the tattoo on +the table, "you do not blame me greatly?" + +"I do not, indeed. No. Only I think perhaps that you should have +retained the right to tell me." + +"I should have done so," said the curate regretfully. + +"He has taken nothing, I suppose?" the rector continued, turning to +the cupboard, and, not only satisfied with the explanation, but liking +Clode better than he had liked him before. + +"No," the other answered. "I was putting things straight when you +entered and startled me. He had dropped the money about the floor, but +you will find it right, I think. He has made a mess among the papers, +I fear, and damaged the cupboard door in forcing it, but that is the +extent of the mischief. By the way," the curate added, "I have a key +to this cupboard at my lodgings. Williams gave it to me. He only kept +parish matters here. I must let you have it." + +"Right," said the rector carelessly; and, a few more words having +passed between them as to the attempted robbery, and the manner in +which the outer door had been opened, the curate took his hat and +prepared to go. "You had a pleasant party, I suppose?" he said, +pausing and turning when halfway across the hall. + +"A _very_ pleasant one," Lindo answered with enthusiasm. + +"They are nice people," said Clode smoothly. + +"They are--very nice. You told me I should find them so, and you were +right. Good-night." + +"Good-night." + +Such harmless words! And yet they roused the curate's jealousy anew. +As he walked home, the church clock tolling midnight above his head, +he drank in no peaceful influence from the dark stillness or the +solemn sound. He was gnawed by fresh hatred of the man who had +surprised and confounded him, and forced him to lie and quibble in +order to escape from a dishonorable position. If you would make a man +your enemy come upon him when he is doing something of which he is +ashamed. He will fear you afterward, but he will hate you more. In the +curate's case it was only he who knew himself discovered, so that he +had no ground for fear. But he hated none the less vigorously. + +And, somehow, in a few days an ugly rumor of which the new rector was +the subject began to gain currency in the town. It was an ill-defined +rumor, coming to one thing in one person's mouth and to a different +thing in another's--a kind of cloud on the rector's fair fame, +shifting from moment to moment, and taking ever a fresh shape, yet +always a cloud. + +One whispered that he had obtained the presentation as the reward of +questionable services rendered to the patron. Another that he had +forged his own deed of presentation, if such a thing existed. A third +that he had been presented by mistake; and a fourth that he had +deceived the authorities as to his age. It was noticeable that these +rumors began low down in the social scale of the town and worked their +way upward, which was odd; and that, whatever form the rumor took, +there was not one who heard it who did not within a fortnight or three +weeks come to associate it with the presence of a seedy, down-looking, +unwholesome man, who was much about the rector's doorway, and, when he +was not there, was generally to be found at the Bull and Staff. +Whether he was the disseminator of the reports, or, alike with the +rector, was the unconscious subject of them, was not known; but at +sight of him--particularly if he were seen, as frequently happened, in +the rector's neighborhood--people shrugged their shoulders and lifted +their eyebrows, and expressed a great many severe things without using +their tongues. + +To the circle of the rector's personal friends the rumors did not +reach. That was natural enough. To tell a person that his or her +intimate friend is a forger or a swindler is a piquant but somewhat +perilous task. And no one mentioned the matter to the Hammonds, or to +the archdeacon, or to the Homfrays of Holberton, or the other county +people living round, with whom it must be confessed that, after that +dinner-party at the Town House, he consorted perhaps too exclusively. +It might have been thought that even the townsfolk, seeing the young +fellow's frank face passing daily about their streets, and catching +the glint of his fair curly hair when, the wintry sunlight pierced the +lanthorn windows and fell in gules and azure on the reading-desk, +would have been slow to believe such tales of him. + +They might have been; but circumstances and Mr. Bonamy were against +him. The lawyer did not circulate the stories; he had not even +mentioned them out-of-doors, nor, for aught the greater part of +Claversham knew, had heard of them at all. But all his weight--and +with the Low-Church middle-class in the town it was great--was thrown +into the scale against the rector. It was known that he did not trust +the rector. It was known that day by day his frown on meeting the +rector grew darker and darker. And the why and the wherefore not being +understood--for no one thought of questioning the lawyer, or observed +how frequently of late the curate happened upon him in the street or +the reading-room--many concluded that he knew more of the clergyman's +antecedents than appeared. + +There was one person, and perhaps only one, who openly circulated and +rejoiced in these rumors. That was a man whom Lindo met daily in the +street and passed with a careless nod and a word, not dreaming for an +instant that the spiteful little busybody was concerning himself with +him. The man was Dr. Gregg, the snappish, ill-bred man who had chanced +upon Lindo and the Bonamy girls breakfasting together at Oxford. The +sight, it will be remembered, had not pleased him, for he had long had +a sneaking liking for Miss Kate himself, and had only refrained from +trying to win her because he still more desired to be of the "best +set" in Claversham. He had been ashamed, indeed, up to this time of +his passion; but, reading on that occasion unmistakable admiration of +the girl in the young clergyman's face, and being himself rather +cavalierly treated by Lindo, he had somewhat changed his views. The +girl had acquired increased value in his eyes. Another's appreciation +had increased his own, and, merely as an incident, the man who had +effected this has earned his hearty jealousy and ill-will. And this, +while Lindo thought him a vulgar but harmless little man. + +But if the rector, immersed in new social engagements, did not see +whither he was tending, others, though they knew nothing of the +unpleasant tales we have mentioned, saw more clearly. The archdeacon, +coming into town one Saturday five or six weeks after Lindo's arrival, +did his business early and turned his steps toward the rectory. He +felt pretty sure of finding the young fellow at home, because he knew +it was his sermon day. A few yards from the door he fell in, as it +chanced, with Stephen Clode. The two stood together talking, while the +archdeacon waited to be admitted, and presently the curate said, "If +you wish to see the rector, archdeacon, I am afraid you will be +disappointed. He is not at home." + +"But I thought that he was always at home on Saturdays?" + +"Generally he is," Clode replied, looking down and tracing a pattern +with the point of his umbrella. "But he is away to-day." + +"Where?" said the archdeacon rather abruptly. + +"He has gone to the Homfrays' at Holberton. They have some sort of +party to-day, and the Hammonds drove him over." Despite himself, the +curate's tone was sullen, his manner constrained. + +"Oh!" said the archdeacon thoughtfully. The Homfrays were his very +good friends, but of the county families round Claversham they were +reckoned the fastest and most frivolous. And he sagely suspected that +a man in Lindo's delicate position might be wiser if he chose other +companions. "Lindo seems to see a good deal of the Hammonds," he +remarked after a pause. + +"Yes," said Clode. "It is very natural." + +"Oh, very natural," the archdeacon hastened to say; but his tone +clearly expressed the opinion that "toujours Hammonds" was not a good +bill of fare for the rector of Claversham. "Very natural, of course. +Only," he continued, taking courage, for he really liked the rector, +"you have had some experience here, and I think it would be well if +you were to give him a hint not to be too exclusive. A town rector +must not be too exclusive. It does not do." + +"No," said Clode. + +"It is different in the country, of course. And then there is Mr. +Bonamy. He is unpleasant, I know, and yet he is honest after a +fashion. Lindo must beware of getting across with him. He has done +nothing about the sheep yet, has he?" + +"No." + +"Well, do not let him, if you can help it. You are not urging him on +in that, are you?" + +"On the contrary," the curate answered rather warmly, "I have all +through told him that I would not express an opinion on it. If +anything, I have discouraged him in the matter." + +"Well, I hope he will let it drop now. I hope he will let it drop." + +They parted then, and the archdeacon, sagely revolving in his mind the +evils of exclusiveness, strolled back to the hotel where he put up his +horses. On his way, casting his eye down the wide, quiet street, with +its old-fashioned houses on this side and that, he espied Mr. Bonamy's +tall spare figure approaching, and he purposely passed the inn and +went to meet him. As a county magnate the archdeacon could afford to +know Mr. Bonamy, and even to be friendly with him. I am not sure, +indeed, that he had not a sneaking liking and respect for the rugged, +snappish, self-made man. + +"How do you do, Mr. Bonamy?" he began. And then, after saying a few +words about closing a road in which he was interested, he slid into a +mention of Lindo, with a view to seeing how the land lay. "I have just +been to call on your rector," he said. + +"You did not find him at home," replied Bonamy, with a queer grin, and +a little jerk of his head which sent his hat still farther back. + +"No, I was unlucky." + +"Not more than most people," said the churchwarden, with much +enjoyment. "I will tell you what it is, Mr. Archdeacon. Mr. Lindo is +better suited for your place. He would make a very good archdeacon. +With a pair of horses and a park phaeton and a small parish, and a +little general superintendence of the district--with that and the life +of a country gentleman he would get on capitally." + +There was just so much of a jest in the words that the clergyman had +no choice but to laugh. "Come, Bonamy," he said good-humoredly, "he is +young yet." + +"Oh, yes, he is quite out of place here in that respect, too!" replied +the lawyer navely. + +"But he will improve," pleaded the archdeacon. + +"I am not sure that he will have the chance," Mr. Bonamy answered in +his gentlest tone. + +The archdeacon was so far from understanding him that he did not +answer save by raising his eyebrows. Could Bonamy really be so +foolish, he wondered, as to think he could get rid of a beneficed +clergyman. The archdeacon was surprised, and yet that was all he could +make of it. + +"He is away at Mr. Homfray's of Holberton now," the lawyer continued, +condemnation in his thin voice. + +"Well, there is no harm in that, Mr. Bonamy," replied the archdeacon, +somewhat offended, "as long as he is back to do the duty to-morrow." + +Mr. Bonamy grunted. "A one-day-a-week duty is a very fine thing," he +said. "You clergymen are to be envied, Mr. Archdeacon!" + +"You would be a great deal more to be envied yourself, Mr. Bonamy," +the magnate returned with heat, "if you did not carp at everything and +look at other people through distorted glasses. Fie! here is a young +clergyman new to the parish, and, instead of helping him, you find +fault with everything he does. For shame! For shame, Mr. Bonamy!" + +"Ah!" said the lawyer, quite unabashed, "you did not mean to say that +when you came across the street to me. But--well, least said soonest +mended, and I will wish you good evening. You will have a wet drive +home, I am afraid, Mr. Archdeacon." + +And he put up his umbrella and went his way sturdily, while the +archdeacon, crossing to his carriage, which was in front of the inn, +entertained an uncomfortable suspicion that he had done more harm than +good by his intercession. "I am afraid," he said to himself, as he +handled the reins and sent his horses down the street in a fashion of +which he was not a little proud--"I am afraid that there is trouble in +front of that young man. I am afraid there is." + +If he had known all, he might have shaken his head still more gravely, + + + + + CHAPTER X. + + OUT WITH THE SHEEP. + + +Stephen Clode, while listening with a certain pleasure to the +archdeacon's hints, did not dream of the good turn which fortune was +about to do him. If he had foreseen it, he would probably have taken a +bolder part in the conversation, and parted from the elder clergyman +with a more jubilant step. As it was, he heard no rumor that evening, +nor was it until ten o'clock on the Sunday morning that he learned +anything was amiss. Calling at the house in the churchyard at that +hour, he was received by Mrs. Baker herself; and he remarked at once +that the housekeeper's face fell in a manner far from flattering when +she recognized him. + +"Oh, it is you, is it, Mr. Clode?" she said, her tone one of +disappointment. "You have not seen him, sir, have you?" + +"Seen whom?" the curate replied in surprise. + +"Mr. Lindo, sir?" + +"Why? Is he not here?" + +"He is not, indeed, sir," the housekeeper said, putting her head out +to look up and down. "He never came back last night, and we have not +heard of him. I sent across to the Town House to inquire, and the only +thing Mrs. Hammond could say was that Mr. Lindo was to follow them, +and they supposed he had come." + +"Well, but--who is to do the duty at the church?" Clode ejaculated. His +dismay at the moment was genuine, for he did not at once see how much +this was to his advantage. + +"There is only you, sir, unless he comes in time," the housekeeper +added despondently. + +"But I am going to the Hamlet church," said Clode, rapidly turning +things over in his mind. If there was no one at the parish church to +conduct the chief service of the week, what a talk there would be! Why +it would almost be matter for the bishop's interference! "You see I +cannot possibly neglect that," he continued, in answer as much to the +remonstrance of his own conscience as to the housekeeper. "It was the +rector's own arrangement, Mrs. Baker. You may be sure he will be here +in time for the eleven o'clock service. Mr. Homfray has kept him over +night. That is all." + +"You do not think he has met with an accident, sir? They say the +coal-pits on Baer Hill----" + +"Pooh, pooh! He will be here in a few minutes, you will see," the +curate answered. And he affected to be so cheerfully certain of this +that he would not wait even for a little while, but started at once +for the Hamlet church--a small chapel-of-ease in the outskirts of the +town. There he put on his surplice early, and was ready in excellent +time. Punctuality is a virtue. + +At half-past ten the bells of the great church began to ring, and +presently door after door in the quiet streets about it opened +silently, and little parties issued forth in their Sunday clothes +and walked stiffly and slowly toward the building. At the moment when +the High Street was dotted most thickly with these groups, and the +small bell was tinkling its impatient summons, the rattle of an old +taxed-cart was heard as the vehicle flashed quickly over the bridge at +the foot of the street. One and another of the church-goers turned in +curiosity to gaze, for such a sound was rare on a Sunday morning. +Judge of their astonishment, then, when they recognized, perched up +beside the boy who urged on the pony, no less a person than the rector +himself! As he jogged up the street in his sorry conveyance and with +his sorry companion, he had to pass under the fire of a battery of +eyes which did not fail to notice all the peculiarities of his +appearance. His tie was awry and his chin unshaven. He had a haggard, +dissipated air, as of one who had been up all night, and there was a +great smudge on his cheek. He looked dissipated---nothing less than +disreputable, some said; and he seemed aware of it, for he sat erect, +gazing straight before him, and declining to see any one. At the top +of the street he descended hastily, and, as the bell jerked out its +final note, hurried toward the vestry with a depressed and gloomy +face. + +"Well!" said Mr. Bonamy to Kate, who was walking up by his side, and +whose face for some mysterious reason was flushed and troubled, "I +think that is the coolest young man I have ever met!" + +"Eh?" said a voice behind them as they entered the porch--the speaker +was Gregg. "What do you think of that, Bonamy? A gay young spark, is +he not?" + +There was time for no more then. But as the congregation waited in +their seats through a long voluntary, many were the nods and winks, +and incessant the low mutterings, as one communicated to another the +details of the scene outside, and his or her view of them. When the +rector appeared--nine minutes late by Mr. Bonamy's watch--he looked +pale and fagged, and the sermon he preached was of the shortest. +Nine-tenths of the congregation noted only the brevity of the +discourse and drew their conclusions. But Kate Bonamy, who sat by her +father with downcast eyes and a tinge of color still in her cheeks, +and who scarcely once looked up at the weary face and tumbled hair, +fancied, heaven knows why, that she detected a new pathos and a deeper +tone of appeal in the few simple sentences; and though she had +scarcely spoken to the rector for a month, and was nursing a tiny +contempt for him, the girl felt on a sudden more kindly disposed +toward the young man. + +Not so Mr. Bonamy, He came out of church chuckling; full of a grim +delight in the fulfilment of his predictions. It was not his custom to +linger in the porch, for he was not a sociable man; but he did so +to-day, and, letting Kate and Daintry go on, formed one of a coterie +of men, who had no difficulty in coming to a conclusion about the +rector. + +"He has been studying hard, poor fellow!" said Gregg, with a +wink--there is no dislike so mean and cruel as that which the ill-bred +man feels for the gentleman--"reading the devil's books all night!" + +"Nine minutes late!" said the lawyer. "That is what comes of having a +young fellow who is always gadding about the country!" + +"He could not gad to a more congenial place than Holberton, I should +think," sneered a third. + +And then all the sins which the Homfrays had ever committed, and all +those which had ever been laid to their charge, were cited to render +the rector's case more black. To do him justice, Mr. Bonamy took but a +listener's part in this. He was a shrewd man, and he did not believe +that the rector could have had anything to do with an elopement from +Holberton which had taken place before his name was heard in the +county; but he was honestly assured that the young fellow had been +sitting over the cards half the night. And as for the other crimes, +perhaps he would commit them if he were left to follow his own foolish +devices. + +"What is ill-gotten soon goes," said one charitable person with a +sneer. "You may depend upon it that what we hear is true." + +"It is all of a piece," said another. "A man does not have a follower +of that kind for nothing?" + +"It comes over the devil's back, and goes--you know how?" said a +third. "But perhaps he is wise to make the most of it while it lasts. +He is consequential enough now, but the Homfrays will not have much to +say to him presently, you will see. A few weeks, and he will go." + +"Well, let him go for the d--d dissipated gambling parson he is!" said +Gregg coarsely, carried away by the unusual agreement with him. "And +the sooner the better, say I!" + +The man beside him, a little startled by the doctor's violence, turned +round to make sure that they were not overheard, and found himself +face to face with the rector, who, seeking to go out--as was not his +custom, for he generally used the vestry door--by the porch, had +walked into the midst of the group, even as Gregg opened his mouth. A +glance at the young man's reddening cheek and compressed lips apprised +the startled group that he had overheard something at least. + +In one way it was the crisis of Lindo's fate at Claversham. But he did +not know it. If he had been wise--if he had been such a man as his +curate, for instance; or if, without being wise, he had learned a +little of the prudence which comes of necessity with years--he would +have passed through them in silence, satisfied with such revenge as +mute contempt could give him. But he was not old, nor very wise; and +perhaps certain things had lately jarred on his nerves, so that he was +not quite himself. He did not pass by in silence, but, instead, stood +for a moment. Then, singling Gregg out with a withering glance, "I am +much obliged to you for your good opinion," he said to him; "but I +should be still more obliged if you would swear elsewhere, sir, and +not in the porch of my church. Leave the building! Go at once!" And he +pointed toward the churchyard with the air of an angry schoolmaster. + +But Gregg did not move. He was astounded by this direct attack, but he +had the courage of numbers on his side, and, though he did not dare to +answer, he did not budge. Neither did the others, though they felt +ashamed of themselves, and looked all ways at once. Only one of them +all met the rector's glance fairly, and that was Mr. Bonamy. "I think +the least said the soonest mended, Mr. Lindo," he replied, with an +acrid smile. + +"I am sorry that you did not think of that before," retorted the young +man, standing before them with his fair head thrown back, his clerical +coat hanging loose, and his brow dark with indignation--for he had +heard enough to be able to guess the cause of Gregg's remark. "Do you +come to church only to cavil and backbite?--to put the worst +construction on what you cannot understand?" + +"Speaking for myself," replied the church warden coolly, "the sole +thing with which I can charge myself is the remark that you were +somewhat late for service this morning, Mr. Lindo." + +"And if I was?" said the clergyman in his haughtiest tone. + +"Well, of course there may have been a good cause for it," the lawyer +replied drily. "But it is a thing I have not known happen here for +twenty years." + +An altercation with these men, none of whom were well disposed toward +him, and half of whom were tradespeople, was the last thing which the +young rector should have allowed himself to enter upon, and the last +thing indeed to which he would have condescended in his normal frame +of mind. But on this unlucky morning he was nervous and irritable; +and, finding himself thus bearded and defied, he spoke foolishly. "You +trouble yourself too much, Mr. Bonamy," he said impulsively, "with +things which do not concern you! The parish, among other things. You +have set yourself, as I know, to thwart and embarrass me; but I warn +you that you are not strong enough! I shall find means to----" + +"To put me down, in fact?" said Mr. Bonamy. + +The young man hesitated, his face crimson. His opponent's sallow +features, seamed with a hundred astute wrinkles, warned him, if the +covert smiles of the others did not, that, in his present mood at any +rate, he was not a match for the lawyer. He had gone too far already, +as he was now aware. "No," he replied, swallowing his rage, "but to +keep you to your proper province, as I hope to keep to mine. I wish +you good morning." + +He passed through them, and hurried away, more angry with them, and +with himself for allowing them to provoke him, than he had ever felt +in his life. He knew well that he had been foolish. He knew that he +had lowered himself in their eyes by his display of temper. But, +though he was bitterly annoyed with himself, the consciousness that +the fault had originally lain with them, and that they had grievously +misjudged him, kept his anger hot; for there is no wrath so fierce as +the indignation of the man falsely accused. He called them under his +breath an uncharitable, spiteful, tattling crew; and was so far +unnerved in thought of them that he had entered his dining-room before +he remembered that he was engaged to take the mid-day meal at the Town +House, as he had done once or twice before, and then walked up with +Laura to the schools. + +He washed and changed hurriedly, keeping his anger hot the while, and +then went across, with the tale on the tip of his tongue. Again, if he +had been wise, he would have kept what had happened to himself. But +the soothing luxury of unfolding his wrong to some one who would +sympathize was one he could not in his soreness forego. + +It was a particularly mild day for the fourth Sunday in Advent, and he +found Miss Hammond still lingering before the door, She was looking +for violets under the north wall, and he joined her, and naturally +broke out at once with the story of what had happened. She was wearing +a little close bonnet, which set off her piquant features and bright +coloring to peculiar advantage, and, as far as looks went, no young +man in trouble ever had a better listener. Only to stand beside her on +the lawn, where the old trees shut out all view of the town and the +troubles he connected with it, was a relief. Of course the search for +violets was soon abandoned. "It is abominable!" she said. But her +voice was like the cooing of a dove. She did everything softly. Even +her indignation was gentle. + +"But you have not heard yet," he protested, "why I really was late." + +"I know what is being said," she murmured, looking up at him, a gleam +of humor in her brown eyes--"that you stayed at the Homfrays' all +night, playing cards. My maid told me as we came in--after church." + +"Ha! I knew that they were saying something of the kind," he replied +savagely. He was so stern that she felt her little attempt at badinage +reproved. "The true reason was of a very different description. What +spiteful busybodies they are! I started to return last evening about +half-past nine, but as I passed Baer Hill Colliery I learned that +there had been an accident. A man going down the shaft with the night +shift had been crushed--hurt beyond help," the rector continued in a +lower voice. "He wanted to see a clergyman, and the other pitmen, some +of whom had seen me pass earlier in the day, stopped me and took me to +him." + +"How sad! How very sad!" she ejaculated. Somehow she felt ill at ease +with him in this mood. With his last words a kind of veil had fallen +between them. + +"I stayed with him the night," the rector continued. "He died at +half-past nine this morning. I came straight from that to this. And +they say these things of me!" + +His voice, though low, was hard, and yet there was a suspicious break +in it as he uttered his last words. Injustice touches a man, young and +not yet hardened, very sorely; and he was overwrought. Laura, +fingering her little bunch of violets, heard the catch in his voice, +and knew that he was not very far from tears. + +She was almost terrified. She longed to respond, to say the proper +thing, but here her powers deserted her. She was not capable of much +emotion, unless the call especially concerned herself; and she could +not rise to this occasion. She could only murmur again that it was +abominable and too bad, or, taking her cue from the young man's face, +that it was very sad. She said enough, it is true, to satisfy him, +though not herself; for he only wanted a listener. And when he went in +to lunch Mrs. Hammond more than bore him out in all his denunciations; +so that when he left to go to the schools he had fully made up his +mind to carry things through. + +This unfortunate quarrel indeed did him great injury by throwing him +into the arms of the party which his own pleasure and taste led him to +prefer. He did not demur when Mrs. Hammond--meaning little evil, but +expressing prejudices which at one time she had sedulously cultivated +(for when one lives near the town one must take especial care not to +be confounded with it)--talked of a set of butchers and bakers, and +said, much more strongly than he had, that Mr. Bonamy must be kept in +his place. A little quarrel with the lawyer, a little social +relaxation in which the young fellow had lost sight of the excellent +intentions with which he had set out, then this final quarrel--such +had been the course of events; sufficient, taken with his own +fastidiousness and inexperience, to bring him to this. + +Mrs. Hammond, standing at the drawing-room window, watched him as he +walked down the short drive. "I like that young man," she said +decisively. "He is thrown away upon those people." + +Laura, who had not gone to the schools, yawned. "He has not one-half +the brains of some one else we know, mother," she answered. + +"Who is that?" + +Laura did not reply; and probably her mother understood, for she did +not press the question. "Well," Mrs. Hammond said, after a moment's +silence, "perhaps he has not. I do not know. But at any rate he is a +gentleman from the crown of his head to the tips of his toes." + +"I dare say he is," said Laura languidly. + +Mrs. Hammond, depositing her own portly form in a suitable chair, +watched her daughter curiously. She would have given a good deal to be +able to read the girl's mind and learn her intentions; but she was too +wise to ask questions, and had always given Laura the fullest liberty. +She had watched the growth of the intimacy between her and Mr. Clode +without demur, feeling a strong liking for the man herself, though she +scarcely thought him a suitable match for her daughter. On the old +rector's death there had seemed for a few days a chance of Mr. Clode +being appointed his successor; and at that time Mrs. Hammond had +fancied she detected a shade of anxiety and excitement in her +daughter's manner. But Mr. Clode had not been appointed, and the new +rector had come; and Laura had apparently transferred her favor from +the curate to him. + +At this Mrs. Hammond had felt somewhat troubled--at first; but in a +short time she had naturally reconciled herself to the change, the +rector's superiority as a _parti_ being indisputable. Yet still Mrs. +Hammond felt no certainty as to Laura's real feelings, and, gazing at +her this afternoon, was as much in the dark as ever. That the girl was +fond of her she knew; indeed, it was quite a pretty sight to see the +daughter purring about the mother. But Mrs. Hammond was more than half +inclined to doubt now whether Laura was fond, or capable of being +fond, of any other human being except herself. + +She sighed gently as she thought of this, and rang the bell for tea. +"I think we will have it early this afternoon," she said, "I feel I +want a cup." + + + + + CHAPTER XI. + + THE DOCTOR SPEAKS. + + +The feelings with which the curate hastened on the conclusion of his +own service, to learn what had happened at the great church may be +imagined. His excitement and curiosity were not the less because he +had to hide them. If there really had been no service--if the rector +had not appeared--what a scandal, what a subject for talk was here! +Even if the rector had appeared a little late there would still be +whispering; for new brooms are expected to sweep clean. The curate +composed his dark face, and purposely made one or two sick calls at +houses which lay in his road, lest he might seem to ask the question +he had to put too pointedly. By the time he reached the rectory he had +made up his mind, judging from the absence of stir in the streets, +that nothing very unusual had happened. + +"Is the rector in?" he asked the servant. + +"No, sir; he has gone to the Town House to dinner," the girl answered. + +Involuntarily Mr. Clode frowned. "He was in time for service, I +suppose?" he asked, more abruptly than he had intended. + +"Oh, yes, sir," said the unconscious maid, who had not been to church. + +"Thank you; that is all," he answered, turning away. So nothing had +come of it after all! His heart was sick with disappointed hope as he +turned into his own dull lodgings; and he felt that the rector in +being in time had wronged him afresh, and by dining at the Town House +had added insult to injury. + +But in the course of the day he learned how late the rector had been; +and early next morning some rumor of the triangular altercation in the +church porch also reached him--of course in an exaggerated form. As a +fact, all Claversham was by this time talking of it, Mr. Bonamy's +companions, with one exception, having taken good care to make the +most of his success, and to paint the rebuff he had administered to +the clergyman in the deepest colors. The curate heard the news with a +face of grave concern, but with secret delight; and, turning over in +his mind what use he might make of it, came opportunely upon Gregg as +the latter was going his rounds. "Hallo!" he said, calling so loudly +that the doctor, who had turned away and would fain have retreated, +could not decently escape, "you are the very man I wanted to see! What +is this absurd story about the rector and you? There is not a word of +truth in it, I suppose?" + +"I am sure I cannot say until you tell me what it is," replied the +doctor snappishly. He was a little afraid of the curate, who had a +knack of being unpleasant without giving an opening in return. + +"Why, you seem rather sore about it," Clode remarked, with apparent +surprise. + +"I do not know why I should!" sneered the doctor, his face a dark red +with anger. + +"Certainly not, if there is no truth in the story," the curate +replied, looking down with his eyes half shut at the chafing little +man. "But I suppose it is all an invention, Gregg?" + +"It is not an invention that the rector was abominably rude to me," +blurted out the doctor, who scarcely knew with whom to be most +angry--his present tormentor or the first cause of his trouble. + +"Pooh!" said Clode, "it is only his way." + +"Then it is a d----, it is a most unpleasant way!" retorted the doctor +savagely. + +"He means no harm," said the curate gaily. "Why did you not answer him +back?" + +Dr. Gregg's face turned a shade redder. That was where the shoe +pinched. Why had he not answered him back as Bonamy had, and not stood +mute, acknowledging himself the smaller man? That was what was +troubling him now, and making him fancy himself the laughing-stock of +the town. "I will answer him back in a way he will not like!" he cried +viciously, striving to hide his embarrassment under a show of bluster. + +"Tut-t-tut!" said the curate provokingly, "do not go and make a fool +of yourself by saying things like that, when you know you don't mean +them, man. What can you say to the rector?" + +"I will ask him----" + +But what he would ask the rector was lost to the world, for at this +moment Mr. Bonamy, coming down the pavement behind him, touched his +sleeve. "I have just been to your house, doctor," he said. "My +youngest girl is a little out of sorts. Would you mind stepping in and +seeing her?" + +Gregg swallowed his wrath, and was perhaps thankful for the +interruption. He said he would; and the lawyer turned to Mr. Clode. +"Well," he said, "so you have made up your minds to fight?" + +"I am not quite sure," said the curate, with caution--for he knew +better than to treat Mr. Bonamy as he treated Gregg--"that I take +you." + +"You have not seen your principal this morning?" replied the lawyer, +with a smile which for him was almost benevolent. The prospect of a +fight was as the Mountains of Beulah to him. + +"Do you mean Mr. Lindo?" said the curate, with some curtness. + +The lawyer nodded. "I see you have not," he continued. "Perhaps you do +not know that he turned the sheep out of the churchyard after +breakfast this morning, and half of them were found nearly a mile down +the Red Lane!" + +"I did not know it," said the curate gravely. But it was as much as he +could do to restrain his exultation and show no sign save of concern. + +"Well, it is the fact," the lawyer replied, rubbing his hands. "It is +quite true he gave the church wardens notice to remove them a +fortnight ago; but we did not comply, because we say it is our affair +and not his. Now you may tell him from me that the only question in my +mind is the form of action." + +"I will tell him,' said the curate with dignity. + +"Just so! What do you say, Gregg?" + +But the doctor, grinning from ear to ear with satisfaction, was gone; +and the curate, not a whit less pleased in his heart, hastened to +follow his example. "Bonamy one, and Gregg two," he said softly to +himself, "and last, but not least, one who shall be nameless, three! +He has made three enemies already, and, if those be not enough, with +right on their side, to oust him from his seat when the time comes, +why, I know nothing of odds!" + +"With right on their side," said the curate, even to himself. He had +made no second attempt to pry into the rector's secrets or to bring +home to him a knowledge of the wrongfulness of his possession. But he +did still believe, or persuaded himself he believed, that Lindo was a +guilty man; or why should the young rector pension the old earl's +servant? And on this ground Clode justified to himself the secret +ill-turns he was doing him. A month's intimacy with the rector would +probably have convinced an impartial mind of his good faith. But the +curate had not, it must be remembered, an impartial mind; and we are +all very apt to believe what suits us. + +To return to the little doctor, whom we left going on his way in a +mood almost hilarious. He hoped that this fresh escapade of the +rector's would wipe out the memory of the fray in which he had himself +borne so inglorious a part. And the more he thought of it, the greater +was his admiration of the lawyer, whom he had long patronized in a +timid fashion, much as a snub-nosed King Charlie treats the butcher's +mongrel. Now he felt a positive reverence for him. He began to think +it possible that, with all his drawbacks of birth, Mr. Bonamy might +become a personage in the town, and pretty Kate not so bad a match. +The result of these musings was that, by the time he reached the +lawyer's door, an idea which he had first entertained on seeing the +young clergyman's admiration for Kate Bonamy, and which he had since +turned over more than once in his mind, had become on a sudden a +settled purpose. So much so that, as the doctor rang the bell, he +looked at his hands, which were not so clean as they might have been, +pished and pshawed, settled his light-blue scarf--which the next +minute rose again to the level of his collar--and at length went in +with a briskly juvenile air and an engaging smile. + +He found Daintry lying on the sofa in the dining-room down-stairs, her +head on a white bed-pillow. Kate was leaning over her. The room was in +some disorder--littered with this and that, a bottle of eau de +Cologne, Mr. Bonamy's papers, books, and sewing; but it looked +comfortable, for it was very evidently inhabited. A fastidious eye +might have thought it was too much inhabited; and yet proofs of +refinement were not wanting, though the sofa was covered with +horsehair, and the mirror was heavy and ugly, and the grate, +knee-high, was as old as the Georges. There were flowers on the table +and on the little cottage piano; and by the side of the last was a +violin-case. Not many people in Claversham knew that Mr. Bonamy played +the violin. Still fewer had heard him play, for he never did so out of +his own house. + +Possibly a very particular suitor might have preferred to find Kate +attending on her sister in a boudoir, free from a lawyer's papers, +furnished in a less solid and durable style, and with some livelier +look-out than through wire blinds upon a dull street. But another +might have thought that the office in which she was engaged, and the +gentleness of her touch and eye as she went about it, made up for all +deficiencies. + +Dr. Gregg was not of a nature to appreciate either the deficiencies or +the set-off; but he had eyes for the girl's grace and beauty, for the +neatness of the well-fitting blue gown and the white collar and cuffs; +and he shook hands with her and devoted himself to Daintry--who +disliked him extremely and was very fractious--with the most anxious +solicitude. "It is only a sick headache!" he said finally, with +bluntness which was meant for encouragement. "It is nothing, you +know." + +"I wish you had it, then!" Daintry wailed, burying her face in the +pillow. + +"It will be gone in the morning!" he retorted, rising and keeping his +temper by an unnatural effort. "She will be the better for it +afterward, Miss Bonamy." + +To this Daintry vouchsafed no answer, unless a muttered "Rubbish!" was +intended for one. He affected not to hear it, at any rate. He was all +good-temper this morning; the unfortunate point about this being that +his good nature was a shade more unpleasant than his usual snappish +manner. + +At any rate Kate thought it so. She felt the instinctive repulsion +which the wrong man's wooing awakens in an unspoiled girl. She was +conscious of an added dislike for the man as she held out her hand to +him at the dining-room door. But she did not divine the cause of this; +no, nor conjecture his purpose when he said in a low voice that he +wished to speak to her outside. + +"May we go in here a moment?" he muttered, when the door was closed +behind them. He pointed to the room on the other side of the hall, +which Mr. Bonamy used in summer as a kind of office. + +"There is no fire there," Kate answered. "I think it has been lighted +up-stairs, however, if you will not mind coming up, Dr. Gregg. Is +there anything"--this was when he had silently followed her into the +stiff drawing-room, where the newly lit fire was rather smoking than +burning--"serious the matter with her, then?" + +Her voice was steady, but her eyes betrayed the sudden anxiety his +manner had aroused in her. + +"With your sister?" he answered slowly. He was really pondering how he +should say what he had come to say. But, naturally, she set down his +thoughtfulness to a professional cause. + +"Yes," she said anxiously. + +"Oh, no--nothing, nothing. The truth is," continued the doctor, +following up a happy thought and smiling approval of it, "the matter +is with me, Miss Bonamy." + +"With you!" Kate exclaimed, opening her eyes in astonishment. Her +momentary anxiety had put all else out of her head. She thought the +doctor had gone mad. + +"Yes," he said jerkily, but with a grin of tender meaning. "With me. +And you are the cause of it. Now do not be frightened, Miss Kate," he +continued hastily, seeing her start of apprehension. "You must have +known for a long time what I was thinking of." + +"Indeed I have not," Kate murmured in a low voice. She did not affect +to misunderstand him. + +"Well, you easily might have known it then," he retorted, forgetting +his _rle_ for an instant. "But the long and the short of it is that I +want you to marry me. I do!" he repeated, overcoming something in his +throat, and going on from this point swimmingly. "And you will please +to hear me out, and not answer in a hurry, Miss Kate. If you like--but +I should not think that you would want it--you can have until +to-morrow to think it over." + +"No," she replied impulsively, her face crimson. And then she shut her +mouth so suddenly, it seemed she was afraid to let anything escape it +except that unmistakable monosyllable. + +"Very well," he replied, comfortably settling his elbow upon the +mantel-shelf, "that is as you like. I hope it does not want much +thinking over myself. I will not boast that I am a rich man, but +I am decently off. I flatter myself that I can keep my head above +water--and yours, too, for the matter of that." + +"Oh, it is not that," she began hurriedly. + +He interrupted her. "No, no," he said jocularly---his last remarks had +put him into a state of considerable self-satisfaction, and he no more +thought it possible that she could or would refuse him than that the +sky could fall--"do not buy a pig in a poke! Hear me out first, Miss +Kate, and we shall start fair. You have been in my house, and, if +it is not quite so large a house as this, I will answer for it you +will find it a great deal more lively. You will see people you have +never seen here, nor will see while your name is Bonamy. You will +have--well, altogether a better time. Not that I mind myself," the +doctor added rather vaguely, forgetting the French proverb about those +who excuse themselves, "what your name is, not I! So don't you think +you could say Yes at once, my dear?" + +He took a step nearer, thinking he had put it rather neatly and +without any nonsense. Possibly, from his point of view of things, he +had. But Kate fell back, nevertheless, as he advanced. + +"Oh, no," she said, flushing painfully. "I could not! I could not +indeed, Dr. Gregg! I am very sorry." + +"Come, come," he said, holding out his hand, his tone one of pleasant +raillery. He had looked for some hanging back, some show of coyness +and bashfulness, and was prepared to laugh in his sleeve at it--"I +think you can, Kate. I think it is possible." That it was in woman's +nature to say No to his comfortable home and the little lift in +society he had to offer--it is only little lifts we appreciate, just +up the next floor above us--he did not believe. + +But Kate soon undeceived him. "I am afraid it is not possible," she +said firmly. "Indeed, I may say at once, Dr. Gregg, that it is out of +the question what you ask; though I thank you, I am sure." + +His face fell ludicrously, and his thick black brows drew together in +a very ominous fashion. But he still could not believe that she meant +it. "I do not think you understand," he said, "that the house is +ready, and the furniture and servants, and there is nothing to prevent +you stepping into it all whenever you please. I will take you away +from this," he continued, darting a scornful glance round the stiff +chilly room--"I do not suppose that ten people enter this room in +the twelvemonth--and I will show you something like life. It is an +offer not many would make you. Come, Kate, do not be a little fool! +You are not going to say No, so say Yes at once. And don't let us +shilly-shally!" + +He had put out his hand as he spoke and captured hers. But she +snatched it from him again almost roughly, and stepped back. The right +man might have used the words the doctor used, and might have scolded +her with impunity, but not the wrong one. Her face, perplexed and +troubled a moment before, grew decided enough now. "I am going to say +No, nevertheless, Dr. Gregg," she replied firmly. "I thought I had +already said it. I will be as plain as you have been. I do not like +you as a wife should like her husband, nor otherwise than as a +friend." + +"A friend!" he exclaimed. He gasped as a man does who has been plunged +suddenly into cold water. His face was red with anger, and his little +black eyes glared at her banefully. "Oh, bother your friendship!" he +added violently. "I did not ask you for that!" + +"I have nothing else to give you," she replied coldly. + +He gasped again. Refused by the Bonamy girl! He had never thought of +this. He was beside himself with astonishment and anger, with +disappointment and wounded pride. "You would not have said this a +month ago!" he cried at last. "It was a pity I did not ask you then!" + +"I should have given you the same answer." + +"Oh, no," he replied ironically, swinging his hat to and fro. "Oh, no, +you would not--not at all, Miss Bonamy. You would have sung to a very +different tune if I had whistled to you before this niminy-piminy +parson showed his face here! Do not think that I am such a fool as not +to see which way the wind is blowing." + +She stood looking at him in silence. But her face was scarlet, and her +hand shook with rage. + +He saw it. "Pooh! do not think to frighten me!" he said coarsely. +"When a man has offered to marry you he has a right to speak his mind! +It will be a long time, I warrant you, before your parson will have +the same right to speak. He was very great with you once, but he has +quite another set of friends now, and I have not heard of him offering +to introduce you to them." + +"Will you go, Dr. Gregg?" she cried passionately, pointing to the +door. His taunts were torture to her. "Will you go, or do you wish to +stay and insult me further?" + +"I wish to say one thing, and I am going to say it," he replied, +nodding triumphantly. "You are pretty proud of your capture, but you +need not be. He will not be much of a match when we have stripped him +of the living he has no right to, and shown him the detected swindler +he is! Wait! Wait a little, Miss Bonamy, and when your parson is +ruined, as he will be before three months are out, high as he holds +his head now, perhaps you will be sorry that you did not take my +offer. Why," he added scornfully, "I should say you are the only +person in the parish who does not know he has no more right where he +is than I have." + +"Go!" she said, pointing to the door. Her face was white now. + +"So I will when I have said one more word----" + +"You won't say it!" cried a sharp voice behind him. "You will go now!" +He shot round, and there was Daintry with her hand on the door. Her +hair was in disorder, her cheeks were flushed, her greenish-gray eyes +were aglow with anger. He saw that she had overheard something of what +had passed, and he began to tremble. He had said more than he +intended. "You will go now, as Kate tells you," she cried, "I will not +have----" + +"Leave the room, child!" he snarled, stamping his foot. + +"I shan't!" she retorted fiercely. "And if you do not go before I +count three I will fetch the dogs." + +Dr. Gregg made a movement as if he would have put her out of the room. +But her presence had a little sobered him, and he stopped. "Look +here," he said. + +"One!" cried Daintry, who knew well that the doctor had a particular +dislike for Snorum, and that the dog's presence was at any time enough +to drive him from the house. + +He turned and looked at Kate. She had gone to the window and was +gazing out, her back to him, her figure proud and scornful. "Miss +Bonamy," he said. + +"Two!" cried Daintry. "Are you going, or shall I fetch Snorum?" + +With a muttered oath he took up his hat and went down the stairs and +out into the street. There at the door he stood a moment, grinding his +teeth, as the full sense of the calamity which had befallen him came +home to him. He had stooped and been rejected--had been rejected by +Bonamy's daughter. He walked away, and still his anger did not +decrease, but all the same he began to be a little thankful that the +child had interrupted him. Had he gone on he might have said too much. +As it was, he had an idea that perhaps he had said more than was quite +prudent. And this had presently a wonderful effect in the way of +sobering him. + + + + + CHAPTER XII. + + THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL. + + +It was tea-time at Mr. Bonamy's; five-thirty, that is, for the lawyer +knew nothing of four o'clock tea. He would have stared had he been +invited into the drawing-room to take it, or had his daughters +produced one of those dainty afternoon tea-tables which were in use at +the Town House, and asked him to support his cup and saucer on his +knee. Compromises found no favor with him. Tea was a meal--he had +always so considered it; and he liked to have the dining-room table +laid for it. Possibly Kate, had she enjoyed more of her own way, +would have altered this, as she would certainly have reformed the +drawing-room. But Mr. Bonamy, who was in many things an indulgent +father, was conservative in some. Four o'clock tea, and a daily use of +the drawing-room, were refinements which he had always regarded as +peculiar to a certain set; and in his pride he would not appear to ape +its ways or affect to belong to it. + +Almost to the moment he came into the room, which was as bright and +cheerful as gaslight and firelight could make it. Laying some letters +under a weight on the mantel-shelf, he turned round and stood with his +back to the fire-place. "How is the child?" he asked. "Has she gone to +bed?" + +"Yes," Kate answered, lifting the lid of the teapot and looking in; "I +think she will be all right after a night's rest." + +"You do not look very bright yourself, Kate," he remarked, as he sat +down. + +Her cheek flushing, she made the old old woman's excuse. "I have a +little headache," she said. "It will be better when I have had my +tea." + +He took a piece of toast and buttered it deliberately. "Gregg came and +saw her?" he asked. + +"Yes. He said it was only a sick headache, and would pass off." + +The lawyer made no comment at the moment, but went on eating his +toast. But presently he looked up. "What is the matter, Kitty?" he +said, not unkindly. + +Her face burning, she peered again quite unnecessarily into the +teapot. Then she said hurriedly, "I have something I think I ought to +tell you, father. Dr. Gregg has asked me to marry him!" + +"The deuce he has!" Mr. Bonamy answered in unmistakable surprise. For +a moment he did not know what to say, or how to feel about it. If any +one had informed the Claversham people that the lawyer's moroseness +was not natural to the man, but the product of many slights, the +informant would have lost his pains. Yet in a great measure this was +so; and first among the things which of late years had exercised Mr. +Bonamy a keen anxiety for his daughters' happiness had place. He had +never made any move toward procuring them the society of their equals; +nay, he had done many things in his pride calculated rather to prolong +their exclusion. Yet all the time he had bitterly resented it, and had +spent many a wakeful night in pondering gloomily over the dull lives +to which they were condemned. Now--strange that he had never thought +of it before--as far as Kate was concerned, he saw a way of escape +opening. Gregg had a fair practice, some private means, a good house, +a tolerable position in the town. In a word, he was perfectly +eligible. Yet Mr. Bonamy was not altogether pleased. He had no +fastidious objection to the doctor. It did not occur to him that the +doctor was not a gentleman. But he did know that he did not like him. + +So the lawyer, after one exclamation of surprise, was for a moment +silent. Then he asked, "Well Kate, and what did you say?" + +"I said No," Kate answered in a low voice. + +"He is a well-to-do man," Mr. Bonamy said, slowly stirring his tea. +"Not that you need think of that only. But you are not likely to know +many people who could make you more comfortable. I believe he is +skilful in his profession. It is a chance, girl, not to be lightly +thrown away." + +"I could not--I could not marry him," Kate stammered, her agitation +now very apparent. "I do not like him. You would not have me----" + +"I would not have you marry any one you do not like!" Mr. Bonamy +replied, almost sternly. "But are you sure that you know your own +mind?" + +"Quite," Kate said, with a shudder. + +"Hum! Well, well; there is no more to be said, then," he answered. +"Don't cry, girl." + +Kate managed to obey him. And in a moment, bravely steadying her +voice, she asked, "What is this about Mr. Lindo, father? I heard that +he had turned the sheep out of the churchyard." + +The lawyer thought she asked the question in order to change the +subject; and he answered briskly, with less reserve perhaps than he +might have exercised at another time. "It is quite true," he said. "He +is making a fool of himself, as I expected. You cannot put old heads +on young shoulders. However, what has happened has convinced me of one +thing." + +"What is that?" she asked in a low voice. + +"That he does not know himself that he has no right here." + +"But has he none?" she murmured, in the same tone. He noticed that her +manner was conscious and embarrassed; but naturally he set this down +to the former topic. He thought she was trying to avoid a scene, and +he admired her for it. + +"Well, I doubt if he has," he answered, "though I am not quite sure +that people have not lit upon a mare's nest. It is the talk of the +town that there was some mistake in his presentation, and there is a +disreputable fellow hanging on his heels, and apparently living on +him, who is said to be in the secret, and to be making the most of it. +I do not believe that now, however," the lawyer continued, falling +into a brown study and speaking as much to himself as to her. "If he +knew he were insecure he would live more quietly than he does. All the +same, he is likely to learn a lesson he will not forget." + +"How?" she asked, her spoon tinkling tremulously against the side of +the cup, and her head bent low over it, as though she saw something +interesting in the lees. + +Mr. Bonamy laughed in his out-of-door manner. "How?" he said grimly. +"Well, if there be any mistake he is going the right way to suffer by +it. If he kept quiet, and went softly, and made no enemies, very +little might be said and nothing done when the mistake came out. But +as it is--well, he has made a good many enemies, and the chances are +that he will lose the best berth he will ever get into. It will be bad +for him, but the better for the parish." + +"Don't you think," said Kate very gently, "that he means well?" + +Mr. Bonamy grunted. "Perhaps so; but he does not go the right way to +do it," he rejoined. "His good fortune has turned his head, and he has +put himself in the hands of the Hammond set, and that does not do at +Claversham." The lawyer ended with a harsh laugh, which said more +plainly than any words, that it never would do while John Bonamy was +church warden at Claversham. + +"It seems a pity," Kate said, almost under her breath. She had never +raised her eyes from the tea-tray since the subject was introduced, +and if her father had looked closely he would have seen that her very +ears were scarlet. "Could you not give him a word of warning?" + +"I!" said the lawyer, with asperity. "Certainly not; why should I?" + +Kate did not say, and her father, with another impatient word or two, +rose from the table, and presently went out. She rang the bell +mechanically and had the table cleared, and in the same mood turned to +the fire and, putting her feet on the fender, began to brood over the +coals, which were burning red and low in the grate. + +Five time's--five times only, counting the Oxford escapade as one, she +had spoken to him; and they--"they" meant Claversham, for it was her +chief misery to believe that the whole town was talking of her--had +made this of it! They had noticed his attentions, and had seen them +scornfully withdrawn when he learned who she was. Oh, it was cowardly +of him--cowardly! And yet--and yet--so her thoughts ran, taking a +fresh turn--had he ever said a word or cast a glance at her which +meant anything--which all the world might not have heard and seen? No, +never. And, with that, her anger changed its course and ran against +Gregg. Him she would never forgive. It was his evil imagination, his +base suspicions, which had built it all up; and Mr. Lindo was no more +to blame--though she a little despised him for his weakness and +conventionality--than she was herself. + +It seemed most sad that he should be ruined because no one would say a +word to warn him. Brooding over the fire, she felt a girl's pity for +the young man's ill-fortune. She forgot the last month, during which +she had spoken to him but once--and then he had seemed embarrassed and +anxious to be gone--and remembered only how frank and gay he had been +in the first blush of his hopes at Oxford, how pleasantly he had +smiled, how well and yet how quaintly his new dignity had sat upon +him, and how navely he had shaken it off at times and shown himself a +boy, with a boy's love of fun and mischief. Or, again, she remembered +how thoughtful he had been for them, how considerate, how much at home +in scenes new to them, with how lordly an air he had provided for +their comfort. Oh, it was a pity--a grievous pity, that his hopes +should end in such a disaster as Mr. Bonamy foretold! And all because +no one would say a friendly word to him! + +The next day (Tuesday) was a wet day--a sleety, blusterous winter day, +and she did not go out. But on the Wednesday, as the rector crossed +the churchyard after reading the Litany, he saw Miss Bonamy passing +his door. He fancied, with a little astonishment--for she had +constantly evinced the same avoidance of intimacy with him which had +at first piqued him--that she slightly checked her pace so as to meet +him. And, to tell the truth, the rector was half pleased and half +annoyed. He had hardened his heart and set his face to crush Mr. +Bonamy. + +He had in his pocket a letter from the lawyer, warning him that, +unless he altered his course, a writ would be served upon him. And a +dozen times to-day he had in his mind called the church warden hard +names. But yet he was not absolutely ill-pleased to see Miss Bonamy. +He felt a certain excitement in the _rencontre_ under the +circumstances. He would meet her magnanimously, and of course she +would ignore the quarrel. He hated Mr. Bonamy for a puritanical old +pettifogger; but that was no reason why he should be rude to his +daughter. + +Lindo saw, when he was a few paces from her and had raised his hat, +that her face expressed much more emotion, if not embarrassment, than +seemed to be called for by the occasion. And naturally this +communicated itself to him. "I have not seen you for a long time," he +said, as he shook hands. Perhaps the worst thing he could have said +under the circumstances. + +She assented, however. "No," she said, sloping her umbrella behind her +so as to keep off the wind and a half-frozen drizzle with which it was +laden. And, as she did this, her eyes met his gallantly. "But I am +glad, Mr. Lindo," she continued, "that I have met you to-day, because +I have something I want to say to you." + +On the instant he vowed within himself that it would be in bad taste, +in the worst taste, if she referred to the quarrel or to parish +matters. And he answered very frigidly. "What is that, Miss Bonamy?" +he said. "Pray speak on." + +She detected the change of tone, and for a second her gray eyes +flashed. But she had come to say something. She had counted the cost, +and nothing he could do should prevent her saying it. She had been +awake all night, torturing herself with imagining the things he would +think of her. But she was not to be deterred by the reality. "Do you +know, Mr. Lindo," she said steadily, "what is being said of you in the +town?" + +"A good many hard things." he answered half lightly and half bitterly. +"So I have reason to believe. But I do not think that they will affect +me one way or the other, Miss Bonamy." + +"And so," she answered, with spirit, "you will not thank any one for +telling you of them? That is what you mean, is it not?" + +He was very sore, and her interference annoyed him +excessively--possibly because he valued her good opinion. He would not +deny the feeling she imputed to him. "Possibly I do mean something of +that kind," he said. "Where ignorance is bliss--you know." + +"Yet there is one thing," she replied, "being said of you in the town, +which I think you should be told, Mr. Lindo. Your friends probably +will not hear it, or, if they do, they will not venture to tell you of +it." + +"Indeed," he answered. "You pique my curiosity." + +"It is being commonly said," she rejoined, looking down for the first +time, "that you have no right to the living, and were appointed by +some mistake, or--or fraud." + +He did not answer her at once. He was so completely taken by surprise +that he stood looking at her with his mouth open. His first and better +impulse was to laugh heartily. But what he did was to say in a very +quiet way, "Indeed. That is being said, is it? It is quite true I had +not heard it. May I ask, Miss Bonamy, if you had it from your father?" + +If his tone had been cold before, it was freezing now. But she was not +to be daunted, and she answered with considerable presence of mind, "I +heard from my father that that was the report in the town, but I also +heard him express his disbelief in the greater part of it." + +"I am much obliged to him," said the rector through his closed teeth. +"He did not think I had been guilty of fraud, then?" + +"No, he did not," Kate muttered, her voice faltering for the first +time. + +"Indeed. I am much obliged to him." + +He had received it even worse than she had expected. It was terrible +to go on in the face of such scorn and incredulity. But to stop there +was to have done only evil, as Kate knew, and she persevered. "I have +one more thing I wish to say, if you will permit me," she continued +steadying her voice and striving to speak in as indifferent a manner +as possible. + +He bowed, his face hard and contemptuous. + +The wind had shifted slightly, and, to protect herself from the small +rain which was falling, she changed her position, so as to face the +churchyard. He saw only her profile. If he looked proud, involuntarily +he remarked how proud she looked also--how pure and cold was the line +of her features, softened only by the roundness of her chin. "I am +told," she said in a low voice, "that the fewer enemies you make, and +the more quietly you proceed, the greater will be the chance of your +remaining when the mistake is found out. Pray," she said more sharply, +for he had raised his hand, as if to interrupt, "have patience for a +moment, Mr. Lindo. I shall not trouble you again. I only wish you to +know that those who have cause to dislike you--I do not mean my +father, there are others--are congratulating themselves that you are +playing into their hands, and consider that every disagreement between +you and any part of the parish is a weapon given them, to be used when +the crisis comes." + +"When the mistake is found out?" he said, grimly repeating her words. +"Or the fraud? But I forgot--Mr. Bonamy does not believe in that!" + +"You understand me, I think," she said, ignoring the latter part of +his speech. + +"And may I ask," he continued, his eyes on her face, "who my +ill-wishers are?" + +"I do not think that matters," she replied. + +"Then, at least, why am I indebted to you for this warning?" + +His tone as he asked the question was as contemptuous as before. And +yet Kate felt that this she must answer. To refuse to answer it, or to +evade it, would be to lay herself open to surmises of all kinds. + +"I thought it a pity that you should fall into a trap unwarned," she +answered, looking away at the yew-trees. "And it seemed to me that, +for several reasons, your friends were not likely to warn you." + +"There, I quite agree with you," he retorted quickly. "My friends +would not have believed in the trap." + +"Perhaps not," she said, outwardly unmoved. + +"I am astonished that you did; I am astonished that you should have +believed anything so absurd, Miss Bonamy!" he said severely. At that +moment, as it happened, two people came round the flank of the church. +The one was the curate; the other was Dr. Gregg. Kate looked at them, +and her face flamed. The rector looked, and felt only relief. They +would afford him an excuse to be gone. "Ah, there is Mr. Clode," he +said indifferently. "I was just looking for him. I think, if you will +excuse me, Miss Bonamy, I will seize the opportunity of speaking to +him now." And raising his hat, with a formality which one of the men +took to be a pretence and a sham, he left her and walked across to +them. + + + + + CHAPTER XIII. + + LAURA'S PROVISO. + + +When a mine has been laid, and the fuse lit, and the tiny thread of +smoke has begun to curl upward, it is apt to seem a long time--so I am +told by those who have stood and watched such things--before the earth +flies into the air. So it seemed to Stephen Clode. The curate looked +to see an explosion follow immediately upon the rector taking the +decisive step of turning out the sheep. But week after week elapsed, +until Christmas was some time gone, and nothing happened. Mr. Bonamy, +with a lawyer's prudence, wrote another letter, and for a time, +perhaps out of regard to the season, held his hand. There was talk of +Lord Dynmore's return, but no sign of it as yet. And Dr. Gregg snapped +and snarled among his intimates, but in public was pretty quiet. + +It was noticeable, however, that the rector was invited to none of the +whist-parties which were a feature of the town life at this season; +and to those who looked closely into things and listened to the gossip +of the place it was plain that the breach between him and the bulk of +his parishioners was growing wider. The rector was much with the +Hammonds, and carried his head high--higher than ever, one of his +parishioners thought since a talk she had had with him in the +churchyard. The habit of looking down upon a certain section of the +town, because they were not quite so refined as himself, because they +were narrow in their opinions, or because the Hammonds looked down +upon them, was growing upon him. And he yielded to it none the less +because he was all the time dissatisfied with himself. He was +conscious that he was not acting up to the standard he had set himself +on coming to the town. He was not living the life he had hoped to +live. He visited his poor and gave almost too largely in the hard +weather, and was diligent at services and sermon-writing. But there +was a flaw in his life, and he knew it; and yet he had not the +strength to set it right. + +All this Mr. Clode might have observed--he was sagacious enough; but +for the time his judgment was clouded by his jealousy, and in his +impatience he fancied that the rector's troubles were passing away. +Each visit Lindo paid to the Town House, each time his name was +coupled with Laura Hammond's, as people were beginning to couple it, +chafed the curate's sore afresh and kept it raw. So that even Stephen +Clode's self-restraint and command of temper began to fail him, and +more than once he said sharp things to his commanding-officer, which +made Lindo open his eyes in unaffected surprise. + +Clode began to feel indeed that the position was becoming intolerable; +and though he had long ago determined that the waiting-game was the +one he ought to play, he presently--in the first week of the new +year--changed his mind. + +Lindo had announced his intention of devoting the afternoon--it was +Wednesday--to his district; and, taking advantage of this, the curate +thought he might indulge himself in a call at the Town House without +fear of unpleasant interruption. He would not admit that he had any +other motive in going there than just to pay a visit--which he +certainly owed. But in truth he was in a dangerous humor. And, alas! +when he had been ushered along the thickly carpeted passage and +entered the drawing-room, there, comfortably seated in the half-light +before the fire, the tea-things gleaming beside them, were Laura and +the rector! + +The curate's face grew dark. He almost felt that Lindo, who had really +been driven in by the rain, had betrayed him; and he shook hands with +Laura and sat down in complete silence, unable to trust himself to +answer the rector's cheery greeting by so much as a word. It was all +he could do to answer "Thank you," when Miss Hammond asked him if he +would take tea. She, of course, saw that something was amiss, and felt +not a little awkward between her two friends; but luckily the rector +remained ignorant and at his ease--he saw nothing, and went on +talking. It was the best thing he could have done, only, +unfortunately, he had to do with a man whom nothing in his present +mood could please. + +"I am glad you have turned up at this particular moment," Lindo said. +"Let me have your opinion. Miss Hammond says that I am pauperizing the +town by giving too much away." + +"If you are half as generous at our bazaar on the 10th," she retorted, +"you will do twice as much good." + +"Or half as much evil!" he said lightly. + +"Have it that way, if you like," she answered laughing. + +The curate set his teeth together in impotent rage. They were so easy, +so unconstrained, on such excellent terms with one another. When +Laura, who was secretly quaking, held out the toast to him and let her +eyes dwell for an instant on his, he looked away stubbornly. "Were you +asking my opinion?" he said in a voice he vainly strove to render cold +and dispassionate. + +"To be sure," said the rector, stirring his tea and enjoying himself. +"Miss Hammond is not impartial. She is biassed by her bazaar." + +If he had known the strong passions that were at work on the other +side of the tea-table! But the curate had his back to the shaded lamp, +and only a fitful gleam of fire-light betrayed even to Laura's +suspicious eyes that he was not himself. Yet, when he spoke, Lindo +involuntarily started, so thinly veiled was the sneer in his tone. +"Well, there is one pensioner, I think, you would do well to strike +off your list," he said. "He does not do you much credit." + +"Who is that? Old Martin at the Gas House?" + +"No, the gentleman at the Bull and Staff!" replied the curate bluntly. + +"At the Bull and Staff? Who is that?" + +"Felton." + +For a moment the rector looked puzzled. He had almost forgotten +the name of Lord Dynmore's servant. Then he colored slightly. "Yes, I +know whom you mean," he said, taken aback as much by the other's +unlooked-for tone as by the mention of the man. "But I did not know he +lived at the Bull and Staff. It is not much of a place, is it?" + +"I should say that it was very nearly the worst house in the town!" +said the curate. + +"Indeed! I will speak to him about it." + +"I would speak to him about getting drunk, if I were you!" Clode +replied with a short laugh. "He is drunk six days in the week; every +day except Saturday, when he comes to you and pulls a long face above +a clean neck-cloth. He is the talk of the town!" + +The rector stared; naturally wondering what on earth had come to the +curate to induce him to take that line. He was rather surprised than +offended, however, and merely answered, "I am sorry to hear it. I will +speak to him about it." + +"Who is this person?" Miss Hammond asked hurriedly. "I do not think +that I know any one in the town of that name." The subject seemed to +be a dangerous one, but anything was better than to leave the curate +free to conduct the discussion. + +He it was, however, who answered her. "He is a _protg_ of the +rector's!" he said, with a laugh that was undisguisedly offensive. +"You had better ask him." + +"He is a servant of Lord Dynmore's," Lindo said, speaking to her with +studious politeness, and otherwise ignoring Clode's interruption. + +"But why you find him in board and lodging at the Bull and Staff free, +gratis, and for nothing," interposed the curate again with the same +rudeness, "passes my comprehension!" + +"Perhaps that is my business," said the rector, losing patience. + +Both men stood up. Laura rose, too, with a scared face, and stood +gazing at them, amazed at the storm which had so suddenly arisen. The +curate's height, as the two stood confronting one another, seemed to +give him the advantage; and his dark rugged face, kindling with +long-repressed feelings, wore the provoking smile of one who, +confident in his own powers, has wilfully thrown down the glove and is +determined to see the matter through. The rector's face, on the other +hand, was red; and, though he faced his man squarely and threw back +his head with the haughtiness of his kind, his anger was mixed with +wonder, and it was plain that he was at a loss to understand the +other's ebullition or to decide how to deal with it. There was a +moment's silence, which Laura had not the presence of mind, nor the +curate the will, to break. Then the rector said, "Perhaps we had +better let this drop for the moment, Mr. Clode." + +"As you will," replied the curate recklessly. + +"Well, I do will," Lindo rejoined, with some _hauteur_. And he looked, +still standing erect and expectant, as if he thought that Clode could +not do otherwise than take his leave. + +But that was just what the curate had not the slightest intention of +doing. Instead, with a cynical smile, he coolly sat himself down +again. His superior's eyes flashed with redoubled anger at this, which +seemed to him, after what had passed, the grossest impertinence; but +Mr. Clode in his present mood cared nothing for that, and made it very +plain that he did not. "Will you think me exacting if I ask for +another cup of tea, Miss Hammond?" he said quietly. + +That was enough to make the rector's cup run over. He did not wait to +hear Laura's answer, but himself said. "Perhaps I had better say good +evening, Miss Hammond." + +"You will not forget the bazaar?" she answered, making no demur, but +at once holding out her hand. + +There was a faint note of appeal in her voice which begged him not to +be angry, and yet he was angry. "The bazaar?" he said coldly. "Oh, +yes, I will not forget it." + +And with that he took up his hat and went, feeling much as a man does +who, walking along a well-known road, has put his foot into a hole and +fallen heavily. He was almost more astonished and aggrieved than hurt. + +When he was gone there was silence in the room. I do not know whether +Laura had been conscious, while the two men wrangled before her, that +she was the prize of the strife, and so, like the maidens of old, had +been content to stand by passive and expectant, satisfied to see the +best man win, or whether she had been too much alarmed to interpose. +But certain it is that, when she was left alone with the curate, she +felt almost as uncomfortable as she had ever felt in her life. She +tried to say something indifferent, but for once she was too nervous +to frame the words. And Mr. Clode, instead of assisting her, instead +of bridging over the awkwardness of the moment, as he should have +done, since he was the person to blame for it all, sat silent and +morose, brooding over the fire and sipping his tea. At last he spoke. +"Well," he said abruptly, turning his dark eyes suddenly on hers. +"Which is it to be, Laura?" + +He had never spoken to her in that tone before, and had any one told +her that morning that she would submit to it, she would have laughed +her informant to scorn. But there was a new-born masterfulness in the +curate's manner which cowed her. "I do not know what you mean," she +murmured, her face hot, her heart beating. + +"I think you do," he answered sternly, without removing his eyes from +her. "Is it to be the rector, or is it to be me, Laura? You must +choose between us." + +She recovered herself with a kind of gasp. "Are you not going a little +too fast?" she said, trying to smile, and speaking with something of +her ordinary manner. "I did not know that my choice was limited to the +two you mention, Mr. Clode, or that I had to choose one at all." + +"I think you must," was his only answer. "You must choose between us." +Then, with a sudden movement, he rose and stood over her. "Laura!" he +said in a different tone, in a low voice, which thrilled through her +and awoke feelings and emotions hitherto asleep. "Laura, do not play +with me! I am a man. Is he more? Is he as much? I love you with all my +being! He cares only to kill time with you! Will you throw me over +because he is a little richer, because I am the curate and he is the +rector? If so, well, tell me, and I shall understand you!" + +It was not the way she had thought he would end. The force, the +abruptness, the almost menace of the last four words took her by +surprise and subdued her afresh. If she had had any doubt before which +of the two men had her liking, she had none now. She knew that Clode's +little finger was more to her than Lindo's whole hand; for, like most +women, she had a secret admiration for force, even when exercised +without much regard to good taste. + +"You need not speak to me like that," she said, in gentle deprecation +of his manner. + +He stooped over her. "Laura," he said, "do you really mean it? Do you +mean you will----" + +"Wait, please!" she answered, recovering a little of her ascendency. +"Give me a little time. I want to think something out." + +But time to think was just what he feared--ignorant as yet of his true +position--to give her; and his face grew dark and sullen again. "No," +he said, "I will not!" + +She rose suddenly. "You will do as I ask you now," she said, asserting +herself bravely, "or I shall leave you." + +He bowed silently, and she sat down again. "Sit down, please," she +said to him. He obeyed her. "Now," she continued, raising her hand so +as to shade her eyes from the fire, "I will be candid with you, +Mr. Clode. If I had no other alternative than the one you have +mentioned--to choose between you and Mr. Lindo--I--I should certainly +prefer you. No!" she continued sharply, bidding him with her hand to +keep his seat, "hear me out, please. You have not stated the case +correctly. In the first place--well, you put me in the awkward +position of having to confess that Mr. Lindo has made no such proposal +as you seem to fancy; and, secondly, there are others in the world." + +"I do not care," the curate exclaimed, his deep voice trembling with +exultation--"I do not care though there be millions--now!" + +She moved her hand, and for a second her eyes, full of a tenderness +such as he had never seen in them before, met his. The look drew him +from his seat again, but she sent him back to it by an imperious +gesture. "I said I would be candid," she continued, "and I intend to +be so, though until a few minutes ago I never thought that I should +speak to you as I am doing." + +"You shall never repent it," he answered fondly. + +"I hope not," she rejoined. But then she paused and was silent. + +He sat waiting patiently for a while; but, as she still said nothing, +he rose. "Laura," he said. + +"Yes, I know," she answered, almost abruptly. "But candor does not +come very easily, sir, under certain circumstances. Don't you know you +have made me afraid of you?" + +He showed that he would have reassured her in the most convincing and +practical manner. But, notwithstanding her words, she had regained her +power and presence of mind, and she repelled him. + +"Wait until you have heard what I have got to say," she said. "It is +this. I would not marry Mr. Lindo because he is a rector with a living +and a position--not though he were six times a rector! But all the +same I will not marry a curate! No," she added in a lower tone, and +with a glance which intoxicated him afresh--"not though he be you!" + +He stood silent, looking down at her, waiting for more. Neither by +word nor gesture did he express dissent. It is possible he already +understood, and felt with her. + +"To marry a curate," she continued in a low voice, "is, for a girl +such as I am, failure. I have held my head rather high, and I have +stood by and seen other girls married. Therefore to marry a curate, +after all, would be an ignominious failure. Are you very angry with +me?" she continued quietly, "or do you understand?" + +"I think I understand," he answered, with just a tinge of bitterness +in his tone. + +"And despise me? Well, you must. I told you I was going to be candid, +and perhaps it is as well--as well, I mean, that you should know me," +she replied, apparently unmoved. + +"I am content," he answered, catching her spirit. + +"And so am I," she said. "To no one else in the world would I have +said as much as I have said to you. To no other man would I say, 'Win +a living, and I will be yours!' But I say it to you. Do as much as +that for me and I will marry you, Stephen. If you cannot, I cannot." + +"You are very prosaic," he replied, lapsing into bitterness again. + +"Oh, if you are not content" she retorted. + +He did not let her finish the sentence. "You will marry me on the day +I obtain a living?" he asked. + +"I will," she answered bravely. + +She was standing up now, and he too--standing where the rector had +stood an hour before. She let him pass his arm round her waist, but +when he would have drawn her closer to him, and bent his head to kiss +her, she hung back. "No," she said, blushing hotly, "I think"--with a +shy laugh--"that you are making too certain, sir." + +"Do you wish me _not_ to succeed?" he replied, looking down at her; +and it must be confessed the lover's _rle_ became him better than +nine-tenths of those who knew his dark, rugged face would have +believed. + +She shook her head, smiling. + +"Then if you wish me success," he replied, "you must send me out with +some guerdon of your favor." And this time she did not resist. He drew +her to him and kissed her thrice. Then she escaped from him and took +refuge on the other side of the fireplace. + +"You must not do that again," she said, biting her lip and trying to +look at him reproachfully. "At any rate, you have had your guerdon +now. When you come back a victor I will crown you. But until then we +are friends only. You understand, sir?" + +And, though he demurred, he presently said he understood. + + + + + CHAPTER XIV. + + THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD. + + +When Stephen Clode left the Town House after his interview with Laura, +he was in a state of exaltation--lifted completely out of his ordinary +cool and calculating self by what had happened. It was raining, but he +had gone some distance before he remarked it, and even then he did not +at once put up his umbrella, but strode along through the darkness, +his thoughts in a whirl of triumph and excitement. The crisis had come +suddenly, but he had not been found unequal to it. He had gone in +through the gates despondent, and come out in joy. He had pitted +himself against his rival, and had had the best of it. He had wooed, +and, almost in spite of his mistress, had won! + +He did not for the first few moments consider whether his altercation +with the rector was likely to have unpleasant consequences, nor did he +trouble himself about the manner in which he was to do Laura's +bidding. Such considerations would come later--with the reaction. For +the present they did not occur to him. It was enough that Laura might +be his--that she never could be the rector's. + +He felt the need, in his present excited mood, of some one to speak +to, and instead of turning into his own lodgings he passed on to the +reading-room, a large, barely furnished room, looking upon the top of +the town, and used as a club by the leading townsfolk and a few of the +local magnates who lived near. He entered it, and, to his surprise, +found the archdeacon seated under the naked gas-burners, interested in +the "Times." The sight filled him with astonishment, for it was seldom +the county members used the room after sunset. + +"Why, Mr. Archdeacon," he said--his tongue naturally hung loose at the +moment, and a _bonhomie_, difficult to assume at another time, came +easily to him now--"what in the world brings you here at this hour?" + +The archdeacon laid down his paper. "Upon my word I think I was +half asleep," he said. "I am in for the 'Free Foresters'' supper. I +thought the hour was half-past six, and came into town accordingly, +whereas I find it is half-past seven. I have been here the best part +of three-quarters of an hour killing time." + +"But I thought that the rector always said grace for the 'Free +Foresters,' the curate answered in some surprise. + +"It has been the custom for them to ask him," the archdeacon replied +cautiously. "By the way you did it last year, did you not?" + +"Yes, for Mr. Williams. He was confined to his room." + +"I thought so. Well, this year these foolish people seem to have taken +a fancy not to have the rector, and they came to me. I tried to +persuade them to have him, but it was no good. And so," the archdeacon +added, in a lower tone, "I thought it would look less like a slight if +I came than if any other clergyman--you, for instance--were the +clerical guest." + +"To be sure," said the curate warmly. "It was most thoughtful of you." + +The archdeacon hitched his chair a little nearer the fire. He felt the +influence of the curate's sympathy. The latter had said little, but +his manner warmed the old gentleman's heart, and his tongue also grew +more loose. "I wonder whether you know," he said genially, rubbing his +hands up and down his knees, which he was gently toasting, and looking +benevolently at his companion, "how near you were to having the +living, Clode?" + +"Do you mean Claversham?" replied the curate, experiencing a kind of +shock at this reference to the subject so near his heart. + +"Yes, of course." + +"I never thought I had a chance of it!" + +"You had so good a chance," responded the archdeacon, nodding his head +wisely, "that only one thing stood between you and it." + +"May I ask what that was?" the curate rejoined, his heart beating +fast. + +"A promise. The earl had promised his old friend that he should have +this living. Lord Dynmore told me so himself, the last time I saw him. +That would be nearly a year ago, when poor Williams was already +ailing." + +"Well, that I supposed to be the case," Clode answered, his tone one +of disappointment. "But I do not quite see how I was affected by +it--more, I mean, than others, archdeacon." + +"That is what I am going to tell you, only it must not go farther," +the archdeacon answered. "Lord Dynmore told me of this promise _ +propos_ of a resolution he had just come to--namely, that, subject to +it, he intended in future to give his livings (he has seven in all, +you know) to the curate, wherever the latter had been two years at +least in the parish, and stood well with it. I am not sure that I +agree with him; but he is a conscientious man, though an odd one, and +he had formed the opinion that that was the right course. So, come +now, if anything should happen to Lindo you would certainly drop into +it. I am not quite sure," added the archdeacon confidentially, "though +no one likes Lindo better than I do, that yours would not have been +the better appointment." + +The curate disclaimed this so warmly and loyally that the archdeacon +was more than ever pleased with him; and, half-past seven striking, +they parted at the door of the reading-room on the best of terms with +one another. The archdeacon crossed to his supper and speech, and the +curate turned into his rooms, and, throwing himself into the big +leather chair before the fire, fixed his eyes on the glowing coals, +and began to think--to apply what he had just heard to what he had +known before. + +A living? He had got to get a living. And without capital to invest in +one, or the favor of a patron, how was it to be done? The bishop? He +had no claim there. He had not been long enough in the diocese, and he +knew nothing of the bishop's wife. There was only one living he could +get, only one living upon which he had a claim, and that was +Claversham. It all came back to that--with this added, that he had now +a stronger motive than ever for ejecting Lindo from it, and the +absolute knowledge to boot that, Lindo ejected, he would be his +successor. + +Stephen Clode's face grew dark and gloomy as he reached this stage in +his reflections. He believed that the rector was enjoying what he had +no right to enjoy, but still he would fain have had no distinct part +in depriving him of it. He would have much preferred to stand by and, +save by a word here and there, by little acts scarcely palpable, and +quite incapable of proof--do nothing himself to injure him. He knew +what loyalty was, and would fain have been loyal in big things at +least. But he did not see how it could be done. He fancied that the +stir against the rector was dying away. Bonamy had not moved. Gregg +was a coward, and of this matter of the "Free Foresters" he thought +nothing. Probably they would return to their allegiance another year, +and among the poor the rector's liberality would soon make friends for +him. Altogether, the curate, getting up and walking the room +restlessly and with a knitted brow, was forced to the conviction that, +if he would be helped, he must help himself, and that now was the +time. The iron must be struck before it cooled. Something must be +done. + +But what? Clode's mind reverted first to the discharged servant, and +discussed more than one way in which he might be used. There was an +amount of danger, however, in tampering with him which the thinker's +astuteness did not fail to note, and which led him presently to +determine to leave Felton alone. Perhaps he had made as much capital +out of him as could be made with safety. + +From him the curate's thoughts passed naturally to the packet of +letters in the cupboard at the rectory, the letters which he had once +held in his hand, and which he could not but believe would prove the +rector's knowledge of the fraud he was committing. Those letters! +Clode, walking up and down the room, pishing and pshawing from time to +time, could not disentangle his thoughts from them. The narrow chance +which had prevented him reading them before somehow made him feel the +more certain of their value now--the more anxious to hold them again +in his hands. + +Were they still in the cupboard, he wondered. He had retained, not +with any purpose, but in pure inadvertence, the key which he had +mentioned to the rector; and he had it now. He took it from the +mantel-shelf, toyed with it, dropped it into his pocket. Then he took +up his hat, and was going abruptly from the room when the little +servant who waited on him met him. She was bringing up his simple +dinner. The curate's first impulse was to order it to be taken down +and kept warm for him. His second, to resume his seat and eat it +hastily. When he had finished--he could not have said an hour later +what he had had--he took his hat again and went out. + +Two minutes saw him at the rectory door, where he was just in time to +meet the rector going out. Lindo's face flushed as he saw who his +visitor was, and there was more than a suspicion of haughtiness in his +tone as he greeted him. "Good-evening," he said. "Do you want to see +me, Mr. Clode?" + +"If you please," the curate answered simply. "May I come in?" + +For answer, Lindo silently held the door open, and Clode passed +through the hall into the library. He was in the habit of entering +this room a dozen times a week, but he never did so after leaving his +own small lodgings without being struck by its handsome proportions, +by the grave harmonious color of its calf-lined walls, and the air of +studious quiet which always reigned within them. Of all the rector's +possessions he envied him this room the most. The very sight of the +shaded lamp standing on the revolving bookcase at the corner of the +hearth, and of the little table beside it, which still bore the +rector's coffee-cup and a tiny silver ewer and basin, aroused his +spleen afresh. But he gave no outward sign of this. He stood with his +hat in one hand, his other leaning on the table, and his head slightly +bent. "Rector," he said, "I am afraid I behaved very badly this +afternoon." + +"I certainly thought your manner rather odd," replied the rector +shortly. But he was half disarmed already. + +"I was annoyed, much annoyed, about a private matter," the curate +proceeded in an even, rather despondent tone. "It is a matter about +which I expect I shall presently have to take your opinion. But for +the present I am not at liberty to name it. However, I was in trouble, +and I foolishly wreaked my annoyance upon the first person I came +across." + +"That was, unfortunately, myself," said Lindo, smiling. + +"It would have been very unfortunate indeed for me, if you were as +some rectors I could name," the curate replied gravely, still with his +eyes cast down. "As it is--well, I think you will accept my apology." + +"Say no more about it," answered the rector hastily. There was nothing +he hated so much as a scene. "Have a cup of coffee, my dear fellow. I +will ring for a cup and saucer." And, before the curate could protest, +Lindo was at the bell and had rung it, his manner almost the manner of +a boy. + +"Sit down, sit down!" he continued. "Sarah, a cup and saucer, please." + +"But you were going out," protested the curate, as he complied. + +"Only to the post with some letters," the rector explained. "I will +send Sarah instead." + +Clode sprang up again, a peculiar flush on his dark cheek, and a glint +as of excitement in his eye. + +"No, no," he said, "I am putting you out. If you were going to the +post, pray go. You can leave me here and come back to me, if that be +all." + +The rector hesitated, his letters in his hand. He might send Sarah. +But it wanted a few minutes only of nine o'clock, and, besides, he did +not approve of the maids going out so late. "Well, I think I will do +as you say," he answered, feeling that compliance was perhaps the +truest politeness; "if you are sure that you do not mind." + +"I beg you will," the curate said warmly. + +The cup and saucer being at that moment brought in, the rector nodded +assent. "Very well; I shall not be two minutes," he said. "Take care +of yourself while I am away." + +The curate, left alone, muttered, "No, you will be at least four +minutes, my friend!" and waited, with his cup poised, until he heard +the outer door closed. Then he set it down. Assuring himself by a +steady look that the windows were shuttered, he rose and, quietly +crossing the room, as a man might who wished to examine a book, he +stood before the little cupboard among the shelves. Perhaps, because +he had done the thing before, he did not hesitate. His hand was as +steady as it had ever been. If it shook at all it was with eagerness. +His task was so easy and so devoid of danger, under the circumstances, +that he even smiled darkly, as he set the key in the lock, at the +thought of the more clumsy burglar whom he had detected there. He +turned the key and opened the door. Nothing could be more simple. The +packet he wanted lay just where he had looked to find it. He took it +out and dropped it into his breast-pocket, and, long before the time +which he had given himself was up, was back in his chair by the fire, +with his coffee-cup on his knee. + +He might have been expected to feel some surprise at his own coolness. +But, as a fact, his thoughts were otherwise employed. He was longing, +with intense eagerness, for the moment when he might take the next +step--when he might open the packet and secure the weapon he needed. +He fingered the letters as they lay in their hiding place, and could +scarcely refrain from taking them out and examining them there and +then. When Lindo returned, and broke into the room with a hearty +word about the haste he had made, the curate's answer betrayed no +self-consciousness. On the contrary, he rather underplayed his part, +his eye and voice being for, a moment so absent as to surprise his +host. The next instant he was aware of this, and conducted himself so +warily during the half-hour he remained that he entirely erased from +the rector's mind the unlucky impression of the afternoon. + +By half-past nine he was back in his own room, at his table, his +hat thrown this way, his umbrella that. It took him but a feverish +moment to turn up the lamp and settle himself in his chair. Then he +took out the packet of letters, and, untying the string which bound +them together, he opened the first--there were only six of them in +all. This was the one which he had partially read on the former +occasion--Messrs. Gearns & Baker's first letter. He read it through +now at his leisure, without interruption, once, twice, thrice, and +with a long breath laid it down again, and sat gazing, with knitted +brows, into the shadow beyond the lamp's influence. There was not a +word in it, not an expression, which helped him; nothing to show the +recipient that he was not the Reginald Lindo for whom the living was +intended. + +The curate sat awhile before he opened the second, and that one he +read more quickly. He dealt in the same way with the next, and the +next. When, in a short minute or two, he had read them all and they +lay in a disordered pile before him--some folded and some unfolded, +just as they had dropped from his hands--he leaned back in his chair, +and, folding his arms, sat frowning darkly into vacancy. There was not +a word to help him in any one of them, not a sentence which even +tended to convict the rector. He had been at all his pains for +nothing. He had---- + +The sound of a raised voice asking for him below, and the hasty tread +of a foot mounting the stairs two at a time, roused him with a start +from the dream of disappointment. In a second he was erect, +motionless, and listening, his hand upon and half covering the +letters. A hasty knock on the outside of his door, and the touch of +fingers on the handle, seemed at the last moment to nerve him to +action. It was all but too late. As the rector came hurriedly into the +room, the curate, his face pallid, and the drops of perspiration +standing on his brow, swept the letters aside and drew a newspaper +partly over them. "What--what is it?" he muttered, stooping forward, +his hands on the table. + +The rector was too full of the news he had brought to observe the +other's agitation, the more as the lamp was between them, and his eyes +were dazzled by the light. "Why, what do you think Bonamy has done?" +he answered excitedly, as he closed the door behind him. He was +breathing quickly with the haste he had made, and, uninvited, he +dropped into a chair. + +"What?" said the curate hoarsely. He dared not look down at the table +lest he should direct the other's eyes to what lay there, but he was +racked as he stood there with the fear that some damning corner of the +paper, some scrap of the writing, should still be visible. The shame +of possible discovery poured like a flood over his soul. "What is it?" +he repeated mechanically. He had not yet recovered enough presence of +mind to wonder why the rector should have paid this untimely call. + +"He has served me with a writ!" Lindo replied, his face hot with haste +and indignation, his lips curling. "At this hour of the night, too! A +writ for trespass in driving out the sheep from the churchyard." + +"A writ!" the curate echoed. "It is very late for serving writs." + +"Yes. His clerk, who handed it to me--he came five minutes after you +left--apologized, and took the blame for that on himself, saying he +had forgotten to deliver it on leaving the office." + +"For trespass!" said the curate stupidly. What a fool he had been to +meddle with those letters! Why had he not had a little patience? Here, +after all, was the catastrophe for which he had been longing. + +"Yes, in the Queen's Bench Division, and all the rest of it!" replied +the rector; and then he waited to hear what the curate had to say. + +But Clode had nothing to say, except "What shall you do?" + +"Fight!" replied Lindo briskly, getting up and approaching the table. +"That of course. And it was about that I came to you. I do not think +there is any lawyer here I should like to employ. Did not you tell me +the other day who the archdeacon's were? Some people in Birmingham, I +think?" + +"I think I did," the curate answered. He had overcome his first fear, +and, as he spoke, looked down at the table, on which he was still +leaning. His hasty movement had disordered his own papers, but none of +the tell-tale letters were visible so far as he could see. But what if +the rector took up the newspaper? Or casually put it aside? The curate +grew hot again, despite his great self-control. He felt himself on the +edge of a precipice down which he dared not cast his eye. + +"Well, can you give me their address?" the rector continued. + +"Certainly!" the curate answered. Indeed he leapt at the suggestion, +for it seemed to offer some chance of escape--at least a way by which +he might rid himself of his visitor. + +"Just write it down, that is a good fellow, then," said the rector, +unconscious of what was passing in his mind. + +The curate said he would, and tore off at random---the rector was +leaning his hand on the newspaper, and might at any moment be taken +with a fancy to raise it--the back sheet of the first stray note that +came to his fingers, and wrote the address upon it. "There, that is +it," he said; and as he gave it to Lindo--he had written it standing +up and stooping--he almost pushed him away from the table. "That will +serve you, I think. They may be trusted, I am told. The best you can +do, I am sure, will be to place the matter in their hands at once." + +"I will write before I sleep!" the younger clergyman answered heartily. +"You cannot think how the narrowness of these people provokes me! But +I will not keep you now. I see you are busy. Come round early in the +morning, will you, and talk it over?" + +"I will come the moment I have had breakfast," the curate answered, +making no attempt to detain his visitor. + +The rector thereupon going, he stood eyeing the newspaper askance +until the other's footsteps died away on the pavement outside. Then he +swept it off and stood contemplating the half-dozen letters with +abhorrence. He loathed and detested them. They had suddenly become to +him such an incubus as his victim's body becomes to the murderer. The +desire which had tempted him to the crime was gone, and he felt them +only as a burden. They were the visible proof of his shame. To keep +them was to become a thief, and yet he shrank with a nervous terror +quite new and strange to him from the task of returning them--of going +to the study at the rectory and putting them back in the cupboard. It +had been easy to get possession of them; but to return them seemed a +task so thankless, and withal so perilous, that he quailed before it. +With shaking hands he bundled them together and locked them in the +lowest drawer of his writing table. He would return them to-morrow. + + + + + CHAPTER XV. + + THE BAZAAR. + + +Long before noon on the next day the service of the writ at the +rectory was pretty well known in the town, and the course which the +churchwardens had taken was freely canvassed in more houses than one. +But they had on their side all the advantages of prescription, while +of the rector people said that there was no smoke without fire, and +that he would not have become the subject of so many comments and +strictures, and the centre of more than one dispute, without being in +fault. There had been none of these squabbles in old Mr. Williams's +time, they said. Tongues had not wagged about him. But then, they +added, he had not aspired to drive tandem with the Homfrays! The town +had been good enough for him. He had not wanted to have everything his +own way, or thought himself a little Jupiter in the place. His head +had not been turned by a little authority conferred too early, and +conferred, if all the town heard was true, in some very odd and +unsatisfactory manner. + +To know that all round you people are saying that your conceit has led +you into trouble is not pleasant. And in one way and another this +impression was brought home to the young rector more than once during +these days, so that his cheek flamed as he passed the window of the +reading-room, or caught the half-restrained sniggle in which Gregg +ventured to indulge when in company. Nor were these annoyances all +Lindo had to bear. The archdeacon scolded him roundly for placing the +matter in the hands of the lawyers without consulting him. Mrs. +Hammond looked grave. Laura seemed less friendly than a while back. +Clode's conduct was odd, too, and unsatisfactory. He was sometimes +enthusiastic and loyal enough, ready to back up his superior as warmly +as could be wished, and anon he would show himself the reverse of all +this--sullen, repellent, and absolutely unsympathetic. + +So that the rector was not having a very sunny time, albeit the heat +of conflict kept him warm; and he threw back his head and set his fair +pleasant face very hard as he strode about the town, his long-tailed +black coat flapping behind him. He hugged himself more than ever on +the one thing which his opponents could not take from him. When all +was said and done, he must still be rector of Claversham. If his +promotion had not brought him as much happiness as he had expected, if +he had not been able to do in his new position all he had hoped, the +promotion and the position were yet undeniable. Knowing so well all +the circumstances of his appointment, he never gave two thoughts to +the curious story Kate Bonamy had told him. He was sorry that he had +treated her so cavalierly, and more than once he had thought with a +regret almost tender of the girl and the interview. But, for the rest, +he treated it as the ignorant invention of the enemy. Possibly on the +strength of certain 'Varsity prejudices he was a little too prone to +exaggerate the ignorance of Claversham. + +On the day before the bazaar a visitor arrived in Claversham, in the +shape of a small, dark, sharp-featured man, with a peculiarly alert +manner, whom the reader will remember to have met in the Temple. Jack +Smith, for he it was--we parted from him last at Euston Station--may +have come over on his own motion, or acting upon a hint from Mr. +Bonamy, who, since the refusal of Gregg's offer, had thought more and +more of the future which lay before his girls. The house had seemed +more and more dull, not to him as himself, but to him considering it +in the night-watches through their eyes. Hitherto the lawyer had not +encouraged the young Londoner's visits, perhaps because he dreaded the +change in his way of life he might be forced to make. But now, whether +he had given him a hint to come or not, he received him with undoubted +cordiality. + +Almost the first question Jack asked, Daintry hanging over the back of +his chair and Kate smiling in more subdued radiance opposite him, was +about his friend, the rector. Fortunately, Mr. Bonamy was not in the +room. "And how about Lindo?" he asked. "Have you seen much of him, +Kate?" + +"No, we have not seen much of him," she answered, getting up to put +something straight which was not much awry before. + +"Father has served him with a writ, though," Daintry explained, +nodding her head seriously. + +Jack whistled. "A writ!" he exclaimed. "What about?" + +"About the sheep in the churchyard. Mr. Lindo turned them out," Kate +explained hurriedly, as if she wished to hear no more upon the +subject. + +But Jack was curious; and gradually he drew from them the story of the +rector's iniquities, and acquired, in the course of it, a pretty +correct notion of the state of things in the parish. He whistled still +more seriously then. "It seems to me that the old man has been putting +his foot in it here," he said. + +"He has," Daintry answered solemnly, nodding any number of times. "No +end!" + +"And yet he is the very best of fellows," Jack replied, rubbing his +short black hair in honest vexation. "Don't you like him?" + +"I did," said Daintry, speaking for both of them. + +"And you do not now?" + +The child reddened, and rubbed herself shyly against Kate's chair. +"Well, not so much!" she murmured, Jack's eyes upon her. "He is too +big a swell for us." + +"Oh, that is it, is it?" Jack said contemptuously. + +He pressed it no farther, and appeared to have forgotten the subject; +but presently, when he was alone with Kate, he recurred to it. "So, +Lindo has been putting on airs, has he?" he observed. "Yet, I thought +when Daintry wrote to me, after you left us, that she seemed to like +him." + +"He was very kind and pleasant to us on our journey," Kate answered, +compelling herself to speak with indifference. "But--well, you know, +my father and he have not got on well; so, of course, we have seen +little of him lately." + +"Oh, that is all, is it?" Jack answered, moving restlessly in his +chair. + +"That is all," said Kate quietly. + +This seemed to satisfy Jack, for at tea he surprised her--and, for +Daintry, she fairly leapt in her seat--by calmly announcing that he +proposed to call on the rector in the course of the evening. "You have +no objection, sir, I hope," he said, coolly looking across at his +host. "He has been a friend of mine for years, and though I hear you +and he are at odds at present, it seems to me that that need not make +mischief between us." + +"N--no," said Mr. Bonamy slowly. "I do not see why it should." +Nevertheless, he was greatly astonished. He had heard that Jack and +Mr. Lindo were acquainted, but had thought nothing of it. It is +possible that the discovery of this friendship existing between the +two led him to take new views of the rector. He continued, "I dare say +in private he is not an objectionable man." + +"Quite the reverse, I should say!" Jack answered stoutly. + +"You have known him well?" + +"Very well." + +"Umph! Then it seems to me it was a pity he did not confine himself to +private life," ejaculated the lawyer, with some scorn. "As a rector I +do not like him." + +"I am sorry for that," Jack answered cheerfully. "But I have not known +much of him as a rector, though indeed, as it happened, he brought the +offer of the living straight to me, and I was the first person who +congratulated him on his promotion." + +Mr. Bonamy lifted his eyes slowly from the teacup he was raising to +his lips, and looked fixedly at his visitor, an expression much +resembling strong curiosity in his face. If a question was on the tip +of his tongue he refrained from putting it, however, and Jack, who by +no means wished to hear the tale of his friend's shortcomings +repeated, said no more until they rose from the table. Then he +remarked, "Lindo dines late, I expect." + +He put the question to Kate, but the lawyer answered it. "Oh, yes, he +does everything which is fashionable," he answered drily. And Jack, +putting this and that together, began to see still more clearly how +the land lay, and on what shoals his friend had wrecked his +popularity. + +About half-past eight he went to the rectory, but found that Lindo was +not at home. The door was opened to him, however, by Mrs. Baker, who +had often seen the barrister in the East India Dock Road, and knew him +well; and she pressed him to walk in and wait. "He dined at home, +sir," she explained. "I think he has only slipped out for a few +minutes." + +He followed her accordingly across the panelled hall to the study, +where for a moment a whimsical smile played upon his face as he viewed +its spacious comfort. The curtains were drawn, the fire was burning +redly, and the lamp was turned half down. The housekeeper made as if +she would have turned it up, but he prevented her. "I like it as it +is," he said genially. "This is better than No. 383, Mrs. Baker?" + +"Well, sir," she answered, looking round with an air of modest +proprietorship, "it is a bit more like." + +"What would you have, Mrs. Baker?" he asked, laughing. "The bishop's +palace?" + +"We may come to that in time, sir," she answered, folding her arms +demurely. "But I do not know that I would wish it! He has a peck of +troubles now, and there would be more in a palace, I doubt." + +"I agree with you," Jack replied, laughing. "Troubles come thick about +an apron, Mrs. Baker." + +"Ay, the men see to that!" retorted the good lady, getting the last +word and going away delighted. + +Left alone, Jack lay back in an arm-chair, and, nursing his hat, +wondered what Mrs. Baker would say when she discovered his connection +with the Bonamys. He had not been seated in this posture two minutes +before he heard the door of the house open and shut, and a man's tread +cross the hall. The next moment the study door opened, and a tall man +appeared at it, and stood holding it and looking into the room. The +hall lamp was behind the newcomer, and Jack, seeing that he was not +the rector, sat still. + +The stranger, satisfied apparently that the room was empty, stepped in +and closed the door behind him; and, rapidly crossing the floor, stood +before one of the bookcases. He took something--a key Jack judged by +what followed--from his pocket, and with it he swiftly threw open a +cupboard among the books. + +There was nothing remarkable in the action; but the stranger's manner +was hurried and nervous, and the looker-on leaned forward, curious to +learn what he was about. He expected to see him take something from +the cupboard. Instead, the man appeared to put something in. What it +was, however, Jack could not discern, for, leaning forward too far in +his anxiety to do so, he upset his hat with some noise on to the +floor. + +The man turned on the instant as if he had been subjected to a +galvanic shock, and stood gazing in the direction of the sound. Jack +heard him draw in his breath with the sharp sound of sudden fear, and +even by that light could see that his face was drawn and white. The +barrister rose quietly in the gloom, the stranger at sight of him +leaning back against the book-case as if his legs refused to support +him. Yet he was the first to speak. "Who is there?" he said, almost in +a whisper. + +"A visitor," Jack answered simply. "I have been waiting to see Mr. +Lindo." + +The curate--for he it was--drew a long breath, apparently of relief, +and in reality of such heartfelt thankfulness as he had never known +before. "What a start you gave me!" he murmured, his voice as yet +scarcely under his control. "I am Mr. Clode, Mr. Lindo's curate. I was +putting up some parish papers, and thought the room was empty." + +"So I saw," Jack answered drily. "I am afraid your nerves are a little +out of order." The curate muttered something which was inaudible, and, +raising his hand to the book-case, locked the cupboard door and put +the key in his pocket. Then he went to the lamp and turned it up. At +the same moment Jack, recovering his hat, advanced into the circle of +light, and the two men looked at one another. "I am afraid if you wish +to see the rector you will be disappointed," the curate said, with +something of hauteur in his voice, assumed to hide his mistrust. "He +was to spend the evening at Mrs. Hammond's. I doubt if he will be back +before midnight." + +"Then I must call another time," said Jack practically. + +"If I see him first, can I tell him anything for you?" the curate +persisted. Who was this man? Could he be a detective? he was +wondering. + +But Jack was so far from being a detective that he had already +dismissed the suspicions he had at first entertained. "I think not, +thank you," he answered; "I will call again." + +"Can I give him any name?" Clode asked in despair. + +"Well, you might say Jack Smith called," the barrister answered, "if +you will be so kind." + +They parted at the door, and Clode went back into the house, where he +speedily learned all that Mrs. Baker knew of Mr. Smith. It dispelled +his first fear. The man was not a detective; still it sent him home +gloomy and ill at ease. What if so intimate a friend of the rector's +as this Smith seemed to be should tell him of his curate's visit to +the cupboard and the excuse which on the spur of the moment he had +invented? It might go ill with him then. What explanation could he +give? He tried to consider such a mishap impossible, or at all events +unlikely; but not with complete success. More than ever he wished that +he had not interfered with the letters. + +To return to Jack. Such mild festivities as the bazaar were not +uncommon in Claversham, but the Bonamy household at any rate had not +been wont to look forward to them with anything approaching +exhilaration. It is wonderful how some children growing up in any kind +of social shadow learn the fact; and Daintry Bonamy, scarcely less +than her sister, had come to regard the annual flower-show, the school +sports, and the regatta with distaste and repugnance, as occasions of +little pleasure and much humiliation. It was Mr. Bonamy's will, +however, that they should attend, though he never went himself; and +times innumerable they had done so, outwardly in pretty dresses and +becoming hats, inwardly in sack-cloth and ashes. + +Jack's presence changed all this, and for once the girls went up to +dress quite gaily. If Kate reflected that Jack's intimacy with the +rector would be likely to bring them also into contact with him, she +said nothing; and from Jack--for the present at least--it was +mercifully hidden that, with all his kindness, his unfailing +good-humor, his wit, his devotion to her, his chief attraction in the +girl's eyes lay in the fact that he was another man's friend. + +When they entered the Assembly Room it was already well filled, the +main concourse being about the two stalls at the end of the room over +which the archdeacon's wife and Mrs. Hammond respectively ruled. Here +the great people were mainly to be seen; and an acute observer would +soon have discovered that between those who habitually hung about this +end and those who surrounded the four lower stalls there was a great +gulf fixed. Those on the one side of this examined the dresses of +those on the other with indulgent interest, and, for the most part, +through double eyeglasses; while those on the other hand either +returned the compliment and made careful notes, or looked about +deferentially for a glance of recognition. The man who should have +bridged that gulf, who should have been equally at home with Mrs. +Archdeacon and the hotel-keeper's wife, was the rector. But as the +rector had entered, the unlucky word "writ" had caught his ears, and +he was in his most unpleasant humor. He felt that the whole room was +talking of him--the majority with a narrow dislike, a few with +sympathy. Was it unnatural that, forgetting his situation, he should +throw in his lot with his friends, who were ever so much the +pleasanter, the wittier, the more amusing, and present a smiling front +of defiance to his opponents or those whom he thought to be such? At +any rate, that was what he was doing, and no one could remark the +carriage of his head or the direction of his eyes without feeling that +there was something in the town complaint that the new clergyman was +above his work. + +Jack and his party did not at once come across him. They found enough +to amuse them at the lower end of the room--the more as to the +barrister the great and little with whom he rubbed shoulders were all +one. Strange to say, he did not discern any great difference even in +their dress! With Daintry hanging on his arm and Kate at his side he +was content, until, turning suddenly in the thick of the crowd to +speak to the elder girl, he saw her face turn crimson. At the same +moment she bowed slightly to some one behind him. He looked round +quickly, with a sharp jealous pang at his heart, to see who had called +forth this show of emotion, and found himself face to face with the +rector. + +Lindo had looked forward to this meeting; he had prepared himself +for it; and yet, occurring in this way, it shook him out of his +self-possession. He colored almost as deeply as the girl had, and, +though he held out his hand with scarcely a perceptible pause, the +action was nervous and jerky. "By Jove! is it you, Jack?" he +exclaimed, his tone a mixture of old cordiality and new antagonism. +"How do you do, Miss Bonamy?" and he held out his hand to the girl +also, who just touched it with her fingers and drew back. "It is +pleasant to see your cousin's face again," he went on more glibly, yet +clearly not at his ease even now. "I was sorry that I was not in last +night when he called." + +"Yes, I was sorry to miss you," Jack answered slowly, his eyes on his +friend's face. He could not quite understand matters. The girl's +embarrassment had been almost a revelation to him, and yet it flashed +across his mind now that the cause of it might have been only the +quarrel between her father and the rector. The same thing might +account for Lindo's shy, ungenial manner. And yet--and yet he could +not quite understand it, and, whether he would or no, his face grew +hard. "You heard I had looked in?" he added. + +"Yes; Mrs. Baker told me," Lindo answered, moving to let some one pass +him, and glancing aside to smile a recognition. + +"She looks the better for the change, I think." + +"Yes; she gets more fresh air now." + +"It does not seem to have done you much good." + +"No?" + +Certainly there was something amiss. These were old, tried college +friends, or had been so a few weeks back, and they had nothing more to +say to one another than this! The rector's self-consciousness began to +infect the other, sowing in his mind he knew not what suspicions. So +that, if ever words of Daintry's were welcome, they were welcome now. +"Jack is going to stay a week," she said inconsequently, standing on +one leg the while with her arm through Jack's and her big eyes on the +rector's face. + +"I am very glad to hear it," Lindo rejoined. "He will find me at home +more than once in the week, I hope." + +"I will come and try," said Jack. + +"Of course you will!" replied the rector, with a flash of his old +manner. "I shall be glad if you will remind him of his promise, Miss +Bonamy." + +Kate murmured that she would. + +"You like your house?" said Jack. + +"Oh, very much--very much indeed." + +"It is an improvement on No. 383?" continued the barrister, rather +drily. + +"It is--very much so!" + +The words were natural. They were the words Jack would have expected. +But, unfortunately, Gregg at that moment passed the rector's elbow, +and the latter's manner was cold and shy--almost as if he resented the +reference to his old life. Jack thought he did, and his lip curled. +Fortunately, Daintry again intervened. "Here is Miss Hammond," she +said. "She is looking for you, Mr. Lindo." + +The rector turned as Laura, threading her way through the press, came +smiling toward him. She glanced with some curiosity at Jack, and then +nodded graciously to Kate, whom she knew at the Sunday school and from +meeting her on such occasions as this. "How do you do, Miss Bonamy?" +she said pleasantly. "Will you pardon me carrying off the rector? We +want him to come to tea." + +Kate bowed, and the rector took off his hat to the girls. Then he +waved an awkward farewell toward Jack, muttered "See you soon!" and +went off with his captor. + +And that was all! Jack turned away with his cousins to the nearest +stall, and bought and chatted. But he did both at random. His thoughts +were elsewhere. He was a keen observer, and he had seen too much for +comfort, yet not enough for comprehension. Nor did the occasional +glance which he shot at Kate's preoccupied face, as she bent over the +wool-work and "guaranteed hand-paintings," tend to clear up his doubts +or render his mood more cheerful. + +Meanwhile the rector's frame of mind, as he rejoined his party, was +not a whit more enviable. He was angry with himself, angry with his +friend. The sight of Jack standing by Kate's side had made his own +conduct to the girl at his last interview with her appear in a worse +light than before--more churlish, more ungrateful. He wished now--but +morosely, not with any tenderness of regret--that he had sought some +opportunity of saying a word of apology to her. And then Jack? He +fancied he saw condemnation written on Jack's face, and that he too, +to whom, in the old days, he had confided his aspirations and +resolves, was on the enemy's side--was blaming him for being on bad +terms with his church wardens and for having already come to blows +with half the parish. + +It was not pleasant. But the more unpleasant things he had to +face, the higher he would hold his head. He disengaged himself +presently--the Hammonds had already preceded him--from the throng and +bustle of the heated room, and went down the stairs alone. Outside it +was already dark, and small rain was falling. The outlook was +wretched, and yet in his present mood he found a tiny satisfaction in +the respect with which the crowd of ragamuffins about the door fell +back to give him passage. With it all, he was some one. He was rector +of the town. + +At the Hammond's door he found a carriage waiting in the rain. It was +not one he knew, and as he laid down his umbrella he asked the servant +whose it was. + +"It is Lord Dynmore's, sir," the man answered, in his low trained +voice. "His lordship is in the drawing-room, sir." + + + + + CHAPTER XVI. + + "LORD DYNMORE IS HERE." + + +When Lord Dynmore, a few minutes before the rector found his carriage +at the door, trotted at the heels of the servant into Mrs. Hammond's +drawing-room, his entrance, unexpected as it was, caused a flutter +among those assembled there. Lords are still lords in the country, and +in the case of his hostess the sensation was wholly one of pleasure. +She was pleased to see him. She was still more pleased that he had +chosen to call at so opportune a moment, when his light would not be +hidden, and James had on his best waistcoat. Consequently she rose to +meet him with a beaming smile, and a cordiality only chastened by the +knowledge that Mrs. Homfray and the archdeacon's wife were observing +her with critical jealousy. "Why, Lord Dynmore," she exclaimed, "this +is most kind of you!" + +"How d'ye do? how d'ye do?" said the peer as he advanced. He was a +slight, short man with bushy gray whiskers and grizzled hair which, +being rather long, strayed over the fur collar of his overcoat. A +noble aquiline nose and keen eyes helped to give him, despite his +shortness, an air of being somebody. "How d'ye do? Why," he continued, +locking round, "you are quite _en fte_ here." + +"We have been at a bazaar, Lord Dynmore," Laura answered. She was +rather a favorite with him and could "say things." "I think you ought +to have been there too, to patronize it. We did not know that you were +in the country, but we sent you a card." + +"Never heard a word of it!" replied his lordship positively. + +"But you must have had the card," Laura persisted. + +"Never heard a word of it!" repeated his lordship, who had by this +time shaken hands with everyone in the room. When the company was not +too large he made a rule of doing this, thereby obviating the ill +results of a bad memory, and earning considerable popularity. +"Archdeacon, you are looking very well," he continued. + +"I think I may say the same of you," answered the clerical dignitary. +"You have had good sport?" + +"Capital! capital!" replied the peer in his jerky way. "But it won't +last my time! In two years there will not be a head of buffalo in the +States! By the way, I saw your nephew." + +"My nephew!" echoed the archdeacon. + +"Yes. Had him up to dinner in Kansas city. A good fellow--a very good +fellow. He put me up to one or two things worth knowing." + +"But, Lord Dynmore, you must be thinking of some one else!" replied +the archdeacon in a fretful tone. "It could not be my nephew: I have +not a nephew out there." + +"No?" replied the earl. "Then it must have been the dean's. Or perhaps +it was old Canon Frampton's--I am not sure now. But he was a good +fellow, an excellent fellow!" And my lord looked round and wagged his +head knowingly. + +The archdeacon's niece, a young lady who had not seen the peer before, +nor indeed any peers, and who consequently was busy making a study of +him, looked astonished. Not so the others who knew him and his ways. +It was popularly believed that Lord Dynmore could keep two things, and +two only, in his mind--the head of game he had killed in each and +every year since he first carried a gun, and the amount of his annual +income from the time of the property coming to him. + +"There have been changes in the parish since you were here last," said +Mrs. Hammond, deftly intervening. She saw that the archdeacon looked a +little put out. "Poor Mr. Williams is gone." + +"Ah! to be sure! to be sure!" replied the earl. "Poor old chap. He was +a friend of my fathers', and now you have a friend of mine in his +place. From generation to generation, you know. I remember now," he +continued, tugging at his whiskers peevishly, "that I meant to see +Lindo before I called here. I must look him up by-and-by." + +"I hope he will save you the trouble," Mrs. Hammond answered. "I am +expecting him every minute." + +"Capital! capital! He is a good fellow now, isn't he? A really good +fellow! I am sure you ought to be much obliged to me for sending you +such a cheery soul, Mrs. Hammond. And he is not so very old," the earl +added waggishly. "Not too old, you know, Miss Hammond. Young for his +years, at any rate." + +Laura laughed and colored a little--what would offend in a commoner is +in a peer pure drollery; and, as it happened, at this moment the +rector came in. The news of the earl's presence had kindled a spark of +elation in his eye. He had not waited for the servant to announce him; +and as he stood a second at the door, closing it, he confronted the +company with an air of modest dignity which more than one remarked. +His glance rested momentarily upon the figure of the earl, who was the +only stranger in the room, so that he had no difficulty in identifying +him; and he seemed in two minds whether he should address him. On +second thoughts he laid aside the intention, and advanced to Mrs. +Hammond. "I am afraid I scarcely deserve any tea," he said pleasantly, +"I am so late." + +Laura, who had risen, touched his arm. "Lord Dynmore is here," she +said in a low voice, which was nevertheless distinctly heard by all. +"I do not think you have seen him." + +He took it as an informal introduction, and turned to Lord Dynmore, +who was leaning against the fireplace, toying with his teacup and +talking to Mrs. Homfray. The young rector advanced a step and held out +his hand, a slight flush on his cheek. "There is no one whom I ought +to be better pleased to see than yourself, Lord Dynmore," he said with +some feeling. "I have been looking forward for some time to this +meeting." + +"Ah, to be sure," replied the peer, holding out his hand readily, +though he was somewhat mystified by the other's earnestness. "I am +pleased to meet you, I am sure. Greatly pleased." + +The listeners, who had heard what he had just said about his great +friend, the rector, stared. Only the person to whom the words were +addressed saw nothing odd in them. "You have not long returned to +England, I think?" he answered. + +"No; came back last Saturday night. And how is the rector? Where is +he? Why does he not show up? I understood Mrs. Hammond to say he was +coming." + +The archdeacon, Mrs. Hammond, and the others were dumb with +astonishment. Even Lindo was surprised, thinking it very dull in the +earl not to guess at once that he was the new incumbent. So no one +answered, and the peer, glancing sharply round, discerned that every +one was at a loss. "Eh! Oh, I see," he resumed in a different tone. +"You are not one of his curates? I made a mistake, I suppose. Took you +for one of his curates, do you see? That was all. Beg your pardon. Beg +your pardon, I am sure. But where is he?" + +"This _is_ the rector, Lord Dynmore," said the archdeacon in an +uncertain, puzzled way. + +"No, no, no, no," replied the great man fretfully. "I mean the old +rector--my old friend." + +"He has forgotten that poor Mr. Williams is dead," Laura murmured to +her mother, amid the general pause of astonishment. + +He overheard her. "Nothing of the kind, young lady!" he answered +irritably. "Nothing of the kind. Bless my soul, do you think I do not +know whom I present to my own livings? My memory is not so bad as +that! I thought this gentleman was Lindo's curate, that was all. That +was all." + +They stared at one another in awkward silence. The rector was the +first to speak. "I am afraid we are somehow at cross purposes still, +Lord Dynmore," he stammered, his manner constrained. "I am not my own +curate--well, because I am myself Reginald Lindo, whom you were kind +enough to present to this living." + +"To Claversham, do you mean?" + +"Yes." + +"And do you say you are Reginald Lindo?" The peer grew very red in the +face as he put this question. + +"Yes, certainly I am." + +"Then, sir, I say that certainly you are not!" was the rapid and +startling answer. "Certainly you are not! You are no more Reginald +Lindo than I am!" the peer repeated, striking his hand upon the table +by his side. "What do you mean by saying that you are, eh? What do you +mean by it?" + +"Lord Dynmore----" + +But the peer would not listen. "Who are you, sir? Answer me that +question first!" he cried. He was a choleric man, and he saw already +that there was something seriously amiss; so that the shocked, +astonished faces round him tended rather to increase than lessen his +wrath. "Answer me that!" + +"I think, Lord Dynmore, that you must be mad," replied the rector, his +lips quivering. "I am as certainly Reginald Lindo as you are Lord +Dynmore!" + +"But what are you doing here?" retorted the other, storming down the +interruption which the archdeacon would have effected. "That is what I +want to know. Who made you rector of Claversham?" + +"The bishop, my lord," answered the young man sternly. + +"Ay, but on whose presentation?" + +"On yours." + +"On mine?" + +"Most assuredly," replied the clergyman doggedly--"as the archdeacon +here, who indicted me, can bear witness." + +"It is false!" Lord Dynmore almost screamed. He turned to the +panic-stricken listeners, who had instinctively grouped themselves +round the two, and appealed to them. "I presented a man nearly thrice +his age, do you hear!--a man of sixty. As for this--this Reginald +Lindo, I never heard of him in my life! Never! If he had letters of +presentation, I did not give them to him." + +The young clergyman's eyes flashed, and his face grew hard as a stone. +He guessed already the misfortune which had happened to him, and his +heart was sore, as well as full of wrath. But in his pride he betrayed +only the anger. "Lord Dynmore," he said fiercely, "you will have to +answer for these insinuations. If there has been any error, the fault +has not lain with me!" + +"An error, you call it, do you? Let me----" + +"Oh, Lord Dynmore!" Mrs. Hammond gasped. + +"One moment, Lord Dynmore, if you please." This from the archdeacon; +and he pressed his interruption, placing himself between the two +men, and almost laying his hands on the excited peer. "If there has +been a mistake," he urged, "a few words will make it clear. I fully +believe--nay, I feel sure, that my friend here is not in fault, +whoever is." + +"Ask your questions," grunted my lord, breathing hard, and eyeing the +young clergyman as a terrier eyes the taller dog it means to attack. +"He will not answer them, trust me!" + +"I think he will," replied the archdeacon with decision. His _esprit +de corps_ was rising. The earl's rude insistance disgusted him. He +remarked, his eyes wandering for a moment while he considered how he +should frame his question, that another person, Mr. Clode, had +silently entered the room, and was listening with a darkly thoughtful +face. It occurred to the archdeacon to suggest that the ladies should +withdraw, but then again it seemed fair that, as they had heard the +charges, they should hear what answer the rector had to make; and he +proceeded. "First, Lord Dynmore," he said, "I must ask you whom you +intended to present." + +"My old friend, Reginald Lindo, of course." + +"His address, please," continued the archdeacon rather curtly. + +"Somewhere in the East End of London," the earl answered. "Oh, I +remember now, St. Gabriel's, Aldgate." + +The archdeacon turned silently to the clergyman. "He was my uncle," +Lindo explained gravely. "He died a year ago last October." + +"Died!" The exclamation was Lord Dynmore's. + +"Yes, died," the young man retorted bitterly. "Your lordship keeps a +watchful eye upon your friends!" + +The shaft went home. The earl caught a quick breath, and his face +changed. The words awoke a slumbering chord in his memory and +recalled--not as might have been expected, old days of frolic and +sport spent with the friend whose death was thus coldly flung in +his face--but a scene in another world. He saw upon the instant a +rock-bound valley, inclosed by hills that rose in giant steps to the +snowy line of the Andes; and in its depths a tiny hunter's camp. He +saw an Indian fishing in the brook, and near him a white man wandering +away--a letter in his hand. Then had come a shot, an alarm, a hasty +striking of the tent, and for many hours--even days--a rapid, +dangerous march. In the excitement the letter had been forgotten, to +be recalled with its tidings here--and now. + +He winced, and muttered, "Good heavens, and I had heard it." The +clergyman caught the words, and his resentment waxed hot. "My uncle's +death," he continued grimly, in the tone of one rather making than +answering an accusation, "occurred a year before the presentation was +offered to me by your solicitors!" + +"Lord help us!" said the peer in a helpless, bewildered tone. "But are +you a clergyman, sir?" + +"That is a fresh insult, Lord Dynmore!" he replied warmly. + +"Hoity-toity!" retorted my lord, recovering himself, "you are a fine +man to talk of insults! And you in my living, without a shadow of +title to it! You must have had some suspicion, sir, that all was not +right." + +"I think I can answer for Mr. Lindo, there!" interposed the curate, +stepping forward for the first time. His face was deeply flushed, and +he spoke hurriedly, not looking up; perhaps, because all eyes were on +him. "When Mr. Lindo came here, I had reason to expect an older man. I +heard by chance from him--I think it was on the evening of his +arrival--that he had not long lost an uncle of the same name, and it +occurred to me then as just possible that there might have been a +mistake. But I particularly observed that he was perfectly free from +any suspicion of that kind himself." + +"Pooh! There is nothing in that!" replied the archdeacon snappishly. + +"I think there is!" cried the earl in triumph. "A great deal in it. If +the idea occurred to a stranger, is it possible that the incumbent's +own mind could be free from it?" + +"Is it possible," the rector answered viciously, a ring as of steel in +his voice, "that a man who had had his dear friend's death announced +to him could forget the news in a year, and think of him as still +alive?" + +The earl gasped with passion. By a tremendous effort he refrained from +using bad words, and even forbore, in view of the alarmed looks of the +ladies and the archdeacon's hasty expostulation, to call his opponent, +a villain or a scoundrel. He stammered only, "You--you--are you going +to give up my living?" + +"No," was the answer. + +"You are not?" + +"Certainly I am not!" the rector answered. "If you had treated me +differently, Lord Dynmore," he continued, speaking with his arms +crossed and his lip curling with scorn and defiance, "my answer might +have been different! Now, though the mistake has been with yourself or +your people, you have accused me of fraud! You have treated me as an +impostor! You have dared to ask me, though I have been ministering to +the people in this parish for months, whether I am a clergyman! You +have insulted me grossly, and, so doing, have put it out of my power +to resign had I been so minded! And you may be sure I shall not +resign." + +He looked handsome enough as he flung down his defiance. But the earl +cared nothing for his looks. "You will not?" he stuttered. + +"No! I acknowledge no authority whatever in you," was the answer. "You +are _functus officio_. I am subject to the bishop, and to him only." + +"Give me my hat," mumbled the peer, turning abruptly away; and, +tugging up the collar of his fur coat, he began to grope about in a +manner which at another time would have been laughable. "Give me my +hat, some one," he repeated. "Let me get out before I swear. I am +_functus officio_, am I? I have never been so insulted in my life! +Never, so help me heaven! Never! Let me get out!" + +His murmurs died away in the hall, Mr. Clode with much presence of +mind opening the door for him and letting him out. When they ceased, +in the room he had left there was absolute silence. The men avoided +one another's eyes. The women, their lips parted, looked each at her +neighbor. Mrs. Homfray, the young wife of an old husband, was the +first to speak. "Well, I never!" she sighed. + +That broke the spell. The rector, who had hitherto gazed darkly, with +flushed brow and compressed lips, at the hearth-rug, roused himself. +"I think I had better go," he said, his tone hard and ungracious, "You +will excuse me, I am sure, Mrs. Hammond. Good-night. Good-night." + +The archdeacon took a step forward, with the intention of intercepting +him, but thought better of it, and stopped, seeing that the time was +not propitious. So, save to murmur an answer to his general farewell, +no one spoke, and he left the room under the impression, though he +himself had set the tone, that he stood alone among them; that he had +not their sympathies. Afterward he remembered this, and it added to +his unhappiness, and to the pride with which he endured it. But at the +moment he was scarcely aware of the impression. The blow had fallen so +swiftly, it was so unexpected and so crushing, that he went out into +the darkness stunned and bewildered, conscious only, as are men whom +some sudden accident has befallen, that in a moment all was changed +with him. + +An hour later Mrs. Hammond and her daughter alone remained. The last +of the visitors had departed, the dinner hour was long past, but they +still sat on, fascinated by the topic, reproducing for one another's +benefit the extraordinary scene they had witnessed, and discussing its +probable consequences. "I am sure, quite sure, poor fellow, that he +knew nothing about it," Mrs. Hammond declared for the twentieth time. + +"So the archdeacon seemed to think, mamma," Laura answered. "And yet +he said that probably Mr. Lindo would have to go." + +"Because of the miserable attacks these people have made upon him!" +her mother rejoined with indignation. "But think of the pity of it! +Think of the income! And such a house as it is!" + +"It _is_ a nice house," Laura assented, thoughtfully gazing into the +fire, a slight access of color in her cheeks. + +"I think it is abominable!" + +"And then," Laura said, continuing her chain of reflection, "there is +the view from the drawing-room windows." + +"Oh, it is too bad! It is really too bad! I declare I am quite upset, +I am so sorry for him. Lord Dymnore ought to be ashamed of himself!" + +"Yes," Laura assented rather absently, "I quite agree with you. And as +for the hall, with a Persian rug or two it would be quite as good as +another room." + +"What hall? Oh, at the rectory?" + +"Yes." + +Mrs. Hammond rose with a quick, pettish air of annoyance. "Upon my +word, Laura," she exclaimed, drawing a little shawl about her +comfortable shoulders, "you seem to think more of the house than of +the poor fellow himself! Let us go to dinner. It is half-past eight, +and more." + + + + + CHAPTER XVII. + + THE LAWYER AT HOME. + + +If Mr. Clode, when he stepped forward to open the door for +Lord Dynmore, had any thought beyond that of facilitating his +departure--if, for instance, as is just possible, he had set his mind +on having a little private talk with the peer--he was disappointed. +Lord Dynmore, after what had happened, was in no mood for +conversation. As, still muttering and mumbling, he seized his hat from +the hall table, he did indeed notice his companion, but it was with +the red angry glare of a bull about to charge. The next moment he +plunged headlong into his brougham, and roared "Home." + +The carriage plunged away into the darkness of the drive, as if it +would reach the Park at a leap. But it had barely cleared Mrs. +Hammond's gates, and was still rattling over the stony pavement of the +top of the town, when the footman heard his master lower the window +and shout "Stop!" The horses were pulled up as suddenly as they had +been started, and the man got down and went to the door. "Do you know +where Mr. Bonamy the lawyer's offices are?" Lord Dynmore said curtly. + +"Yes, my lord." + +"Then drive there!" + +The footman got upon the box again. "What has bitten him now, I +wonder?" he grumbled to his companion as he passed on the order. "He +is in a fine tantrum in there!" + +"Who cares?" retorted the coachman, with a coachman's fine +independence. "If old Bonamy is in, there will be a pair of them!" + +Mr. Bonamy was in. In that particular Lord Dynmore had better luck +than he perhaps deserved. Late as it was for business--it was after +seven--the gas was still burning in the lawyer's offices, illuminating +the fanlight over the door and the windows of one of the rooms on the +ground floor--the right-hand room. The servant jumped down and rapped, +and his summons was answered almost immediately by Mr. Bonamy himself, +who jerked open the door, and stood holding it ajar, with the air of a +man interrupted in the middle of his work, and bent on sending the +intruder off with a flea in his ear. Catching sight of the earl's +carriage, however, and the servant murmuring that my lord wished to +see him on business, the lawyer stepped forward, his expression +changing to one of extreme surprise. + +The Dynmore business had been hitherto monopolized by the London +solicitors to the estate. In cases where a country agent had been +necessary they had invariably employed a firm in Birmingham. Neither +Mr. Bonamy nor the other Claversham lawyer had ever risen to the +dignity of being concerned for Lord Dynmore, nor could Mr. Bonamy +recall any occasion in the past on which the great man had crossed the +threshold of his office. + +His appearance now, therefore, was almost as welcome as it was +unexpected. Yet from some cause, probably the lateness of the hour, +though that seems improbable, there was a visible embarrassment in the +lawyer's manner as he recognized him; and Mr. Bonamy only stepped +aside to make way for him to enter upon hearing from his own lips that +he desired to speak with him. + +Then he opened the door of the room on the left of the hall. "If your +lordship will take a seat here," he said, "I will be with you in a +moment." + +The room was in darkness, but he struck a match and lit the gas, +placing a chair for Lord Dynmore, who, fretting and fuming and more +than half inclined as he took it to walk out again, said sharply that +he had only a minute to spare. + +"I shall not be a minute, my lord," the lawyer answered. He retired at +once with that, closing the door behind him, and went, as his visitor +could hear, into the opposite room. Lord Dynmore looked round +impatiently. He had not so high as opinion of his own importance as +have some who are no peers. But he was choleric and accustomed to have +his own way, and he thought that at least this local man whom he was +going to patronize might receive him with more respect. + +Mr. Bonamy, however, was as good as his word. In less than a minute he +was back. Closing the door carefully behind him, he sat down at the +table. "I am entirely at your lordship's service now," he said, bowing +slightly. + +The earl laid his hat on the table. "Very well," he answered abruptly. +"I have heard that you are a sharp fellow, Mr. Bonamy, and a good +lawyer, and that is why I have come to you--that and the fact that my +business will not wait and I have a mind to punish those confounded +London people who have let me into this mess!" + +That it was rather impatience than anything else which had brought him +he betrayed by getting up and striding across the room. Meanwhile the +lawyer, golden visions of bulky settlements and interminable leases +floating before his eyes, murmured his anxiety to be of service, and +waited to hear more. + +"It is about that confounded sneak of a rector of yours!" my lord +exclaimed, coming to a stand before the table. + +Mr. Bonamy started, his visions fading rapidly away. "What rector?" he +replied, gazing at his client in great astonishment. "Our rector, my +lord?" + +"The man who calls himself your rector!" the earl growled. "He is no +more a rector than I am, and pretty fools you were to be taken in by +him!" + +"Now that is odd!" the lawyer answered. He spoke absently, his eyes +resting on the peer's face as if his thoughts were far away. + +"Odd or not," Lord Dynmore replied, stamping on the floor with +undiminished irritation, "it is the fact, sir! And now if you will +listen to me I will tell you what I want you to do." + +The lawyer bowed slightly again, and the earl proceeded to tell his +tale. Passing lightly over his own forgetfulness and negligence, he +laid stress on all the facts which seemed to show that Lindo could not +have accepted the living in good faith. He certainly made out a +plausible case, but his animus in telling it was so apparent that, +when he had finished and wound up by announcing his firm resolve to +eject the young man from his cure, Mr. Bonamy only shook his head with +a doubtful smile. "You will have to prove guilty knowledge on his +part, my lord," he said gravely. + +"So I will!" quoth the earl roundly. + +Mr. Bonamy seemed for a moment inclined to shake his head again, but +he thought better of it. "Well, you may be right, my lord," he +answered. "At any rate--without going further into the matter at this +moment, or considering what course your lordship, could or should +adopt--I think I can do one thing. I can lay some information on this +point before you at once." + +"What! To show that he knew?" cried the earl eagerly. + +"Yes, I think so. But as to its weight----" + +"What is it? What is it? Let me hear it!" was the impatient +interruption. The earl was on his feet in a moment. "Why, gadzooks, we +may have him in a corner before the day is out, Mr. Bonamy," he +continued. "True? I will be bound it is true!" + +Mr. Bonamy looked as if he very much doubted that, but he offered no +further opposition. Begging Lord Dynmore--who could not look upon him +with sufficient admiration, so much was he struck with this strange +preparedness--to excuse him for a moment, he left the room. He +returned almost immediately, however, followed by a man whom the earl +at once recognized, and recognized with the utmost astonishment. "Why, +you confounded rascal!" he gasped. "What are you doing here?" + +It was Felton. Yet not the same Felton whose surreptitious visit to +the rectory had been cut short by Mr. Clode. A few weeks of idleness +and drinking, a month or two at the Bull and Staff had much changed +the once sleek and respectable servant. Had he gone to the rectory for +help now, his tale could not have passed muster even for a moment. His +coat had come to hang loosely about him, and he wore no tie. His hands +were dirty and tremulous, his eyes shifty and bloodshot. His pasty +face had grown puffy and was stained with blotches which it was +impossible to misinterpret. He had gone down the hill fast. + +Seeing his old master before him he began to whimper, but the lawyer +cut him short. "This man, who says he was formerly your servant, has +come to me with a strange story, Lord Dynmore," he said. + +"Ten to one it's a lie!" replied the peer, scowling darkly at the poor +wretch. + +"So I think likely!" Mr. Bonamy rejoined with the utmost dryness. +"However, what he says is this: that when he landed in England without +a character he considered what he should do, and, remembering that he +had heard you say that Mr. Lindo the elder, whom he knew, had been +appointed to this living, he came down here to see what he could get +out of him." + +"That is likely enough!" cried the peer scornfully. + +"When he called at the rectory, however, he found Mr. Lindo, the +younger, in possession. He had an interview with him, and he states +that Mr. Lindo, to purchase his silence, undertook to pay him ten +shillings a week until your return." + +"Phaugh!" my lord exclaimed in astonishment. + +The servant mistook his astonishment for incredulity. "He did, my +lord!" he cried passionately. "It is heaven's own truth I am telling! +I can bring half a dozen witnesses to prove it." + +"You can?" + +"I can, my lord." + +"Yes, but to prove what?" said the lawyer sharply. + +"That he paid me ten shillings a week down to last week, my lord." + +"That will do! That will do!" cried the earl in great glee. "Set a +thief to catch a thief--that is the plan!" + +Mr. Bonamy looked displeased. "I think you are a little premature, my +lord," he said with some sourness. + +"Premature? How?" + +"At present you have only this man's word for what is on the face of +it a very improbable story." + +"Improbable? I do not see it," replied the peer quickly, but with less +heat. "He says that he has witnesses to prove that this fellow paid +him the money. If that be so, explain the payment if you can. And, +mark you, Mr. Bonamy, the allowance stopped last week--on my arrival, +that is." + +The man cried eagerly that that was so; the earl at once bidding him +be silent for a confounded rascal as he was. Mr. Bonamy stood rubbing +his chin thoughtfully and looking on the floor, but said nothing; so +that the great man presently lost patience. "Don't you agree with me?" +he cried irascibly. + +"I think we had better get rid of our friend here before we discuss +the matter, my lord," the lawyer answered bluntly. "Do you hear, +Felton?" he continued, turning to the servant. "You may go now. Come +to me to-morrow morning at ten o'clock, and I will tell you what Lord +Dynmore proposes to do." + +The ex-valet would have demurred to being thus set aside, but the earl +roaring "Go, you scoundrel!" in a voice he had been accustomed to +obey, and Mr. Bonamy opening the door for him, he submitted and went. +The streets were wet and gloomy, and he was more sober than he had +been for a week. In other words, his nerves were shaky, and he soon +began, as he slunk homeward, to torment himself with doubts. Had he +made the best of his story? Might it not have been safer to make a +last appeal to the rector? Above all, would Mr. Clode, whose game he +did not understand, hold his hand, or play the trump by disclosing +that little burglary we know of? Altogether Felton was not happy, and +saw before him but one resource--to get home as quickly as possible +and get drunk. + +Meanwhile the lawyer, left alone with his client, seemed as much +averse as before to speaking out. Lord Dynmore had again to take the +initiative. "Well, it is good enough, sir, is it not?" he said, +frowning impatiently on his new adviser. "There is a clear case, I +suppose!" + +"I think your lordship had better hear first," Mr. Bonamy answered, +"how your late servant came to bring his story to me." He proceeded to +explain the course which the young clergyman had pursued in the parish +from the first, and the opposition and ill-will it had provoked. He +told the story from his own point of view, but with more fairness than +might have been expected, although, as was natural, when he came to +the matter of the sheep-grazing and the writ he took care to make his +own case good. The earl listened and chuckled, and at last interrupted +him. + +"So you have been at him already?" he said, grinning. + +"Yes," the lawyer answered slowly. "I may say, indeed, that I have +been in constant opposition to him since his arrival. Felton (the man +who has just left us) knew that, and it led him to bring his tale to +me this evening." + +"When he could get no more money out of the parson!" the earl replied +with a sneer. "But, now, what is to be done, Mr. Bonamy?" + +Mr. Bonamy did not at once answer, but stood looking much disturbed. +His doubt and uneasiness, in fact, visibly increased as the seconds +flew by, and still Lord Dynmore's gaze, bent on him at first in +impatience and later in surprise, seemed to be striving to probe his +thoughts. He looked down at the table and frowned, as if displeased by +the scrutiny; and when he at length spoke, his voice was harsher than +usual. "I do not think, my lord," he said, "that I can answer that +question." + +"Do you want to take counsel's opinion?" + +"No, my lord," Mr. Bonamy answered curtly. "I mean something +different. I do not think, in fact, that I can act for your lordship +in this matter." + +"Cannot act for me?" the earl gasped. + +"That is what I mean," Mr. Bonamy answered doggedly, a slight flush as +of shame on his sallow cheek. "I have explained, my lord, that I have +been constantly opposed to this young man, but my opposition has been +of a public nature and upon principle. I have no doubt that he and +others consider me his chief enemy in the place, and to that I have no +objection. But I am unwilling that he or others should think that +private interest has had any part in my opposition, and therefore, +being churchwarden, I would prefer, though I must necessarily offend +your lordship, to decline undertaking the business." + +"But why? Why?" cried the earl, between anger and astonishment. + +"I have tried to explain," Mr. Bonamy rejoined with firmness. "I am +afraid I cannot make my reasons clearer." + +The earl swore softly and took up his hat. He really was at a loss to +understand; principally because, knowing that Mr. Bonamy had risen +from the ranks, he did not credit him with any fineness of feeling. He +had heard only that he was a clever and rather sharp practitioner, and +a man who might be trusted to make things unpleasant for the other +side. So he took up his hat and swore softly. "You are aware," he +said, turning at the door and looking daggers at the solicitor, "that +by taking this course you are throwing away a share of my work?" + +Mr. Bonamy, wearing a rather more gaunt and grim air than usual, +simply bowed. + +"You will act for the other side, I suppose?" my lord snarled. + +"I shall not act professionally for any one, my lord!" + +"Then you are a damned quixotic fool--that is all I have to say!" was +the earl's parting shot. Having fired it, he flung out of the room and +in great amaze roared for his carriage. + +A man is seldom so much inclined--on the surface, at any rate--to +impute low motives to others as when he has just done something which +he suspects to be foolish and quixotic. When Mr. Bonamy, a few minutes +later, entered his rarely used drawing-room and discovered Jack and +the two girls playing at Patience, he was in his most cynical mood. He +stood for a moment on the hearth-rug, his coat-tails on his arms, and +presently he said to Jack, "I am surprised to see you here." + +Jack looked up. The girls looked up also. "I wonder you are not at the +rectory," Mr. Bonamy continued ironically, "advising your friend how +to keep out of jail!" + +"What on earth do you mean, sir?" Jack exclaimed, laying down his +cards and rising from the table. He saw that the lawyer had some news +and was anxious to tell it. + +"I mean that he is in very considerable danger of going there!" was +Mr. Bonamy's answer. "There has been a scene at Mrs. Hammond's this +afternoon. By this time the story must be all over the town. Lord +Dynmore turned up there and met him--denounced him as a scoundrel, and +swore he had never presented him to the living." + +For a brief moment no one spoke. Then Daintry found her voice. "My +goody!" she exclaimed, her eyes like saucers. "Who told you, father?" + +"Never you mind, young lady!" Mr. Bonamy retorted with good-humored +sharpness. "It is true. What is more, I am informed that Lord Dynmore +has evidence that Mr. Lindo has been paying a man, who was aware of +this, a certain sum every week to keep his mouth shut." + +"My goody!" cried Daintry again. "I wonder, now, what he paid him! +What do you think, Jack?" And she turned to Jack to learn what he was +doing that he did not speak. + +Poor Jack! Why did he not speak? Why did he stand silent, gazing hard +into the fire? Because he resented his friend's coldness? Because he +would not defend him? Because he thought him guilty? No, but because +in the first moment of Mr. Bonamy's disclosure he had looked into +Kate's face--his cousin's face, who the moment before had been +laughing over the cards at his side, in all things so near to him--and +he had read in it, with the keen insight, the painful sympathy which +love imparts, her secret. Poor Kate! No one else had seen her face +fall or discovered her embarrassment. A few seconds later even her +countenance had regained its ordinary calm composure, even the blood +had gone back to her heart. But Jack had seen and read aright. He +knew, and she knew that he knew. When at last--but not before Mr. +Bonamy's attention had been drawn to his silence--he turned and spoke, +she avoided his eyes. "That is rather a wild tale, sir, is it not?" he +said with an effort and a pale smile. + +If Mr. Bonamy had not been a man of great shrewdness, he would have +been tempted to think that Jack had been in the secret all the time. +As it was, he only answered, "I have reason to think that there is +something in it, wild as it sounds. At any rate, the man in question +has himself told the story to Lord Dynmore." + +"The pensioner?" + +"Precisely." + +"Well, I should like to ask him a few questions," Jack answered +drearily. But for the chill feeling at his heart, but for the +knowledge he had just gained, he would have treated the matter very +differently. He would have thought of his friend only--his feelings, +his possible misery. He would not have condescended in this first +moment to the evidence. But he could not feel for his friend. He could +not even pity him. He needed all his pity for himself. + +"I do not answer for the story," Mr. Bonamy continued. "But there is +no doubt of one thing--that Mr. Lindo was appointed in error, whether +he was aware of the mistake or not. I do not know," the lawyer added +thoughtfully, "that I shall pity him greatly. He has been very +mischievous here. And he has held his head very high." + +"He is the more likely to suffer now," Jack answered almost cynically. + +"Possibly," the lawyer replied. Then he added, "Daintry, fetch me my +slippers, there is a good girl. Or, stay. Get me a candle and take +them to my room." + +He went out after her, leaving the cousins alone. Neither spoke. Jack +stood near the corner of the mantel-shelf, gazing rigidly, almost +sullenly, into the fire. What was Lindo to him? Why should he be sorry +for him? A far worse thing had befallen himself. He tried to harden +his heart, and to resolve that nothing of his suffering should be +visible even to her. But he had scarcely formed the resolution when, +his eyes wandering despite his will to the pale set face on the other +side of the hearth, he sprang forward and, almost kneeling, took her +hand in both his own. "Kate," he whispered, "is it so? Is there no +hope for me, then?" + +She, too, had been looking into the fire. She could feel for him now. +She no longer thought his attentions "nonsense" as at the station a +while back. But she could not speak. She could only shake her head, +the tears in her eyes. + +Jack laid down the hand and rose and went back to the fire, and stood +looking into it sorrowfully; but his thoughts were no longer wholly of +himself. Brave heart, the rarest of gentlemen, though he was neither +six feet high nor an Adonis, he had scarcely felt the weight of the +blow which had fallen on himself, before he began to think what he +could do to help her. Presently he put his thought into words. "Kate," +he said, in a voice scarcely above a whisper, "can I do anything?" + +She had made no attempt to deny the inference he had drawn. She seemed +content, indeed, that he should have her secret, though the knowledge +of it by another would have covered her with shame. But at the sound +of his question she only shook her head with a sorrowful smile. + +It was all dark to him. He knew nothing of the past--only that the +faint suspicion he had felt at the bazaar was justified, and that Kate +had given away her heart. He did not dare to ask whether there was any +understanding between her and his friend; and, not knowing that, what +could he do? Nothing, he was afraid. + +Then a noble thought came into his head. "I am afraid," he said +slowly, looking at his watch, "that Lindo is in great trouble. I think +I will go to him. It is not ten o'clock." + +He tried not to look at her as he spoke, but all the same he saw the +crimson tide rise slowly over cheek and brow, which his prayer had +left so pure and pale. Her lip trembled and she rose hurriedly, +muttering something inaudible. Poor Jack! + +For a moment self got the upper hand, and he stood still, frowning. +Then he said gallantly, "Yes, I think I will go. Will you let my uncle +know in case I should be late." + +He did not look at her again, but hurried out of the room. It was a +stiff, formal room, we know--a set, comfortless, middle-class room, +which had given the rector quite a shock on his first introduction to +it--but if it had grafted all the grace of the halls of Abencerrages +upon the stately comfort of a sixteenth-century dining-hall it would +have been no more than worthy of the man who quitted it. + + + + + CHAPTER XVIII. + + A FRIEND IN NEED. + + +I have heard that the bitterest pang a boy feels on returning to +school after his first holidays is reserved for the moment when he +opens his desk and recalls the happy hour, full of joyous +anticipation, when he had closed that desk with a bang. Oh, the pity +of it! The change from that boy to this, from that morning to this +evening! How meanly, how inadequately--so it seems to the urchin +standing with smudged cheeks before the well-remembered grammar--did +the lad who turned the key estimate his real happiness! How little did +he enter into it or deserve it! + +Just such a pang shot through the young rector's heart as he +passed into the rectory porch after that momentous scene at Mrs. +Hammond's. His rage had had time to die down. With reflection +had come a full sense of his position. As he entered the house he +remembered--remembered only too well, grinding his teeth over the +recollection--how secure, how free from embarrassments, how happy had +been his situation when he last issued from that door a few, a very +few, hours before. Such troubles as had then annoyed him seemed +trifles light as air now. Mr. Bonamy's writ, the dislike of one +section in the parish--how could he have let such things as these make +him miserable for a moment? + +How, indeed? Or, if there were anything grave in his situation then, +what was it now? He had held his head high; henceforward he would be a +by-word in the parish, a man under a cloud. The position in which he +had placed himself would still be his, perhaps, but only because he +would cling to it to the last. Under no circumstances could it any +longer be a source of pride to him. He had posed, will he, nill he, +as the earl's friend; he must submit in the future to be laughed at +by the Greggs and avoided by the Homfrays. It seemed to him indeed +that his future in Claversham could be only one long series of +humiliations. He was a proud man, and as he thought of this he sprang +from his chair and strode up and down the room, his cheeks flaming. +Had there ever been such a fall before! + +Mrs. Baker, as yet ignorant of it all, though the news was by this +time spreading through the town, brought him his dinner, and he ate +something in the dining-room. Then he went back to the study and sat +idle and listless before his writing-table. There was a number of +"Punch" lying on it, and he took this up and read it through drearily, +extracting a faint pleasure from its witticisms, but never for an +instant forgetting the cloud of trouble brooding over him. Years +afterward he could recall some of the jokes in that "Punch"--with a +shudder. Presently he laid it down and began to think. And then, +before his thoughts became quite insufferable, they were interrupted +by the sound of a voice in the hall. + +He rose and stood with his back to the fire, and as he waited, his +eyes on the door, his face grew hot, his brow defiant. He had little +doubt that the visitor was Clode. He had expected the curate before, +and even anticipated the relief of pouring his thoughts into a +friendly ear. None the less, now the thing had come, he dreaded the +first moment of meeting, scarcely knowing how to bear himself in these +changed circumstances. + +It was not Clode, however, who entered, but Jack Smith. The rector +started, and, uncertain whether the barrister had heard of the blow +which had fallen on him or no, stepped forward awkwardly, and held out +his hand in a constrained fashion. Jack, on his side, had his own +reasons for being ill at ease with his friend. But the moment the +men's hands met they somehow closed on one another in the old hearty +fashion, and the grip told the rector that the other knew all. "You +have heard?" he muttered. + +"Mr. Bonamy told me," the barrister answered. "I came across almost at +once." + +"You do not believe that I was aware of the earl's mistake, then?" +Lindo said, with a faint smile. + +"I should as soon believe that I knew of it myself!" Jack replied +warmly. He was glad beyond measure now that he had come. As he and +Lindo stood half facing one another, each with an elbow on the +mantel-shelf, he felt that he could defy the chill at his own +heart--that, notwithstanding all, his old friend was still dear to +him. Perhaps if the rector had been prospering as before, if no cloud +had arisen in his sky, it might have been different. But as it was, +Jack's generous heart went out to him. "Tell me what happened, old +fellow," he said cheerily--"that is, if you have no objection to +taking me into your confidence." + +"I shall be only too glad of your help," Lindo answered thankfully, +feeling indeed--so potent is a single word of sympathy--happier +already. "I would ask you to sit down, Jack," he continued, in a tone +of rather sheepish raillery, "and have a cup of coffee or some +whiskey, but I do not know whether I ought to do so, now that Lord +Dynmore says the things are not mine." + +"I will take the responsibility," Jack answered, briskly ringing the +bell. "Was my lord very rude?" + +"Confoundedly!" the rector answered, and proceeded to tell his story. +Jack was surprised to find him at first more placable than he had +expected, but presently he learned that this moderation was only +assumed. The rector rose as he went on, and began to pace the room, +and, the motion freeing his tongue, he gradually betrayed the +indignation and resentment which he really felt. Jack asked him, with +a view to clearing the ground, whether he had quite made up his mind +not to resign, and was astonished by the force and anger with which he +repudiated the thought of doing so. "Resign? No never!" he cried, +standing still, and almost glaring at his companion. "Why should I? +What have I done? Was it my mistake, that I am to suffer for it? Was +it my fault, that for penalty I am to have the tenor of my life +broken? Do you think I can go back to the Docks the same man I left +them? I cannot. Nor is that all, or nearly all," he added still more +warmly--"I have been called a swindler and an impostor. Am I by +resigning to plead guilty to the charge?" + +"No!" said Jack, himself catching fire, "certainly not! I did not +intend for a moment to advise that course. I think you would be acting +very foolishly if you resigned under these circumstances." + +"I am glad of that," the rector said, sitting down with a sigh of +relief. "I feared you did not quite enter into my feelings." + +"I do thoroughly," the barrister answered, with feeling, "but I want +to do more--I want to help you. You must not go into this business +blindly, old man. And, first, I think you ought to take the archdeacon +or some other clergyman into your confidence. Show him the whole of +your case, I mean, and----" + +"And act upon his advice?" said the young rector, rebellion already +flashing in his eye. + +"No, not necessarily," the barrister answered, skilfully adapting +his tone to the irritability of his patient. "Of course your _bona +fides_ at the time you accepted the living is the point of importance +to you, Lindo. You did not see their solicitors--the earl's people, I +mean--did you?" + +"No," the rector answered somewhat sullenly. + +"Then their letter conveyed to you all you knew of the living and the +offer?" + +"Precisely." + +"Let us see them, then," replied Jack, rising briskly from his chair. +He had already determined to say nothing of the witness whom Mr. +Bonamy had mentioned to him as asserting that the rector had bribed +him. He knew enough of his friend to utterly disbelieve the story, and +he considered it as told to him in confidence. "There is no time like +the present," he continued. "You have kept the letters, of course?" + +"They are here," Lindo answered, rising also, and unlocking as he +spoke the little cupboard among the books; "I made them into a packet +and indorsed them soon after I came. They have been here ever since." + +He found them after a moment's search and without himself examining +them, pitched them to Jack, who had returned to his seat. The +barrister untied the string and glancing quickly at the dates of the +letters, arranged them in order and flattened them out on his knee. +"Now," he said, "number one! That I think I have seen before." He +mumbled over the opening sentences, and turned the page. "Hallo!" he +exclaimed, holding the letter from him, and speaking in a tone of +surprise--almost of consternation--"how is this?" + +"What?" said the rector. + +"You have destroyed the latter part of this letter! Why on earth did +you do that?" + +"I never did," Lindo answered incredulously. Obeying Jack's gesture he +came, and, standing by his chair, looked over his shoulder. Then he +saw that part of the latter half of the sheet had been torn off. The +signature and the last few words of the letter, were gone. He looked +and wondered. "I never did it," he said positively, "whoever did. You +may be sure of that." + +"You are certain?" + +"Absolutely certain," the rector answered with considerable warmth. "I +remember arranging and indorsing the packet. I am quite sure that this +letter was intact then, for I read over every one. That was a few +evenings after I came here." + +"Have you ever shown the letters to any one?" Jack asked suspiciously. + +"Never," said the rector; "they have never been removed from this +cupboard, to my knowledge, since I put them there." + +"Think! I want you to be quite sure," Jack rejoined, pressing his +point steadily; "you see this letter is rendered utterly worthless by +the mutilation. Indeed, to produce it would be to raise a natural +suspicion that the last sentence of the letter was not in our favor, +and we had got rid of it. Of course the chances are that the earl's +solicitors have copies, but for the present that is not our business." + +"Well," said the rector somewhat absently--he had been rather thinking +than listening--"I do remember now a circumstance which may account +for this. A short time after I came a man broke into the house and +ransacked this cupboard. Possibly he did it." + +"A burglar, do you mean? Was he caught?" the barrister asked, +figuratively pricking up his ears. + +"No--or, rather, I should say yes," the rector answered. And then he +explained that his curate, taking the man red-handed, had let him go, +in the hope that, as it was his first offence, he would take warning +and live honestly. + +"But who was the burglar?" Jack inquired. "You know, I suppose? Is he +in the town now?" + +"Clode never told me his name," Lindo answered. "The man made a point +of that, and I did not press for it. I remember that Clode was +somewhat ashamed of his clemency." + +"He had need to be," Jack snorted. "It sounds an extraordinary story. +All the same, Lindo, I am not sure it has any connection with this." +He held the letter up before him as though drawing inspiration from +it. "This letter, you see," he went on presently, "being the first in +date would be inside the packet. Why should a man who wanted perhaps a +bit of paper for a spill or a pipe-light unfasten this packet and take +the innermost letter? I do not believe it." + +"But no one else save myself," Lindo urged, "has had access to the +letter. And there it is torn." + +"Yes, here it is torn," Jack admitted, gazing thoughtfully at it; +"that is true." + +For a few moments the two sat silent, Jack fingering the letter, Lindo +with his eyes fixed gloomily on the fire. Suddenly the rector broke +out without warning or preface. "What a fool I have been!" he +exclaimed, his tone one of abrupt overwhelming conviction. "Good +heavens, what a fool I have been!" + +His friend looked at him in surprise, and saw that his face was +crimson. "Is it about the letter?" he asked, leaning forward, his tone +sharp with professional impatience. "You do not mean to say, Lindo, +that you really----" + +"No, no!" replied the young clergyman, ruthlessly interrupting him. +"It has nothing to do with the letter." + +He said no more, and Jack waited for further light, but none came, and +the barrister reapplied his thoughts to the problem before him. He had +only just hit upon a new idea, however, when he was again diverted by +an interruption from Lindo. "Jack," said the latter impressively, "I +want you to give a message for me." + +"Not a cartel to Lord Dynmore, I hope?" the barrister muttered. + +"No," Lindo answered, getting up and poking the fire +unnecessarily--what a quantity of embarrassment has been liberated +before now by means of pokers--"no, I want you to give a message to +your cousin---Miss Bonamy, I mean." The rector paused, the poker still +in his hand, and stole a sharp glance at his companion; but, reassured +by the discovery that he was to all appearance buried in the letter, +he continued: "Would you mind telling her that I am sorry I misjudged +her a short time back--she will understand--and behaved, I feel, very +ungratefully to her? She warned me that there was a rumor afloat that +something was amiss with my title, and I am afraid' I was very rude to +her. I should like you to tell her, if you will, that I--that I am +particularly ashamed of myself," he added, with a gulp. + +He did not find the words easy of utterance--far from it; but the +effort they cost him was slight and trivial compared with that which +poor Jack found himself called upon to make. For a moment, indeed, he +was silent, his heart rebelling against the task assigned to him. To +carry his message to her! Then his nobler self answered to the call, +and he spoke. His words, "Yes, I'll tell her," came, it is true, a +little late, in a voice a trifle thick, and were uttered with a +coldness which Lindo would have remarked had he not been agitated +himself. But they came--at a price. The Victoria Cross for moral +courage can seldom be gained by a single act of valor. Many a one has +failed to gain it who had strength enough for the first blow. "Yes, I +will tell her," Jack repeated a few seconds later, folding up the +letter and laying it on the table, but so contriving that his face was +hidden from his friend. "To-morrow will do, I suppose?" he added, the +faintest tinge of irony in his tone. He may be pardoned if he thought +the apology he was asked to carry came a little late. + +"Oh, yes, to-morrow will do," Lindo answered with a start; he had +fallen into a reverie, but now roused himself. "I am afraid you are +very tired, old fellow," he continued, looking gratefully at his +friend. "A friend in need is a friend indeed, you know. I cannot tell +you"--with a sigh--"how very good I think it was of you to come to +me." + +"Nonsense!" Jack said briskly. "It was all in the day's work. As it +is, I have done nothing. And that reminds me," he continued, facing +his companion with a smile--"what of the trouble between my uncle and +you? About the sheep, I mean. You have put it in some lawyer's hands, +have you not?" + +"Yes," Lindo answered reluctantly. + +"Quite right, too," said the barrister. "Who are they?" + +"Turner & Grey, of Birmingham." + +"Well, I will write," Jack answered, "if you will let me, and tell +them to let the matter stand for the present. I think that will be the +best course. Bonamy won't object." + +"But he has issued a writ," the rector explained. A writ seemed to him +a formidable engine. As well dally before the mouth of a cannon. + +But Jack knew better. The law's delays were familiar to him. He was +aware of many a pleasant little halting-place between writ and +judgment. "Never mind about that," he answered, with a confident +laugh. "Shall I settle it for you? I shall know better, perhaps, what +to say to them." + +The rector assented gladly; adding: "Here is their address." It was +stuck in the corner of a picture hanging over the fireplace. He took +it down as he spoke and gave it to Jack, who put it carelessly into +his pocket, and, seizing his hat, said he must go at once--that it was +close on twelve. The rector would have repeated his thanks; but Jack +would not stop to hear them, and in a moment was gone. + +Reginald Lindo returned to the study after letting him out, and, +dropping into the nearest chair, looked round with a sigh. Yet, the +sigh notwithstanding, he was a hundredfold less unhappy now than he +had been at dinner or while looking over that number of "Punch." His +friend's visit had both cheered and softened him. His thoughts no, +longer dwelt on the earl's injustice, the desertion of his friends, or +the humiliations in store for him; but went back again to the warning +Kate Bonamy had given him. Thence it was not unnatural that they +should revert to the beginning of his acquaintance with her. He +pictured her at Oxford, he saw her scolding Daintry in the stiff +drawing-room, or coming to meet him in the Red Lane; and, the veil of +local prejudice torn from his eyes by the events of the day, he began +to discern that this girl, with all the drawbacks of her surroundings, +was the fairest, bravest, and noblest girl he had met at Claversham, +or, for aught he could remember, elsewhere. His eyes glistened. He was +sure--so sure that he would have staked his life on the result--that +for all the earls in England Kate Bonamy would not have deserted him! + +He had reached this point, and Jack had been gone some five minutes or +more, when he was startled by a loud rap at the house door. He stood +up and, wondering who it could be at this hour, took a candle and went +into the hall. Setting the candlestick on a table, he opened the door, +and there, to his astonishment, was Jack come back again! + +"Capital!" said the barrister, slipping in and shutting the door +behind him, as though his return were not in the least degree +extraordinary, "I thought it was you. Look here; there is one thing I +forget to ask you, Lindo. Where did you get the address of those +lawyers?" + +He asked the question so earnestly, and his face, now it could be seen +by the strong light of the candle at his elbow, wore so curious an +expression, that the rector was for a moment quite taken aback. "They +are good people, are they not?" he said, wondering much. + +"Oh, yes, the firm is good enough," Jack answered impatiently. "But +who gave you their address?" + +"Clode," the rector answered. "I went round to his lodgings and he +wrote it down for me." + +"At his lodgings?" cried the barrister. + +"To be sure." + +"Ah! then look here," Jack replied, laying his hand on Lindo's sleeve +and looking up at him with an air of peculiar seriousness--"just tell +me once more, so that I may have no doubt about it: Are you sure that +from the time you docketed those letters until now you have never +removed them--from this house, I mean?" + +"Never!" + +"Never let them go out of the house?" + +"Never!" answered the rector firmly. "I am as certain of it as a man +can be certain of anything." + +"Thanks!" Jack cried. "All right. Good night." And that was all; for, +turning abruptly, in a twinkling he had the door open and was gone, +leaving the rector to go to bed in such a state of mystification as +made him almost forget his fallen fortunes. + + + + + CHAPTER XIX. + + THE DAY AFTER. + + +Oddly enough, the rector's first thought on rising next morning was of +his curate. He had expected, as we have seen, that Clode would call +before bedtime. Disappointed in this, he still felt so certain that +the curate would hasten as soon as possible to offer his sympathy and +assistance that after breakfast he repaired to his study for the +express purpose of receiving him. To find one friend in need is good, +but to find two is better. The young clergyman felt, as people in +trouble of a certain kind do feel, that though he had told Jack all +about it, it would be a relief to tell Stephen all about it also; +the more as Jack, whom he had told, was his personal friend, while +Clode was identified with the place and his unabated confidence and +esteem--of retaining which the rector made no doubt--would go some way +toward soothing the latter's wounded pride. + +It was well, however, that Lindo, sitting down at his writing-table to +await his visitor, found there some scattered notes upon which he +could employ his thoughts, and which without any great concentration +of mind he could form into a sermon. For otherwise his time would have +been wasted. Ten o'clock came, and eleven, and half-past eleven; but +no curate. + +Mr. Clode, in fact, was engaged elsewhere. About half-past ten he +turned briskly into the drive leading to Mrs. Hammond's house and +walked up it at a good pace, with the step of a man who has news to +tell, and is going to tell it. The morning was bright and sunny, the +air crisp and fresh, yet not too cold. The gravel crunched pleasantly +under his feet, while the hoar-frost melting on the dark green leaves +of the laurels bordered his path with a million gems as brilliant as +evanescent. Possibly the pleasure he took in these things, possibly +some thought of his own, lent animation to the curate's face and +figure as he strode along. At any rate, Miss Hammond, meeting him +suddenly at a turn in the approach, saw a change in him, and, reading +the signs aright, blushed. + +"Well?" she said, smiling a question as she held out her hand. They +had scarcely been alone together since the afternoon when the rector's +inopportune call had brought about an understanding between them. + +"Well?" he answered, retaining her hand. "What is it, Laura?" + +"I thought you were going to tell me," she said, glancing up with shy +assurance. The morning air was not fresher. She was so bright and +piquant in her furs and with her dazzling complexion, that other eyes +than her lover's might have been pardoned for likening her to the +frost drops on the laurels. At any rate, she sparkled as they did. + +He looked down at her, fond admiration in his eyes. Had he not come up +on purpose to see her? + +"I think it is all right," he said, in a slightly lower tone. "I think +I may answer for it, Laura, that we shall not have much longer to +wait." + +She gazed at him, seeming for the moment startled and taken by +surprise. "Have you heard of a living, then?" she murmured, her eyes +wide, her breath coming and going. + +He nodded. + +"Where?" she asked, in the same low tone. "You do not mean--here!" + +He nodded again. + +"At Claversham!" she exclaimed. "Then will he have to go, really?" + +"I think he will," Clode replied, a glow of triumph warming his dark +face and kindling his eyes. "When Lord Dynmore left here yesterday he +drove straight to Mr. Bonamy's. You hardly believe it, do you? Well, +it is true, for I had it from a sure source. And, that being so, I do +not think Lindo will have much chance against such an alliance. It is +not as if he had many friends here, or had got on well with the +people." + +"The poor people like him," she urged. + +"Yes," Clode answered sharply. "He has spent money among them. It was +not his own, you see." + +It was a brutal thing to say, and she cast a glance of gentle reproof +at him. She did not remonstrate, however, but, slightly changing the +subject, asked, "But even if Mr. Lindo goes, are you sure of the +living?" + +"I think so," he answered, smiling confidently down at her. + +She looked puzzled. "How do you know?" she asked. "Did Lord Dynmore +promise it to you?" + +"No; I wish he had," he answered. "All the same, I think I am fairly +sure of it without the promise." And then he related to her what the +archdeacon had told him as to Lord Dynmore's intention of presenting +the curates in future. "Now do you see, Laura?" he asked. + +"Yes, I see," she answered, looking down and absently poking a hole in +the gravel with the point of her umbrella. + +"And you are content?" + +"Yes," she answered, looking up brightly from a little dream of the +rectory as it should be, when feminine taste had transformed it with +the aid of Persian rugs and old china and the hundred knickknacks +which are half a woman's life--"Yes, I am content, Mr. Clode." + +"Say 'Stephen.'" + +"I am quite content, Stephen," she answered obediently, a bright blush +for a moment mingling with her smile. + +He was about to make some warm rejoinder, when the sound of footsteps +approaching from the house diverted his attention, and he looked up. +The new-comer was Mrs. Hammond, also on her way into the town. She +waved her hand to him. "Good morning," she cried in her cheery +voice--"you are just the person I wanted to see, Mr. Clode. This is +good luck. Now, how is he?" + +"Who? Mrs. Hammond," said the curate, quite taken by surprise. + +"Who?" she replied warmly, reproach in her tone. She was a +kind-hearted woman, and the scene in her drawing-room had really cost +her a few minutes' sleep. "Why, Mr. Lindo, to be sure. Whom else +should I mean? I suppose you went in last night at once and told him +how much we all sympathized with him? Indeed, I hope you did not leave +him until you saw him well to bed, for I am sure he was hardly fit to +be left alone, poor fellow!" + +Mr. Clode stood silent, and looked troubled. Really, if it had +occurred to him, he would have called to see Lindo. But it had not +occurred to him, after what had happened--perhaps because he had been +busied about things which "seemed worth while." He regretted now, +since Mrs. Hammond seemed to think it so much a matter of course, that +he had not done so; the more as the omission compelled him to choose +his side earlier than he need have done. However, it was too late now. +So he shook his head. "I have not seen him, Mrs. Hammond," he said +gravely. "I have not been to the rectory." + +"What! you have not seen him?" she cried in amazement. + +"No, I have not," he answered, a slight tinge of hauteur in his +manner. After all, he reflected that he would have found it painful to +play another part before Laura after disclosing so much of his mind to +her. "What is more, Mrs. Hammond," he continued, "I am not anxious to +see him; for, to tell you the truth, I fear that the meeting could +only be a painful one." + +"Why, you do not mean to say," the lady answered in a low, +awe-stricken voice, "that you think he knew anything about it, Mr. +Clode?" + +"At any rate," the curate replied firmly, "I cannot acquit him." + +"Not acquit him!--Mr. Lindo!" she stammered. + +"No, I cannot," Clode replied, striving to express in his voice and +manner his extreme conscientiousness and the gloomy sense of +responsibility under which he had arrived at his decision. "I cannot +get out of my head," he continued, "Lord Dynmore's remark that, if the +circumstances aroused suspicion in my mind, they could scarcely fail +to apprise Mr. Lindo, who was more nearly concerned, of the truth, or +something like the truth. Mind!" the curate added with a great show of +candor, "I do not say, Mrs. Hammond, that Mr. Lindo knew. I only say I +think he suspected." + +"Well, _that_ is very good of you!" Mrs. Hammond exclaimed, displaying +a spirit and a power of sarcasm he had not expected. "I dare say Mr. +Lindo will be much obliged to you for _that!_ But, for my part, I +think it is a distinction without a difference!" + +"Oh, no!" the curate protested hastily. + +"Well, I think it is, at any rate!" retorted the lady, very red in the +face, and with all the bugles in her bonnet shaking. "However, +everyone to his opinion. But that is not mine, and I am sorry it is +yours. Why, you are his curate!" she added in a tone of indignant +wonder, which brought the blood to Clode's cheeks, and made him bite +his lip in impotent anger. "You ought to be the last person to doubt +him!" + +"Can I help it if I do?" he answered sullenly. + +"Mother," said Laura quickly, intercepting the angry reply which was +on Mrs. Hammond's lips, "if Mr. Clode thinks in that way, can he be +blamed for telling us? We are not the town. What he has told us he has +told us in confidence." + +"A confidence Mrs. Hammond has made me bitterly regret," he rejoined, +taking skilful advantage of her intervention. + +Mrs. Hammond grunted. She was still angry, but she felt herself +baffled. "Well, I do not understand these things, perhaps," she said. +"But I do not agree with Mr. Clode, and I am not going to pretend to." + +"I am sure he does not wish you to," said Laura sweetly. "Only you did +not quite understand, I think, that he was only giving us his private +opinion. Of course he would not tell it to the town." + +"Well, that makes a difference, of course," Mrs. Hammond allowed. "But +now, however, I will say good-morning! I shall go straight to the +rectory now and inquire. Are you coming, Laura?" + +Laura thought it better to go and with a bright little nod, tripped +off after her mother. Mr. Clode, thus deserted, walked slowly down the +drive, wondering whether he had been premature in his revolt. He did +not think so; and yet he wished he had not been so hasty--that he had +not shown his hand quite so early. The truth was, he had been a little +carried away by the events of the previous afternoon. But, even now, +the more he thought of it, the more hopeless seemed the rector's +position. Openly denounced by his patron as an impostor, at war with +his church-warden, disliked by a powerful section of the parish, one +action already commenced against him and another threatened--what else +could he do but resign? "He may say he will not to-day and to-morrow," +the curate thought, smiling darkly to himself, "but they will be too +much for him the day after." + +And whether Mr. Clode told this opinion of his in the own or not, it +was certainly a very common one. Never had Claversham been treated to +such a dish of gossip as this. On the evening of the bazaar, before +the unsold goods had been cleared from the tables, the wildest rumors +were already afloat in the town. The rector had been arrested; he had +decamped; he was to be tried for fraud; he was not in holy orders at +all; Mrs. Bedford would have to be married over again! With the +morning these reports died away, and something like the truth came to +be known--to the inexpressible satisfaction of Dr. Gregg and his like. +The doctor was in and out of half the houses in the town that day. +"Resign!" he would say with a shriek--"of course he will resign! And +glad to escape so easily!" Dr. Gregg, indeed, was in his glory now. +The parts were reversed. It was for him now to meet the rector with a +patronizing nod; only, for some reason best known to himself, and +perhaps connected with an essential distinction between the two men, +he preferred to celebrate his triumph figuratively, and behind Lindo's +back. + +What was said, and how it was said, can well be imagined. When a man +who for some cause has held his head a little above his neighbors +stumbles and falls, we know what is likely to be said of him. And the +young rector knew, and in his heart and in his study suffered +horribly. All the afternoon of the day after the bazaar he walked the +town with a smile on his face, ostensibly visiting in his district, +really vindicating his pride and courage. He carried his head as high +as ever, and the skirts of his long black coat fluttered as bravely as +before. Dr. Gregg, who saw him from the reading-room window, gave it +as his opinion that he did not know what shame meant. But at heart the +young man was unutterably miserable. He knew that inquisitive eyes +were upon his every gesture; that he was watched, jeered at, worst of +all--pitied. He guessed, as the day wore on, drawing the inference +from the curate's avoidance of him, that even Clode had deserted him; +and this, perhaps, almost as much as the resentment he harbored +against Lord Dynmore, hardened him in his resolve not to resign or +abate one tittle of his rights. + +He fancied he stood alone. But, of course, there were some who +sympathized with him, and some who held their tongues and declined to +commit themselves to any opinion. Among the latter Mr. Bonamy was +conspicuous--to the intense disgust of Dr. Gregg, whose first +expression, indeed, on hearing the news had been, "What nuts for +Bonamy!" As a fact, however, the snappish little doctor had never +found his friend so morose and unpleasant as when he tried to sound +him on this subject. He espied him on the other side of the street, +and rushed across, stuttering almost before he reached him, "Well? He +will have to resign, won't he?" + +"Who?" said Mr. Bonamy, standing still, and fixing his cold gray eyes +on the excited little man. "Who will have to resign?" + +"Why, the rector, to be sure!" rejoined Gregg, feeling the check +unpleasantly. + +"Will he?" + +"Well, I should say so," urged the doctor, now quite taken aback, and +gazing at the other with eyes of surprise. "But I suppose you know +best, Bonamy." + +"Then I am going to keep my knowledge to myself!" snarled the lawyer; +and, rattling a handful of silver in his pocket, he stalked away, his +hat on the back of his head, and his lank figure more ungainly than +usual. He was in the worst of tempers; angry with Lord Dynmore and +dissatisfied with himself--given to calling himself, half a dozen +times in an hour, a quixotic fool for having thrown away the earl's +business for the sake of a scruple that was little more than a whim. +It is all very well to have a queer rugged code of honor of one's own, +and to observe it; but when the observance sends away business--such +business as brings with it the social considerations which men prize +most highly when they most affect to despise it--why then a man is apt +to take out his self-denial in ill-temper. Mr. Bonamy did so. + +Dr. Gregg went away calling the lawyer a bear and an ill-bred fellow +who did not know his own friends. Alas! the same thing might have been +said, and with greater justice, of the rector. The archdeacon sat an +hour in his study, waiting patiently for him to return from his +district, and after all got but a sorry reception. The elder man +expressed, and expressed very warmly--he had come to do so--his full +belief in Lindo's honesty and good faith, and was greatly touched by +the effect his words produced upon the young fellow, who had come into +the room, after learning his visitor's presence, with set lips and +eyes of challenge, but had by-and-by to turn his back on his friend +and look out of the window, while in a very low tone he murmured his +thanks. But, alas! the archdeacon went farther, and let drop something +about concession, and then the boat was over! + +"Concession!" said the young man, turning as on a pivot, with every +hair of his whiskers bristling, and his voice clear enough now. "What +kind of concession do you mean?" + +"Well," said the archdeacon persuasively, "the earl is a choleric +man--a most passionate man, I know; and, when excited, utterly foolish +and wrong-headed. But in his cooler moments I do not know any one more +just or, indeed, more generous. And I feel sure that if you could +prevail on yourself to meet him half-way----" + +"By resigning?" snapped the rector, interrupting him point-blank with +the question. + +"Oh, no, no," said the archdeacon, "I do not mean that." + +"Then in what way? How?" + +But as the archdeacon really meant by resigning, he could not answer +the question, and the interview ended in Lindo roundly declaring, as +he walked up and down the room, "I will not resign! Understand that, +archdeacon! I will not resign! If Lord Dynmore can put me out, well +and good--let him. If not, I stay. He may be just or generous," +continued the young man scornfully--"all I know is that he insulted me +grossly, and as no gentleman would have insulted another." + +"He is passionate, and was taken by surprise," the archdeacon ventured +to say. But Lindo would not listen; and his visitor had presently to +go, fearing that he had done more harm than good by his mediation. As +for the rector, he was severely scolded later in the evening by Jack +Smith for having omitted to lay the letters offering him the living +before the archdeacon, or to explain to him the precise circumstances +under which he had accepted it. + +"But he said he did not doubt me," the rector urged rather +fractiously. + +"Pooh! that is not the point," the barrister retorted. "Of course he +does not. He knows you. But I want to put him in possession of such a +case as he may lay before others who do not know you. Look here, you +are acquainted with a man called Felton, are you not?" + +"Yes," Lindo answered, with a slight start. + +"Well, perhaps you are not aware that he has been to Lord Dynmore--so +the tale runs in the town, and I know it is true--and stated that you +have been for weeks bribing him to keep the secret." + +The rector sat motionless, staring at his friend. "I did not know it," +he said at last, quite quietly. He was becoming accustomed to +surprises of this kind. "It is a wicked lie, of course." + +"Of course," Jack assented tossing one leg easily over the other, and +thrusting his hands deep into his trousers' pockets. "But what do you +say to it?" + +"The man came to me," Lindo answered steadily, "and told me that he +was Lord Dynmore's servant, and that, crossing from America, he had +foolishly lost his money at play. He begged me to assist him until +Lord Dynmore's return, and I did so. Some ten days ago I discovered +that he was leading a disreputable life, and I stopped the allowance." + +"Thanks," said Jack, nodding his head. "That is precisely what I +thought. But the mischief of it is, you see, that the man's tale may +be true in his eyes. He may have believed that he was blackmailing +you. And therefore, since we cannot absolutely refute his story, it is +the more important that we should show as good a case as possible +_aliunde_. Nor does it make any difference," Jack continued drily, +"that the man, after seeing Lord Dynmore last night, has taken himself +quietly off this morning." + +"What! Felton?" the rector exclaimed, coming suddenly upright. + +"Yes. There is no doubt he has absconded. Bonamy's clerk has been +after him all day, and has discovered that he begged half-a-crown from +your curate, to whom he was seen speaking at the Top of the Town about +ten this morning. Since that time he has not been seen." + +"He may turn up yet," said the rector. + +"I do not think he will," the barrister replied, with a shrewd gleam +in his eyes. "But you must not flatter yourself that his disappearance +will do you any good. Of course some people will say that he was +afraid to remain and support a false statement. But more, I fear, will +lean to the opinion that he was got out of the way by some one--you, +for instance." + +"I see," said Lindo slowly, after a long pause. "Then it is the more +imperative that I should not dream of resigning." + +"I think so," said Jack. + + + + + CHAPTER XX. + + A SUDDEN CALL. + + +"Kate," said Daintry, looking up from a lesson book as her sister +entered the dining-room a few mornings after the bazaar, "are you +_never_ going to see old Peggy Jones again? I am sure that you have +not been near her for a fortnight?" + +"I ought to go, I know," Kate answered, pausing by the sideboard, with +a big bunch of keys dangling from her fingers and an absent expression +in her gray eyes. "I have not been for some time." + +"I should think you had not!" quoth Daintry severely. "You have hardly +been out of the house the last four days." + +A faint color stole into the elder girl's face, and, seeming suddenly +to recollect what she wanted, she turned and began to search in the +drawer behind her. She knew quite well that what Daintry said was +true--that she had not been out for four days. Jack had delivered the +rector's message to her, and she had listened with downcast eyes and a +grave composure--a composure so perfect that even the messenger who +held the clue in his hand was almost deceived by it. All the same, it +had made her very happy. The young rector appreciated at last the +motive which had led her to give him that strange warning. He was +grateful to her, and anxious to make her understand his gratitude. And +while she dwelt on this with pleasure, she foresaw with a strange +mingling of joy and fear, of anticipation and shrinking, that the +first time she met him abroad he would strive to make it still more +clear to her. + +So for four days, lest she should seem even to herself to be +precipitating the meeting, she had refrained from going out. Now, when +Daintry remarked upon the change in her habits, she blushed at the +thought that she might all the time have been exaggerating a trifle; +and, though she did not go out at once, in the course of the afternoon +she did issue forth, and called upon old Peggy. Coming back she had to +pass through the churchyard, and there, on the very spot where she had +once forced herself to address him, she met the rector. + +She saw him while he was still some way off, and before he saw her, +and she looked eagerly for any trace of the trouble of the last few +days. It had not changed him, at any rate. It had rather accentuated +him, she thought. He looked more boyish, more impetuous, more +independent than ever, as he came swinging along, his blond head +thrown back, his eyes roving this way and that, his long skirts +flapping behind him. Of defeat or humiliation he betrayed not a trace; +and the girl wondered, seeing him so calm and strong, if he had really +sent her that message--which seemed to have come from a man hard +pressed. + +A glance told her all this; and then he saw her, and, a flash of +recognition sweeping across his face, quickened his steps to meet her. +He seemed to be shaking hands with her before he had well considered +what he would say, for when he had gone through that ceremony, and +said "Good morning." he stood awkwardly silent. Then he said +hurriedly, "I have been waiting for some time to speak to you, Miss +Bonamy." + +"Indeed?" she said calmly. She wondered at her own self-control. + +"Yes," he answered, his color rising. "And I could not have met you in +a better place." + +"Why?" she asked. As if she did not know! The simplest woman is an +actress by nature. + +"Because," he answered, "it is well that I should do penance where I +sinned, Miss Bonamy," he continued impetuously, yet in a low voice, +and with his eyes on the ground. "I owe you a deep apology for my rude +thanklessness when I met you here last. You were right and I was +wrong; but if it had been the other way, still I ought not to have +behaved to you as I did. I thought--that is--I----" + +He faltered and stopped. He meant that he had thought that she was +playing into her father's hands, but he could hardly tell her that. +She understood, however, or guessed, and for the first time she +blushed. "Pray, do not say any more about it," she said hurriedly. + +"I did send you a message," he answered. + +"Oh, yes, yes," she replied, anxious only to put an end to his +apologies. + +"Well," he rejoined with a smile which did not completely veil his +earnestness, "I do find it a little more pleasant to look farther back +to our Oxford visit. But you are going this way. May I turn with you?" + +"I am only going home," Kate answered coldly. He had been humble +enough to her. He had said and looked all she had expected. But he was +not at all the crushed, beaten man whom she had looked to meet. He +was, outwardly at least, the same man who had once sought her society +for a few weeks and had then slighted her and shunned her to consort +with the Homfreys and their class. He had not said he was sorry for +_that_. + +He read her tone aright, and he colored furiously, growing in a second +a thousand times more confused than before. It was on the cards that +he would accept the rebuff, and leave her in resentment. Indeed, that +was his first impulse. But the consciousness, which the next moment +filled his mind, that he had deserved this, and perhaps the charm of +her gray eyes and proud downturned face, overcame him. "I will come a +little way with you, if you will let me," he said, turning and walking +by her side. + +Kate's heart gave a great leap. She understood both the first thought +and the second, the weaker impulse and the stronger one which mastered +it, and she would not have been a woman had she not felt her triumph. +She hastened to find something to say, and could think only of the +bazaar. She asked him if it had been a success. + +"The bazaar?" he said. "To tell you the truth, I am afraid I hardly +know. I should say so, now you ask me, but I have not given much +thought to it since. I have been too fully occupied with other +things," he added, a note of bitterness in his voice. "Ah! Miss +Bonamy," with a fresh change of tone, "what a good fellow your cousin +is!" + +"Yes, he is indeed!" she answered heartily. + +"I cannot tell you," he continued, "what generous help and support he +has given me during the last few days. He has been the greatest +possible comfort to me." + +She looked up at him impulsively. "He is Daintry's hero," she said. + +"Yes," he answered laughing, "I remember that her praise made me +almost jealous of him. That was when I first knew you--when I was +coming to Claversham, you remember, Miss Bonamy, full of pleasant +anticipations and hopes. The reality has been different. Jack has told +you, of course, of Lord Dynmore's strange attack upon me? But +perhaps," he added, checking himself, and glancing at her, "I ought +not to speak to you about it, as your father is acting for him." + +"I do not think he is," she murmured, looking straight before her. + +"But--it is true the only communication I have had since has been from +London--still I thought--I mean I was under the impression that Lord +Dynmore had at once gone to your father." + +"I think he saw him at the office," Kate answered, "but I believe my +father is not acting for him." + +"Do you know why?" said the rector bluntly. "Why he is not, I mean?" + +"No," she said--that and nothing more. She was too proud to defend her +father, though he had let drop enough in the family circle to enable +her to come to a conclusion, and she might with truth have made out a +story which would have set the lawyer in a light differing much from +that in which the rector was accustomed to view him. + +Reginald Lindo walked on considering the matter. Suddenly he said, +"The archdeacon thinks I ought to resign. What do you think, Miss +Bonamy?" + +Her heart began to beat quickly. He was seeking her advice!--asking +her opinion in this matter so utterly important to him, so absolutely +vital! For a moment she could not speak, she was so filled with +surprise. Then she said gently, her eyes on the pavement, "I do not +think I can judge." + +"But you must have heard--more I dare say than I have!" he rejoined +with a forced laugh. "Will you tell me what you think?" + +She looked before her, her face troubled. Then she spoke bravely. + +"I think you should judge for yourself," she said in a low tone, full +of serious feeling. "The responsibility is yours. I do not think that +you should depend entirely on any one's advice, but should try to do +right according to your conscience--not acting hastily, but coolly, +and on reflection." + +They were almost at Mr. Bonamy's door when she said this, and he +traversed the remainder of the distance without speaking. At the steps +he halted and held out his hand. "Thank you," he said simply. "I hope +I shall use this advice to better purpose than the last you gave me. +Please remember me to your sister. Good-by." + +She bowed silently and went in, and he turned back and walked up the +street. The dusk was falling. A few yards in front of him the lame +lamplighter was going his rounds, ladder on shoulder. In every other +shop the gas was beginning to gleam. The night was coming, was almost +come, yet still above the houses the sky, a pale greenish-blue, was +bright with daylight, against which the great tower of the church +stood up bulky and black. The young man was in a curious mood. Though +he walked the common pavement, he felt himself, as he gazed upward, +alone with his thoughts which went back, will he nill he, to his first +evening in Claversham. He remembered how free from reproach or +stumbling-blocks his path had seemed then, to what blameless ends he +had in fancy devoted himself. What works of thanksgiving, small but +beneficent as the tiny rills which steal downward through the ferns to +the pasture, he had planned. And in the centre of that past dream of +the future he pictured now--Kate Bonamy. Well, the reality had been +different. + +He was just beginning to wonder when he would be likely to meet her +again, and to dwell with curious pleasure on some of the details of +her dress and appearance, when the sudden clatter of hoofs behind him +caused him to turn his head. Far down the street a rider had just +turned the corner, and was now galloping up the middle of the roadway, +the manner in which he urged on his pony speaking loudly of disaster +and ill news. Opposite the rector he pulled up and cried out, "Where +is the doctor's, sir?" + +Lindo turned sharply round and rang the bell of the house behind him, +which happened to be Gregg's. + +"Here," he said briefly. "What is it, my man?" + +"An explosion in the Big Pit at Baerton," the man replied, almost +blubbering with excitement and the speed at which he had come. "There +is like to be fifty killed and as many hurt, I was told. But I came +straight off." + +"When did it happen?" Lindo asked, a wave of wild excitement following +his first impulse of horror. + +"About an hour and a quarter ago, as near as I can say," the +messenger, a farm laborer called from the plough, answered. + +Dr. Gregg was out, and the clergyman walked by the side of the horse, +a crowd gathering behind him as the news spread, to the house of Mr. +Keogh the other doctor, who fortunately lived close by. He was at +home, and, the messenger going in to tell him the particulars, in five +minutes his gig was at the door, The rector, who had gone in too, came +out with him, and, without asking leave, climbed to the seat beside +him. + +"Hallo!" said the surgeon, an elderly man, stout and white-haired, +"are you coming, too, Mr. Lindo?" + +"I think," the rector answered, "that there may be cases in which you +can do little and I much. Mr. Walker, the vicar of Baerton, is ill in +bed, I know; and as the news has come to me first, I think I ought to +go." + +"Right you are!" said Mr. Keogh gruffly. "Let go!" + +In another moment the fast trotting cob was whirling the two men down +the street. They turned the corner sharply, and as the breeze met them +on the bridge, compelling Lindo to turn up the collar of his coat and +draw the rug more closely round him, the church clock in the town +behind them struck the half-hour. "Half-past five," said the rector. +The surgeon did not answer. They were in the open country now, the +hedges speeding swiftly by them in the light of the lamps, and the +long outline of Bear Hill, a huge misshapen hump which rose into a +point at one end, lying dim and black before them. A night drive is +always impressive. In the gloom, in the sough of the wind, in the sky +serenely star-lit, in a tumult of hurrying clouds, in the rattle of +the wheels, in the monotonous fall of the hoofs, there is an appeal to +the sombre side of a man. How much more when the sough of the wind +seems to the imagination a cry of pain, and the night is a dark +background on which the fancy paints dying faces! At such a time the +cares of life, which day by day rise one beyond another and prevent us +dwelling over-much on the end, sink into pettiness, leaving us face to +face with weightier issues. + +"There have been accidents here before?" the clergyman asked, after a +long silence. + +"Thirty-five years ago there was one!" his companion answered, with a +groan which betrayed his apprehensions. "Good heavens, sir, I remember +it now! I was young then and fresh from the hospitals; but it was +almost too much for me!" + +"I hope that this one has been exaggerated," Lindo replied, entering +fully into the other's feelings. "I did not quite understand the man's +account; but, as far as I could follow it, one of the two shafts--the +downcast shaft I think it was---was jammed full of rubbish and +rendered quite useless." + +"Just what I expected!" ejaculated his companion. + +"And they could now communicate with the workings only through the +upcast shaft, in which they had rigged up some temporary lifting +gear." + +"Ay, and it is the deepest pit here," the surgeon chimed in, as the +horse began to breast the steeper part of the ascent, and the furnace +fires, before and above them, began to flicker and glow, now sinking +into darkness, now flaming up like beacon-fires. "The workings are two +thousand feet below the surface, man!" + +"Stop!" Lindo said. "Here is some one looking for us, I think." + +Two women with shawls over their heads came to the side of the gig. +"Be you the doctors?" said one of them; and then in another minute the +two were following her up the side of the cutting which here confined +the road. The hillside gained, they were hurried round pit-banks and +slag-heaps, and under cranes and ruinous sinking walls, and over and +under mysterious obstacles, sometimes looming large in the gloom and +sometimes lying unseen at their feet--until they emerged at length +with startling abruptness into a large circle of dazzling light. Four +great fires were burning close together, and round them, motionless +and for the most part silent, in appearance almost apathetic, stood +hundreds of dark shadows--men and women waiting for news. + +The silence and inaction of so large a crowd struck a chill to +Lindo's heart. When he recovered himself, he was standing in the midst +of a dozen rough fellows, some half-stripped, some muffled up in +pilot-jackets or coarse shiny clothes. The crowd seemed to be watching +them, and they spoke now and then to one another in a desultory +expectant fashion, from which he judged they were in authority. + +"It is a bad job--a very bad job!" his companion was saying nervously. +"Is there anything I can do yet?" + +"Well, that depends, doctor," answered one of the men, his manner of +speaking proving that he was not a mere working collier. "There is no +one up yet," he added, eyeing the doctor dubiously. "But it does not +exactly follow that you can do nothing. Some of us have just come up, +and there is a shift of men exploring down there now. Three bodies +have been recovered, and they are at the foot of the shaft; and three +poor fellows have been found alive, of whom one has since died. The +other two are within fifty yards of the shaft, and as comfortable as +we can make them. But they are bad--too bad to come up in a bucket; +and we can rig up nothing bigger at present so there they are fixed. +The question is, will you go down to them?" + +Mr. Keogh's face fell, and he shook his head. He was no longer young, +and to descend a sheer depth of five hundred yards in a bucket +dangling at the end of a makeshift rope was not in his line. "No, +thank you," he said, "I could not do it." + +"Come, doctor," the man persisted--he was the manager of a neighboring +colliery--"you will be there in no time." + +"Just so," said the surgeon drily. "It is the coming back is the rub, +you see, Mr. Peat. No, thank you, I could not." + +The other still urged him. "These poor fellows are about as bad as +they can be, and you know if the mountain will not go to Mahomet, +Mahomet must go to the mountain." + +"I know; and if it were a mountain, well and good," Mr. Keogh +answered, smiling in sickly fashion as his eye strayed to a black +well-like hole close at hand--a mere hole in some loose planks +surmounted by a windlass and fringed with ugly wreckage. "But it is +not. It is quite the other thing, you see." + +Mr. Peat, the manager, shrugged his shoulders, and glanced at his +companions rather in sorrow than surprise. Lindo, standing behind the +doctor, saw the look. Till then he had stood silent. Now he pressed +forward. "Did I hear you say that one of the injured men died after he +was found?" he asked. + +"Yes, that is so," the manager answered, looking keenly at him, and +wondering who he was. + +"The others that are hurt--are their lives in danger?" + +"I am afraid so," the man replied. + +"Then I have a right to be with them," the rector answered quickly. "I +am a clergyman, and I have hastened here, fearing this might be the +case. But I have also attended an ambulance class, and I can dress a +burn. Besides, I am a younger man than our friend here, and, if you +will let me down, I will go." + +"By George, sir!" exclaimed the manager, looking round for approval +and smiting his thigh heavily, "you are a man as well as a parson, and +down you shall go, and thank you! You may make the men more +comfortable, and any way you will put heart into them, for you have +some to spare yourself. As for danger, there is none!--Jack!"--this in +a louder voice to some one in the background--"just twitch that rope! +And get that tub up, will you? Look slippery now." + +Lindo felt a hand on his arm and, obeying the silent gesture of the +nearest gaunt figure, stepped aside. In a twinkling the man stripped +off the parson's long coat and put on him the pilot jacket from his +own shoulders; a second man gave Lindo a peaked cap of stiff leather +in place of his soft hat and a third fastened a pit lamp round his +neck, explaining to him how to raise the wick without unlocking the +lamp, and also showing him that, if it hung too much on one side or +were upset, its flame would expire of itself. And upon one thing Lindo +was never tired of dwelling afterward--the kindly tact of these rough +men, and how by seemingly casual words, and even touches, the roughest +sought to encourage him, while ignoring the possibility of his feeling +alarm. + +Meanwhile Mr. Keogh, standing in a state of considerable perplexity +and discomfiture where the rector had left him, heard a well-known +voice at his elbow, and turned to find that Gregg had arrived. The +younger doctor was not the man to be awed into silence, and, as he +came up, was speaking loudly. "Hallo, Mr. Keogh!" he said. "Heard you +were before me. Have you got them all in hand? Cuts or burns mostly, +eh?" + +"They are not above ground yet," Mr. Keogh answered. He and Gregg were +not on speaking; terms, but such an emergency as this was allowed to +override their estrangement. + +"Oh, then we shall have to wait," Gregg answered, looking round on the +scene with a mixture of curiosity and professional _aplomb_. "I wish I +had spared my horse. Any other medical man here?" + +"No; and they want one of us to go down in the bucket," Keogh +explained. "There are some injured men at the foot of the shaft. I +have a wife and children, and I thought that perhaps you----" + +"Would not mind breaking my neck!" Gregg retorted with decision. "No, +thank you, not for me I hope to have a wife and children some day, and +I will keep my neck for them. Go down!" he repeated, looking round +with extreme scorn. "Pooh! No one can expect us to do it! It is these +people's business, and they are used to it; but there is not a sane +man in the kingdom, besides, would go down that place after what has +just happened. It is a quarter of a mile as a stone falls, if it is an +inch!" + +"It is all that," assented the other, much relieved. + +"And a height makes me giddy," Dr. Gregg added. + +"I feel the same now," said his elder. + +"No; every man to his trade," Gregg concluded, settling the matter to +his satisfaction. "Let them bring them up, and we will doctor them. +But while they are below ground---- Hallo!" + +His last word was an oath of surprise and anger. Happening to glance +round, the doctor saw Lindo coming forward to the shaft, and +recognized him in spite of his disguise. One look, and Gregg would +cheerfully have given ten pounds either to have had the rector away, +or to have arrived a little later himself. He had reckoned already in +his own mind that, if no outsider went down, he could scarcely be +blamed for taking care of himself. But, if the rector went down, the +matter would wear a different aspect. And Dr. Gregg saw this so +clearly that he turned pale with rage and chagrin, and swore more +loudly than before. + + + + + CHAPTER XXI. + + IN PROFUNDIS. + + +The young clergyman's face, as he walked forward to the shaft, formed +no index to his mind, for while it remained calm and even wore a faint +smile, he was inwardly conscious of a strong desire to take hold of +anything which presented itself, even a straw. He stepped gravely into +the tub amid a low murmur, and, clutching the iron bar above it, felt +himself at a word of command lifted gently into the air, and swung +over the shaft. For an uncomfortable five seconds or so he remained +stationary; then there was a jerk--another--and the dark figures, the +lines of faces, and the glare of the fires leapt suddenly above his +head. He found himself dropping through space with a swift, sickening +motion, as of one falling away from himself. His heart rose into his +throat. There was a loud buzzing in his ears, and yet above this he +heard the dull rattling sound of the rope being paid out. Every other +sense was spent in the stern clutch of his hands on the bar above his +head. + +In a few seconds the horrible sensation of falling passed away. He was +no longer in space with nothing stable about him, but in a small tub +at the end of a tough rope. Except for a slight swaying motion, he +hardly knew that he was still descending; and presently a faint light, +more diffused than his own lamp, grew visible. Then he came gently to +a standstill, and some one held up a lantern to his face. With +difficulty he made out two huge figures standing beside him, who laid +hold of his tub and pulled it toward them until it rested on something +solid. "You are welcome," growled one, as, aided by a hand of each, +Lindo stepped out. "You will be the doctor, I suppose, master? Well, +this way. Catch hold of my jacket." + +Lindo obeyed, being only too glad of the help thus given him; for +though the men seemed to move about with ease and certainty, he could +make out nothing but shapeless gloom. "Now you sit right down there," +continued the collier, when they had moved a few yards, "and you will +get the sight of your eyes in a bit." + +He did as he was bid, and one by one the objects about him became +visible. His first feeling was one of astonishment. He had put a +quarter of a mile of solid earth between himself and the sunlight, and +yet, for all he could see, he might be merely in a cellar under a +street. He found himself seated on a rough bench, in a low-roofed, +windowless, wooden cabin, strangely resembling a very dirty London +office in a fog. True, everything was black--very black. On another +bench, opposite him, sat the two colliers who had received him, their +lamps between their knees. His first impulse was to tell them +hurriedly that he was not the doctor. "I am afraid you must be +disappointed," he added, "but I hope one will follow me down. I am a +clergyman, and I want to do something for those poor fellows, if you +will take me to them." + +The two men betrayed no surprise, but he who had spoken before quietly +poked up the wick of his lamp and held the lantern up so as to get a +good view of his face. "Ay, ay," he said, nodding, as he lowered it +again. "I thought you weren't unbeknown to me. You are the parson we +fetched to poor Lucas a while ago. Well, Jim will have a rare cageful +of his friends with him to-night." + +The rector shuddered. Such apathy, such matter-of-factness was new to +him. But though his heart sank as the collier rose and, swinging his +lamp in his hand, passed through the doorway, he made haste to follow +him; and the man's next words, "You had best look to your steps, +master, for there is a deal of rubbish come down"--pointing as they +did to a material danger--brought him, in the diversion of his +thoughts, something like relief. + +The road on which he found himself, being the main heading or highway +of the pit, was a good wide one. It was even possible to stand upright +in it. Here and there, however, it was partially blocked by falls of +coal caused by the explosion, and over one of these his guide put out +his hand to assist him. Lindo's lamp was by this time burning low. The +pitman silently took it and raised the wick, a grim smile distorting +his face as he handed it back. "You will be about the first of the +gentry," he muttered, "as has been down this pit without paying his +footing." + +Lindo took the words for a hint, and was shocked by the man's +insensibility. "My good fellow," he answered, "if that is all, you +shall have what you like another time. But for heaven's sake let us +think of these poor fellows now." + +The man turned on him and swore furiously. "Do you think I meant +that?" he cried, with another violent oath. + +The rector recoiled, not at the sound of the man's profanity, but in +disgust at his own mistake. Then he held out his hand. "My man," he +said, "I beg your pardon. It was I who was wrong." + +The giant looked at him with another stare, but made no answer, and a +dozen steps brought them to another cabin. Across the doorway--there +was no door--hung a rough curtain of matting. This the man raised, +and, holding his lamp over the threshold, invited the rector to look +in. "I guess," he added significantly, "that you would not have made +that mistake, master, after seeing this." + +Lindo peered in. On the floor, which was little more than six feet +square, lay four quiet figures, motionless, and covered with coarse +sacking. No human eye falling on them could have taken them for +anything but what they were. The visitor shuddered, as his guide let +the curtain fall again and muttered with a backward jerk of the head, +"Two of them I came down with this morning--in the cage." + +The rector had nothing to answer, and the man, preceding him to a +cabin a few yards farther on, invited him by a sign to enter, and +himself turned back the way they had come. A faint moaning warned +Lindo, before he raised the matting, what he must expect to see. +Instinctively, as he stepped in, his eyes sought the floor; and +although three pitmen crouching upon one of the benches rose and made +way for him, he hardly noticed them, so occupied was he with pitiful +looking at the two men lying on coarse beds on the floor. They were +bandaged and muffled almost out of human form. One of them was rolling +his sightless face monotonously to and fro, pouring out an unceasing +stream of delirious talk. The other, whose bright eyes met the +newcomer's with eager longing, paused in the murmur which seemed to +ease his pain, and whispered, "Doctor!" so hopefully that the sound +went straight to Lindo's heart. + +To undeceive him, and to explain to the others that he was not the +expected surgeon, was a bitter task with which to begin his +ministrations; but he was greatly cheered to find that, even in their +disappointment, they took his coming as a kindly thing, and eyed him +with surprised gratitude. He told them the latest news from the +bank--that a cage would be rigged up in a few hours at farthest--and +then, conquering his physical shrinking, he knelt down by the least +injured man and tried to turn his surgical knowledge to account. It +was not much he could do, but it certainly eased the poor man's +present sufferings. A bandage was laid more smoothly here, a little +cotton-wool readjusted there, a change of posture managed, a few +hopeful words uttered which helped the patient to fight against the +shock--so that presently he sank into a troubled sleep. Lindo tried to +do his best for the other also, terrible as was the task; but the +man's excitement and unceasing restlessness, as well as his more +serious injuries, made help here of little avail. + +When he rose, he found one of the watchers holding a cup of brandy +ready for him; and, sitting down upon the bench behind, he discovered +a coat laid there to make the seat more comfortable, though no one +seemed to have done it, or to be conscious of his surprise. They +talked low to him, and to one another, in a disjointed taciturn +fashion, with immense gaps and long intervals of silence. He learned +that there were twenty-seven men yet missing, but it was thought that +the afterdamp had killed them all. Those already found alive had been +in the main heading, where the current of air gave them a better +chance. + +One or other of the workers was continually going out to listen for +the return of the party who were exploring the workings near the foot +of the other shaft; and once or twice a member of this party, +exhausted or ill, looked in for a dose of tea or brandy, and then +stumbled out again to get himself conveyed to the upper air. These +looked curiously at the stranger, but, on some information being +muttered in their ears, made a point on going out of giving him a nod +which was full of tacit acknowledgment. + +In a quiet interval he looked at his watch and wound it up, finding +the time to be half-past two. The familiar action carried his mind +back to his neat, spotless bedroom at the rectory and the cares and +anxieties of everyday life, which had been forgotten for the last five +hours. Could it be so short a time, he asked himself, since he was +troubled by them? It seemed years ago. It seemed as if a gulf, deep as +the shaft down which he had come, divided him from them. And yet the +moment his thoughts returned to them the gulf became less, and +presently, although his eyes were still fixed upon the poor collier's +unquiet head and the murky cabin with its smoky lamp, he was really +back in Claversham, busied with those thoughts again, and pondering on +the time when he should be above ground. The things that had been +important before rose into importance again, but their relative +values among themselves were altered, in his eyes at any rate. With +what he had seen and heard in the last few hours fresh in his mind, +with the injured men lying still in his sight--one of them never to +see the sun again--he could not but take a different, a wider, a less +selfish view of life and its aims. His ideal of existence grew higher +and purer, his notion of success more noble. In the light of his own +self-forgetting energy and of others' pain he saw things as they +affected his neighbor rather than himself and so presently--not in +haste, but slowly in the watches of the night--he formed a resolution +which shall be told presently. The determinations to which men come at +such times are, in nine cases out of ten, as transitory as the +emotions on which they are based. But this time, and with this man, it +was not to be so. Kate Bonamy's words, bringing before his mind the +responsibility which rested upon him, had in a degree prepared him to +examine his position gravely and from a lofty standpoint; so that the +considerations which now assailed him could scarcely fail to have due +and lasting weight with him, and to leave impressions both deep and +permanent. + +He was presently roused from his reverie by a sound which caused his +companions to rise to their feet with the first signs of excitement +they had betrayed in their manner. It was the murmur of voices in the +heading, which, beginning far away, rapidly approached and gathered +strength. Going to the door of the cabin, he saw lights in the gallery +becoming each instant more clear. Then the forms of men coming on by +twos and threes rose out of the darkness. And so the procession wound +in, and Lindo found himself suddenly surrounded--where a moment before +no sounds but painful ones had been heard--by the hum and bustle, the +quick question and answers, of a crowd. For the men brought good news. +The missing were found; and though many of them were burned or +scorched, and others were suffering from the effects of the afterdamp, +the explorers brought back with them no still, ominous burden, nor +even any case of hopeless injury, such as that of the poor fellow in +delirium over whom his mates bent with the strange impassive patience +which seems to be a quality peculiar to those who get their living +underground. + +Not that Lindo at the time had leisure to consider their behavior. The +injured were brought to him as a matter of course, and he did what he +could with simple bandages and liniment to keep the air from their +wounds, and to enable the men to reach the surface with as little pain +as possible. For more than an hour, as he passed from one to the +other, his hands were never empty; he could think only of his work. +The deputy-manager, who had been leading the rescue party, was +thoroughly prostrated. The rest never doubted that the stranger was a +surgeon, and it was curious to see their surprise when the general +taciturnity allowed the news to spread that he was only a parson. They +were like savants with a specimen which, known to belong to a +particular species, has none of the class attributes, and sets at +defiance all preconceived ideas upon the subject. He, too, when he was +at length free to look about him, found matter for astonishment in his +own sensations. The cabin and the roadway outside, where the men sat +patiently waiting their turns to ascend, had become almost homelike in +his eyes. The lounging figures here thrown into relief by a score of +lamps, there lost in the gloom of the background, had grown familiar. +He knew that this was here and that was there, and had his receptacles +and conveniences, his special attendants and helpers. In a word, he +had made the place his own, yet without forgetting old habits--for +more than once he caught himself looking at his watch, and wondering +when it would be day. + +Toward seven o'clock a message directed to him by name came down. A +cage would be rigged up within the hour. Before that period elapsed, +however, he was summoned to see the poor fellow die who had been +delirious ever since he was found and who now passed away in the +same state. It was a trying scene coming just when the clergyman's +wrought-up nerves were beginning to feel a reaction--the more trying +as all looked to him to do anything that could be done. But that was +nothing; and he felt gravely thankful when the poor man's sufferings +were over and the throng of swarthy faces melted from the open +doorway. + +He sat apart a little after that until a commotion outside the cabin +and a cheery voice asking for Mr. Lindo summoned him to the door, +where he found the same manager who had sent him down the night +before, and who now greeted him warmly. "It is not for me to thank +you," Mr. Peat said--"I have nothing to do with this pit--the owner, +to whom what has happened will be reported, will do that; but +personally I am obliged to you, Mr. Lindo, and I am sure the men are." + +"I wanted only to be of help," the clergyman answered simply. "There +was not much I could do." + +"Well, that is a matter of opinion," the manager replied. "I have +mine, and I know that the men who have come up have theirs. However, +here is the cage; perhaps you will not mind going up with poor +Edwards?" + +"Not at all," said the rector; and, following the manager to the cage, +he stepped into it without any suspicion that this was a trick on the +part of Mr. Peat to insure his volunteer's services being recognized. + +He found the ascent a very different thing from the descent. The +steady upward motion was not unpleasant, and long before the surface +was reached his eyes, accustomed to darkness, detected a pale gleam of +light stealing downward, and could distinguish the damp brickwork +gliding by. Presently the light grew stronger--grew dazzling in its +wonderful whiteness. "We are going up nicely," his companion murmured, +remembering in his gratitude that the ascent, which was a trifle to +him even with shattered nerves, might be unpleasant to the other--"we +are nearly there." + +And so they were; and slowly and gently they rose into the broad +daylight and the sunshine which seemed to proclaim to the rector's +heart that sorrow may endure for a night, but joy comes in the +morning. + +Standing densely packed round the pit's mouth was a great crowd--a +crowd, at any rate, of many hundreds. They greeted the appearance of +the cage with a quick drawing-in of the breath and a murmur of pity. +Lindo's face and hands were as black as any collier's; his dress +seemed at the first glance as theirs. But as he helped to lift his +injured companion out and carry him to the stretcher which stood at +hand, the word who he was ran round; and, though no one spoke, the +loudest tribute could scarcely have been more eloquent than the +respect with which the rough assemblage fell away to right and left +that he might pass out to the trap which had been thoughtfully +provided--first to carry him to the vicarage for a wash, and afterward +to take him home. His heart was full as he walked down the lane, every +man standing uncovered, and the women gazing on him with unspoken +blessings in their eyes. + +A very few hours before he had felt at war with the world. He had +said, not perhaps that all men were liars, but that they were unjust, +full of prejudice and narrowness, and ill-will; that, above all, they +judged without charity. Now, as the pony-cart rattled down the road +through the cutting, and the sunny landscape, the winding river, and +the plain round Claversham opened before him, he felt far otherwise. +He longed to do more for others than he had done. He dwelt with wonder +on the gratitude which services so slight had evoked from men so rough +as those from whom he had just parted; and unconsciously he placed the +balance in their favor to the general account of the world, and +acknowledged himself its debtor. + + + + + CHAPTER XXII. + + THE RECTOR'S DECISION. + + +The church clock was striking nine as the rector, jogging along behind +the little pony, came in sight of the turnpike-house outside the town. +He had no overcoat, and the drive had chilled him; and, anxious at +once to warm himself and to reach the rectory as quietly as possible, +he bade the driver stop at the gate and set him down. The lad had been +strictly charged to see the parson home, and would have demurred, but +Lindo persisted good-humoredly, and had his way. In two minutes he was +striding briskly along the road, his shoulders squared, and the +night's reflections still running like a rich purple thread through +the common stuff of his every-day thoughts. + +In this mood, which the pure morning air and crisp sunshine tended to +favor and prolong, he came at a corner plump upon Mr. Bonamy, who, +like all angular, uncomfortable men, was an early riser, and had this +morning chosen to extend his before-breakfast walk in the direction of +Baerton. The lawyer's energy had already been rewarded. He had met Mr. +Keogh, and learned not only the earlier details of the accident--which +were, indeed, known to all Claversham, for the town had sat up +into the small hours listening for wheels and discussing the +catastrophe--but had further received a minute description of the +rector's conduct. Consequently his thoughts were already busy with the +clergyman when, turning a corner, he came unexpectedly upon him. + +Lindo met his glance and looked away hastily. The rector had +been anxious to avoid, by going home at once, any appearance of +parading what he had done, and he would have passed on with a brief +good-morning. But the lawyer seemed to be differently disposed. He +stopped short in the middle of the path, so that the clergyman could +not pass him without rudeness, and nodded a jerky greeting. "You have +not walked all the way, I suppose, Mr. Lindo?" he said, his keen small +eyes reading the other's face like a book. + +"No," the rector answered, coloring uncomfortably under his gaze. "I +drove as far as the turnpike, Mr. Bonamy." + +"Well, you may think yourself lucky to be well out of it," the lawyer +rejoined, with a dry smile. "To be here at all, indeed," he continued, +with a gesture of the hand which seemed meant to indicate the sunshine +and the upper air. "When a man does a foolhardy thing he does not +always escape, you know." + +The younger man reddened. But this morning he had his temper well +under control and he merely answered, "I thought I was called upon to +do what I did, Mr. Bonamy. But of course that is a matter of opinion. +Perhaps I was wrong, perhaps right. I did what I thought best at the +moment, and I am satisfied." + +Mr. Bonamy shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, well, every man to his +notion," he said. "I do not approve, myself, of people running risks +which do not lie within the scope of their business. And as nothing +has happened to you----" + +"The risk of anything happening," the rector rejoined, with warmth, +"was so small that the thing is not worth discussing, Mr. Bonamy. +There is a matter, however," he continued, changing the subject on a +sudden impulse, "which I think I may as well mention to you now as +later. You, as churchwarden, have in fact, a right to be informed of +it. I----" + +"You are cold," said Mr. Bonamy abruptly. "Allow me to turn with you." + +The rector bowed and complied. The request, however, had checked the +current of his speech, even the current of his thoughts, and he did +not finish his sentence. He felt, indeed, for a moment a temptation as +sudden as it was strong. He saw at a glance what his resolve meant. He +discerned that what had appeared to him in the isolation of the night +an act of dignified self-surrender must, and would, seem to others an +acknowledgment of defeat--almost an acknowledgment of dishonor. He +recalled, as in a flash, all the episodes of the struggle between +himself and his companion. And he pictured the latter's triumph. He +wavered. + +But the events of the night had not been lost upon him, and, after a +brief hesitation, he set the seal on his purpose. "You are aware, I +know, Mr. Bonamy," he said, "of the circumstances under which, in Lord +Dynmore's absence, I accepted the living here." + +"Perfectly," said the lawyer drily. + +"He has made those circumstances the subject of a grave charge against +me," the rector continued, a touch of hauteur in his tone. "That you +have heard also, I know. Well, I desire to say once more that I +repudiate that charge in the fullest and widest sense." + +"So I understand," Mr. Bonamy murmured. He walked along by his +companion's side, his face set and inscrutable. If he felt any +surprise at the communication now being made to him he had the skill +to hide it. + +"I repudiate it, you understand!" the clergyman repeated, stepping out +more quickly in his excitement, and glaring angrily into vacancy. "It +is a false and wicked charge! But it does not affect me. I do not care +a jot for it. It does not in any sense force me to do what I am going +to do. If that were all, I should not dream of resigning the living, +but, on the contrary, would hold it, as a few days ago I had +determined to hold it, in the face of all opposition. However," he +continued, lowering his tone, "I have now examined my position in +regard to the parish rather than the patron, and I have come to a +different conclusion, Mr. Bonamy--namely, to place my resignation in +the proper hands as speedily as possible." + +Mr. Bonamy nodded gently and silently. He did not speak, he did not +even look at the clergyman; and this placid acquiescence irritated the +young man into adding a word he had not intended to say. "I tell you +this as my church-warden, Mr. Bonamy," he continued stiffly, "and not +as desiring or expecting any word of sympathy or regret from you. On +the contrary," he added, with some bitterness, "I am aware that my +departure can be only a relief to you. We have been opposed to one +another since my first day here." + +"Very true," said Mr. Bonamy. "I suppose you have considered----" + +"What?" + +"The effect which last night's work may have on the relations between +you and Lord Dynmore?" + +"I do not understand you," the rector answered haughtily, and yet with +some wonder. What did the man mean? + +"You know, I suppose," Mr. Bonamy retorted, turning slightly so as to +command a view of his companion's face, "that he is the owner of the +Big Pit at Baerton from which you have just come?" + +"Lord Dynmore is?" + +"To be sure." + +A flush of crimson swept over the rector's brow and left him red and +frowning. "I did not know that!" he said, his teeth set together. + +"So I perceive," the lawyer replied, with a nod. "But I can reassure +you. It is not at all likely to affect the earl's plans. He is an +obstinate man, though in some points a good-natured one, and he will +most certainly accept your resignation if you send it in. But here you +are at home." He paused, standing awkwardly by the clergyman's side. +Then he added, "It is a comfortable house. I do not think that there +is a more comfortable house in Claversham." + +He retired a few steps into the churchyard as he spoke, and stood +looking up at the massive old-fashioned front of the rectory, as if he +had never seen the house before. The clergyman, anxious to be indoors +and alone, shot an impatient glance at him, and waited for him to go. +But he did not go, and presently something in his intent gaze drew +Lindo, too, into the churchyard, and the two ill-assorted companions +looked up together at the old gray house. The early sun shone aslant +on it, burnishing the half-open windows. In the porch a robin was +hopping to and fro. "It is a comfortable, roomy house," the lawyer +repeated. + +"It is," the rector answered slowly, as if the words were wrung from +him. And he, too, stood looking up at it as if he were fascinated. + +"A man might grow old in it," murmured Mr. Bonamy. There was a slight, +but very unusual, flush on his parchment-colored face, and his eyes, +when he turned with an abrupt movement to his companion, did not rise +above the latter's waistcoat. "Comfortably too, I should say," he +added querulously, rattling the money in his pockets. "I think if I +were you I would reconsider my determination. I think I would, do you +know? As it is, what you have told me will not go any farther. You did +one foolish thing last night. I would not do another to-day, if I were +you, Mr. Lindo." + +And he turned abruptly away--his head down, his coat-tails swinging, +and both his hands thrust deep into his trouser-pockets--such a +shrewd, angular, ungainly figure as only a small country town can +show. He left the rector standing before his rectory in a state of +profound surprise and bewilderment. The young man felt something very +like a lump in his throat as he turned to go in. He discerned that the +lawyer had meant to do a kind, nay, a generous action; and yet if +there was a man in the world whom he had judged incapable of such +magnanimity it was Mr. Bonamy! He went in not only touched, but +ashamed. Here, if he had not already persuaded himself that the world +was less ill-conditioned than he had lately thought it, was another +and a surprising lesson! + +Meanwhile Mr. Bonamy went home, and finding his family already at +breakfast, sat down to the meal in a very snappish humor. The girls +were quick to detect the cloud on his brow, and promptly supplied his +wants, forbearing, whatever their curiosity, to make any present +attempt to satisfy it. Jack was either less observant or more hardy. +He remarked that Mr. Bonamy was late, and elicited only a grunt. A +further statement that the morning was more like April than February +gained no answer at all. Still undismayed, Jack tried again, plunging +into the subject which the three had been discussing before the lawyer +entered. "Did you hear anything of Lindo, sir?" he asked, buttering +his toast. + +"I saw him," the lawyer said curtly. + +"Was he ail right?" + +"More right than he deserved to be!" Mr. Bonamy snarled. "What right +had he down the pit at all? Gregg did not go." + +"More shame to Gregg, I think!" Jack said. + +Mr. Bonamy prudently shifted his ground, and got back to the rector. +"Well, all I can say is that a more foolish, reckless, useless piece +of idiocy I never heard of in my life!" he declared in a tone of +scorn. + +"I call it glorious!" said Daintry, looking dreamily across the table +and slowly withdrawing an egg-spoon from her mouth. "I shall never say +anything against him again." + +Mr. Bonamy looked at her for an instant as if he would annihilate her. +And then he went on with his breakfast. + +Apparently, however, the outburst had relieved him, for presently he +began on his own account. + +"Has your friend any private means?" he asked, casting an ungracious +glance at the barrister, and returning at once to his buttered toast. + +"Who? Lindo, do you mean?" Jack replied in surprise. + +"Yes." + +"Something, I should say. Perhaps a hundred a year. Why?" + +"Because, if that is all he has," the lawyer growled, buttering a +fresh piece of toast and frowning at it savagely, "I think that you +had better see him and prevent him making a fool of himself. That is +all." + +His tone meant more than his words expressed. Kate's eyes sought +Jack's in alarm, only to be instantly averted. Though she had the urn +before her, she turned red and white, and had to bury her face in her +cup to hide her discomposure. Yet she need not have feared. Mr. Bonamy +was otherwise engaged, and as for Jack, her embarrassment told him +nothing of which he was not already aware. He knew that his service +was and must be a thankless and barren service--that to him fell the +empty part of the slave in the triumph. Had he not within the last few +hours--when the news that the rector had descended the Big Fit to tend +the wounded and comfort the dying first reached the town, and a dozen +voices were loud in his praise--had he not seen Kate's face now bright +with triumph and now melting with tender anxiety. Had he not felt a +bitter pang of jealousy as he listened to his friend's praises? and +had he not crushed down the feeling manfully, bravely, heroically, and +spoken as loudly, ay, and as cordially after an instant's effort, as +the most fervent? + +Yes, he had done all this and suffered all this, being one of those +who believe that + + + Loyalty is still the same, + Whether it win or lose the game: + True as the dial to the sun, + Although it be not shone upon. + + +And he was not going to flinch now. He put no more questions to Mr. +Bonamy, but, when breakfast was finished, he got up and went out. It +needed not the covert glance which he shot at Kate as he disappeared, +to assure her that he was going about her unspoken errand. + +Five minutes saw him face to face with the rector on the latter's +hearth-rug. Or, rather, to be accurate, five minutes saw him staring +irate and astonished at his host while Lindo, with one foot on the +fender and his eyes on the fire, seemed very willing to avoid his +gaze. "You have made up your mind to resign!" Jack exclaimed, in +accents almost awe-stricken. "You are joking!" + +But the rector, still looking down, shook his head. "No, Jack, I am +not," he said slowly. "I am in earnest." + +"Then may I ask when you came to this extraordinary resolution?" the +barrister retorted. "And why?" + +"Last night; and because--well, because I thought it right," was the +answer. "You thought it right?" + +Jack's tone was a fine mixture of wonder, contempt, and offence. It +made Lindo wince, but it did not shake his resolution. "Yes," he said +firmly. "That is so." + +"And that is all you are going to tell me, is it? You put yourself in +my hands a few days ago. You took my advice and acted upon it, and +now, without a word of explanation, you throw me over! Good heavens! I +have no patience with you!" Jack added, beginning to walk up and down +the room. "Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday? Tell me +that." + +"Well," the rector began, turning and speaking slowly, "the truth +is----" + +"No!" cried the barrister, interrupting him ruthlessly. "Tell me this +first. Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday?" + +"It is, but the view I take of it is different," the young clergyman +answered earnestly. "Let me explain, Jack. When I agreed with you a +few days ago that the proper course for me to follow, the course which +would most fitly assert my honesty and good faith, was to retain the +living in spite of threats and opposition, I had my own interests and +my own dignity chiefly in view. I looked upon the question as one +solely between Lord Dynmore and myself; and I felt, rightly as I still +think, that, as a man falsely accused by another man, I had a right to +repel the charge by the only practical means in my power--by +maintaining my position and defying him to do his worst." + +He paused. + +"Well," said Jack drily. + +But the rector did not continue at once, and when he did speak it was +with evident effort. He first went back to the fire, and stood gazing +into it in the old attitude, with his head slightly bowed and his foot +on the fender. The posture was one of humility, and so unlike the man, +that it struck Jack and touched him strangely. At last Lindo did +continue. "Well," he said slowly, "that was all right as far as it +went. My mistake lay in taking too narrow a view. I thought only of +myself and Lord Dynmore, when I should have been thinking of the +parish and of--a word I know you are not very fond of--the Church. I +should have remembered that with this accusation hanging over me I +could not hope to do much good among my people; and that to many of +them I should seem an interloper, a man clinging obstinately to +something not his own nor fairly acquired. In a word, I ought to +have remembered that for the future I should be useless for good and +might, on the other hand, become a stumbling-block and occasion for +scandal--both inside the parish and outside. You see what I mean, I am +sure." + +"I see," quoth Jack contemptuously, "that you need a great many words +to make out your case. What I do not think you have considered is the +inference which will be drawn from your resignation--you will be taken +to have confessed yourself in the wrong." + +"I cannot help that." + +"Will not that be a scandal?" + +"It will, at any rate, be one soon forgotten." + +"Now, I tell you what!" Jack exclaimed, standing still and confronting +the other with the air of a man bent on speaking his mind though the +heavens should fall. "This is just a piece of absurd Quixotism, Lindo. +You are a poor man, without means and without influence; and you are +going, for the sake of a foolish idea--a mere speculative scruple--to +give up an income and a house and a useful sphere of work such as you +will never get again! You are going to do that, and go back--to what? +To a miserable curacy--don't wince, my friend, for that is what you +are going to do--and an income one-fifth of that which you have been +spending for the last six months! Now the sole question is, are you +quite an idiot?" + +"You are pretty plain-spoken," said the rector, smiling feebly. + +"I mean to be!" was Jack's uncompromising retort. "I have asked you, +and I want an answer--are you a fool?" + +"I hope not." + +"Then you will give up this fool's notion?" Jack replied viciously. + +But the rector's only answer was a shake of the head. He did not look +round. Had he done so, he would have seen that, though Jack's keen +face was flushed with anger and annoyance, his eyes were moist and +wore an expression at variance with his tone. + +He missed that, however; and Jack made one more attempt. "Look here," +he said bluntly; "have you considered that if you stop you will find +your path a good deal smoothed by last night's work?" + +"No, I have not," the rector answered stubbornly. + +"Well, you will find it so, you may be sure of that! Why, man alive!" +Jack continued with vehemence, "you are going to be the hero of the +place for the time. No one will believe anything against you, except, +perhaps, Gregg and a few beasts of his kind. Whereas, if you go now, +do you know who will get your berth?" + +"No." + +Jack rapped out the name. "Clode! Clode, and no one else, I will be +bound!" he said. "And you do not love him." + +The rector had not expected the reply. He started, and, removing his +foot from the fender, turned sharply so as to face his friend. "No," +he said slowly, "I do not think I do like him. I consider that he has +behaved badly, Jack. He has not stood by me as he should have done, or +as I would have stood by him had our positions been reversed. I do not +think he has called here once since the bazaar, except on business, +and then I was out. I had planned, indeed, to see him to-day and ask +him what it meant, and, if I found he had come to an adverse opinion +in my matter, to give him notice. But now----" + +"You will make him a present of the living instead," Jack said grimly. + +"I do not know why he should get it," the rector answered, with a +frown, "more than any one else." + +"It is the common report that he will," Jack retorted. "As for that, +however----" + +But why follow him through all the resources of his art? He put forth +every effort--perhaps against his own better judgment, for a man will +do for his friend what he will not do for himself--to persuade the +rector to recall his decision. And he failed. He succeeded, indeed, in +wringing the young clergyman's heart and making him wince at the +thought of his barren future and his curate's triumph; but there his +success ended. He made no progress toward inducing him to change his +mind; and presently he found that all the arguments he advanced were +met by a set formula, to which the rector seemed to cling as in +self-defence. + +"It is no good, Jack," he answered--and if he said it once, he said it +half a dozen times--"it is no good! I cannot take any one's advice on +this subject. The responsibility is mine, and I cannot shift it! I +must try to do right according to my own conscience!" + +Jack did not know that the words were Kate's, and that every time the +rector repeated them he had Kate in his mind. But he saw that they +were unanswerable; and when he had listened to them for the sixth time +he took up his hat in a huff. "Well, have our own way!" he said. +"After all, you are right. It is your business and not mine. Give +Clode the living if you like!" + +And he went out sharply. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIII. + + THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS. + + +Seldom, if ever, had the curate passed a week so harassing as that +which was ushered in by the bazaar, and was destined to end--though he +did not know this--in the colliery accident. During these seven days +he managed to run through a perfect gamut of feelings. He rose each +day in a different mood. One day he was hopeful, confident, assured of +success; the next fearful, despondent, inclined to give up all for +lost. One day he went about telling himself that the rector would not +resign; that he would not resign himself in his place; that people +were mad to say he would; that men do not resign livings so easily; +that the very circumstances of the case must compel the rector to +stand his ground. The next he saw everything in a different light. He +appreciated the impossibility of a man attacked on so many sides +maintaining his position for any length of time. One hour he bitterly +regretted that he had cut himself off from his chief, the next he +congratulated himself as sincerely on being untrammelled by any but a +formal bond. Why, people might even have expected him, had he strongly +supported the rector, to refuse the living! + +He saw Laura several times during the week, but he did not open to her +the extent of his hopes and fears. He shrank from doing so out of a +natural prudent reticence; which after all meant only the refraining +from putting into words things perfectly understood. To some extent he +kept up between them the thin veil of appearances, which many who go +through life in closest companionship, preserve to the end, though +each has long ago found it transparent. But though he said nothing, +confining the tumult of his feelings to his own breast, he was not +blind, and he soon perceived that Laura shared his suspense, and was +watching the rector's fortunes with an interest as selfish and an eye +as cold as his own. Which, far from displeasing him, rather increased +his ardor. + +As the days passed by, however, bringing only the sickness of hope +deferred and tidings of the rector's sturdy determination to hold what +he had got, the curate began, not in a mere passing mood, but, on +grounds of reason and calculation, to lose hope. Every tongue in the +town was wagging about Lindo. My lord was, or was supposed to be, +setting the engines of the law in motion. Mr. Bonamy was believed, +probably with less reason, to be contemplating an appeal to the bishop +and the Court of Arches. In a word, all the misfortunes which Clode +had foreseen were accumulating about the devoted head; and yet--and +yet it was a question whether the owner of the head was a penny the +worse! Perhaps some day he might be. The earl was a great man, with a +long purse, and he might yet have his way. But this was not likely to +happen, as the curate now began to see, until long after the Rev. +Stephen Clode's connection with the parish and claim upon the living +should have become things of the past. + +On the top of this conviction, which sufficiently depressed him, came +the news of the colliery accident--news which did not reach him until +late at night. It plunged him into the depth's of despair. He cursed +the ill-luck which had withheld from him the opportunity of +distinguishing himself, and had granted it to the rector. He saw how +fatally the affair would strengthen the latter's hands. And in effect +he gave up. He resigned himself to despair. He had not the spirit to +go out, but sat until long after noon, brooding miserably over the +fire, his table littered with unremoved breakfast things, and his mind +in a similar state of slovenly disorder. That was a day, a miserable +day, he long remembered. + +About half-past two he made an effort to pull himself together. +Mechanically putting a book in his pocket, he took his hat and went +out, with the intention of paying two or three visits in his district. +He had pride enough left to excite him to the effort, and sufficient +sense to recognize its supreme importance. But, even so, before he +reached the street he was dreaming again--the old dreary dreams. He +started when a voice behind him said brusquely, "Going your rounds, I +see! Well, there is nothing like sticking to business, whatever is on +foot. Shall I have to congratulate you this time?" + +He knew the voice and turned round, a scowl on his dark face. The +speaker was Gregg--Gregg wearing an air of unusual jauntiness and +gaiety. It fell from him, however, as he met the other's eyes, leaving +him, metaphorically speaking, naked and ashamed. The doctor stood in +wholesome dread of the curate's sharp tongue and biting irony, nor +would he have accosted him in so free-and-easy a manner now, had he +not been a little lifted above himself by something he had just +learned. + +"Congratulate me? What do you mean?" Clode replied, turning on him +with the uncompromising directness which is more "upsetting" to a man +uncertain of himself than any retort, however discourteous. + +"What do I mean?" the doctor answered, striving to cover his +discomfiture with a feeble smile. "Well, no harm, at any rate, Clode. +I hope I shall have to congratulate you. But if you are going to----" + +"On what?" interrupted the curate sternly. "On what are you going to +congratulate me?" + +"Haven't you heard the news?" Gregg said in surprise. + +"What news? Of the pit accident?" Clode answered, restraining with +difficulty a terrible outburst of passion. "Why I should think there +is not a fool within three counties has not heard it by this time!" + +He almost swore at the man, and was turning away, when something in +the doctor's "No, no!" struck him, excited as he was, as peculiar. +"Then what is it?" he said, hanging on his heel, half curious and half +in scorn. + +"You have not heard about the rector?" + +The curate glared. "About the rector?" he said in a mechanical way. A +sudden stillness fell on his face and tone at mention of the name. +"No, what of him?" he continued, after another pause. + +"You have not heard that he is resigning?" Gregg asked. + +The curate's eyes flashed with returning anger. "No," he said grimly. +"Nor any one else out of Bedlam!" + +"But it is so! It is true, I tell you!" the doctor answered in the +excitement of conviction. "I have just seen a man who had it from the +archdeacon, who left the rectory not an hour ago. He is going to +resign at once." + +The curate did not again deny the truth of the story. But he seemed to +Gregg, watching eagerly for some sign of appreciation, to take the +news coolly, considering how important it was to him. He stood silent +a moment, looking thoughtfully down the street, and then shrugged his +shoulders. That was all. Gregg did not see the little pulse which +began to beat so furiously and suddenly in his cheek, nor hear the +buzzing which for a few seconds rendered him deaf to the shrill cries +of the schoolboys playing among the pillars of the market hall. + +"Mr. Lindo has changed his mind since yesterday, then," Clode said at +last, speaking in his ordinary rather contemptuous tone. + +"Yes, I heard he was talking big then," replied the doctor, delighted +with his success. "Defying the earl, and all the rest of it. That was +quite in his line. But I never heard that much came of his talking. +However, you are bound to stick up for him, I suppose." + +The curate frowned a little at that--why, the doctor did not +understand--and then the two parted. Gregg went on his way to carry +the news to others, and Clode, after standing a moment in thought, +turned his steps toward the Town House. The sky had grown cloudy, the +day cold and raw. The leafless avenue and silent shrubberies through +which he strode presented but a wintry prospect to the common eye, but +for him the air was full of sunshine and green leaves and the songs of +birds. From despair to hope, from a prison to a palace, he had leapt +at a single bound. In the first intoxication of confidence he could +even spare a moment to regret that his hands were not _quite_ clean. +He felt a passing remorse for the doing of one or two things, as +needless, it now turned out, as they had been questionable. Nay, he +could afford to shudder, with a luxurious sense of danger safely +passed, at the risks he had been so foolish as to run; thanking +Providence that his folly had not landed him, as he now saw that it +easily might have landed him, in such trouble as would have +effectually tripped up his rising fortunes. + +He reached the Town House in a perfect glow of moral worth and +self-gratulation; and he was already half-way across the drawing-room +before he perceived that it contained, besides Mrs. Hammond and her +daughter, a third person. The third person was the rector. Except in +church the two men had not met since the day of the bazaar, and both +were unpleasantly surprised. Lindo rose slowly from a seat in one of +the windows, and, without stepping forward, stood silently looking at +his curate, as one requiring an explanation, not offering a greeting; +while Clode felt something of a shock, for he discerned at once that +the situation would admit of no half measures. In the presence of Mrs. +Hammond, to whom he had expressed his view of the rector's conduct, he +could not adopt the cautious apologetic tone which he would probably +have used had he met Lindo alone. He was fairly caught. But he was not +a coward, and before the tell-tale flush had well mounted to his brow +he had determined on his _rle_. + +Half-way across the room he stopped, and looked at Mrs. Hammond. "I +thought you were alone," he said with an air of constraint, partly +real, partly assumed. + +"There is only the rector here," she answered bluntly. And then she +added, with a little spice of malice, for Mr. Clode had not been a +favorite with her since his defection, "I suppose you are not afraid +to meet him?" + +"Certainly not," the curate answered, thus challenged. And he turned +haughtily to meet the rector's angry gaze. "I am not aware that I have +any need to be. I am glad to see that you are none the worse for your +gallant conduct last night," he added with perfect _aplomb_. + +"Thank you," Lindo answered, choking down his indignation with an +effort. For a week--for a whole week--this, his chosen lieutenant, had +not been near him in his trouble! "I am much obliged to you," he +continued, "but I am rather surprised that your anxiety on my account +did not lead you to come and see me at the rectory." + +"I called, and failed to find you," Clode answered, sitting resolutely +down. + +Lindo followed his example. "I believe you did once," he replied +contemptuously. Had a friend been about to succeed him, he could have +borne even to congratulate him. But the thought of this man entering +on the enjoyment of all the good things he was resigning was well-nigh +unendurable. Though he knew that it would best consort with his +dignity to be silent, he could not refrain from pursuing the subject. +"You thought," he went on, the same gibe in his tone, "that a +non-committal policy was best, I suppose?" + +The curate for a moment sat silent, his dark face glowing with +resentment. "If you mean," he said at last, neither Mrs. Hammond nor +her daughter venturing to interfere--the former because she thought he +was only getting his deserts, and the latter because she felt no call +to champion him at present--"if you mean that I did not wish to +publish my opinion, you are right, Mr. Lindo." + +"I think you published it sufficiently for your purpose'" the young +rector retorted with bitterness. + +"Then why throw my non-committal policy in my teeth?" replied the +curate deftly. Thereby winning at least a logical victory. + +Lindo sneered and grew, of course, twice as angry as before. "Very +neatly put!" he said. "I do not doubt that you would have got out of +your confession of faith--or lack of faith--as cleverly, if +circumstances had required it." + +The words were scarcely out of his mouth before Miss Hammond rose in a +marked way and left the room; while Clode for a moment glared at him +as though he would resent the insult--for it was little less--in a +practical manner. Fortunately the curate's, calculating brain told him +that nothing could be gained by this, and with an admirable show of +patience and forbearance he waved the words aside. "I really do not +understand you," he said with a maddening air of superiority. "I +cannot be blamed for having formed an opinion of my own on a subject +which affected me. Then, having formed it, what was I to do? Publish +it, or keep it to myself? As a fact, I did not publish it." + +"Except by your acts," said the rector. + +"Take it that way, then," the curate replied, still with patience. "Do +I gather that you would have had me, though I held an opinion adverse +to you, come to you as before, be about you, treat you in all respects +as if I were on your side? Is that your complaint? That I did not play +the hypocrite?" + +The rector felt that he was fairly defeated and out-man[oe]uvred; so +much so that Mrs. Hammond, whose sympathies were entirely on his side, +expected him to break into a furious passion. But the very skill and +coolness of his adversary acted as a warning and an example, and by a +mighty effort he controlled himself. He rose from his chair with +outward calmness, and, saying contemptuously, "Well, I am glad that I +know what your opinion is--an open foe is less dangerous than a secret +one," he turned from Clode. Holding out his hand to his hostess, he +muttered some form of leave-taking, and walked out of the room with as +much dignity as he could muster. He had certainly had the worst of the +encounter. + +And he felt very bitter about it, as he crossed the top of the town. +Whether the curate knew of his intention of resigning or not, his +conduct in turning upon him and openly expressing his disbelief in his +honesty was alike cruel and brutal. The man was false. The rector felt +sure of it. But the pain which he experienced on this account--the +pain of a generous man misunderstood and ill-requited--soon gave way +to self-reproach. He had brought the thing on himself by his +indiscreet passion. He had acted like a boy! He was not fit to be in a +responsible position. + +While he was still full of this, chewing the cud of his imprudence, he +saw a slender figure, which he recognized, crossing the street a +little way before him. He knew it at the first glance. In a moment he +recognized the graceful lines, the half-proud, half-gentle carriage of +the head, the glint of the cold February sun in the fair hair. It was +Kate Bonamy; and the rector, as he increased his pace, became +conscious, with something like a shock, of the pleasure it gave him to +see her, though he had parted from her not twenty-four hours before. +In a moment he was at her side, and she, turning suddenly, saw him +with a start of glad surprise. "Mr. Lindo!" she stammered, holding out +her hand before he offered his, and uttering the first words which +rose to her lips, "I am so glad!" + +She was thinking of the pit accident, of the risk and his safety, and +perhaps a little of his good name. And he understood. But he affected +not to do so. "Are you indeed, Miss Bonamy?" he answered. "Glad that I +am going?" + +His eyes met hers, and then both his and hers fell. "No," she said +gently and slowly. "But I am very glad, Mr. Lindo, that you have done +what seemed right to you without considering your own advantage." + +"I have done a great deal since I saw you yesterday," he answered, +taking refuge in a jest. + +"You have, indeed." + +"Including taking your advice." + +"I am quite sure you had made up your mind before you asked my +opinion," she answered earnestly. + +"No," he said, "I am sure I had not. It was your hint which led me to +think the position out from the beginning. When I did so it struck me +that, irritated by Lord Dynmore's words and manner, I had considered +the question only as it affected him and myself. Going on to think of +the parish, I came to the conclusion, that I was quite unfit for the +position." + +Kate started. The end of his sentence was a surprise to her. They were +walking along side by side now--very slowly--and she looked at him, +mute interrogation in her eyes. + +"I am too young," he said. "Your father, you know, was of that opinion +from the first." + +"Oh, but"--she answered hurriedly, "I----" + +"You do not think so?" he said with a droll glance. "Well, I am glad +of that. What? You were not going to say that, Miss Bonamy?" + +"No," she answered, blushing. "I was going to say that my father's +opinion might not now be the same, Mr. Lindo." + +"I expect it is. However, the opinion on which I acted was my own. I +have a very hasty temper, do you know. This very afternoon I have been +quarrelling, and have put my foot into it! I confess I thought when I +came here that I could manage. Now I see I am not fit for it--for the +living, I mean." + +"Perhaps," she answered slowly and in a low voice, "you are the more +fit because you feel unfit." + +"Well, I do not think I dare act on that," he cried gaily. "So you now +see before you, Miss Bonamy, a very humble personage--a kind of +clerical man-of-all-work out of place! You do not know an incumbent of +easy temper who wants a curate, do you?" + +He spoke lightly, without any air of seeking or posing for admiration. +Yet there was a little inflection of bitterness in his voice which did +not escape her ear, and perhaps spoke to it--and to her heart--more +loudly, because it was not intended for either. She suddenly looked at +him, and her face quivered, and then she looked away. But he had seen +and understood. He marked the color rising to the roots of her hair, +and was as sure as if he had seen them that her eyes were wet with +tears. + +And then he knew. He felt a sudden answering yearning toward her, a +forgetfulness of all her surroundings, and of all his surroundings +save herself alone. What a fool, what an ingrate, what a senseless +clod he had been, not to have seen months before--when it was in his +power to win her, when he might have asked for something besides her +pity, when he had something to offer her--that she was the fairest, +purest, noblest of women! Now, when it was too late, and he had +sacrificed all to a stupid conventionality, a social prejudice--what +was her father to her save the natural crabbed foil of her grace and +beauty--now he felt that he would give all, only he had nothing to +give, to see her wide gray eyes grow dark with tenderness, and--and +love. + +Yes, love. That was it. He knew now. "Miss Bonamy," he said hurriedly. +"Will you----" + +Kate started. "Here is my cousin," she said quietly, and yet with +suspicious abruptness. "I think he is looking for me, Mr. Lindo." + + + + + CHAPTER XXIV. + + THE CUP AT THE LIP. + + +The ten days which followed the events just described were long +remembered in Claversham with fondness and regret. The accident at +Baerton, and the strange position of affairs at the rectory, falling +out together, created intense excitement in the town. The gossips had +for once as much to talk about as the idlest could wish, and found, +indeed, so much to say on the one side and the other that the grocer, +it was rumored, ordered in a fresh supply of tea, and the two bakers +worked double tides at making crumpets and Sally Lunns, and still +lagged behind the demand. Old Peggy from the almshouse hung about the +churchyard half the day, noting who called at the rector's, and took +as much interest in her task as if her weekly dole had depended on Mr. +Lindo's fortunes; while every one who could lay the least claim to +knowing more than his neighbors became for the time the object of as +many attentions as a London belle. + +The archdeacon drove in and out daily. Once the rumor got abroad that +he had gone to see Lord Dynmore; and more than once it was said that +he was away at the palace conferring with the bishop. Those most +concerned walked the streets with the faces of sphinxes. The curate +and the rector were known to be on the most distant terms; and to put +an edge on curiosity, already keen, Mrs. Hammond was twice seen +talking to Mr. Bonamy in the street. + +Even the poor colliers' funeral, though a great number of the townsmen +trooped out to the bleak little churchyard on Baer Hill to witness +it--and to be rewarded by the sight of the young rector reading the +service in the midst of a throng of bareheaded pitmen such as no +Claversham eye had ever seen before--even this, which in ordinary +times would have furnished food for talk for a month, at least, went +for little now. It was discussed, indeed, for an evening, and then +recalled only for the sake of the light which it was supposed to throw +upon the rector's fate. + +That gentleman, indeed, continued to present to the public an unmoved +face. But in private, in the seclusion of his study--the lordly room +which he had prized and appreciated from the first, taking its +spacious dignity as the measure of his success--he wore no mask. +There he had--as all men have, the man of destiny and the conscript +alike--his solitary hours of courage and depression, anxiety and +resignation. Of hope also; for even now--let us not paint him greater +than he was--he clung to the possibility that Lord Dynmore, whom every +one agreed in describing as irascible and hasty, but generous at +bottom, would refuse to receive his resignation of the living, and +this in such terms as would enable him to remain without sacrificing +his self-respect. There would be a victory indeed, and at times he +could not help dwelling on the thought of it. + +Consequently, when Mrs. Baker, four days after the funeral, ushered in +the archdeacon, and the young rector, turning at his writing-table, +read his fate in the old gentleman's eyes, the news came upon him with +crushing weight. Yet he did not give way. He rose and welcomed his +visitor with a brave face. "So the bearer of the bow-string has come +at last!" he said lightly, as the two met on the hearth-rug. + +The archdeacon held his hand a few seconds longer than was necessary. +"Yes," he said, "I am afraid that is about what I am. I am sorry to +bring you such news, Lindo--more sorry than I can tell you." And, +having got so far, he dropped his hat and picked it up again in a +great hurry, and for a moment did not look at his companion. + +"After all," the rector said manfully, "it is the only news I had a +right to expect." + +"There is something in that," the archdeacon admitted, sitting down. +"That is so, perhaps. All the same," he went on, looking about him +unhappily, and rubbing his head in ill-concealed irritation, "if I had +known how the earl would take it, I should not have advised you to +make any concessions. No, I should not. But, there, he is an odd +man--odder than I thought." + +"He accepts my offer to resign, of course?" + +"Yes." + +"And that is all?" the rector said, a little huskiness in his tone. +"That is all," the archdeacon replied, rubbing his head again. It was +plain that he had hard work to keep his vexation within bounds. + +"Well, I must not complain because he has taken me at my word," the +rector said, recovering himself a little. + +"Well, I hoped the bishop might have had a word to say to it," the +archdeacon grumbled. "But he had not, and I could not get to see his +wife. He spoke very highly of your conduct, but he did not see his way +clear, he said, to interfering." + +"I scarcely see how he could," Lindo answered slowly. + +"Well, I do not know. Bonamy's representation in the church-wardens' +names was very strong--very strong indeed, coming from them, you +know." + +Lindo reddened. "There is an odd man for you, if you like," he said +impulsively. He was glad, perhaps, to change the subject. "He has +scarcely said a civil word to me since I came. He even began an action +against me. Yet when this happened he turned round and in his way +fought for me." + +"Well, that is Bonamy all over!" the archdeacon answered, almost with +enthusiasm. "He is rough and crabbed, but he has the instincts of a +gentleman, which are the greater credit to him, since he is a +self-made man. I think I can tell you something about him, though, +which you do not know." + +"Indeed?" said Lindo mechanically. + +"Yes. It has to do with your letter, too. I had it from Lord Dynmore. +In the first flush of his anger, it seems, he went to Bonamy and +directed him to take the necessary steps to eject you. He is not the +earl's solicitor, and he must have seen an excellent opportunity of +getting hold of the Dynmore business through this. He could not but +see it. Nevertheless, he declined." + +"Why?" asked the rector shortly. + +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders. "Ah! that I cannot say," he +answered. "I only know that he did, putting forward some scruple or +other which sent the earl off almost foaming with rage; and, of +course, sent off with him Bonamy's chance of his business." + +"He is a strange man!" Lindo sighed as he spoke. + +The archdeacon took a turn up the room. "Now," he said, coming back, +"I want to talk to you about another man." + +"Clode?" muttered the rector. + +"Well, yes; you have guessed it," the elder clergyman assented. "The +truth is, I am to offer him the living if you report well of him." + +"I do not like him," Lindo said briefly. + +"To be candid," replied the other as briefly, "neither do I, now." + +To that Lindo for a moment said nothing. The young man had fallen into +an old attitude, and stood with his foot on the fender, his head bent, +his eyes fixed on the fire. He was passing through a temptation. Here +was a brave vengeance ready to his hand. The man who had behaved +badly, heartlessly, disloyally to him, who had taken part against him, +and been hard and unfriendly from the moment of Lord Dynmore's return, +was now in his power. He had only to say that he distrusted Clode, +that he suspected him of being unscrupulous, even that their +connection had not been satisfactory to himself--and the thing was +done. Clode would not have the living. + +Yet he hesitated to say those words. He felt that the thing was a +temptation. + +He remembered that Clode had worked well in the parish, and that his +only offence was a private one. And, not at once, but after a pause, +he gulped down the temptation, and, looking up with a flushed face, +spoke. "Yes," he said, "I must report well of him--in the parish, that +is. He is a good worker. I am bound to say as much as that, I think." + +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders once more. "Right!" he said, +with a certain curtness which hid his secret disgust. "I suppose that +is all, then. Will you come with me and tell him?" + +"No," the rector answered very decidedly, "certainly I will not." + +"It will look well," the other still suggested. + +"No," Lindo replied again, almost in anger, "I cannot sincerely +congratulate the man, and I will not!" + +Nor would he budge from that resolve; and when the archdeacon called +at the curate's lodgings a few minutes later, he called alone. The man +he sought was out, however. "Mr. Clode is at the Reading-Room, I +think, sir," the landlady said, with her deepest courtesy. And +thither, accordingly, after a moment's hesitation, the archdeacon +went. + +The gas in the big, barely-furnished room, which we have visited more +than once, had just been lit, but the blinds still remained up; and in +this mingling of lights the place looked less home-like and more +uncomfortable than usual. There were three people in the room when the +archdeacon entered. Two sat reading by the fire, their backs to the +door. The third--the future rector--was standing up near one of the +windows, taking advantage of the last rays of daylight to read the +_Times_, which he held open before him. The archdeacon cast a casual +glance at the others, and then stepped across to him and touched him +on the shoulder. + +Clode turned with a start. He had not heard the approaching footstep. +One glance at the newcomer's face, however, set his blood in a glow. +It told him, or almost told him, all; and instinctively he dropped his +eyes, that the other might not read in them his triumph and +exultation. + +The archdeacon's first words confirmed him in his hopes. "I have some +good news for you, Mr. Clode," he said, smiling benevolently. He had +of late distrusted the curate, as we have seen; but he was a man of +kindly nature, and such a man cannot convey good tidings without +entering into the recipient's feelings. "I saw Lord Dynmore +yesterday," he continued. + +"Indeed," said the curate a little thickly. His face had grown hot, +but the increasing darkness concealed this. + +"Yes," the archdeacon resumed, in a confidential tone which was yet +pretty audible through the room. "You have heard, no doubt, that Mr. +Lindo has resigned the living?" + +The curate nodded. At that moment he dared not speak. A dreadful +thought was in his mind. What if the archdeacon's good news was news +that the earl declined to receive the resignation? Some people might +call that good news! The mere thought struck him dumb. + +The archdeacon's next words resolved his doubts. "Frankly," the elder +man said in a genial tone, "I am sorry--sorry that circumstances have +forced him to take so extreme a step. But having said that, Mr. Clode, +I have done for the present with regret, and may come to pleasanter +matter. I have to congratulate you. I am happy to say that Lord +Dynmore, whom I saw yesterday, has authorized me to offer the living +to you." + +The newspaper rustled in the curate's grasp, and for a moment he did +not answer. Then he said huskily, "To me?" + +"Yes," the archdeacon answered expansively--it was certainly a +pleasant task he had in hand, and he could not help beaming over it. +"To you, Mr. Clode. On one condition only," he continued, "which is +usual enough in all such cases, and I venture to think is particularly +natural in this case. I mean that you have your late rector's good +word." + +"Mr. Lindo's good word?" the curate stammered. + +"Of course," the unconscious archdeacon answered. + +The curate's jaw dropped; but by an effort he forced a ghastly smile. +"To be sure," he said. "There will be no difficulty about that, I +think." + +"No," replied the other, "for I have just seen him, and can say at +once that he is prepared to give it you. He has behaved throughout in +a most generous manner, and the consequence is that I have nothing +more to do except to offer you my congratulations on your preferment." + +For a moment Clode could scarcely believe in his happiness. In the +short space of two minutes he had tasted to the full both the pleasure +of hope and the pang of despair. Could it be that all that was over +already? That the period of waiting and uncertainty was past and gone? +That the prize to which he had looked so long--and with the prize the +woman he loved--was his at last?--was actually in his grasp? + +His head reeled, great as was his self-control, and a haze rose before +his eyes. As this passed away he became conscious that the archdeacon +was shaking his hand with great heartiness, and that the thing was +real! He was rector, or as good as rector, of Claversham. The object +of his ambition was his! He was happy: perhaps it was the happiest +moment of his life. He had even time to wonder whether he could not do +Lindo a good turn--whether he could not somehow make it up to him. + +"You are very good," he muttered, gratefully pressing the archdeacon's +hand. + +"I am glad it is not a stranger," that gentleman replied heartily. +"Oh," he continued, turning and speaking in a different tone, "is that +you, Mr. Bonamy? Well, there can be no harm in your hearing the news +also. You are people's warden, of course, and have a kind of claim to +hear it early. To be sure you have." + +"What is the news?" Mr. Bonamy asked rather shortly. He had risen and +drawn near unnoticed, Jack Smith behind him. "Do I understand that +Lord Dynmore has accepted the rector's resignation?" + +"That is so." + +"And that he proposes to present Mr. Clode?" the lawyer continued, +looking at the curate as he named him. + +"Precisely," replied the archdeacon, without hesitation. + +"I hope you have no objection, Mr. Bonamy," said the curate, bowing +slightly with a gracious air. He could afford to be gracious now. He +even felt good--as men in such moments do. + +But in the lawyer's response there was no graciousness, nor much +apparent goodness. "I am afraid," he said, standing up gaunt and +stiff, with a scowl on his face, "that I must take advantage of that +saving clause, Mr. Clode. I am people's warden, as the archdeacon +says, and frankly I object to your appointment--to your appointment as +rector here." + +"You object!" the curate stammered, between wrath and wonder. + +"Bless me!" exclaimed the archdeacon in unmixed astonishment. "What do +you mean?" + +"Just what I say. I object," repeated the lawyer firmly. This time +Clode said nothing, but his eyes flashed, and he drew himself up, his +face dark with passion. "Shall I state my objection now?" Mr. Bonamy +continued, with the utmost gravity. "It is not quite formal, but--very +well, I will do so. I have rather a curious story to tell, and I must +go back a short time. When Mr. Lindo's honesty in accepting the living +was called in question about a month ago, he referred to the letters +in which Lord Dynmore's agents conveyed the offer to him. He had those +letters by him. Naturally, he had preserved them with care, and he +began to regard them in the light of valuable evidence on his behalf, +since they showed the facts brought to his knowledge when he accepted +the living. I have said that he had preserved them with care; and, +indeed, he is prepared to say to-day, that from the time of his +arrival here until now, they have never, with his knowledge or +consent, passed out of his possession." + +The lawyer's rasping voice ceased for a moment. Stephen Clode's face +was a shade paler, but away from the gas-jets this could not be +distinguished. He was arming himself to meet whatever shock was to +come, while below this voluntary action of the brain his mind ran in +an undercurrent of fierce, passionate anger against himself--anger +that he had ever meddled with those fatal letters. Oh, the folly, the +uselessness, the danger of that act, as he saw them now! + +"Nevertheless," Mr. Bonamy resumed in the same even, pitiless tone, +"when Mr. Lindo referred to these letters--which he kept, I should +add, in a locked cupboard in his library--he found that the first in +date, and the most important of them all, had been mutilated." + +The curate's brow cleared. "What on earth," he broke out, "has this to +do with me, Mr. Bonamy?" And he laughed--a laugh of relief and +triumph. The lawyer's last words had lifted a weight from his heart. +They had found a mare's nest after all. + +"Quite so!" the archdeacon chimed in with good-natured fussiness. +"What has all this to do with the matter in hand, or with Mr. Clode, +Mr. Bonamy? I fail to see." + +"In a moment I will show you," the lawyer answered. Then he paused, +and, taking a letter-case form his pocket, leisurely extracted from it +a small piece of paper. "I will first ask Mr. Clode," he continued, +"to tell us if he supplied Mr. Lindo with the names of a firm of +Birmingham solicitors." + +"Certainly I did," replied the curate haughtily. + +"And you gave him their address, I think?" + +"I did." + +"Perhaps you can tell me, then, whether that is the address you wrote +for him," continued the lawyer smoothly, as he held out the paper for +the curate's inspection. + +"It is," Clode answered at once. "I wrote it for Mr. Lindo, in my own +room, and gave it him there. But I fail to see what all this has to do +with the point you have raised," he continued with considerable heat. + +"It has just this to do with it, Mr. Clode," the lawyer answered +drily, a twinkle in his eyes--"that this address is written on the +reverse side of the very piece of paper which is missing from Mr. +Lindo's letter--the important letter I have described. And I wish to +ask you, and I think it will be to your interest to give as clear an +answer to the question as possible, how you came into possession of +this scrap of paper." + +The curate glared at his questioner. "I do not understand you," he +stammered. And he held out his hand for the paper. + +"I think you will when you look at both sides of the sheet," replied +the lawyer, handing it to him. "On one side there is the address you +wrote. On the other are the last sentence and signature of a letter +from Messrs. Gearns & Baker to Mr. Lindo. The question is a very +simple one. How did you get possession of this piece of paper?" + +Clode was silent--silent, though he knew that the archdeacon was +looking at him, and that a single hearty spontaneous denial might +avert suspicion. He stood holding the paper in his hand, and gazing +stupidly at the damning words, utterly unable to comprehend for the +moment how they came to be there. Little by little, however, as the +benumbing effects of the surprise wore off, his thoughts went back to +the evening when the address was written, and he remembered how the +rector had come in and surprised him, and how he had huddled away the +letters. In his disorder, no doubt, he had left one lying among his +own papers, and made the fatal mistake of tearing from it the scrap on +which he had written the address. + +He saw it all as he stood there, still gazing at the piece of paper, +while his rugged face grew darkly red and then again a miserable +sallow, and the perspiration sprang out upon his forehead. He felt +that the archdeacon's eyes were upon him, that the archdeacon was +waiting for him to speak. He saw the mistake he had made, but his +brain, usually so ready, failed to supply him with the explanation he +required. + +"You understand?" Mr. Bonamy said slowly. "The question is, how this +letter came to be in your room that evening, Mr. Clode. That is the +question." + +"I cannot say," he answered huskily. He was so shaken by the +unexpected nature of the attack, and by the strange and ominous way +in which the evidence against him had arisen, that he had not the +courage to look up and face his accuser. "I think--nay, I am sure, +indeed--that the rector must have given me the paper," he explained, +after an awkward pause. + +"He is positive he did not," Mr. Bonamy answered. + +Then Clode recovered himself and looked up. After all, it was only his +word against another's. "Possibly he is," he said, "and yet he may be +mistaken. I cannot otherwise see how the paper could have come into my +hands. You do not really mean," he continued with a smile, which was +almost easy, "to charge me with stealing the letter, I suppose?" + +"Well, to be quite candid, I do," Mr. Bonamy replied curtly. Nor was +this unexpected slap in the face rendered more tolerable by the +qualification he hastened to add--"or getting it stolen." + +The curate started. "This is not to be borne," he cried hotly. He +looked at the archdeacon as if expecting him to interfere. But he +found that gentleman's face grave and troubled, and, seeing he must +expect no help from him at present, he continued, "Do you dare to make +so serious an accusation on such evidence as this, Mr. Bonamy?" + +"On that," the lawyer replied, pointing to the paper, "and on other +evidence besides." + +The curate flinched. Had they found Felton, the earl's servant? Had +they any more scraps of paper--any more self-wrought damning evidence +of that kind? It was only by an effort, which was apparent to one at +least of his hearers, that he gathered himself together, and answered, +with a show of promptitude and ease, "Other evidence? What, I ask? +Produce it!" + +"Here it is," said Mr. Bonamy, pointing to Jack Smith, who had been +standing at his elbow throughout the discussion. + +"What has he to do with it?" Clode muttered with dry lips. + +"Only this," the barrister said quietly, addressing himself to the +archdeacon. "That some time ago I saw Mr. Clode replace a packet in +the cupboard in the rector's library. He only discovered my presence +in the room when the cupboard door was open, and his agitation on +observing me struck me as strange. Afterward I made inquiries of Mr. +Lindo, without telling him my reason, and learned that Mr. Clode had +no business at that cupboard--which was, in fact, devoted to the +rector's private papers." + +"Perhaps, Mr. Clode, you will explain that," said the lawyer with +quiet triumph. + +He might have denied it had he spoken out at once. He might have given +Jack the lie. But he saw with sudden and horrible clearness how this +thing fitted that other thing, and this evidence corroborated that; +and he lost his presence of mind, and for a moment stood speechless, +glaring at his new accuser. He did not need to look at the archdeacon +to be sure that his face was no longer grave only, but stern and +suspicious. The gas-jets flared before his eyes and dazzled him. The +room seemed to be turning. He could not answer. It was only when he +had stood for an age, as it seemed to him, dumb and self-convicted +before those three faces, that he summoned up courage to mutter, "It +is false. It is all false, I say!" and to stamp his foot on the floor. + +But no one answered him, and he quailed. His nerves were shaken. He, +who on ordinary occasions prided himself on his tact and management, +dared not now urge another word in his own defence lest some new piece +of evidence should arise to give him the lie. The meaning silence of +his accusers and his own conscience were too much for him. And, +suddenly snatching up his hat, which lay on a chair beside him, he +rushed from the room. + +He had not gone fifty yards along the pavement before he recognized +the mad folly of this retreat--the utter surrender of all his hopes +and ambitions which it meant. But it was too late. The strong man had +met a stronger. His very triumph and victory had gone some way toward +undoing him, by rendering him more open to surprise and less prepared +for sudden attack. Now it was too late to do more than repent. He saw +that. Hurrying through the darkness, heedless whither he went, he +invented a dozen stories to explain his conduct. But always the +archdeacon's grave face rose before him, and he rejected the clever +fictions and the sophisms in support of them, which his ingenuity was +now so quick to suggest. + +How he cursed the madness, the insensate folly, which had wrecked him! +Had he only let matters take their own course and stood aside, he +would have gained his ends! For a minute and a half he had been as +good as rector of Claversham. And now! + +Laura Hammond, crossing the hall after tea, heard the outer door open +behind her, and, feeling the cold gust of air which entered, stopped +and turned, and saw him standing on the mat. He had let himself in in +this way on more than one occasion before, and it was not that which +in a moment caused her heart to sink. She had been expecting him all +day, for she knew the crisis was imminent, and had been hourly looking +for news. But she had not been expecting him in this guise. There was +a strange disorder in his air and manner. He was wet and splashed with +mud. He held his hat in his hand, as if he had been walking bareheaded +in the rain. His eyes shone with a wild light, and he looked at her +oddly. She turned and went toward him. "Is it you?" she said timidly. + +"Oh, yes, it is I," he answered, with a forced laugh. "I want to speak +to you." And he let drop the _portire_, which he had hitherto held in +his hand. + +There was a light in the breakfast-room, which opened on the hall, and +she led the way into that room. He followed her and closed the door +behind him. She pointed to a chair, but he did not take it. "What is +it?" she said, looking up at him in real alarm. "What is the matter, +Stephen?" + +"Everything!" he answered, with another laugh. "I am leaving +Claversham." + +"You are leaving?" she said incredulously. + +"Yes, leaving!" he answered. + +"To-night?" she stammered. + +"Well, not to-night," he answered, with rude irony. "To-morrow. I have +been within an ace of getting the living, and I--I have lost it. That +is all." + +Her cheek turned a shade paler, and she laid one hand on the table to +steady herself. "I am so sorry," she murmured. + +He did not see her tremor; he heard only her words, and he resented +them bitterly. "Have you nothing more to say than that?" he cried. + +She had much more to say--or, rather, had she said all that was +in her mind she would have had. But his tone helped her to recover +herself--helped her to play the part on which she had long ago +decided. In her way she loved this man, and her will had melted at +sight of him, standing downcast and defeated before her. Had he +attacked her on the side of her affections he might have done much--he +might have prevailed. But his hard words recalled her to her natural +self. "What would you have me say?" she answered, looking steadily +across the table at him. Something, she began to see, had happened +besides the loss of the living--something which had hurt him sorely. +And as she discerned this, she compared his dishevelled, untidy dress +with the luxury of the room, and shivered at the thought of the +precipice on the brink of which she had paused. + +He did not answer. + +"What would you have me say?" she repeated more firmly. + +"If you do not know, I cannot teach you," he retorted, with a sneer. + +"You have no right to say that," she replied bravely. "You remember +our compact." + +"You intend to keep to it?" he answered scornfully. + +She had no doubt about that now, and she summoned up her courage by an +effort. "Certainly I do," she murmured. "I thought you understood me. +I tried to make my meaning clear." + +Clode did not answer her at once. He stood looking at her, his eyes +glowing. He knew that his only hope, if hope there might be, lay in +gaining some word from her now--now, before any rumor to his +disadvantage should get abroad in the town. But his temper, long +restrained, was so infuriated by disappointment and defeat, that for +the moment love did not prevail with him. He knew that a tender word +might do much, but he could not frame it. When he did at last find +tongue it was only to say, "And that is your final decision?" + +"It is," she answered in a low voice. She did not dare to look up at +him. + +"And all you have to say to me?" + +"Yes. Except that I wish you well. I shall always wish you well, Mr. +Clode," she muttered. + +"Thank you," he answered coldly. + +So coldly, and with so much composure, that she did not guess the gust +of hatred of all things and all men which was in his heart. He was +beside himself with love, rage, disappointment. For a moment longer he +stood gazing at her downcast face. But she did not look up at him; and +presently, in a strange silence, he turned and went out of the room. + + + + + CHAPTER XXV. + + HUMBLE PIE. + + +The success of reticence is great. Mr. Bonamy and his nephew, as they +went home to tea after their victory, plumed themselves not a little +upon the proof of this which they had just given Mr. Clode. They said +little, it is true; even to one another, but more than once Mr. Bonamy +chuckled in a particularly dry manner, and at the top of the street +Jack made an observation "You think the archdeacon was satisfied?" he +asked, turning to his companion for a moment. + +"Absolutely," quoth Mr. Bonamy; and he strode on with one hand in his +pocket, his coat-tails flying, and his money jingling in a manner +inimitable by any other Claversham person. + +At tea they were both silent upon the subject, but the lawyer +presently let drop the fact that the earl had accepted the rector's +resignation. Jack, watchfully jealous, poor fellow, yet in his +jealousy loyal to the core, glanced involuntarily at Kate to see what +effect the news produced upon her; and then glanced swiftly away +again. Not so swiftly, however, that the change in the girl's face +escaped him. He saw it flush with mingled pride and alarm, and then +grow grave and thoughtful. After that she kept her eyes averted +from him, and he talked busily to Daintry. "I must be leaving you +to-morrow," he said by-and-by, as they rose from the table. + +"You will be coming back again?" Mr. Bonamy answered, interrupting a +loud wail from Daintry. It should be explained that Jack had not +stayed through the whole of these weeks at Claversham, but had twice +left for some days on circuit business. Mr. Bonamy thought he was +meditating another of these disappearances. + +"I should like to do so," Jack answered quietly, "but I must get back +to London now." + +"Well, your room will be ready for you whenever you like to come to +us," Mr. Bonamy replied with crabbed graciousness. And he fully meant +what he said. He had grown used to Jack's company. He saw, too, the +change his presence had made in the girls' lives, and possibly he +entertained some thoughts of a greater change which the cousin might +make in the life of one of them. + +So he was sorry to lose Jack. But Daintry was inconsolable. When she +and Kate were alone together she made her moan, sitting in a great +chair three sizes too big for her, with her legs sprawling before her, +her hands on the chair-arms, and her eyes on the fire. "Oh, dear, what +shall we do when he is gone, Kate?" she said disconsolately. "Won't it +be miserable?" + +Kate, who was bending over her work, and had been unusually silent for +some time, looked up with a start and a rush of color to her cheeks. +"When who is gone--oh, you mean Jack!" she said rather incoherently. + +"Of course I do," Daintry answered crossly. "But you never did care +for Jack." + +"You have no right to say that," Kate answered quickly, letting her +work drop for the moment. "I think Jack is one of the noblest, the +most generous--yes," she continued quickly, "the bravest man I have +ever known, Daintry." + +Her voice trembled, and Daintry saw with surprise that her eyes were +full of tears. "I never thought you felt like that about him," the +younger girl answered penitently. + +"Perhaps I did not a little while back," Kate answered gently, as she +took up her work again. "I know him better now, that is all." + +It was quite true. She knew him better now. A fellow-feeling makes us +wondrous kind. Love, which blinds our eyes to some things, opens them +to others. Had Jack offered Kate "Their Wedding Journey" now she might +still have asked him to change the book for another, but assuredly she +would not have told him it sounded silly, nor hurt his feelings by so +much as a look. + +It was quite true that she thought him all she said, that her eyes +grew moist for his sake. But his was the minute only; the hour was +another's. Daintry, proceeding to speculate gloomily on the dulness of +Claversham without Jack, thought her sister was attending to her, +whereas Kate's thoughts were far away now, centred on a fair head and +a bright boyish face, and a solitary room in which she pictured +Reginald Lindo sitting alone and despondent, the short-lived +brilliance of his Claversham career already extinguished. What were +his thoughts, she wondered. Was he regretting--for the strongest have +their hours of weakness--the step he had taken? Was he blaming her for +the advice she had given? Was he giving a thought to her at all, or +only planning the new life on which he must now enter--forming the new +hopes which must henceforth cheer him on? + +Kate let her work drop and looked dreamily before her. Assuredly the +prospect was a dull and uninviting one. Before _his_ coming there had +always been the unknown something, which a girl's future holds--a +possibility of change, of living a happier, fuller life. But now she +had nothing of this kind before her. He had come and robbed her even +of this, and given her in return only regret and humiliation, and a +few--a very few--hours of strange pleasure and sunshine and womanly +pride in a woman's influence nobly used. Yet would she have had it +otherwise? No, not for all the unknown possibilities of change, not +though Claversham life should stretch its dulness unbroken through a +century. + +She was sitting alone in the dining-room next morning, Mr. Bonamy +being at the office, and Daintry out shopping, when the maid came in +and announced that Mr. Lindo was at the door and wished to see her. +"Are you sure that he did not ask for Mr. Bonamy?" Kate said, rising +and laying down her work with outward composure and secret agitation. + +"No; he asked particularly for you, miss," the servant answered, +standing with her hand on the door. + +"Very well; you can show him in here," Kate replied, casting an eye +round her, but disdaining to remove the signs of domestic employment +which met its scrutiny. "He has come to say good-by," she thought to +herself; and she schooled herself to play her part fitly and close the +little drama with decency and reserve. + +He came in looking very thoughtful. She need not have feared for her +father's papers, her sister's dog's-eared Ollendorf, or her own +sewing. He did not so much as glance at them. She thought she saw +business in his eye, and she said as he advanced, "Did you wish to see +me or my father, Mr. Lindo?" + +"You, Miss Bonamy," he answered, shaking hands with her. "You have +heard the news, I suppose?" + +"Yes," she replied soberly. "I am so very sorry. I fear--I mean I +regret now, that when you----" + +"Asked for advice"--he continued, helping her out with a grave smile. +He had taken the great leather-covered easy-chair on the other side of +the fireplace, and was sitting forward in it, toying with his hat. + +"Yes," she said, coloring--"if you like to put it in that very +flattering form--I regret now that I presumed to give it, Mr. Lindo." + +"I am sorry for that," he answered, looking up at her as he spoke. + +She felt herself coloring anew. "Why?" she asked rather tremulously. + +"Because I have come to ask your advice again. You will not refuse to +give it me?" + +She looked at him in surprise; with a little annoyance even. It was +absurd. Why should he come to her in this way? Why, because on one +occasion, when circumstances had impelled him to speak and her to +answer, she had presumed to advise--why should he again come to her of +set purpose? It was ridiculous of him. "I think I must refuse," she +said gravely and a little formally. "I know nothing of business." + +"It is not upon a matter of business," he answered. + +She uttered a sigh of impatience. "I think you are very foolish, Mr. +Lindo. Why do you not go to my father?" + +"Well, because it is--because it is on a rather delicate matter," he +answered impulsively. + +"Still I do not see why you should bring it to me," she objected, with +a flash in her gray eyes, and many memories in her mind. + +"Well, I will tell you why I bring it to you," he answered bluntly. +"Because I acted on your advice the other day; and that, you see, Miss +Bonamy, has put me in this fix; and--and, in fact, made other advice +necessary, don't you see?" + +"I see you are inclined to be somewhat ungenerous," she answered. "But +if it must be so, pray go on." + +He rose slowly and stood leaning against the mantel-shelf in his +favorite attitude, his foot on the fender. "I will be as short as I +can," he said, a nervousness she did not fail to note in his manner. +"Perhaps you will kindly hear me to the end before you solve my +problem for me. It will help me a little, I think, if I may put my +case in the third person. Miss Bonamy"--he paused on the name and +cleared his throat, and then went on more quickly--"a man I know, +young and keen, and at the time successful--successful beyond his +hopes, so that others of his age and standing looked on him with envy, +came one day to know a girl, and, from the moment of knowing her, to +admire and esteem her. She was not only very beautiful, but he thought +he saw in her, almost from the first hour of their acquaintance, such +noble and generous qualities as all men, even the weakest, would fain +imagine in the woman they love." + +Kate moved suddenly in her chair as if to rise. Then she sat back +again, and he went on. + +"This was a weak man," he said in a low voice. "He had had small +experience; let that be some excuse for him. He entered at this time +on a new field of work in which he found himself of importance and +fancied himself of greater importance. There he had frequent +opportunities of meeting the woman I have mentioned, who had already +made an impression on him. But his head was turned. He discovered that +for certain small and unworthy reasons her goodness and her fairness +were not recognized by those among whom he mixed, and he had the +meanness to swim with the current and to strive to think no more of +the woman to whom his heart had gone out. He acted like a cur, in +fact, and presently he had his reward. Evil times came upon him. The +position he loved was threatened. Finally he lost it, and found +himself again where he had started in life--a poor curate without +influence or brilliant prospects. Then--it seems an ignoble, a mean, +and a miserable thing to say--he found out for certain that he loved +this woman, and could imagine no greater honor or happiness than to +have her for his wife." + +He paused a moment, and stole a glance at her. Kate sat motionless and +still, her lips compressed and her eyes hidden by their long lashes, +her gaze fixed apparently on the fire. Save that her face was slightly +flushed, and that she breathed quickly, he might have fancied that she +did not understand, or even that she had not heard. When he spoke +again, after waiting anxiously and vainly for any sign, his voice was +husky and agitated. "Will you tell me, Miss Bonamy, what he should +do?" he said. "Should he ask her to forgive him and to trust him, or +should he go away and be silent?" + +She did not speak. + +"Kate, will you not tell me? Can I not hope to be forgiven?" He was +stooping beside her now, and his hand almost touched her hair. + +Then, at last, she looked up at him. "Will not my advice come a little +late?" she whispered tremulously and yet with a smile--a smile which +was at once bright and tearful and eloquent beyond words. + +Afterward she thought of a dozen things she should have said to +him--about his certainty of himself, about her father; but at the time +none of these occurred to her. If he had come to her with his hands +full, it would certainly have been otherwise. But she saw him poor +through his own act, and her pride left her. When he took her in his +arms and kissed her, she said not a word. And he said only, "My +darling!" + + + * * * * * + + +The rich can afford to be niggardly. Lindo did not stay long, the +question he had to put once answered, his claim to happiness once +allowed. When Mr. Bonamy came in half an hour later, he found Kate +alone. There was an austere elation in his eye which for a moment led +her to think that he had heard her news. His first words, however, +dispelled the idea. "I have just seen Lord Dynmore," he said, taking +his coat-skirts on his arms and speaking with a geniality which showed +that he was moved out of his every-day self. "He has--he has +considerably surprised me." + +"Indeed?" said Kate, blushing and conscious, half-attentive and half +given up to thinking how she should tell her own tale. + +"Yes. He has very much surprised me. He has asked me to undertake the +agency of his property in this part of the country." + +Kate dropped her sewing in genuine surprise "No?" she said. "Has he, +indeed?" + +Mr. Bonamy, pursing up his lips to keep back the smile of complacency +which would force its way, let his eyes rove round the room. "Yes," he +said, "I do not mind saying here that I am rather flattered. Of course +I should not say as much out of doors." + +"Oh, papa, I am so glad," she cried, rising. An unwonted softness in +her tone touched and pleased him. + +"Yes," he continued, "I am to go over to the park to-morrow to lunch +with him and talk over matters. He told me something else which will +astonish you. He has behaved very handsomely to Mr. Lindo. It seems he +saw him early this morning, after having an interview with the +archdeacon, and offered him the living of Pocklington, in +Oxfordshire--worth, I believe, about five hundred a year. He is going +to give the vicar of Pocklington the rectory here." + +Kate's face was scarlet. "But I thought--I understood," she stammered, +"that Mr. Clode was to be rector here?" + +"Not at all," said Mr. Bonamy, with some asperity. "The whole thing +was settled before ten o'clock this morning. Mary told me at the door +that Lindo had been here since, so I supposed he had told you +something about it." + +"He did not tell me a word of it!" Kate answered impulsively, the +generous trick her lover had played breaking in upon her mind in all +its fulness. "Not a word of it! But papa"--with a pause and then a +rush of words--"he asked me to be his wife, and I--I told him I +would." + +For a moment Mr. Bonamy stared at his daughter as if he thought she +had lost her wits. Probably since his boyhood he had never been so +much astonished. "I was talking of Mr. Lindo," he said at length, +speaking with laborious clearness. "You are referring to your cousin, +I fancy." + +"No," Kate said, striving with her happy confusion. "I mean Mr. Lindo, +papa." + +"Indeed! indeed!" Mr. Bonamy answered after another pause, speaking +still more slowly, and gazing at her as if he had never seen her +before, nor anything at all like her. "You have a good deal surprised +me. And I am not easily surprised, I think. Not easily, I think." + +"But you are not angry with me, papa?" she murmured rather tearfully. + +For a moment he still stared at her in silence, unable to overcome his +astonishment. Then by a great effort he recovered himself. "Oh, no," +he said, with a smack of his old causticity, "I do not see why I +should be angry with you, Kate. Indeed, I may say I foretold this. I +always said that young man would introduce great changes, and he has +done it. He has fulfilled my words to the letter, my dear!" + + + + + CHAPTER XXVI. + + LOOSE ENDS. + + +Dr. Gregg was one of the first persons in the town to hear of the late +rector's engagement. His reception of the news was characteristic. "I +don't believe it!" he shrieked. "I don't believe it! It is all +rubbish! What has he got to marry upon, I should like to know?" + +His informant ventured to mention the living of Pocklington. + +"I don't believe it!" the little doctor shrieked. "If he had got that +he would see her far enough before he would marry her. Do you think I +am such a fool as to believe that?" + +"But you see, Bonamy--the earl's agency will be rather a lift in the +world for him. And he has money." + +"I don't believe it!" shrieked Gregg again. But, alas! he did. He knew +that these things were true, and when he next met Bonamy he smiled a +wry smile, and tried to swallow his teeth, and grovelled, still with +the native snarl curling his lips at intervals. The doctor, indeed, +had to suffer a good deal of unhappiness in these days. Clode, about +whom he had boasted largely, was conspicuous by his absence. Lord +Dynmore's carriage might be seen any morning in front of the Bonamy +offices. And rumor said that the earl had taken a strange fancy to the +young clergyman whom he had so belabored. Things seemed to Gregg and +to some other people in Claversham to be horribly out of joint at this +time. + +Among others, poor Mrs. Hammond found her brain somewhat disordered. +To the curate's unaccountable withdrawal, as to the translation of the +late rector to Pocklington, she could easily reconcile herself. But to +Mr. Lindo's engagement to the lawyer's daughter, and to the surprising +intimacy between the earl and Mr. Bonamy, she could not so readily +make up her mind. Why, it was reported that the earl had walked into +town and taken tea at Mr. Bonamy's house! Still, facts are stubborn +things, nor was it long before Mrs. Hammond was heard to say that the +lawyer's conduct in supporting Mr. Lindo in his trouble had produced a +very favorable impression on her mind, and prepared her to look upon +him in a new light. + +And Laura? Laura, during these changes, showed herself particularly +bright and sparkling. She was not of a nature to feel even defeat very +deeply, or to philosophize much over past mistakes. Her mother saw no +change in her--nay, she marvelled, recalling her daughter's intimacy +with Mr. Clode and the obstinacy she had exhibited in siding with him, +that Laura could so completely put him out of her mind and thoughts. +But the least sensitive feel sometimes. The most thoughtless have +their moments of care. Even the cat, with its love of home and +comfort, will sometimes wander on a wet night. And there are times +when Laura, doubting the future and weary of the present, wishes she +had had the courage to do as her heart bade her, and make the plunge, +careless what the world, and her rivals, might say of her marriage to +a curate. For Clode's rugged face and masculine will dominate her +still. Though a year has elapsed, and she has not heard of him, nor +probably will hear of him now, she thinks of him with regret and +soreness. She had not much to give, but to her sorrow she knows now +that she gave it to him, and that in that struggle for supremacy both +were losers. + +The good wine last. Kate broke the news to Jack herself, and found it +no news. "Yes, I have just seen Lindo," he answered quietly, taking +her hand, and looking her in the face with dry eyes. "May he make you +very happy, Kate, and--well, I can wish you nothing better than that." +Then Kate broke down and cried bitterly. When she recovered herself +Jack was gone. + +If you were to describe that scene to Jack Smith's friends in the +Temple they would jeer at you. They would cover you with ridicule and +gibes. There is no one so keen, so sharp, so matter-of-fact, so +certain to succeed as he, they say. They have only one fault to find +with him, that he works too hard; that he bids fair to become one of +those legal machines which may be seen any evening taking in fuel at +solitary club tables, and returning afterward to dusty chambers, with +the regularity of clockwork. But there is one thing even in his +present life which his Temple friends do not know, and which gives me +hope of him. Week by week there comes to him a letter from the country +from a long-limbed girl in short frocks, whose hero he is. Time, +which, like Procrustes' bed, brings frocks and legs to the same length +at last, heals wounds also. + +When a day not far distant now shall show him Daintry in the bloom of +budding womanhood, is it to be thought that Jack will resist her? I +think not. But, be that as it may, with no better savor than that of +his loyalty, the silent loyalty of an English friend, could the +chronicle of a Bayard--much less the tale of a country town--come to +an end. + + + + THE END. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The New Rector, by Stanley J. Weyman + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR *** + +***** This file should be named 39215-8.txt or 39215-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/2/1/39215/ + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the +Web Archive (Harvard University) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/old/39215-8.zip b/old/39215-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a72b974 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/39215-8.zip diff --git a/old/39215.txt b/old/39215.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7a87c54 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/39215.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9895 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The New Rector, by Stanley J. Weyman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The New Rector + +Author: Stanley J. Weyman + +Release Date: March 20, 2012 [EBook #39215] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the +Web Archive (Harvard University) + + + + + +no gutcheck/jeebies/gutspell + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + 1. Page scan source: + http://www.archive.org/details/newrector00weymgoog + (Harvard University) + + 2. Table of Contents added. + + 3. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. + + + + + + + THE NEW RECTOR + + + + + + BY + + STANLEY J. WEYMAN + + + + + + NEW YORK + + AMERICAN PUBLISHERS CORPORATION + + 310-318 Sixth Avenue + + + + + + + Copyright 1891, + BY + UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY. + + * * * + + _All rights reserved_ + + + + + + + CONTENTS. + + CHAPTER + + I. "LE ROI EST MORT!" + + II. "VIVE LE ROI!" + + III. AN AWKWARD MEETING. + + IV. BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS. + + V. "REGINALD LINDO, 1850." + + VI. THE BONAMYS AT HOME. + + VII. THE HAMMONDS' DINNER PARTY. + + VIII. TWO SURPRISES. + + IX. TOWN TALK. + + X. OUT WITH THE SHEEP. + + XI. THE DOCTOR SPEAKS. + + XII. THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL. + + XIII. LAURA'S PROVISO. + + XIV. THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD. + + XV. THE BAZAAR. + + XVI. "LORD DYNMORE IS HERE." + + XVII. THE LAWYER AT HOME. + + XVIII. A FRIEND IN NEED. + + XIX. THE DAY AFTER. + + XX. A SUDDEN CALL. + + XXI. IN PROFUNDIS. + + XXII. THE RECTOR'S DECISION. + + XXIII. THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS. + + XXIV. THE CUP AT THE LIP. + + XXV. HUMBLE PIE. + + XXVI. LOOSE ENDS. + + + + + + + THE NEW RECTOR. + + + + + CHAPTER I. + + "LE ROI EST MORT!" + + +The king was dead. But not at once, not until after some short +breathing-space, such as was pleasant enough to those whose only +concern with the succession lay in the shouting, could the cry of +"Long live the king!" be raised. For a few days there was no rector of +Claversham. The living was during this time in abeyance, or in the +clouds, or in the lap of the law, or in any strange and inscrutable +place you choose to name. It may have been in the prescience of the +patron, and, if so, no locality could be more vague, the whereabouts +of Lord Dynmore himself, to say nothing of his prescience, being as +uncertain as possible. Messrs. Gearns & Baker, his solicitors and +agents, should have known as much upon this point as any one; yet it +was their habit to tell one inquirer that his lordship was in the +Cordilleras, and another that he was on the slopes of the Andes, +and another that he was at the forty-ninth parallel--quite +indifferently--these places being all one to Messrs. Gearns & Baker, +whose walk in life had lain for so many years about Lincoln's Inn +Fields that Clare Market had come to be their ideal of an uncivilized +country. + +And more, if the whereabouts of Lord Dynmore could only be told in +words rather far-sounding than definite, there was room for a doubt +whether his prescience existed at all. For, according to his friends, +there never was a man whose memory was so notably eccentric--not weak, +but eccentric. And if his memory was impeccable, his prescience-- But +we grow wide of the mark. The question being merely where the living +of Claversham was during the days which immediately followed Mr. +Williams's death, let it be said at once that we do not know. + +Mr. Williams was the late incumbent. He had been rector of the little +Warwickshire town for nearly forty years; and although his people were +ready enough to busy themselves with the question of his successor, he +did not lack honor in his death. His had been a placid life, such as +suited an indolent and easy-going man. "Let me sit upon one chair and +put up my feet on another, and there I am," he was once heard to say; +and the town repeated the remark and chuckled over it. There were some +who would have had the parish move more quickly, and who talked with a +sneer of the old port-wine kind of parson. But if he had done little +good, he had done less evil. He was kindly and open-handed, and he had +not an enemy in the parish. He was regretted as much as such a man +should be. Besides, people did not die commonly in Claversham. It was +but once a year, or twice at the most, that any one who was any one +passed away. And so, when the event did occur the most was made of it +in an old-fashioned way. When Mr. Williams passed for the last time +into his churchyard, there was no window which did not, by shutter or +blind, mark its respect for him, not a tongue which wagged foul of his +memory. And then the shutters were taken down and the blinds pulled +up, and every one, from Mr. Clode, the curate, to the old people at +Bourne's Almhouses, who, having no affairs of their own, had the more +time to discuss their neighbors', asked, "Who is to be the new +rector?" + +On the day of the funeral two of these old pensioners watched the +curate's tall form as he came gravely along the opposite side of the +street, to fall in at the door of his lodgings with two ladies, one +elderly, one young, who were passing so opportunely that it really +seemed as if they might have been waiting for him. He and the elder +lady--she was so plump of figure, so healthy of eye and cheek, and was +dressed besides with such a comfortable richness that it did one good +to look at her--began to talk in a subdued, decorous fashion, while +the girl listened. He was telling them of the funeral, how well the +archdeacon had read the service, and what a crowd of Dissenters had +been present, and so on: and at last he came to the important +question. + +"I hear, Mrs. Hammond," he said, "that the living will be given to Mr. +Herbert of Easthope, whom you know, I think? To me? Oh, no, I have +not, and never had, any expectation of it. Please do not," he added, +with a slight smile and a shake of the head, "mention such a thing +again. Leave me in my content." + +"But why should you not have it?" said the young lady, with a pleasant +persistence. "Every one in the parish would be glad if you were +appointed. Could we not do something or say something--get up a +petition or anything? Lord Dynmore ought, of course, to give it to +you. I think some one should tell him what are the wishes of the +parish. I do indeed!" + +She was a very pretty young lady, with bright brown eyes and hair and +rather arch features, and the gentleman she was addressing had long +found her face pleasant to look upon; but at this moment it really +seemed to him as the face of an angel. Yet he only answered with a +kind of depressed gratitude. "Thank you, Miss Hammond," he said. "If +good wishes could procure me the living, I should have an excellent +reason for hoping. But as things are, it is not for me." + +"Pooh! pooh!" said Mrs. Hammond cheerily, "who knows?" And then, after +a few more words, they went on their way, and he turned into his +rooms. + +The old women were still watching. "I don't well know who'll get it, +Peggy," said one, "but I be pretty sure of this, as he won't! It isn't +his sort as gets 'em. It's the lord's friends, bless you!" + +So it appeared that she and Mr. Clode were of one mind on the matter. +But was that really Mr. Clode's opinion? It was when the crow opened +its beak that it dropped the piece of cheese; and so to this day the +wise man has no chance or expectation of this or that until he gets +it. And if a patron or a patron's solicitor has for some days had +under his paperweight a letter written in a hand that bears a strange +likeness to the wise man's--a letter setting forth the latter's claims +and wisdom--what of that? That is a private matter, of course. + +Be that as it may, there was scarcely a person in Claversham who did +not give some time that evening, and on subsequent evenings too, to +the interesting question who was to be the new rector. The rector was +a big factor in the town-life. Girls wondered whether he would be +young, and hoped he would dance. Their mothers were sanguine that he +would be unmarried, and their fathers that he would play whist. And +one questioned whether he would buy Mr. Williams's stock of port, and +another whether he would dine late. And some trusted that he would let +things be, and some hoped that he would cleanse the stables. And only +one thing was certain and sure and immutably fixed--that, whoever he +was, he would not be able to please everybody. + +Nay, the ripple of excitement spread far beyond Claversham. Not only +at the archdeacon's at Kingsford Carbonel, five miles away among the +orchards and hopyards, was there much speculation upon the matter, but +even at the Homfrays', of Holberton, ten miles out beyond the Baer +Hills, there was talk about it, and bets were made across the +billiard-table. And in more distant vicarages and curacies, where the +patron was in some degree known, there were flutterings of heart and +anxious searchings of the "Guardian" and Crockford. Those who seemed +to have some chance of the living grew despondent, and those who had +none talked the thing over with their wives after the children had +gone to bed, until they persuaded themselves that they would die at +Claversham Rectory. Middle-aged men who had been at college with Lord +Dynmore remembered that they had on one occasion rowed in the same +boat with him; and young men who had danced with his niece thought +secretly that, dear little woman as Emily or Annie was, they might +have done better. And a hundred and eleven letters, written by people +who knew less than Messrs. Gearns & Baker of the Andes, seeing that +they did not know that Lord Dynmore was there or thereabouts, were +received at Dynmore Park and forwarded to London, and duly made up +into a large parcel with other correspondence by Messrs. Gearns & +Baker, and so were despatched to the forty-ninth parallel--or +thereabouts. + + + + + CHAPTER II. + + "VIVE LE ROI!" + + +It was at the beginning of the second week in October that Mr. +Williams died; and, the weather in those parts being peculiarly fine +and bright for the time of year, men stood about in the churchyard +with bare heads, and caught no colds. And it continued so for some +days after the funeral. But not everywhere. Upon a morning, some three +perhaps after the ceremony at Claversham, a young gentleman sat down +to his breakfast, only a hundred and fifty miles away, under such +different conditions--a bitter east wind, a dense fog, and a general +murkiness of atmosphere--that one might have supposed his not +over-plentiful meal to be laid in another planet. + +The air in the room--a meagrely furnished, much littered room, was +yellow and choking, and the candles burned dimly in the midst of +yellow halos. The fire seemed to be smouldering, and the owner of the +room had to pay some attention to it before he sat down and found a +letter lying beside his plate. He glanced at it doubtfully. "I do not +know the handwriting," he muttered, "and it is not a subscription, for +they never come in an east wind. I am afraid it is a bill." + +The letter was addressed to the Rev. Reginald Lindo, St. Barnabas +Mission House, 383 East India Dock Road, London, E. After scrutinizing +it for a moment, he pulled a candle toward him and tore open the +envelope. + +He read the letter slowly, his teacup at his lips, and, though he was +alone, his face grew crimson. When he had finished it he turned back +and read it again, and then flung it down and, starting up, began to +walk the room. "What a boy I am!" he muttered. "But it is almost +incredible. Upon my honor it is almost incredible!" + +He was still at the height of his excitement, now sitting down to take +a mouthful of breakfast and now leaping up to pace the room, when his +housekeeper entered and said that a woman from Tamplin's Rents wanted +to see him. + +"What does she want, Mrs. Baxter?" he asked. + +"Husband is dying, sir," the old lady replied briefly. + +"Do you know her at all?" + +"No, sir. She is as poor a piece as I have ever seen. She says that +she could not have come out, for want of clothes, if it had not been +for the fog. And they are not particular here, as I know--the +hussies!" + +"Say that I shall be ready to go with her in less than five minutes," +the young clergyman answered. "And here! Give her some tea, Mrs. +Baxter. The pot is half full." + +He bustled about; but nevertheless the message and the business he was +now upon had sobered him, and as he buttoned up the letter in his +breast-pocket, his face was grave. He was a tall young man, fair, +with regular features, and curling hair cut rather short. His eyes +were blue and pleasantly bold; and in his every action and in +his whole carriage there was a great appearance of confidence and +self-possession. Taking a book and a small case from a side-table, he +put on his overcoat and went out. A moment, and the dense fog +swallowed him up, and with him the tattered bundle of rags, which had +a husband, and very likely had nothing else in the world of her own. +Tamplin's Rents not affecting us, we may skip a few hours, and then go +westward with him as far as the Temple, which in the East India Dock +Road is considered very far west indeed by those who have ever heard +of it. + +Here he sought a dingy staircase in Fig-tree Court, and, mounting to +the second floor, stopped before a door which was adorned by about a +dozen names, painted in white on a black ground. He knocked loudly, +and, a small boy answering his summons with great alacrity and +importance, our friend asked for Mr. Smith, and was promptly ushered +into a room about nine feet square, in which, at a table covered with +papers and open books, sat a small, dark-complexioned man, very keen +and eager in appearance, who looked up with an air of annoyance. + +"Who is it, Fred?" he said impatiently, moving one of the candles, +which the fog still rendered necessary, although it was high noon. "I +am engaged at present." + +"Mr. Lindo to see you, sir," the boy announced, with a formality very +funny in a groom of the chambers about four feet high. + +The little man's countenance instantly changed, and he jumped up +grinning. "Is it you, old boy?" he said. "Sit down, old fellow! I +thought it might be my own solicitor, and it is well to be prepared, +you know." + +"But you are not really busy?" said the visitor, looking at him +doubtfully. + +"Well, I am and I am not," replied Mr. Smith; and, deftly tipping +aside the books, he disclosed some slips of manuscript. "It is an +article for the 'Cornhill,'" he continued; "but whether it will ever +appear there is another matter. You have come to lunch, of course? And +now, what is your news?" + +He was so quick and eager that he reminded people who saw him for the +first time of a rat. When they came to know him better, they found +that a stauncher friend than Jack Smith was not to be found in +the Temple. With this he had the reputation of being a clever, +clear-headed man, and his sound common-sense was almost a proverb. +Observing that Lindo did not answer him, he repeated, "Is anything +amiss, old fellow?" + +"Well, not quite amiss," Lindo answered, his face flushing a little. +"But the fact is"--taking the letter from the breast-pocket--"that I +have had the offer of a living, Jack." + +Smith leaped up and clapped his friend on the shoulder. "By Jove! old +man," he exclaimed heartily, "I am glad of it! Right glad of it! You +must have had enough of that slumming. But I hope it is a better +living than mine," he continued, with a comical glance round the tiny +room. "Let us have a look! What is it? Two hundred and a house?" + +Lindo handed the letter to him. It was written from Lincoln's Inn +Fields, and was dated the preceding day. It ran thus: + + +"Dear Sir:--We are instructed by our client, the Right Honorable the +Earl of Dynmore, to invite your acceptance of the living of Claversham +in the county of Warwick, vacant by the death on the 15th instant of +the Rev. John Williams, the late incumbent. The living, of which his +lordship is the patron, is a town rectory, of the approximate value of +810_l_ per annum and a house. Our client is travelling in the United +States, but we have the requisite authorities to proceed in due form +and without delay, which in this matter is prejudicial. We beg to have +the pleasure of receiving your acceptance at as early a date as +possible, + + "And remain, dear Sir, + + "Your obedient servants, + + "Gearns & Baker. + +"To the Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A." + + +The barrister read this letter with even greater surprise than seemed +natural, and, when he had done, looked at his companion with wondering +eyes. "Claversham!" he ejaculated. "Why, I know it well!" + +"Do you? I have never heard you mention it." + +"I knew old Williams!" Jack continued, still in amaze. "Knew him well, +and heard of his death, but little thought you were likely to succeed +him. My dear fellow, it is a wonderful piece of good fortune! +Wonderful! I shake you by the hand! I congratulate you heartily! But +how did you come to know the high and mighty earl? Unbosom yourself, +my dear boy!" + +"I do not know him--do not know him from Adam!" replied the young +clergyman gravely. + +"You don't mean it?" + +"I do. I have never seen him in my life." + +Jack Smith whistled. "Are you sure it is not a hoax?" he said, with a +serious face. + +"I think not," the rector-elect replied. "Perhaps I have given you a +wrong impression. I have had nothing to do with the earl; but my uncle +was his tutor." + +"Oh!" said Smith slowly, "that makes all the difference. What uncle?" + +"You have heard me speak of him. He was vicar of St. Gabriel's, +Aldgate. He died about a year ago--last October, I think. Lord Dynmore +and he were good friends, and my uncle used often to stay at his place +in Scotland. I suppose my name must have come up some time when they +were talking." + +"Likely enough," assented the lawyer. "But for the earl to remember +it, he must be one in a hundred!" + +"It is certainly very good of him," Lindo replied, his cheek flushing. +"If it had been a small country living, and my uncle had been alive to +jog his elbow, I should not have been so much surprised." + +"And you are just twenty-five!" Jack Smith observed, leaning back in +his chair, and eyeing his friend with undisguised and whimsical +admiration. "You will be the youngest rector in the Clergy List, I +should think! And Claversham! By Jove, what a berth!" + +A queer expression of annoyance for a moment showed itself in Lindo's +face. "I say, Jack, stow that!" he said gently, and with a little +shamefacedness. "I mean," he continued, smoothing down the nap on his +hat, "that I do not want to look at it altogether in that way, and I +do not want others to regard it so." + +"As a berth, you mean?" Jack said gravely, but with a twinkle in his +eyes. + +"Well, from the loaves and fishes point of view," Lindo commenced, +beginning to walk up and down the room. "I do not think an officer, +when he gets promotion, looks only at the increase in his pay. Of +course I am glad that it is a good living, and that I shall have a +house, and a good position, and all that. But I declare to you, Jack, +believe me or not as you like, that if I did not feel that I could do +the work as I hope, please God, to do it, I would not take it up--I +would not, indeed. As it is, I feel the responsibility. I have been +thinking about it as I walked down here, and upon my honor for a while +I thought I ought to decline it." + +"I would not do that!" said Gallio, dismissing the twinkle from his +eye, and really respecting his old friend, perhaps, a little more than +before. "You are not the man, I think, to shun either work or +responsibility. Did I tell you," he continued in a different tone, +"that I had an uncle at Claversham?" + +"No," said Lindo, surprised in his turn. + +"Yes, and I think he is one of your church wardens. His name is +Bonamy, and he is a solicitor. His London agent is my only client," +Jack said jerkily. + +"And he is one of the church wardens! Well, that is strange--and +jolly!" + +"Umph! Don't you be too sure of that!" retorted the barrister sharply. +"He is a--well, he has been very good to me, and he is my uncle, and I +am not going to say anything against him. But I am not quite sure that +I should like him for my church warden. _Your_ church warden! Why, it +is like a fairy tale, old fellow!" + +And so it seemed to Lindo when, an hour later, the small boy, with the +same portentous gravity of face, let him out and bade him good-day. As +the young parson started eastward, along Fleet Street first, he looked +at the moving things round him with new eyes, from a new standpoint, +with a new curiosity. The passers-by were the same, but he was +changed. He had lunched, and perhaps the material view of his position +was uppermost, for those in the crowd who specially observed the tall +young clergyman noticed in his bearing an air of calm importance and a +strong sense of personal dignity, which led him to shun collisions, +and even to avoid jostling his fellows, with peculiar care. The truth +was that he had all the while before his eyes, as he walked, an +announcement which was destined to appear in the "Guardian" of the +following week: + +"The Rev. Reginald Lindo, M.A., St. Barnabas' Mission, London, to be +Rector of Claversham. Patron, the Earl of Dynmore." + + + + + CHAPTER III. + + AN AWKWARD MEETING. + + +A fortnight after this paragraph in the "Guardian" had filled +Claversham with astonishment and Mr. Clode with a modest thankfulness +that he was spared the burden of office, a little dark man--Jack +Smith, in fact--drove briskly into Paddington Station, and, +disregarding the offers of the porters, who stand waiting on the +hither side of the journey like Charon by the Styx, and see at a +glance who has the obolus, sprang from the hansom without assistance, +and bustled on to the platform. + +Here he looked up and down as if he expected to meet some one, and +then, glancing at the clock, found that he had a quarter of an hour to +spare. He made at once for the bookstall, and, with a lavishness which +would have surprised some of his friends, bought "Punch," a little +volume by Howells, the "Standard," and finally, though he blushed as +he asked for it, the "Queen." He had just gathered his purchases +together and was paying for them, when a high-pitched voice at his +elbow made him start. "Why, Jack! what in the world are you buying all +those papers for?" The speaker was a girl about thirteen years old, +who in the hubbub had stolen unnoticed to his side. + +"Hullo, Daintry," he answered. "Why did you not say that you were here +before? I have been looking for you. Where is Kate? Oh, yes, I see +her," as a young lady turning over books at the farther end of the +stall acknowledged his presence by a laughing nod. "You are here in +good time," he went on, while the younger girl affectionately slipped +her arm through his. + +"Yes," she said. "Your mother started us early. And so you have come +to see us off, after all, Jack?" + +"Just so," he answered drily. "Let us go to Kate." + +They did so, the young lady meeting them halfway. "How kind of you to +be here, Jack!" she said. "As you have come, will you look us out a +comfortable compartment? That is the train over there. And please to +put this, and this, and Daintry's parcel in the corners for us." + +This and this were a cloak and a shawl, and a few little matters in +brown paper. In order to possess himself of them, Jack handed Kate the +papers he was carrying. + +"Are they for me?" she said, gratefully indeed, but with a placid +gratitude which was not perhaps what the donor wanted. "Oh, thank you. +And this too? What is it?" + +"'Their Wedding Journey,'" said Jack, with a shy twinkle in his eyes. + +"Is it pretty?" she answered dubiously. "It sounds silly; but you are +supposed to be a judge. I think I should like 'A Chance Acquaintance' +better, though." + +Of course the little book was changed, and Jack winced. But he had not +time to think much about it, for he had to bustle away through the +rising babel to secure seats for them in an empty compartment of the +Oxford train, and see their luggage labelled and put in. This done, he +hurried back, and pointed out to them the places he had taken. "Oh, +dear, they are in a through carriage," Kate said, stopping short and +eyeing the board over the door. + +"Yes," he answered. "I thought that that was what you wanted." + +"No, I would rather go in another carriage, and change. We shall get +to Claversham soon enough without travelling with Claversham people." + +"Indeed we shall," Daintry chimed in. "Let us go and find seats, and +Jack will bring the things after us." + +He assented meekly--very meekly for sharp Jack Smith--and presently +came along with his arms full of parcels, to find them ensconced in +the nearer seats of a compartment, which contained also one gentleman +who was already deep in the "Times." Jack, standing at the open door, +could not see his face, for it was hidden by the newspaper, but he +could see that his legs wore a youthful and reckless air; and he +raised his eyebrows interrogatively. "Pooh!" whispered Daintry in +answer. "How stupid you are! It is all right. I can see he is a +clergyman by his boots!" + +Jack smiled at this assurance, and, putting in the things he was +holding, shut the door and stood outside, looking first at the +platform about him, on which all was flurry and confusion, and then at +the interior of the carriage, which seemed in comparison peaceful and +homelike. "I think I will come with you to Westbourne Park," he said +suddenly. + +"Nonsense, Jack!" Kate replied, with crushing decision. "We shall be +there in five minutes, and you will have all the trouble of returning +for nothing." + +He acquiesced meekly--poor Jack! "Well," he said, with a new effort at +cheerfulness, "you will soon be at home, girls. Remember me to the +governor. I am afraid you will be rather dull at first. You will have +one scrap of excitement, however." + +"What is that?" said Kate, very much as if she were prepared to +depreciate it before she knew what it was. + +"The new rector!" + +"He will make very little difference to us!" the girl answered, with +an accent almost of scorn. "Papa said in his letter that he thought it +was a great pity a local man had not been appointed--some one who knew +the place and the old ways. You say he is clever and nice; but either +way it will not affect us much." + +No one noticed that the "Times" newspaper in the far corner of the +compartment rustled suspiciously, and that the clerical boots became +agitated on a sudden, as though their wearer meditated a move; and, in +ignorance of this, "I expect I shall hate him!" said Daintry calmly. + +"Come, you must not do that," Jack remonstrated "You must remember +that he is not only a very good fellow, but a great friend of mine." + +"Then we ought indeed to spare him!" Kate said frankly, "for you have +been very good to us and made our visit delightful." + +His face flushed with pleasure even at those simple words of praise. +"And you will write and tell me," he continued eagerly, "that you have +reached your journey's end safely." + +"One of us will," was the answer. "Daintry," Kate went on calmly, +"will you remind me to write to Jack to-morrow evening?" + +His face fell sadly. So little would have made him happy. He looked +down and kicked the step of the carriage, and made his tiny moan to +himself before he spoke again. "Good-bye," he said then. "They are +coming to look at your tickets. You are due out in one minute. +Good-bye, Daintry." + +"Good-bye, Jack. Come and see us soon," she cried earnestly, as she +released his hand. + +"Good-bye, Kate." Alas! Kate's cheek did not show the slightest +consciousness that his clasp was more than cousinly. She uttered her +"Good-bye, Jack, and thank you so much," very kindly, but her color +never varied by the quarter of a tone, and her grasp was as firm and +as devoid of shyness as his own. + +He had not much time to be miserable, however, then, for, the +ticket-collector coming to the window, Jack had to fall back, and in +doing so made a discovery. Kate, hunting for her ticket in one of +those mysterious places in which ladies will put tickets, heard him +utter an exclamation, and asked, "What is it, Jack?" + +To her surprise, the collector having by this time disappeared, he +stretched out his hand through the window to some one beyond her. +"Why, Lindo!" he cried, "is that you? I had not a notion of your +identity. Of course you are going down to take possession." + +Kate, trembling already with a horrible presentiment, turned her head. +Yes, it was the clergyman in the corner who answered Jack's greeting +and rose to shake hands with him, the train being already in motion. +"I did not recognize your voice out there," he said, looking rather +hot. + +"No? And I did not know you were going down to-day," Jack answered, +walking beside the train. "Let me introduce you to my cousins, Miss +Bonamy and Daintry. I am sorry that I did not see you before. Good +luck to you! Good-bye, Kate!" + +The train was moving faster and faster, and Jack was soon left behind +on the platform gazing pathetically at the black tunnel which had +swallowed it up. In the carriage there was silence, and in the heart +of one at least of the passengers the most horrible vexation. Kate +could have bitten out her tongue. She was conscious that the clergyman +had bowed in acknowledgment of Jack's introduction and had muttered +something. But then he had sunk back in his corner, his face wearing, +as it seemed to her, a frown of scornful annoyance. Even if nothing +awkward had been said, she would still have shunned, for a certain +reason, such a meeting as this with a new clergyman who did not yet +know Claversham. But now she had aggravated the matter by her +heedlessness. So she sat angry, and yet ashamed, with her lips pressed +together and her eyes fixed upon the opposite cushion. + +For the Rev. Reginald, he had been by no means indifferent to the +criticisms he had unfortunately overheard. Always possessed of a +fairly good opinion of himself, he had lately been raising his +standard to the rectorial height; and, being very human, he had come +to think himself something of a personage. If Jack Smith had +introduced him under the same circumstances to his aunt, there is no +saying how far the acquaintance would have progressed or how long the +new incumbent might have fretted and fumed. But presently he stole a +look at Kate Bonamy and melted. + +He saw a girl, slightly above the middle height, graceful and rounded +of figure, with a grave stateliness of carriage which oddly became +her. Her complexion was rather pale, but it was clear and healthy, and +there was even a freckle here and a freckle there which I never heard +a man say that he would have had elsewhere. If her face was a trifle +long, with a nose a little aquiline and curving lips too wide, yet it +was a fair and dainty face, such as Englishmen love. The brown hair, +which strayed on to the broad white brow and hung in a heavy loop upon +her neck, had a natural waviness--the sole beauty on which she prided +herself. For she could not see her eyes as others saw them--big gray +eyes that from under long lashes looked out upon you, full of such +purity and truth that men meeting their gaze straightway felt a desire +to be better men and went away and tried--for half an hour. Such was +Kate outwardly. Inwardly she had faults of course, and perhaps pride +and a little temper were two of them. + +The rector was still admiring her askance, surprised to find that Jack +Smith, who was not very handsome himself, had such a cousin, when +Daintry roused him abruptly. For some moments she had been gazing at +him, as at some unknown specimen, with no attempt to hide her +interest. Now she said suddenly, "You are the new rector?" + +He answered stiffly that he was; being a good deal taken aback at +being challenged in this way. Remonstrance, however, was out of the +question, and Daintry for the moment said no more, though her gaze +lost none of its embarrassing directness. + +But presently she began again. "I should think the dogs would like +you," she said deliberately, and much as if he had not been there to +hear; "you look as if they would." + +Silence again. The rector smiled fatuously. What was a beneficed +clergyman, whose dignity was young and tender, to do, subjected to the +criticism of unknown dogs? He tried to divert his thoughts by +considering the pretty sage-green frock and the gray fur cape and hat +to match which the elder girl was wearing. Doubtless she was taking +the latest fashions down to Claversham, and fur capes and hats, +indefinitely and mysteriously multiplying, would listen to him on +Sundays from all the nearest pews. And Daintry was silent so long that +he thought he had done with her. But no. "Do you think that you will +like Claversham?" she asked, with an air of serious curiosity. + +"I trust I shall," he said, a flush rising to his cheek. + +She took a moment to consider the answer conscientiously, and, +thinking badly of it, remarked gravely, "I don't think you will." + +This was unbearable. The clergyman, full of a nervous dread lest the +next question should be, "Do you think that they will like you at +Claversham?" made a great show of resuming his newspaper. Kate, +possessed by the same fear, shot an imploring glance at Daintry; but, +seeing that the latter had only eyes for the stranger, hoped +desperately for the best. + +Which was very bad. "It must be jolly," remarked the unconscious +tormentor, "to have eight hundred pounds a year, and be a rector!" + +"Daintry!" Kate cried in horror. + +"Why, what is the matter?" asked Daintry, turning suddenly to her +sister with wide-open eyes. Her look of aggrieved astonishment at once +overcame Lindo's gravity, and he laughed aloud. He was not without a +charming sense, still novel enough to be pleasing, that Daintry was +right. It was jolly to be a rector and have eight hundred a year! + +That laugh came in happily. It seemed to sweep away the cobwebs of +embarrassment which had lain so thickly about two of the party. Lindo +began to talk pleasantly, pointing out this or that reach of the +river, and Kate, meeting his cheery eyes, put aside a faint idea of +apologizing which had been in her head, and replied frankly. He told +them tales of summer voyages between lock and lock, and of long days +idly spent in the Wargrave marshes; and, as the identification of +Mapledurham and Pangbourne and Wittenham and Goring rendered it +necessary that they should all cross and recross the carriage, they +were soon on excellent terms with one another, or would have been if +the rector had not still detected in Kate's manner a slight stiffness +for which he could not account. It puzzled him also to observe that, +though they were ready, Daintry more particularly, to discuss the +amusements of London and the goodness of cousin Jack, they both grew +reticent when the conversation turned toward Claversham and its +affairs. + +At Oxford he got out to go to the bookstall. + +"Jack was right," said Daintry, looking after him. "He _is_ nice." + +"Yes," her sister allowed, rising and sitting down again in a restless +fashion. "But I wish we had not fallen in with him, all the same." + +"It cannot be helped now," said Daintry, who was evidently prepared to +accept the event with philosophy. + +Not so her sister. "We might go into another carriage," she suggested. + +"That would be rude," said Daintry calmly. + +The question was decided for them by the young clergyman's return. He +came along the platform, an animated look in his face. "Miss Bonamy," +he said, stopping at the open door with his hand extended, "there is +some one in the refreshment-room whom I think that you would like to +see. Mr. Gladstone is there, talking to the Duke of Westminster, and +they are both eating buns like common mortals. Will you come and take +a peep at them?" + +"I don't think that we have time," she objected. + +"There is sure to be time," Daintry cried. "Now, Kate, come!" And she +was down upon the platform in a moment. + +"The train is not due out for five minutes yet," Lindo said, as he +piloted them through the crowd to the doorway. "There, on the left by +the fireplace," he added. + +Kate glanced, and turned away satisfied. Not so Daintry. With rapt +attention in her face, she strayed nearer and nearer to the great men, +her eyes growing larger with each step. + +"She will be talking to them next," said Kate, in a fidget. + +"Perhaps asking him if he likes Downing Street," Lindo suggested +slyly. "There, she is coming now," he added, as Miss Daintry turned +and came to them at last. + +"I wanted to make sure," she said simply, seeing Kate's impatience, +"that I should know them again. That was all." + +"Quite so; I hope you have succeeded," Kate answered drily. "But, if +we are not quick, we shall miss our train." And she led the way back +with more speed than dignity. + +"There is plenty of time--plenty of time," Lindo answered, following +them. He could not bear to see her pushing her way through the mixed +crowd, and accepting so easily a footing of equality with it. He was +one of those men to whom their womenkind are sacred. He took his time, +therefore, and followed at his ease; only to see, when he emerged from +the press, a long stretch of empty platform, three porters, and the +tail of a departing train. "Good gracious!" he stammered, with dismay +in his face. "What does it mean?" + +"It means," Kate said, in an accent of sharp annoyance--she did not +intend to spare him--"that you have made us miss our train, Mr. Lindo. +And there is not another which reaches Claversham today!" + + + + + CHAPTER IV. + + BIRDS IN THE WILDERNESS. + + +"There! That was your fault!" said Daintry, turning from the departing +train. + +The young rector could not deny it. He would have given anything for +at least the appearance of being undisturbed; but the blood came into +his cheek, and in his attempt to maintain his dignity he only +succeeded in looking angry as well as confused and taken aback. He had +certainly made a mess of his escort duty. What in the world had led +him to go out of his way to make a fool of himself? he wondered. And +with these Claversham people! + +"There may be a special train to-day," Kate suggested suddenly. She +had got over her first vexation, and perhaps repented that she had +betrayed it so openly. "Or we may be allowed to go on by a +luggage-train, Mr. Lindo. Will you kindly see?" + +He snatched at the relief which her proposal held out to him, and went +away to inquire. But almost at once he was back again. "It is most +vexatious!" he said loudly. "It is only three o'clock, and yet there +is no way of getting to Claversham to-night! I am very sorry, but I +never dreamed the company managed things so badly. Never!" + +"No," said Kate drily. + +He winced and looked at her sharply, his vanity hurt again. But then +he found that he could not keep it up. No doubt it was a ridiculous +position for a beneficed clergyman, on his way to undertake the work +of his life, to be delayed at a station with two girls; but, after +all, for a young man to be angry with a young woman who is also +pretty--well, the task is difficult. "I am afraid," he said shyly, and +yet with a kind of frankness, "that I have brought you into trouble, +Miss Bonamy. As your sister says, it was my fault. Is it a matter of +great consequence that you should reach home tonight?" + +"I am afraid that my father will be vexed," she answered. + +"You must telegraph to him," he rejoined. "I am afraid that is +all I can suggest. And that done, you will have only one thing to +consider--whether we shall stay the night here or go on to +Birmingham." + +Kate looked at him, her gray eyes very doubtful, and did not at once +answer. He had clearly made up his mind to join his fortunes to +theirs, while she, on her side, had reasons for shrinking from +intimacy with him. But he seemed to consider it so much a matter of +course that they should remain together and travel together, that she +scarcely saw how to put things on a different footing. She knew, too, +that she would get no help from Daintry, who already regarded their +detention in the light of a capital joke. + +"What are you going to do yourself, Mr. Lindo?" she said at last, her +manner rather chilling. + +He opened his eyes and smiled. "You discard me, then?" he said. "You +have lost all faith in me, Miss Bonamy? Well, I deserve it after the +scrape into which I have led you." + +"I did not mean that," she answered. "I wished to know if you had made +any plans." + +"Yes," he replied--"to make amends, if you will let me take command of +the party. We will stay in Oxford, and I will show you round the +colleges." + +"No?" exclaimed Daintry. "Will you? How jolly! And then?" + +"We will dine at the Mitre," he answered, smiling, "if Miss Bonamy +will permit me to manage everything. And then, if you leave here at +nine-thirty to-morrow you will be at Claversham soon after twelve. +Will that suit you?" + +Daintry's face answered sufficiently for her. As for Kate, she was in +a difficulty. She knew little of hotels: yet they must stop somewhere, +and no doubt Mr. Lindo would take a great deal of trouble off her +hands. But would it be proper to do as he proposed? She really did not +know--only that it sounded odd. That it would not be wise she knew. +She could answer that question at once. But how could she explain, and +how tell him to go his way and leave them? And, after all, to see +Oxford would be delightful; and he really was very pleasant, very +different from the men she knew at home. + +"You are very good," she said at length, with a grateful sigh--"if we +have no choice but between Oxford and Birmingham." + +"And no choice of guides at all," he said, smiling, "you will take +me." + +"Yes," she answered, looking away primly. + +Her reserve, however, did not last. Once through the station gates, +that free holiday feeling which we have all experienced on being set +down in an unknown town, with no duty before us save to explore it, +soon possessed her; while he wished nothing better than to play the +showman--a part we love. The day was fine and bright, though cold. She +had eyes for beauty and a soul for the past, and soon forgot herself; +and he, piloting the sisters through Magdalen Walks, now strewn with +leaves, or displaying with pride the staircase of Christ Church, the +quaint library of Merton, or the ancient front of John's, forgot +himself also, and especially his new-born dignity, in which he had +lived rather too much, perhaps, during the last three weeks. He +showed himself in his true colors--the colors known to his intimate +friends--and was so bright and cheery that Kate found herself talking +to him in utter forgetfulness of his position and theirs. The girl +frankly sighed when darkness fell and they had to go into the house, +their curiosity still unsated. + +She thought it was all over. But, lo! there was a cheery fire awaiting +them in the "house" room (he had looked in for a few minutes on their +first arrival and given his orders), and before it a little table laid +for three was sparkling with plate and glass. Nay, there were two cups +of tea ready on a side-table, for it wanted an hour yet of dinnertime. +Altogether, as Daintry naively told him, "even Jack could not have +made it nicer for us." + +"Jack is a favorite of yours?" he said, laughing. + +"I should think so!" Daintry answered, in wonder. "There is no one +like Jack." + +"After that I shall take myself off," he replied. "I really want to +call on a friend, Miss Bonamy. But if I may join you at dinner----" + +"Oh, do!" she said impulsively. Then, more shyly, she added, "We shall +be very glad if you will, Mr. Lindo." + +He felt singularly pleased with himself as he turned the windy corner +of the Broad. It was pleasant to be in Oxford again, a beneficed +clergyman. Pleasant to have such a future to look forward to, such a +holiday moment to enjoy. Pleasant to anticipate the cheery meal and +the girl's smile, half shy, half grateful. And Kate?--she remained +before the fire, saying little because Daintry's tongue gave few +openings, but thinking a good deal. Once she did speak. "It won't +last," she said pettishly. + +"Why, Kate? Do you think he will be different at Claversham?" Daintry +protested. + +"Of course he will!" She spoke with a little scorn in her voice, and +that sort of decision which we use when we wish to crush down our own +unwarranted hopes. + +"But he is nice," Daintry persisted. "You do think so, Kate, don't +you?" + +"Oh, yes, he is very nice," she said drily. "But he will be in the +Hammond set at home, and we shall see nothing of him." + +But presently he was back, and Kate found it impossible to resist the +charm. He ladled the soup and dispensed the mutton-chops with a gaiety +and boyish glee which were really the stored-up effervescence of +weeks, the ebullition of the long-repressed delight which he took in +his promotion. He learned casually that the girls had been in London +for more than a month staying with Jack's mother in Bayswater, and +that they were very sorry to be upon their road home. + +"And yet," he said--this was toward the end of dinner--"I have been +told that your town is a very picturesque one. But I fancy that we +never appreciate our home as we do a place strange to us." + +"Very likely that is so," Kate answered quietly. And then a little +pause ensued, such as he had observed several times before, and come +to connect with any mention of Claversham. The girls' tongues would +run on frankly and pleasantly enough about their London visit, or Mr. +Gladstone; but let him bring the talk round to his parish and its +people, and forthwith something of reserve seemed to come between him +and them until the conversation strayed afield again. + +After the others had finished, he still toyed with his meal, partly in +lazy enjoyment of the time, partly as an excuse for staying with them. +They were sitting in a momentary silence, when a boy passed the window +chanting a ditty at the top of his voice. The doggrel came clearly to +their ears---- + + + Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, + Birds in the wilderness, birds in the wilderness; + Here we sit like birds in the wilderness, + Samuel asking for more. + + +As the sound passed on the young man looked up, a mischievous twinkle +in his eyes, and met their eyes, and all three burst into a merry peal +of laughter. They were the birds in the wilderness, sitting there in +the circle of light, in the strange room in the strange town, almost +as intimate as if they had known one another for years, or had been a +week at sea together. + +But Kate, having acknowledged by that pleasant outburst her sense of +the oddity of the position, rose from the table, and the rector had to +say good-night, explaining at the same time that he should not travel +with them next morning, but intended to go on by a later train, as his +friend wished to see more of him. Nevertheless, he said he should be +up to breakfast with them and should see them off. And in this +resolution he persisted, notwithstanding Kate's protest, which perhaps +was not very violent. + +Notwithstanding, he was a little late next morning. When he came down +he found them already seated in the coffee-room. There were others +breakfasting here and there in the room, chiefly upon toast-racks and +newspapers, and he did not at once observe that the gentleman standing +with his back set negligently against the mantelpiece was talking to +Kate. Arrived at the table, however, he saw that it was so; and the +cheery greeting on his lips faded into a commonplace "Good-morning, +Miss Bonamy." He took no apparent notice of the stranger as he added, +"I am afraid I am rather late." + +The intruder, a short dark-whiskered man between thirty and forty, +seemed to the full as much surprised by the clergyman's appearance as +Lindo was by his, and as little able to hide the feeling as Kate +herself to control the color which rose in her cheeks. She gave Mr. +Lindo his tea in silence, and then with an obvious effort introduced +the two men. "This is Dr. Gregg of Claversham--Mr. Lindo," she said. + +Lindo rose and shook hands. "Mr. Lindo the younger, I presume?" said +the doctor, with a bow and a swagger intended to show that he was +quite at his ease. + +"The only one, I am afraid," replied the rector, smiling. Though he by +no means liked the look of the man. + +"Did I rightly catch your name?" was the answer--"'Mr. Lindo?'" + +"Yes," said the rector again, opening his eyes. + +"But--you are not--you do not mean to say that you are the new +rector?" pronounced the dark man abruptly, and with a kind of +aggressiveness which seemed his most striking quality--"the rector of +Claversham, I mean?" + +"I believe so," said Lindo quietly. "You want some more water, do you +not, Miss Bonamy?" he continued. "Let me ring the bell." He rose and +crossed the room to do so. The truth was, he hated the newcomer +already. His first sentence had been enough. His manner was not the +manner of the men with whom Lindo had mixed, and the rector felt +almost angry with Kate for introducing Gregg---albeit his +parishioner--to him, and quite angry with her for suffering the doctor +to address her with the familiarity he seemed to affect. + +And Kate, her eyes downcast, knew by instinct how it was with him, and +what he was thinking. "I have been telling Dr. Gregg," she said +hurriedly, when he returned, "how we missed our train yesterday." + +"Rather how I missed it for you," Lindo answered gravely, much engaged +apparently with his breakfast. + +"Ah, yes, it was very funny!" fired off the doctor, watching each +mouthful they ate. Daintry had finished, and was sitting back in her +chair kicking the leg of the table monotonously; not in the best of +tempers apparently. "Very funny indeed!" the doctor continued. "An +accident, I hope?" with a little sniggling laugh. + +"Yes!" said the rector, looking up at him with a black brow and +steadfast eyes--"it was an accident." + +Gregg was a little cowed by the look, and in a moment, with a +muttered word or two, fidgeted himself away, cursing the general +superciliousness of parsons and the quiet airs of this one in +particular. He was a little dog-in-the-mangerish man, ill-bred, and, +like most ill-bred men, resentful of breeding in others. The fact that +he had a sneaking liking for Kate did not tend to lessen his +disgustful wonder how the Bonamy girls and the new rector came to be +travelling together--which, indeed, to any Claversham person would +have seemed a portent. But, then, Lindo did not know that. + +The objectionable item removed, and the temptation to remark upon him +overcome, Lindo soon recovered his good temper, and rattled away so +pleasantly that the train time seemed to all of them to come very +quickly. "There," he said, as he handed the last of Kate's books into +the railway-carriage, "now I have done something to make amends for my +fault, I trust. One thing more I can do. When you get home you need +not spare me. You can put it all on my shoulders, Miss Bonamy." + +"Thank you," Kate answered demurely. + +"You are going to do so, I see," he said, laughing. "I fear my +character will reach Claversham before me." + +"I do not think we shall spread it very widely," she answered in a +peculiar tone, which he naturally misunderstood. + +The train was already in motion then, and he shook hands with her as +he walked beside it. "Goodbye," he said. And then he added in a lower +tone--he was such a very young rector--"I hope to see very much of you +in the future, Miss Bonamy." + +Kate sank back in her seat, her cheek a shade warmer. And in a moment +he was alone upon the platform. + + + + + CHAPTER V. + + "REGINALD LINDO, 1850." + + +Long before the later train by which the rector came on arrived at the +Claversham station, the Rev. Stephen Clode was waiting on the +platform. The curate was a tall, dark man, somewhat over thirty, with +a strong rugged face and a bush of stiff black hair standing up from +his forehead. He had been at Claversham three years, enjoying all the +importance which old Mr. Williams's long illness naturally gave to his +curate and _locum tenens_; and, though the town was agreed that his +chagrin at having a new rector set over his head was great, it must be +admitted that he concealed it with admirable skill. More than one +letter had passed between him and the new incumbent, and, in securing +for the latter Mr. Williams's good old-fashioned furniture, and in +other ways, he had made himself very useful to Lindo. But the two had +not met, and consequently the curate viewed the approaching train with +lively, though secret, curiosity. + +It came, the bell rang, the porter cried, "Claversham! Claversham!" +and the curate walked down it, past the carriage-windows, looking for +the man he had come to meet. Half-a-dozen people stepped out, and for +a moment there was a mimic tumult on the little platform; but nowhere +amid it all could Clode see any one like the new rector. "He has +missed another train!" he muttered to himself in contemptuous wonder; +and he was already casting a last look round him before turning on his +heel, when a tall, fair young man, in a clerical overcoat, who had +been one of the first to alight, stepped up to him. "Am I speaking to +Mr. Clode?" said the stranger pleasantly. And he lifted his hat. + +"Certainly," the curate answered. "I am Mr. Clode. But I fear I have +not the----" + +"No, I know," replied the other, smiling, and at the same time holding +out his hand. "Though, indeed, I hoped that you might have been here +on purpose to meet me. My name is Lindo." + +The curate uttered an exclamation of surprise; and, hastily returning +the proffered grip, fixed his black eyes curiously on his new friend. +"Mr. Lindo did not mention that you were with him," he answered in a +tone of some embarrassment. "But, there, let me see to your luggage. +Is it all here?" + +"Yes, I think so," Lindo answered, tapping one article after another +with his umbrella, and giving the stationmaster a pleasant "Good-day!" +"Is there an omnibus or anything?" + +"Yes," Clode said; "it will be all right. They know where to take it. +You will walk up with me, perhaps. It is about a quarter of a mile to +the rectory." + +The new comer assented gladly, and the two passed out of the station +together. Lindo let his eye travel up the wide steep street before +him, until it rested on the noble tower which crowned the little hill +and looked down now, as it had looked down for five centuries, on the +red roofs clustering about it. His tower! His church! Even his +companion did not remark, so slight was the action, that, as he passed +out of the station and looked up, he lifted his hat for a second. + +"And where is your father?" Clode asked. "Was he delayed by business? +Or perhaps," he added, dubiously scanning him, "you are Mr. Lindo's +brother?" + +"I _am_ Mr. Lindo!" said our friend, turning in astonishment and +looking at his companion. + +"The rector?" + +"Yes." + +It was the curate's turn to stare now, and he did so--his face +flushing darkly and his eyes wide opened for once. He even seemed for +a moment to be stricken dumb with surprise and emotion. "Indeed!" he +said at last, in a half stifled voice which he vainly strove to +control. "Indeed! I beg your pardon. I had thought--I don't know +why--I mean that I had expected to see an older man." + +"I am sorry you are disappointed," the rector replied, smiling +ruefully. "I am beginning to think I am rather young, for you are not +the first to-day who has made that mistake." + +The curate did not answer, and the two walked on in silence, feeling +somewhat awkward. Clode, indeed, was raging inwardly. By one thing and +another he had been led to expect a man past middle life, and the only +Clergy List in the parish, being three years old and containing the +name of Lindo's uncle only, had confirmed him in the error. He had +never conceived the idea that the man set over his head would be a +fledgling, scarcely a year in priest's orders, or he would have gone +elsewhere. He would never have stayed to be at the beck and call of +such a puppy as this! He felt now that he had been entrapped, and he +chafed inwardly to such an extent that he did not dare to speak. To +have this young fellow, six or seven years his junior, set over him +would humiliate him in the eyes of all those before whom he had long +played a different part! + +In a minor degree Lindo was also vexed--not only because he was +sufficiently sensitive to enter into the other's feelings, but also +because he foresaw trouble ahead. It was annoying, too, to be received +at each new _rencontre_ as a surprise--as the reverse of all that had +been expected and all that had been, as he feared, hoped. + +"You will find the rectory a very comfortable house," said the curate +at last, his mind fully made up now that he would leave at the +earliest possible date. "Warm and old-fashioned. Rough-cast outside. +Many of the rooms are panelled." + +"It looks out on the churchyard, I believe," replied the rector, with +the same labored politeness. + +"Yes, it stands high. The view from the windows at the back is +pleasant. The front is perhaps a little gloomy--in winter at least." + +Near the top of the street a quaint, narrow flight of steps conducted +them to the churchyard--an airy, elevated place, surrounded on three +sides by the church and houses, but open on the fourth, where a +terraced walk, running along the summit of the old town wall, admitted +the southern sun and afforded a wide view of plain and hill. The two +men crossed the churchyard, the new rector looking about him with +curiosity and a little awe, his companion marching straight onward, +his strongly-marked face set ominously. He would go! He would go at +the earliest possible minute! he was thinking. + +It did not affect him nor alter his resolution that in the wooden +porch of the old rectory the new rector turned to him and shyly, yet +with real feeling, besought his help and advice in the work before +him. The young clergyman, commonly so self-confident, was moved, and +moved deeply, by the evening light and his strange and solemn +surroundings. Stephen Clode's answer was in the affirmative--it could +hardly have been other; and it was spoken becomingly, if a little +coldly, in view of the rector's advances; but, even while the curate +spoke it, he was considering how he might best escape from Claversham. +Still his Yea, yea, comforted his companion and lightened his +momentary apprehensions. + +Nor was the curate, when he had recovered from the first shock of +surprise and disgust, so foolish as to betray his feelings by wanton +churlishness. He parted from his companion at the door, leaving him to +the welcome of Mrs. Baker, the rector's London housekeeper, who had +come down two days before; but at the same time he consented readily +to return at half-past six and share his dinner, and gave him in the +course of the meal all the information in his power. Left to himself, +the rector went over the house under Mrs. Baker's guidance, and, +as he trod the polished floors, could not but feel some access of +self-importance. The panelled hall, with its wide oak staircase, fed +this, and the spacious sombrely-furnished library, with its books +and busts, its antique clock and one good engraving, and its lofty +windows opening upon the garden. So, in a less degree, did the long +oak-panelled dining-room and a smaller sitting-room which looked to +the front and the churchyard; and the drawing-room, which was situated +over the library, and seemed the larger because Mr. Williams had +furnished it but scantily and lived in it less. Then there were six or +seven bedrooms, and in the garden a stone basin and fountain. +Altogether, when the rector descended after washing his hands, and +stood on the library hearth-rug looking about him, he would have been +more than human if he had not, with a feeling of thankfulness, +entertained also some faint sense of self-congratulation and personal +desert. Nor, probably, would Mr. Clode have been human if, coming in +and finding the younger man standing on that hearth-rug, and betraying +in his face and attitude something of his thoughts, he on his part had +not felt a degree of envy and antagonism. The man was so prosperous, +so self-contented, so conscious of his own merit and success. + +But the curate was too wise to betray this feeling; and, laying +himself out to be pleasant, he had, before the little meal was over, +so far ingratiated himself with his entertainer that the rector was +greatly surprised when he presently learned that Clode had not been to +a university. "You astonish me," he said, "for you have so completely +the manner of a 'varsity-man!" + +The observation was a little too gracious, a little wanting in tact, +but it would not have hurt the curate had he not been at the moment in +a state of irritation. As it was, Clode treasured it up, and never got +rid of the feeling that the Oxford man looked down upon him because he +had been only at Wells; whereas Lindo, with some prejudices and +sufficiently prone to judge his fellows, had far too high an opinion +of himself to be bound by such distinctions, but was just as likely to +make a friend of a ploughboy, if he liked him, as of a Christchurch +man. After that speech, however, the curate was more than ever +resolved to go, and go quickly. + +But, when dinner was over and he was about to take his leave, he +happened to pick up, as he moved about the room, a small prayer-book +which Lindo had just unpacked, and which was lying on the +writing-table. Clode idly looked into it as he talked, and, seeing on +the flyleaf "Reginald Lindo, 1850," took occasion, when he had done +with the subject in hand, to discuss it. "Surely," he said, holding it +up, "you did not possess this in 1850, Mr. Lindo!" + +"Hardly," Lindo answered, laughing. "I was not born until '54." + +"Then who?" + +"It was my uncle's," the rector explained. "I was his god-son, and his +name was mine also." + +"Is he alive, may I ask?" the curate pursued, looking at the +title-page as if he saw something curious there--though, indeed, what +he saw was not new to him; only from it he had suddenly deduced a +thought. + +"No, he died about a year ago--nearly a year ago, I think," Lindo +answered carelessly, and without the least suspicion. "He was always +particularly kind to me, and I use that book a good deal. I must have +it rebound." + +"Yes," Clode said mechanically; "it wants rebinding If you value it." + +"I shall have it done. And a lot of these books," the rector +continued, looking at old Mr. Williams's shelves, "want their clothes +renewing. I shall have them all looked to, I think." He had a pleasant +sense that this was in his power. The cost of the furniture and +library had made a hole in his not very large private means; but that +mattered little now. Eight hundred a year, paid quarterly, will bind a +book or two. + +Had the curate been attending, he would have read Lindo's thoughts +with ease. But Clode was pursuing a train of reflections of his own, +and so was spared this pang. "Your uncle was an old man, I suppose," +he said. "I think I observed in the Clergy List that he had been in +orders about forty years." + +"Not quite so long as that," Lindo replied. "He was sixty-four when he +died. He had been Lord Dynmore's private tutor you know, though they +were almost of an age." + +"Indeed," the curate rejoined, still with that thoughtful look on his +face. "You knew Lord Dynmore through him, I suppose, then, Mr. Lindo?" + +"Well, I got the living through him, if that what you mean," Lindo +said frankly. "But I do not think that I ever met Lord Dynmore. +Certainly I should not know him from Adam." + +"Ah!" said the curate, "ah! indeed!" He smiled as he gazed into the +fire, and stroked his chin. In the other's place, he thought, he would +have been more reticent. He would not have disclaimed, though he might +not have claimed, acquaintance with Lord Dynmore. He would have left +the thing shadowy, to be defined by others as they pleased. Thinking +thus, he got up somewhat abruptly, and wished Lindo good-night. A cool +observer, indeed, might have noticed--but the rector did not--a change +in his manner as he did so--a little accession of familiarity, which +did seem not far removed from a delicate kind of contempt. The change +was subtle, but one thing was certain. Stephen Clode had no longer any +intention of leaving Claversham in a hurry. That resolve was gone. + +Once out of the house, he passed quickly from the churchyard by a +narrow lane leading to an irregular open space quaintly called "The +Top of the Town." Here were his own lodgings, on the first-floor over +a stationer's; but he did not enter them. Instead, he strode on toward +the farther and darker side of the square, where were no buildings, +but a belt of tall trees stood up, gaunt and rustling in the night +wind above a line of wall. Through the trees the lights of a large +house were visible. He walked up the avenue which led to the door and, +ringing loudly, was at once admitted. + +The sound of the bell came to the ears of two ladies who had been for +some time placidly expecting it. They were seated in a small but +charming room filled with soft, shaded light and warmth and color, +an open piano and dainty pictures and china, and a well-littered +writing-table all contributing to the air of accustomed luxury which +pervaded it. The elder lady--that Mrs. Hammond whom we saw talking to +the curate on the day of the old rector's funeral--looked up +expectantly as Mr. Clode entered, and, extending to him a podgy white +hand covered with rings, began to chide him in a rich full voice for +being so late. "I have been dying," she said cheerfully, "to hear what +is the fate before us, Mr. Clode. What is he like?" + +"Well," he answered, taking with a word of thanks the cup of tea which +Laura offered him, "I have one surprise in store for you. He is +comparatively young." + +"Sixty?" said Mrs. Hammond interrogatively. + +"Forty?" said Laura, raising her eyebrows. + +"No," Clode replied, smiling and stirring his tea, "you must guess +again. He is twenty-six." + +"Twenty-six! You are joking," exclaimed the elder lady. While Laura +opened her eyes very wide, but said nothing yet. + +"No," said the curate. "He told me himself that he was not born until +1854." + +The two ladies were loud in their surprise then, while for a moment +the curate sipped his tea in silence. The brass kettle hissed and +bubbled on the hob. The tea-set twinkled cheerfully on the wicker +table, and faint scents of flowers and fabrics filled the room with an +atmosphere which he had long come to associate with Laura. It was +Laura Hammond, indeed, who had introduced him to this new world. The +son of an accountant living in a small Lincolnshire town, he owed his +clerical profession to his mother's ardent wish that he should rise in +the world. His father was not wealthy, and, before he came as curate +to Claversham, Mr. Clode had had no experience of society. Then, +alighting: on a sudden in the midst of much such a small town as his +native place, he found himself astonishingly transmogrified into a +person of social importance. He found every door open to him, and +among them the Hammonds', who were admitted to be the first people in +the town. He fell in easily enough with the "new learning," but the +central figure in the novel pleasant world of refinement continued +throughout to be Laura Hammond. + +Much petting had somewhat spoiled him, and it annoyed him now, as he +sat sipping his tea, to observe that the ladies were far from +displeased with his tidings. "If he is a young man, he is sure not to +be evangelical," said Mrs. Hammond decisively. "That is well. That is +a comfort, at any rate." + +"He will play tennis, I dare say," said Laura. + +"And Mr. Bonamy will be kept in some order now," Mrs. Hammond +continued. "Not that I am blaming you, Mr. Clode," she added +graciously--indeed, the curate was a great favorite with her, "but in +your position you could do nothing with a man so impracticable." + +"He really will be an acquisition," cried Laura gleefully, her brown +eyes shining in the firelight. And she made her tiny lace handkerchief +into a ball and flung it up--and did not catch it, for, with all her +talk of lawn-tennis, she was no great player. Her _role_ lay rather in +the drawing-room. She was as fond of comfort as a cat, and loved the +fire with the love of a dog, and was, in a word, pre-eminently +feminine, delighting to surround herself with all such things as +tended to set off this side of her nature. "But now," she continued +briskly, when the curate had recovered her handkerchief for her, "tell +me what you think of him. Is he nice?" + +"Certainly; I should say so," the curate answered, smiling. + +But, though he smiled, he became silent again. He was reflecting, with +well-hidden bitterness, that Lindo would not only override him in the +parish, but would be his rival in the particular inner clique which he +affected--perhaps his rival with Laura. The thought awoke the worst +nature of the man. Up to this time, though he had not been true, +though he had kept back at Claversham details of his past history +which a frank man would have avowed, though in the process of +assimilating himself to his new surroundings he had been over-pliant, +he had not been guilty of any baseness which had seemed to him a +baseness, which had outraged his own conscience. But, as he reflected +on the wrong which this young stranger was threatening to do him, he +felt himself capable of much. + +"Mrs. Hammond," he said suddenly, "may I ask if you have destroyed +Lord Dynmore's letter which you showed me last week?" + +"Destroyed Lord Dynmore's letter!" Laura answered, speaking for her +mother in a tone of comic surprise. "Do you think, sir, that we get +peers' autographs every day of the week?" + +"No," Mrs. Hammond said, waving aside her daughter's flippancy and +speaking with some stateliness. "It is not destroyed, though such +things are not so rare with us as Laura pretends. But why do you ask?" + +"Because the rector was not sure when Lord Dynmore meant to return to +England," Clode explained readily. "And I thought he mentioned the +date in his letter to you, Mrs. Hammond." + +"I do not think so," said Mrs. Hammond. + +"Might I look?" + +"Of course," was the answer. "Will you find it, Laura? I think it is +under the malachite weight in the other room." + +It was, sitting there in solitary majesty. Laura opened it, and took +the liberty of glancing through it first. Then she gave it to him. +"There, you unbelieving man," she said, "you can look. But he does not +say a word about his return." + +The curate read rapidly until he came to one sentence, and on this his +eye dwelt a moment. "I hear with regret," it ran, "that poor Williams +is not long for this world. When he goes I shall send you an old +friend of mine. I trust he will become an old friend of yours also." +Clode barely glanced at the rest of the letter, but, as he handed it +back, he informed himself that it was dated in America two days before +Mr. Williams's death. + +"No," he admitted, "I was wrong. I thought he had said when he would +return." + +"And you are satisfied?" said Laura. + +"Perfectly," he answered. "Perfectly!" with a little unnecessary +emphasis. + +He lingered long enough to give them a personal description of the +new-comer--speaking always of him in words of praise--and then he took +his leave. As his hand met Laura's, his face flushed ever so slightly +and his dark eyes glowed; and the girl, as she turned away, smiled +furtively, knowing well, though he had never spoken, that she was the +cause of this. So she was, but in part only. At that moment the curate +saw something besides Laura--he saw across a narrow strait of trouble +the fairer land of preferment, his footing on which once gained he +might pretend to her and to many other pleasant things at present +beyond his reach. + + + + + CHAPTER VI. + + THE BONAMYS AT HOME. + + +Lindo made his first exploration of the neighborhood, not on the day +after his arrival, which was taken up with his induction by the +archdeacon and with other matters, but on the day after that. He chose +to avoid the streets, in which he felt somewhat shy, so polite were +the attentions and so curious the glances of his parishioners; and he +selected instead a lane which, starting from the churchyard, seemed to +plunge at once into the country. It was a pleasant lane. It lay deep +sunk in a cutting through the sandstone rock--a cutting first formed, +perhaps, when the great stones for the building of the church were +dragged up that way. He paused halfway down the slope to look about +him curiously, and was still standing when some one came round the +corner before him. It was Kate Bonamy. He saw the girl's cheek--she +was alone--flush ever so slightly as their eyes met; and he noticed, +too, that to all appearance she would have passed him with a bow had +he not placed himself in her way. "Come," he said, laughing frankly as +he held out his hand, "you must not cut me, Miss Bonamy! Let me tell +you, you have quite the aspect of an old friend, for until now I have +not seen one face since I came here that was not absolutely new to +me." + +"It must feel strange, no doubt," she murmured. + +"It is. _I_ feel strange!" he replied. "I want you to tell me where +this road goes to, if you please. I am so strange, I do not even know +that." + +"Kingsford Carbonel," she answered briefly. + +"Ah! The archdeacon lives there, does he not?" + +"Yes." + +"And the distance, please, is----?" + +"Three miles." + +"Thank you," he said. "Really you are as concise as a mile-stone, Miss +Bonamy. And now let me remind you," he continued--there was an air of +"I am going on this moment" about her, which provoked him to detain +her the longer--"that you have not yet asked me what I think of +Claversham." + +"I would rather ask you in a month's time," Kate answered quietly, +holding out her hand to take leave. "Though it is already reported in +the town that you will only stay a year, Mr. Lindo." + +"I shall only stay a year!" the rector repeated in astonishment. + +"Certainly," she answered, smiling, and relapsing for a moment into +the pleasant frankness of that day at Oxford--"only a year; your days +are already numbered." + +"What do you mean?" he said point-blank. + +"Have you never heard the old tradition that as many times as a +clergyman sounds the bell at his induction, so many years will he +remain in the living? And the report in Claversham is that you rang it +only once." + +"You did not hear it yourself?" he said, catching her eyes suddenly, a +lurking smile in his own. + +Her color rose faintly. "I am not sure," she said. Then, meeting his +eyes boldly, she added in a different tone, "Yes, I did hear it." + +"Only once?" + +She nodded. + +"Oh, that is sad," he answered. "Well, the tradition is new to me. If +I had known it," he added, laughing, "I should have tolled the bell at +least fifty times. Clode should have instructed me; but I suppose he +thought I knew. I remember now that the archdeacon did say something +afterward, but I did not understand the reference. You know the +archdeacon, Miss Bonamy, I suppose?" + +"No," said Kate, growing stiff again. + +"Do you not? Well, at any rate you can tell me where Mrs. Hammond +lives. She has kindly asked me to dine with her on Tuesday. I put my +acceptance in my pocket, and thought I would deliver it myself when I +came back from my walk." + +"Mrs. Hammond lives at the Town House," Kate answered. "It is the +large house among the trees by the top of the town. You cannot mistake +it." + +"Shall I have the pleasure of meeting you there?" he asked, holding +out his hand at last. + +"No; I do not know Mrs. Hammond," Miss Bonamy said with decision. +"Good-day, Mr. Lindo." And she was gone; rather abruptly at last. + +"That is odd--very odd," Lindo reflected as, continuing his walk, he +turned to admire her graceful figure and the pretty carriage of her +head. "I fancied that in these small towns every one knew every one. +What sort of people are the Hammonds, I wonder? New, rich, and vulgar +perhaps. It may be, and that would account for it. Yet Clode spoke +highly of them." + +Something which he did not understand in the girl's manner continued +to pique the young man's curiosity after he had parted from her, and +led him to dwell more intently upon her than upon the scenery, novel +as this was to him. She had shown herself at one moment so frank, and +at another so stiff and constrained, that it was equally impossible to +ascribe the one attitude to shyness or the other to a naturally candid +manner. The rector considered the question so long, and found it so +puzzling--and interesting--that on his return to town he had come to +one conclusion only--that it was his immediate duty to call upon his +church wardens. He had made the acquaintance of Mr. Harper, his own +warden, at his induction. It remained therefore to call upon Mr. +Bonamy, the peoples' warden. When he had taken his lunch, it seemed to +him that there was no time like the present. + +He had no difficulty in finding Mr. Bonamy's house, which stood in the +middle of the town, about halfway down Bridge Street. It was a +substantial, respectable residence of brick, not detached nor +withdrawn from the roadway. It had nothing aristocratic in its +appearance, and was known by a number. Its eleven windows, of which +the three lowest rejoiced in mohair blinds, were sombre, its doorway +was heavy. In a word, it was a respectable middle-class house in a +dull street in a country town--a house suggestive of early dinners and +set teas. The rector felt chilled by its very appearance; but he +knocked, and presently a maid-servant opened the door about a foot. +"Is Mr. Bonamy at home?" he said. + +"No, sir," the girl drawled, holding the door as if she feared he +might attempt to enter by force, "he is not." + +"Ah, I am sorry I have missed him," said the clergyman, handling his +card-case. "Do you know at what time he is likely to return?" + +"No, sir, I don't," replied the girl, who was all eyes for the strange +rector; "but I expect Miss Kate does. Will you walk up-stairs, sir? +and I will tell her." + +"Perhaps I had better," he answered, pocketing his card-case. +Accordingly he walked in, and followed the servant to the +drawing-room, where she poked the sinking fire and induced a sickly +blaze. + +Left to himself--for Kate was not there--he looked round curiously, +and as he looked the sense of disappointment which he had felt at +sight of the house grew upon him. It was a cold, uncomfortable room. +It had a set, formal look, which was not quaintness, nor harmony, and +which was strange to the Londoner. It was so neat: every article in it +had a place, and was in its place, and apparently never had been out +of its place. There was a vase of chrysanthemums on the large centre +table, but the rector thought they must be wax, they were so prim. +There were other wax flowers--which he hated. He almost shivered as he +looked at the four walls. He felt obliged to sit upright on his chair, +and to place his hat exactly in the middle of a square of the carpet, +and to ponder over the question of what the maid had done with the +poker. For she had certainly not stirred the fire with the bright and +shining thing which lay in evidence in the fender. + +He was in the act of rising cautiously with the intention of solving +this mystery, when the door opened and the elder sister came in, +Daintry following her. "My father is not in, Mr. Lindo," Kate said, +advancing to meet him, and shaking hands with him. + +"No; so I learned down-stairs," he answered. "But I----" + +The girl--she had scarcely turned from him--cut him short with an +exclamation of dismay. "Oh, Daintry, you naughty girl!" she cried. +"You have brought Snorum up." + +"Well," said Daintry simply--a large white dog, half bull-dog, half +terrier, with red-rimmed eyes and projecting teeth, had crept in at +her heels--"he followed me." + +"You know papa would be so angry if he found him here." + +"But I only want him to see Mr. Lindo. You are unkind, Kate! You know +he never gets a chance of seeing a stranger." + +"You want to know if he likes me?" the rector said, laughing. + +"That is it," she answered, nodding. + +But Kate, though she laughed, was inexorable. She bundled the big dog +out. "Do you know, she has two more like that, Mr. Lindo?" she said, +apologetically. + +"Snip and Snap," said Daintry. "But they are not like that. They are +smaller. Jack gave me Snorum, and Snip and Snap are Snorum's sons." + +"It is quite a genealogy," the rector said, smiling. + +"Yes, and Jack was the Genesis. Genesis means beginning, you know," +Daintry explained. + +"Daintry, you must go down-stairs if you talk nonsense," Kate said +imperatively. She was looking, the young man thought, prettier than +ever in a gray and blue plaid frock and the neatest of collars and +cuffs. As for Daintry, she shrugged her shoulders under the rebuke, +and lolled in one of the stiff-backed chairs, her attitude much like +that of a vine clinging to a telegraph-post. + +Her wilfulness had one happy effect, however. The rector in his +amusement forgot the chill formality of the room and the dull +respectability of the house's exterior. For half an hour he talked on +without a thought of the gentleman whom he had come to see. Some +inkling of the circumstances of the case which had entered his head +before the sisters' appearance faded again, and in gazing on the pure +animated faces of the two girls he quickly lost sight of the evidences +of lack of taste which appeared in their surroundings. If Kate, on her +side, forgot for a moment certain chilling realities and surrendered +herself to the pleasure of the moment, it must be remembered that +hitherto--in Claversham, at least--her experience of men had been +confined to Dr. Gregg and his fellows, and also that none of us, even +the wisest and proudest, are always on guard. + +Mr. Bonamy not appearing, Reginald left at last, perfectly assured +that the half-hour he had just spent was the pleasantest he had spent +in Claversham. He went out of the house in a gentle glow of +enthusiasm. The picture of Kate Bonamy, trim and neat, with her hair +in a bright knot, and laughter softening her eyes, remained with him, +and he walked half-way down the street lost in a delightful reverie. + +He was aroused by the approach of a tall, elderly man who had just +turned the corner before him, and was now advancing along the pavement +with long, rapid strides. The stranger, who seemed about sixty, wore a +wide-skirted black coat, and had a tall silk hat, from under which the +gray hairs straggled thinly, set far back on his head. His figure was +spare, his face sallow, his features prominent. His mouth was peevish, +his eyes sharp and saturnine. As he walked he kept one hand in his +trousers'-pocket, the other swung by his side. The rector looked at +him a moment in doubt, and then stopped him. "Mr. Bonamy, I am sure?" +he said, holding out his hand. + +"Yes, I am," replied the other, fixing him with a penetrating glance. +"And you, sir?" + +"May I introduce myself? I have just called at your house, and, +unluckily, failed to find you at home. I am Mr. Lindo." + +"Oh, the new rector!" said Mr. Bonamy, putting out a cold hand, while +the chill glitter of his eye lost none of its steeliness. + +"Yes, and I am glad to have intercepted you," Lindo continued, with a +little color in his cheek, and speaking quickly under the influence of +his late enthusiasm, which as yet was proof against the lawyer's +reserve. "For I have been extremely anxious to make your acquaintance, +and, indeed, to say something particular to you, Mr. Bonamy." + +The elder man bowed to hide a smile. "As church warden, I presume?" he +said smoothly. + +"Yes, and--and generally. I am quite aware, Mr. Bonamy," continued the +rash young man in a fervor of frankness, "that you were not disposed +to look upon my appointment--the appointment of a complete stranger, I +mean--with favor." + +"May I ask who told you that?" said Bonamy abruptly. + +The young clergyman colored. "Well, I--perhaps you will excuse me +saying how I learned it," he answered, beginning to see that he would +have done better to be more reticent. There is no mistake which youth +more often makes than that of arousing sleeping dogs, and trying to +explain things which a wiser man would pass over in silence. Mr. +Bonamy had his own reasons for regarding the parson with suspicion, +and had no mind to be addressed in the indulgent vein. Nor was he +propitiated when Lindo added, "I learned your feeling, if I may say +so, by an accident." + +"Then I think you should have kept knowledge so gained to yourself!" +the lawyer retorted. + +The rector started and turned crimson under the reproof. His dignity +was new and tender, and the other's tone was offensive in the last +degree. Yet the young man tried to control himself, and for the moment +succeeded. "Possibly," he said, with some stiffness. "My only motive +in mentioning the latter, however, was this, that I hope in a short +time, by appealing to you for your hearty co-operation, to overcome +any prejudices you may have entertained." + +"My prejudices are rather strong," the lawyer answered grimly. "You +are quite at liberty to try, however, Mr. Lindo. But I may as well +warn you of one thing now, as frankness seems to be in fashion. I have +just been told that you are meditating considerable changes in our +church here. Now, I must tell you this, that I object to anything +new--anything new, and not only to new incumbents!" with a smile which +somewhat softened his last words. + +"But who informed you," cried the rector in angry surprise, "that I +meditated changes, Mr. Bonamy?" + +"Ah!" the lawyer answered in his dryest and thinnest voice. "That is +just what I cannot tell you. Let us say that I learned it--by +accident, Mr. Lindo!" And his sharp eyes twinkled. + +"It is not true, however!" the rector exclaimed. + +"Is it not? Well," with a slight cough, "I am glad to hear it!" + +Mr. Bonamy's tone as he made this admission, however, was such that it +only irritated Lindo the more. "You mean that you do not believe me!" +he cried, speaking so fiercely that Clowes the bookseller, who had +been watching the interview from his shop-door, was able to repeat the +words to a dozen people afterward. "I can assure you that it is so. I +am not thinking of making any changes whatever--unless you consider +the mere removal of the sheep from the churchyard a change!" + +"I do. A great change," replied the church warden with grimness. + +"But surely you do not object to it!" Lindo exclaimed in astonishment. +"Every one must agree that in these days, and in town churchyards at +any rate, the presence of sheep is unseemly." + +"I do not agree to that at all!" Mr. Bonamy answered calmly. "Neither +did Mr. Williams, the late rector, who had had long experience, act as +if he were of that mind." + +The present rector threw up his hands in disgust--in disgust and +wonder. Remember, he was very young. The thing seemed to him so clear +that he was assured the other was arguing for the sake of argument--a +thing we all hate in other people--and he lost patience. "I do not +think you mean what you say, Mr. Bonamy," he blurted out at last. He +was much discomposed, yet he made an attempt to assume an air of +severity which did not sit well upon him at the moment. + +Mr. Bonamy grinned. "That you will see when you turn out the sheep, +Mr. Lindo," he said. "For the present I think I will bid you good +evening." and taking off his hat gravely--to the rector the gravity +seemed ironical--he went his way. + +Men take these things differently. To the lawyer there was nothing +disturbing in such a passage of arms as this. He was never so +happy--Claversham knew it well--as in and after a quarrel. "Master +Lindo thought to twist me round his finger, did he?" he muttered to +himself as he stopped on his own doorstep and thrust the key into the +lock. "He has found out his mistake now. We will have nothing new +here--nothing new while John Bonamy is warden, at any rate, my lad! It +is well, however," continued Mr. Bonamy with a backward glance, "that +Clode gave me a hint in time. Set a beggar on horseback and he will +ride--we know whither!" And the lawyer went in and slammed the door +behind him. + +Meanwhile, what is sauce for the goose is not always sauce for the +gander. The younger man turned away, at the moment, indeed, in a white +heat, full of wrath at the other's unreasonableness, folly, +churlishness. But the comfortable warmth which this engendered passed +away quickly--alas! much too quickly--and long before Lindo reached +the rectory, though the walk through the gray streets, where the shops +were just being lighted, did not take him two minutes, a chill +depression had taken its place. This was a fine beginning! This was a +happy augury of his future administration of the parish! To have begun +by quarrelling with his church warden--could anything have been worse? +And the check had come so suddenly, so unexpectedly, and at a time +when he had been on such good terms with himself, that he felt it the +more sorely. He went into the house with his head bent, and was not +best pleased to find Stephen Clode inquiring after him in the hall. He +would rather have been alone. + +The curate, as he came forward, did not fail to note that something +was amiss, and a gleam of intelligence flashed for an instant across +his dark face. "Come into the study," said the rector curtly. Since +Clode was here, and could not be avoided, he felt it would be a relief +to tell him all. And he did so, the curate listening and making no +remark whatever, so that the rector presently looked at him in +surprise. "What do you think of it?" he said, some impatience in his +one. "It is unfortunate, is it not?" + +"Well, I don't know," the curate answered, leaning forward in his +chair, with his elbows on his knees and his eyes cast down upon the +hat which he was slowly revolving between his hands. "I am not +astonished, you know. What can you expect from a pig but a grunt?" + +The rector got up, and, leaning his arm on the mantel-shelf, felt, if +the truth be told, rather uncomfortable. "I do not understand you," he +said at length. + +"It is what I should have expected from Bonamy. That is all." + +"Then you must think him a very ill-conditioned man!" Lindo retorted +warmly, scarcely knowing whether the annoyance he felt was a +reminiscence of his late conflict or caused by his companion's manner. + +"Well, again, what else can you expect?" Clode replied sagely, looking +up and shrugging his shoulders. "You know all about him, I suppose?" + +"I know nothing," said the rector, frowning slightly. + +"He is not a gentleman, you know," the curate answered, still looking +up and speaking with languid indolence as if what he said must be +known to everyone. "You have heard his history?" + +"No, I have not." + +"He was an office-boy with Adams & Rooke, the old solicitors here, +swept out the office, and brought the coal, and so forth. He had his +wits about him, and old Adams gave him his articles, and finally took +him into partnership. Then the old men died off and it all came to +him. He is well off, and has power of a sort in the town; but, of +course," the curate added, getting up lazily and yawning--"well, +people like the Hammonds do not visit with him." + +There was silence in the room for a full minute. The rector had left +the fireplace and, with his back to the speaker, was raising the +lamp-wick. "Why did you not tell me this before?" he said at length, +his voice hard. + +"I did not see why I should prejudice you against the man before you +saw him," replied the curate, with much reason. "Besides, I really was +not sure whether you knew his history or not. I am afraid I did not +give much thought to the matter." + +"Umph!" + + + + + CHAPTER VII. + + THE HAMMONDS' DINNER PARTY. + + +The new top, the new book, the bride--the first joy in the possession +of each one of these fades, not gradually, but at a leap, as day fades +in the tropics. A chip in the wood, the turning of the last page, the +first selfish word, and the thing is done; ecstasy becomes sober +satisfaction. It was so with the rector. The first glamour of his good +fortune, of his new toy, died abruptly with that evening--with the +quarrel with his church warden, and the discovery of the cause of that +constraint which he had remarked in Kate Bonamy's manner from the +first. + +He was a conscientious man, and the failure of his good resolutions, +his aspirations to be the perfect parish priest, fretted him. +Moreover, he had to think of the future. He soon learned that Mr. +Bonamy might not be a gentleman, and was indeed reputed to be a +stubborn, queer-tempered curmudgeon; but he learned also that he had +great influence in the town, though, except in the way of business, he +associated with few, and that he, Reginald Lindo, would have to reckon +with him on that footing. The certainty of this and of the bad +beginning he had made naturally depressed the young man, his customary +good opinion of himself not coming to his aid at once. And, besides, +he carried about with him--sometimes it came between him and his book, +sometimes he saw it framed by the autumn landscape--the picture of +Kate's pure proud face. At such moments he felt himself humiliated by +the slights cast upon her. The Hammonds did not think her fit company +for them! The Hammonds! + +Not that he knew the Hammonds yet, or many others, the days which +intervened between his induction and the dinner at the Town House +being somewhat lonely days, during which he was much thrown back upon +himself, and only felt by slow degrees the soothing influence of the +routine work of his position. Of his curate, and of him only, he +naturally saw much, and found it small comfort to learn from the +Reverend Stephen that the fracas with Mr. Bonamy had not escaped the +attention of the town, but was being made the subject of comment by +many who were delighted to have so novel a subject as the new rector +and his probable conduct. + +He was sitting at breakfast a few days later--on the morning of the +Hammonds' party--when Mrs. Baker announced an early visitor. "No, he +is not a gentleman, sir," she said, "though he has on a black coat. A +stranger to the town, I think, but he will not say what he wants, +except to see you." + +"I will come to him in the study," replied her master. + +The housekeeper, however, going out, and taking a second glance at the +caller, did not show him into the study, but instead, gave him a seat +in the hall on the farther side from the coatstand. There the rector, +when he came out, found him--a pale fat-faced man, dressed neatly and +decorously, though his clothes were threadbare. He took him into the +study, and asked him his business. "But first sit down," the rector +added pleasantly, desiring to set the man at his ease. + +The stranger sat down gingerly on the edge of a chair. For a +moment there was a pause of seeming embarrassment, and then, "I am +body-servant, sir," he said abruptly, passing his tongue across his +lips, and looking up furtively to learn the effect of his +announcement, "to the Earl of Dynmore." + +"Indeed!" the rector replied, with a slight start. "Has Lord Dynmore +returned to England, then?" + +Again the man looked up slyly. "No, sir," he answered with +deliberation, "I cannot say that he has, sir." + +"You have brought some letter or message from him, perhaps?" the +clergyman hazarded. The stranger seemed to have a difficulty in +telling his own story. + +"No, sir, if you will pardon me, I have come about myself, sir," the +man explained, speaking a little more freely. "I am in a little bit of +trouble, and I think you would help me, sir, if you heard the story." + +"I am quite willing to hear the story," said the rector gravely. +Looking more closely at the man, he saw that his neatness was only on +the surface. His white cravat was creased, and his wrists displayed no +linen. An air of seediness marked him in the full light of the +windows, and, pale as his face was, it wore here and there a delicate +flush. Perhaps the man's admission that he was in trouble helped the +rector to see this. + +"Well, sir, it was this way," the servant began. "I was not very +well out there, sir, and his lordship--he is an independent kind of +man--thought he would be better by himself. So he gave me my +passage-money and board wages for three months, and told me to come +home and take a holiday until he returned to England. So far it was +all right, sir." + +"Yes?" said the rector. + +"But on board the boat--I am not excusing what I did, sir; but there +are others have done worse," continued the man, with another of his +sudden upward glances--"I was led to play cards with a set of +sharpers, and--and the end of it was that I landed at Liverpool +yesterday without a halfpenny." + +"That was bad." + +"Yes, it was, sir. I do not know that I ever felt so bad in my life," +replied the servant earnestly. "And now you know my position, sir. +There are several people in the town--but they have no means to help +me--who can tell you I am his lordship's valet, and my name Charles +Felton." + +"You want help, I suppose?" + +"I have not a halfpenny, sir! I want something to live on until his +lordship comes back." + +His tone changed as he said this, growing hard and almost defiant. The +rector noted the alteration, and did not like it. "But why come to +me?" he said, more coldly than he had yet spoken. "Why do you not go +to Lord Dynmore's steward, or agent, or his solicitor, my man?" + +"They would tell of me," was the curt answer. "And likely enough I +should lose my place." + +"Still, why come to me?" Lindo persisted--chiefly to learn what was in +the man's mind, for he had already determined what he would do. + +"Because you are rector of Claversham, sir," the applicant retorted at +last. And he rose suddenly and confronted the parson with an +unpleasant smile on his pale face--"which is in my lord's gift, as you +know, sir," he continued, in a tone rude and almost savage--a tone +which considerably puzzled his companion, who was not conscious of +having said anything offensive to the man. "I came here, sir, +expecting to meet an older gentleman, a gentleman of your name, a +gentleman known to me, and I find you--and I see you, do you see, +where I expected to find him." + +"You mean my uncle, I suppose?" said Lindo. + +"Well, sir, you know best," was the odd reply, and the man's look was +as odd as his words. "But that is how the case stands; and, seeing it +stands so, I hope you will help me, sir. I do hope, on every account, +sir, that you will see your way to help me." + +The rector looked at the speaker with a slight frown, liking neither +the man nor his behavior. But he had already made up his mind to help +him, if only in gratitude to his patron, whose retainer he was; and +this, though the earl would never know of the act, nor possibly +approve of it. The man had at least had the frankness to own the folly +which had brought him to these straits, and Lindo was inclined to set +down the oddity of his present manner to the fear and anxiety of a +respectable servant on the verge of disgrace. "Yes," he said coldly, +after a moment's thought, "I am willing to help you. Of course I shall +expect you to repay me if and when you are able, Felton." + +"I will do that," replied the man rather cavalierly. + +"You might have added, 'and thank you, sir,'" the rector said, with a +keen glance of reproof. He turned, as he spoke, to a small cupboard +constructed between the bookshelves near the fireplace, and, opening +it, took out a cash-box. + +The man colored under his reproach, and muttered some apology, +resuming, as by habit, the tone of respect which seemed natural to +him. All the same he watched the clergyman's movements with great +closeness, and appraised, even before it was placed in his hand, the +sum which Lindo took from a compartment set apart apparently for gold. +"I will allow you ten shillings a week--on loan, of course," Lindo +said after a moment's thought. "You can keep yourself on that, I +suppose? And, besides, I will advance you a sovereign to supply +yourself with anything of which you have pressing need. That should be +ample. There are three half sovereigns." + +This time the man did thank him with an appearance of heartiness. But +before he had said much the study door opened, and Stephen Clode came +in, his hat in his hand. "Oh, I beg your pardon," the curate said, +taking in at a glance the open cash-box and the stranger's +outstretched hand, and preparing to withdraw. "I thought you were +alone." + +"Come in, come in!" said the rector, closing the money-box hastily, +and with some embarrassment, for he was not altogether sure that he +had not done a foolish and quixotic thing. "Our friend here is going. +You can send me your address, Felton. Good-day." + +The man thanked him and, taking up his hat, went. "Some one out of +luck?" said Clode. + +"Yes." + +"I did not much like his looks," the curate remarked. "He is not a +townsman, or I should know him." The rector felt that his discretion +was assailed, and hastened to defend himself. "He is respectable +enough," he said carelessly. "As a fact, he is Lord Dynmore's valet." + +"But has Lord Dynmore come back?" the curate exclaimed, his hand +arrested in the act of taking down a book from a high shelf, and his +head turning quickly. If he expected to learn anything, however, from +his superior's demeanor he was disappointed. Lindo was busy locking +the cupboard, and had his back to him. + +"No, he has not come back," Reginald explained, "but he has sent the +man home, and the foolish fellow lost his money on the boat coming +over, and wants an advance until his master's return." + +"But why on earth does he come to you for it?" cried the curate, with +undisguised, astonishment. + +The rector shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, I do not know," he said, a +trifle of irritation in his manners. "He did, and there is an end of +it. Is there any news?" + +Mr. Clode seemed to find a difficulty in at once changing the +direction of his thoughts. But he did so with an effort, and, after a +pause, answered, "No, I think not. There is a good deal of interest +felt in the question of the sheep out there, I fancy--whether you will +take your course or comply with Mr. Bonamy's whim." + +"I do not know myself," said the young rector, turning and facing the +curate, with his feet apart and his hands thrust deep into his +pockets. "I do not, indeed. It is a serious matter." + +"It is. Still you have the responsibility," said the curate with +diffidence, "and, without expressing any view of my own on the +subject, I confess----" + +"Well?" + +"I think if I bore the responsibility, I should feel called upon to do +what I myself thought right in the matter." + +The younger man shook his head doubtfully. "There is something in +that," he said; "but, on the other hand, one cannot look on the point +as an essential, and, that being so, perhaps one should prefer peace. +But, there, enough of that now, Clode. I think you said you were not +going to the Hammonds' this evening?" + +"No, I am not." + +The rector almost wished he were not. However sociable a man may be, a +few days of solitude and a little temporary depression will render him +averse from society if he be sensitive. Lindo as a man was not very +sensitive; he held too good an opinion of himself. But as rector he +was, and as he walked across to the Town House he anticipated anything +but enjoyment. + +In a few minutes, however--has it not some time or other happened to +all of us?--everything was changed with him. He felt as if he had +entered another world. The air of culture and refinement which +surrounded him from the hall inward, the hearty kindness of Mrs. +Hammond, the pretty rooms, the music and flowers, Laura's light +laughter and pleasant badinage, all surprised and delighted him. The +party might almost have been a London party, it was so lively. The +archdeacon, a red-faced, cherry, white-haired man, whose acquaintance +Lindo had already made, and his wife, who was a mild image of himself, +were of the number, which was completed by their daughter and four or +five county people, all prepared to welcome and be pleased with the +new rector. Lindo, sprung from gentlefolk himself, had the ordinary +experience of society; but here he found himself treated as a stranger +and a dignitary to a degree of notice and a delicate flattery of which +he had not before tasted the sweets. Perhaps he was the more struck by +the taste displayed in the house, and the wit and liveliness of his +new friends, because he had so little looked for them--because he had +insensibly judged his parish by his experience of Mr. Bonamy, and had +come expecting this house to be as his. + +If, under these circumstances, the young fellow had been unaffected by +the incense offered to him he would have been more than mortal. But he +was not. He began, before he had been in the house an hour, to change, +all unconsciously of course, his standpoint. He began to wonder +especially why he had been so depressed during the last few days, and +why he had troubled himself so much about the opinions of people whose +views no sensible man would regard. + +Perhaps the girl beside him--he took in Laura--contributed as much as +anything to this. It was not only that she was bright and sparkling, +in the luxury of her pearls and evening dress even enchanting, nor +only that the femininity which had enslaved Stephen Clode began to +have its effects on her new neighbor. But Laura had a way while she +talked to him, while her lustrous brown eyes dwelt momentarily on his, +of removing herself and himself to a world apart--a world in which +downrightness seemed more downright and rudeness an outrage. And so, +while her manner gently soothed and flattered her companion, it led +him almost insensibly to--well, to put it in the concrete--to think +scorn of Mr. Bonamy. + +"You have had a misunderstanding," she said softly, as they stood +together by the piano after dinner, a feathering plant or two fencing +them off in a tiny solitude of their own, "with Mr. Bonamy, have you +not, Mr. Lindo?" + +From anyone else, perhaps from her half an hour before, he would have +resented mention of the matter. Now he did not seem to mind. +"Something of the kind," he said, laughing. + +"About the sheep in the churchyard, was it not?" she continued. + +"Yes." + +"Well, will you pardon me saying something?" Resting both her hands on +the raised lid of the piano, she looked up at him, and it must be +confessed that he thought he had never seen eyes so soft and brilliant +before. "It is only this," she said earnestly. "That I hope you will +not give way to him. He is a wretched, cross-grained, fidgety man and +full of crotchets. You know all about him, of course?" she added, a +slight ring of pride in her voice. + +"I know that he is my church warden," said the rector, half in +seriousness. + +"Yes!" she replied. "That is just what he is fit for!" + +"You think so?" Lindo retorted, smiling. "Then you really mean that I +should be guided by him? That is it?" + +She looked brightly at him for a moment. "I think you will be guided +only by yourself," she murmured; and, blushing slightly, she nodded +and left him to go to another guest. + +They were all in the same tale. "He is a rude overbearing man, Mr. +Lindo," Mrs. Hammond said roundly, even her good nature giving place +to the _odium theologicum_. "And I cannot imagine why Mr. Williams put +up with him so long." + +"No indeed," said the archdeacon's wife, complacently smoothing down +her skirt. "But that is the worst of a town parish. You have this sort +of people." + +Mrs. Hammond looked for the moment as if she would have liked to deny +it. But under the circumstances this was impossible. "I am afraid we +have," she admitted gloomily. "I hope Mr. Lindo will know how to deal +with him." + +"I think the archdeacon would," said the other lady, shaking her head +sagely. + +But, naturally enough, the archdeacon was more guarded in his +expressions. "It is about removing the sheep from the churchyard, is +it not?" he said, when he and Lindo happened to be left standing +together and the subject came up. "They have been there a long time, +you know." + +"That is true, I suppose," the rector answered. "But," he continued +rather warmly--"you do not approve of their presence there, +archdeacon?" + +"No, certainly not." + +"Nor do I. And, thinking the removal right, and the responsibility +resting upon me, ought I not to undertake it?" + +"Possibly," replied the older man. "But pardon me making a suggestion. +Is not the thing of so little importance that you may, with a good +conscience, prefer quiet to the trouble of raising it?" + +"If the matter were to end there, I think so," replied the new rector, +with perhaps too strong an assumption of wisdom in his tone. "But what +if this be only a test case?--if to give way here means to encourage +further trespass on my right of judgment? The affair would bear a +different aspect then, would it not?" + +"Oh, no doubt. No doubt it would." + +And that was all the archdeacon, who was a cautious man and knew Mr. +Bonamy, would say. But it will be observed that the rector had both +altered his standpoint and done another thing which most people find +easy enough. He had discovered an answer to his own arguments. + + + + + CHAPTER VIII. + + TWO SURPRISES. + + +On the evening of the Hammonds' party, Mr. Clode sat alone in his +room, trying to compose himself to work. His lamp burned brightly, and +his tea kettle--he had already sent down his frugal dinner an hour or +more--murmured pleasantly on the hob. But for some reason Mr. Clode +could do no work. He was restless, gloomy, ill-satisfied. The +suspicions which had been aroused in his breast on the evening of the +rector's arrival had received, up to to-day at least, no confirmation; +but they had grown, as suspicions will, feeding on themselves, and +with them had grown the jealousy which had fostered them into being. +The curate saw himself already overshadowed by his superior, socially +and in the parish; and this evening felt this the more keenly that, as +he sat in his little room, he could picture perfectly the gay scene at +the Town House, where, for nearly two years, not a party had taken +place without his presence, no festivity had been arranged without his +co-operation. The omission to invite him to-night, however natural it +might seem to others, had for him a tremendous significance; so that +from a jealousy that was general he leapt at once to a jealousy more +particular, and conjured up a picture of Laura--with whose disposition +he was not unacquainted--smiling on the stranger, and weaving about +him the same charming net which had caught his own feet. + +At this thought Clode sprang up with a passionate gesture and began to +walk to and fro, his brow dark. He felt sure that Lindo had no right +to his cure, but he knew also that the cure was a freehold, and that +to oust the rector from it something more than a mere mistake would +have to be shown. If the rector should turn out to be very +incompetent, if he should fall on evil times in the parish, then +indeed he might find his seat untenable when the mistake should be +discovered; and with an eye to this the curate had already dropped a +word here and there--as, for instance, that word which had reached Mr. +Bonamy. But Clode was not satisfied with that now. Was there no +shorter, no simpler course possible? There was one. The rector might +be shown to have been aware of the error when he took advantage of it. +In that case his appointment would be vitiated, and he might be +compelled to forego it. + +Naturally enough, the curate had scarcely formulated this to himself +before he became convinced--in his present state of envy and +suspicion--of the rector's guilt. But how was he to prove it? As he +walked up and down the room, chafing and hot-eyed, he thought of a way +in which proof might be secured. The letters which had passed between +Lindo and Lord Dynmore's agents in regard to the presentation, must +surely contain some word, some expression sufficient to have apprised +the young man of the truth--that the living was intended not for him +but for his uncle. A look at those letters, if they were in existence, +might give Stephen Clode, mere curate though he was, the whip-hand of +his rector! + +He had another plan in his mind, of which more presently, and probably +he would have pursued the idea which has just been mentioned no +farther if his eye had not chanced to light at the moment on a small +key hanging upon a nail by the fireplace. Clode looked at the key, and +his face flushed. He stood thinking and apparently hesitating, the +lamp throwing his features into strong relief, while a man might count +twenty. Then he sat down with an angry exclamation and plunged into +his work. But in less than a minute he lifted his head. His glance +wandered again to the key; and, getting up suddenly, he took it down, +put on his hat, and went out. + +His lodgings were over the stationer's shop, but he could go in and +out through a private passage. He saw, as he passed, however; that +there was a light in the shop, and he opened the side door. "I am +going to the rectory to consult a book, Mrs. Wafer," he said, seeing +his landlady dusting the counter. "You can leave my lamp alight. I +shall want nothing more to-night, thank you." + +She bade him good-night, and he closed the door again and rushed into +the street. Crossing the top of the town, he had to pass the Market +Hall, where he spoke to the one policeman on night duty; and here he +saw that it was five minutes to ten, and hastened his steps, in the +fear that the rector's household might have retired. "He will not be +home himself until eleven, at the earliest," the curate muttered as he +turned rapidly into the churchyard, which was very dark, the night +being moonless. "I have a clear hour. It was well that I looked in +late the other night." + +But, whatever his design, it received a sudden check. The rectory was +closed! The front of the house stood up dark and shapeless as the +great church which towered in front of it. The servants had gone to +bed, and, as they slept at the back, he would have found it difficult +to arouse them, had it suited his plans to do so. As it was, he did +not dream of such a thing, and with a slight shiver--for the night was +cold, and now that his project no longer excited him he felt it so, +and felt too the influence of the night wind soughing in sad fashion +through the yews--he was turning away, when something arrested his +attention, and he paused. + +The something he had seen, or fancied he had seen, was a momentary +glimmer of light shining through the fanlight over the door. It could +not affect him, for, if the servants had really closed the house for +the night, even if they had not all gone to bed, he could scarcely go +in. And yet some impulse led him to step softly into the porch and +grope for the knocker. + +His hand lit instead on the iron-studded surface of the old oak door, +and, to his surprise, he felt it move slightly under his touch. He +pushed, and the door slid slowly and silently open, disclosing the +dusky outline of the hall, faintly illuminated by a thin shaft of +light which proceeded apparently from the study, the door of which was +a trifle ajar. + +The sight recalled to the curate's mind the errand on which he had +come, and he stole across the hall on tiptoe, listening with all his +ears. He heard nothing, however, and presently he stood on the mat at +the study door intercepting the light. Then he did hear the dull +footsteps of some one moving in the room, and suddenly it occurred to +him that the rector had stepped home to fetch something--a song, +music, or a book possibly--and was now within searching for it. That +would explain all. + +The curate was seized with panic at the thought, and, fearful of being +discovered in his present position--for though he might have done all +he had done in perfect innocence, conscience made a coward of him--he +crept across the hall again and passed out into the churchyard. There +he stood in the darkness, waiting and watching, expecting the rector +to bustle out each minute. + +But five minutes passed, and even ten, as it seemed to the curate in +his impatience, and no one came out, nor did the situation alter. Then +he made up his mind that the person moving in the study could not be +the owner of the house, and he went in again and, crossing the hall, +flung the study door wide open and entered. + +There was a ringing sound as of coins falling on the floor, and a man +who had been kneeling low over something sprang to his feet and gazed +with wide, horror-stricken eyes at the intruder. A moment only the man +looked, and then he fell again on his knees. "Oh, mercy! mercy!" he +cried, almost grovelling before the curate. "Don't give me up! I have +never been took! I have never been in jail or in trouble in my life! I +did not know what I was doing, sir! I swear I did not! Don't give me +up!" + +This cry, which was low and yet piercing, ended in hysterical sobbing. +On the table by his side stood a single candle, and by its light Clode +saw that the little cupboard among the books was open. The curate +started at the sight, and the words which he had been about to utter +to the shrinking wretch begging for mercy on the floor before him died +away in his husky throat. His eyes, however, burned with a gloomy +rage, and when he recovered himself his voice was pitiless. "You +scoundrel!" he said, in the low rich tone which had been so much +admired in the church when he first came to Claversham, "what are you +doing here? Get up and speak!" And he made as if he would spurn the +creature with his foot. + +"I am a respectable man," the rogue whined. "I am--that is I was, I +mean, sir--don't be hard on me--Lord Dynmore's own valet. I will tell +you all, sir." + +"I know you!" rejoined Clode, looking harshly at him. "You were here +this morning. And Mr. Lindo gave you money." + +"He did, sir. I confess it. I am a----" + +"You are an ungrateful scoundrel!" Stephen Clode answered, cutting the +man short. "That is what you are! And in a few days you will be a +convicted felon, with the broad-arrow on your clothes, my man!" + +To hear his worst anticipations thus put into words was too much for +the poor wretch. He fell on his knees, feebly crying for mercy, mercy! +"You are a minister of the gospel. Give me this one more chance, sir!" +he prayed. + +"Stop that noise!" growled the curate fiercely, his dark face rendered +more rugged by the light and shadow cast by the single candle. "Be +silent! do you hear? and get up and speak like a man, if you can. Tell +me all--how you came here, and what you came for, and perhaps I may +let you escape. But the truth, mind, the truth!" he added truculently. + +The knave was too thoroughly terrified to think of anything else. +"Lord Dynmore dismissed me," he muttered, his breath coming quickly. +"He missed some money in Chicago, and he gave me enough to carry me +home, and bade me go to the devil! I landed in Liverpool without a +shilling--sir, it is God's truth--and I remembered the gentleman Lord +Dynmore had just put in the living here. I had known him, and he had +given me half a sovereign more than once. And I thought I would come +to him. So I pawned my clothes, and came on." + +"Yes, yes!" exclaimed the curate, leaning forward, with fierce +impatience in his tone. "And then?" + +"Sir?" + +"Well? When you came here? What happened? Go on, fool!" He could +scarcely control himself. + +"I found a stranger," whimpered the man--"another Mr. Lindo. He had +got in here somehow." + +"Well? But there," added the curate with a sudden change of manner, +"how do you know that Lord Dynmore meant to put the clergyman you used +to know in here?" + +"Because I heard him read a letter from his agents about it," the +fellow replied at once. "And from what his lordship said I knew it was +his old pal--his old friend, sir, I mean, begging your pardon humbly, +sir." + +"And when did you learn," said the curate more quickly, "that the +gentleman here was not your Mr. Lindo?" + +"I heard in the town that he was a young man. And, putting one thing +and another together, and keeping a still tongue myself, I thought he +would serve me as well as the other, and I called----" + +"What did you say?" + +"Not much, sir," answered the valet, a twinkle of cunning in his eye. +"The less said the sooner mended. But he understood, and he promised +to give me ten shillings a week." + +"To hold your tongue?" + +"Well, so I took it, sir." + +The curate drew a long breath. This was what he had expected. It was +to information which might be drawn from this man that his second +scheme had referred. And here was the man at his service, bound by a +craven fear to do his bidding--bound to tell all he knew. "But why," +Clode asked suspiciously, a thought striking him, "if what you say be +true, are you here now--doing this, my man?" + +"I was tempted, sir," the servant answered, his tone abject again. "I +confess it truly, sir. I saw the money in the box here this morning, +sir, and I thought that my ten shillings a week would not last long, +and a little capital would set me up comfortably. And then the devil +put it into my head that the young gentleman would not persecute me, +even if he caught me." + +"You did not think of me catching you?" said the curate grimly. + +The man uttered a cry of anguish. "That I did not, sir," he sobbed. +"Oh, Lord! I have never had a policeman's hand on me. I have been +honest always." + +"Until you took his lordship's money," replied the curate quietly. +"But I understand. You have never been found out before, you mean." + +No doubt when people of a certain class, for which respectability has +long spelled livelihood, do fall into the law's clutch they suffer +very sharply. Master Felton continued to pour forth heartrending +prayers; but he might have saved his breath. The curate's thoughts +were elsewhere. He was thinking that a witness so valuable must be +kept within reach at any cost and it did flash across his brain that +the best course would be to hand him over now to the police, and trust +to the effect which his statements respecting the rector should +produce upon the inquiry. But the reflection that the allegations of a +man on his trial for burglary would not obtain much credence led Clode +to reject this simple course and adopt another. "Look here!" he said +curtly. "I am going to deal mercifully with you, my man. But--but," +he continued, frowning impatiently, as he saw the other about to +speak--"on certain conditions. You are not to leave Claversham. That +is the first. If you leave the town before I give you the word, I +shall put the police on your track without an instant's delay. Do you +hear that?" + +"I will stop as long as you like, sir," said the servant submissively, +but with wonder apparent both in his voice and face. + +"Very well. I wish it for the present, no matter why. Perhaps because +I would see that you lead an honest life for awhile." + +"And--how shall I live, sir?" said the culprit timidly. + +"For the present you may continue to draw your half-sovereign a week," +the curate answered hastily, his face reddening, he best knew why. +"Possibly I may tell Mr. Lindo at once. Possibly I may give you +another chance, and tell him later, if I find you deserving. What is +your address?" + +"I am at the Bull and Staff," muttered Felton. It was a small public +house of no very good repute. + +"Well, stay there," Stephen Clode answered after a moment's thought. +"But see you get into no harm. And since you are living on the +rector's bounty, you may say so." + +The man looked puzzled as well as relieved, but, stealing a doubtful +glance at the curate's dark fate, he found his eyes still upon him, +and cowered afresh. "Yes, take care," said Clode, smiling unpleasantly +as he saw the effect his look produced. "Do not try to evade me or it +will be the worse for you, Felton. And now go! But see you take +nothing from here." + +The detected one cast a sly glance at the half-rifled box which still +lay on the carpet at his feet, a few gold coins scattered round it; +then he looked up again. "It is all there, sir," he said, cringing. "I +had but just begun." + +"Then go!" said the curate, pointing with emphasis to the door. "Go, I +tell you!" + +The man's presence annoyed and humiliated him so that he felt a +positive relief when the valet's back was turned. Left alone he stood +listening, a cloud on his brow, until the faint sound of the outer +door being pulled to reached his ear, and then, stooping hastily, he +gathered up the sovereigns and half-sovereigns, which lay where they +had fallen, and put them into the box. This done, he rose and laid the +box itself upon the table by his side. And again he stood still, +listening, a dark shade on his face. + +Long ago, almost at the moment of his entrance, he had seen the pale +shimmer of papers at the back of the little cupboard. Now, still +listening stealthily, he thrust in his hand and drew out one of the +bundles and opened it. The papers were parish accounts in his own +handwriting! With a gesture of fierce impatience he thrust them back +and drew out others, and, disappointed again in these, exchanged them +hastily for a third set. In vain! The last were as worthless to him as +the first. + +He was turning away baffled and defeated, when he saw lying at the +back of the lower compartment of the cupboard, whence the cash-box had +come, two or three smaller packets, consisting apparently of letters. +The curate reached hastily for one of these, and the discovery that it +contained some of Lindo's private accounts, dated before his +appointment, made his face flush and his fingers tremble with +eagerness. He glanced nervously round the room and stopped to listen; +then, moving the candle a little nearer, he ran his eye over the +papers. But here, too, though the scent was hot, he took nothing, and +he exchanged the packet for one of the others. Looking at this, he saw +that it was indorsed in Lindo's handwriting, "Letters relating to the +Claversham Living." + +"At last," Clode muttered, his eyes burning, "I have it now." The +string which bound the packet was knotted tightly, and his fingers +seemed all thumbs as he labored to unfasten it. But he succeeded at +last, and opening the uppermost letter (they were all folded across), +saw that it was written from Lincoln's Inn Fields. "My dear sir," he +read; and then--with a mighty crash sounding awfully in his ears--the +door behind him was flung open just as he had flung it open himself an +hour before, and, dropping the letter, he sprang round, to find the +rector confronting him with a face of stupid astonishment. + + + + + CHAPTER IX. + + TOWN TALK. + + +He was a man, as the reader will perhaps have gathered, of many +shifts, and cool-headed; but for a moment he felt something of the +anguish of discovery which had so tortured the surprised servant. The +table shook beneath his hand, and it was with difficulty he repressed +a wild impulse to overturn the candle, and escape in the darkness. He +did repress it, however; nay, he forced his eyes to meet the rector's, +and twisted his lips into the likeness of a smile. But when he thought +of the scene afterward he found his chief comfort in the reflection +that the light had been too faint to betray his full embarrassment. + +Naturally the rector was the first to speak. "Clode!" he ejaculated +softly, his surprise above words. "Is it you? Why, man," he +continued, still standing with his hand on the door and his eyes +devouring the scene, "what is up?" + +The money-box stood open at the curate's side, and the letters lay +about his feet where they had fallen. The little cupboard yawned among +the books. No wonder Lindo's amazement, as he gradually took it all +in, rather increased than diminished, or that the curate's tongue was +dry and his throat husky when he at last found his voice. "It is all +right. I will explain it," he stammered, almost upsetting the table in +his agitation. "I expected you before," he added fussily, moving the +light. + +"The dickens you did!" slipped from the rector. It was difficult for +him not to believe that his arrival had been the last thing expected. + +"Yes," returned the curate, with a little snap of defiance. He was +recovering himself, and could look the other in the face now. "But I +am glad you did not come before, all the same." + +"Why?" + +"I will explain." + +The light which the one candle gave was not so meagre that Clode's +embarrassment had altogether escaped Lindo; and had the latter been a +suspicious man he might have had queer thoughts, and possibly +expressed them. As it was, he was only puzzled, and when the curate +said he would explain, answered simply, "Do." + +"The truth is," said Stephen Clode, beginning with an effort, "I have +taken a good deal on myself, and I am afraid you will blame me, Mr. +Lindo. If so, I cannot help it." His face flushed, and he beat a +tattoo on the table with his fingers. "I came across," he continued, +"to borrow a book a little before ten. The lights here were out; but, +to my surprise, your house-door was open." + +"As I found it myself!" the rector exclaimed. + +"Precisely. Naturally I had misgivings, and I looked into the hall. I +saw a streak of light proceeding from the doorway of this room, and I +came in softly to see what it meant. I heard a man moving about in +here, and I threw open the door much as you did." + +"Did you?" said Lindo eagerly. "And who was it--the man, I mean?" + +"That is just what I cannot tell you," replied the curate. His face +was pale, but there was a smile upon it, and he met the other's gaze +without flinching. He had settled his plan now. + +"He got away, then?" said the rector, disappointed. + +"No. He did not try either to escape or to resist," was the answer. + +"But was he really a burglar?" + +"Yes." + +"Then where is he?" The rector looked round as if he expected to see +the man lying bound on the floor. "What did you do with him?" + +"I let him go." + +Lindo whistled; and when he had done whistling still stood with his +mouth open and a face of the most complete mystification. "You let him +go?" he repeated mechanically, but not until after a pause of half a +minute or so. "Why, may I ask?" + +"You have every right to ask," the curate answered with firmness, +and yet despondently. "I will tell you why--why I let him go, and +why I cannot tell you his name. He is a parishioner of yours. It was +his first offence, and I believe him to be sincerely penitent. I +believe, too, that he will never repeat the attempt, and that the +accident of my entrance saved him from a life of crime. I may have +been wrong--I dare say I was wrong," continued the curate, growing +excited--excitement came very easily to him at the moment--"but I +cannot go back from my word. The man's misery moved me. I thought what +I should have felt in his place, and I promised him, in return for his +pledge that he would live honestly in the future, that he should go +free, and that I would not betray his name to any one--to any one!" + +"Well!" exclaimed the rector, his tone one of unbounded admiration in +every sense of the word. "When you do a thing nobly, my dear fellow, +you do do it nobly, and no mistake! I wonder who it was! But I must +not ask you." + +"No." said Clode. "And now," he continued, still beating the tattoo on +the table, "you do not blame me greatly?" + +"I do not, indeed. No. Only I think perhaps that you should have +retained the right to tell me." + +"I should have done so," said the curate regretfully. + +"He has taken nothing, I suppose?" the rector continued, turning to +the cupboard, and, not only satisfied with the explanation, but liking +Clode better than he had liked him before. + +"No," the other answered. "I was putting things straight when you +entered and startled me. He had dropped the money about the floor, but +you will find it right, I think. He has made a mess among the papers, +I fear, and damaged the cupboard door in forcing it, but that is the +extent of the mischief. By the way," the curate added, "I have a key +to this cupboard at my lodgings. Williams gave it to me. He only kept +parish matters here. I must let you have it." + +"Right," said the rector carelessly; and, a few more words having +passed between them as to the attempted robbery, and the manner in +which the outer door had been opened, the curate took his hat and +prepared to go. "You had a pleasant party, I suppose?" he said, +pausing and turning when halfway across the hall. + +"A _very_ pleasant one," Lindo answered with enthusiasm. + +"They are nice people," said Clode smoothly. + +"They are--very nice. You told me I should find them so, and you were +right. Good-night." + +"Good-night." + +Such harmless words! And yet they roused the curate's jealousy anew. +As he walked home, the church clock tolling midnight above his head, +he drank in no peaceful influence from the dark stillness or the +solemn sound. He was gnawed by fresh hatred of the man who had +surprised and confounded him, and forced him to lie and quibble in +order to escape from a dishonorable position. If you would make a man +your enemy come upon him when he is doing something of which he is +ashamed. He will fear you afterward, but he will hate you more. In the +curate's case it was only he who knew himself discovered, so that he +had no ground for fear. But he hated none the less vigorously. + +And, somehow, in a few days an ugly rumor of which the new rector was +the subject began to gain currency in the town. It was an ill-defined +rumor, coming to one thing in one person's mouth and to a different +thing in another's--a kind of cloud on the rector's fair fame, +shifting from moment to moment, and taking ever a fresh shape, yet +always a cloud. + +One whispered that he had obtained the presentation as the reward of +questionable services rendered to the patron. Another that he had +forged his own deed of presentation, if such a thing existed. A third +that he had been presented by mistake; and a fourth that he had +deceived the authorities as to his age. It was noticeable that these +rumors began low down in the social scale of the town and worked their +way upward, which was odd; and that, whatever form the rumor took, +there was not one who heard it who did not within a fortnight or three +weeks come to associate it with the presence of a seedy, down-looking, +unwholesome man, who was much about the rector's doorway, and, when he +was not there, was generally to be found at the Bull and Staff. +Whether he was the disseminator of the reports, or, alike with the +rector, was the unconscious subject of them, was not known; but at +sight of him--particularly if he were seen, as frequently happened, in +the rector's neighborhood--people shrugged their shoulders and lifted +their eyebrows, and expressed a great many severe things without using +their tongues. + +To the circle of the rector's personal friends the rumors did not +reach. That was natural enough. To tell a person that his or her +intimate friend is a forger or a swindler is a piquant but somewhat +perilous task. And no one mentioned the matter to the Hammonds, or to +the archdeacon, or to the Homfrays of Holberton, or the other county +people living round, with whom it must be confessed that, after that +dinner-party at the Town House, he consorted perhaps too exclusively. +It might have been thought that even the townsfolk, seeing the young +fellow's frank face passing daily about their streets, and catching +the glint of his fair curly hair when, the wintry sunlight pierced the +lanthorn windows and fell in gules and azure on the reading-desk, +would have been slow to believe such tales of him. + +They might have been; but circumstances and Mr. Bonamy were against +him. The lawyer did not circulate the stories; he had not even +mentioned them out-of-doors, nor, for aught the greater part of +Claversham knew, had heard of them at all. But all his weight--and +with the Low-Church middle-class in the town it was great--was thrown +into the scale against the rector. It was known that he did not trust +the rector. It was known that day by day his frown on meeting the +rector grew darker and darker. And the why and the wherefore not being +understood--for no one thought of questioning the lawyer, or observed +how frequently of late the curate happened upon him in the street or +the reading-room--many concluded that he knew more of the clergyman's +antecedents than appeared. + +There was one person, and perhaps only one, who openly circulated and +rejoiced in these rumors. That was a man whom Lindo met daily in the +street and passed with a careless nod and a word, not dreaming for an +instant that the spiteful little busybody was concerning himself with +him. The man was Dr. Gregg, the snappish, ill-bred man who had chanced +upon Lindo and the Bonamy girls breakfasting together at Oxford. The +sight, it will be remembered, had not pleased him, for he had long had +a sneaking liking for Miss Kate himself, and had only refrained from +trying to win her because he still more desired to be of the "best +set" in Claversham. He had been ashamed, indeed, up to this time of +his passion; but, reading on that occasion unmistakable admiration of +the girl in the young clergyman's face, and being himself rather +cavalierly treated by Lindo, he had somewhat changed his views. The +girl had acquired increased value in his eyes. Another's appreciation +had increased his own, and, merely as an incident, the man who had +effected this has earned his hearty jealousy and ill-will. And this, +while Lindo thought him a vulgar but harmless little man. + +But if the rector, immersed in new social engagements, did not see +whither he was tending, others, though they knew nothing of the +unpleasant tales we have mentioned, saw more clearly. The archdeacon, +coming into town one Saturday five or six weeks after Lindo's arrival, +did his business early and turned his steps toward the rectory. He +felt pretty sure of finding the young fellow at home, because he knew +it was his sermon day. A few yards from the door he fell in, as it +chanced, with Stephen Clode. The two stood together talking, while the +archdeacon waited to be admitted, and presently the curate said, "If +you wish to see the rector, archdeacon, I am afraid you will be +disappointed. He is not at home." + +"But I thought that he was always at home on Saturdays?" + +"Generally he is," Clode replied, looking down and tracing a pattern +with the point of his umbrella. "But he is away to-day." + +"Where?" said the archdeacon rather abruptly. + +"He has gone to the Homfrays' at Holberton. They have some sort of +party to-day, and the Hammonds drove him over." Despite himself, the +curate's tone was sullen, his manner constrained. + +"Oh!" said the archdeacon thoughtfully. The Homfrays were his very +good friends, but of the county families round Claversham they were +reckoned the fastest and most frivolous. And he sagely suspected that +a man in Lindo's delicate position might be wiser if he chose other +companions. "Lindo seems to see a good deal of the Hammonds," he +remarked after a pause. + +"Yes," said Clode. "It is very natural." + +"Oh, very natural," the archdeacon hastened to say; but his tone +clearly expressed the opinion that "toujours Hammonds" was not a good +bill of fare for the rector of Claversham. "Very natural, of course. +Only," he continued, taking courage, for he really liked the rector, +"you have had some experience here, and I think it would be well if +you were to give him a hint not to be too exclusive. A town rector +must not be too exclusive. It does not do." + +"No," said Clode. + +"It is different in the country, of course. And then there is Mr. +Bonamy. He is unpleasant, I know, and yet he is honest after a +fashion. Lindo must beware of getting across with him. He has done +nothing about the sheep yet, has he?" + +"No." + +"Well, do not let him, if you can help it. You are not urging him on +in that, are you?" + +"On the contrary," the curate answered rather warmly, "I have all +through told him that I would not express an opinion on it. If +anything, I have discouraged him in the matter." + +"Well, I hope he will let it drop now. I hope he will let it drop." + +They parted then, and the archdeacon, sagely revolving in his mind the +evils of exclusiveness, strolled back to the hotel where he put up his +horses. On his way, casting his eye down the wide, quiet street, with +its old-fashioned houses on this side and that, he espied Mr. Bonamy's +tall spare figure approaching, and he purposely passed the inn and +went to meet him. As a county magnate the archdeacon could afford to +know Mr. Bonamy, and even to be friendly with him. I am not sure, +indeed, that he had not a sneaking liking and respect for the rugged, +snappish, self-made man. + +"How do you do, Mr. Bonamy?" he began. And then, after saying a few +words about closing a road in which he was interested, he slid into a +mention of Lindo, with a view to seeing how the land lay. "I have just +been to call on your rector," he said. + +"You did not find him at home," replied Bonamy, with a queer grin, and +a little jerk of his head which sent his hat still farther back. + +"No, I was unlucky." + +"Not more than most people," said the churchwarden, with much +enjoyment. "I will tell you what it is, Mr. Archdeacon. Mr. Lindo is +better suited for your place. He would make a very good archdeacon. +With a pair of horses and a park phaeton and a small parish, and a +little general superintendence of the district--with that and the life +of a country gentleman he would get on capitally." + +There was just so much of a jest in the words that the clergyman had +no choice but to laugh. "Come, Bonamy," he said good-humoredly, "he is +young yet." + +"Oh, yes, he is quite out of place here in that respect, too!" replied +the lawyer naively. + +"But he will improve," pleaded the archdeacon. + +"I am not sure that he will have the chance," Mr. Bonamy answered in +his gentlest tone. + +The archdeacon was so far from understanding him that he did not +answer save by raising his eyebrows. Could Bonamy really be so +foolish, he wondered, as to think he could get rid of a beneficed +clergyman. The archdeacon was surprised, and yet that was all he could +make of it. + +"He is away at Mr. Homfray's of Holberton now," the lawyer continued, +condemnation in his thin voice. + +"Well, there is no harm in that, Mr. Bonamy," replied the archdeacon, +somewhat offended, "as long as he is back to do the duty to-morrow." + +Mr. Bonamy grunted. "A one-day-a-week duty is a very fine thing," he +said. "You clergymen are to be envied, Mr. Archdeacon!" + +"You would be a great deal more to be envied yourself, Mr. Bonamy," +the magnate returned with heat, "if you did not carp at everything and +look at other people through distorted glasses. Fie! here is a young +clergyman new to the parish, and, instead of helping him, you find +fault with everything he does. For shame! For shame, Mr. Bonamy!" + +"Ah!" said the lawyer, quite unabashed, "you did not mean to say that +when you came across the street to me. But--well, least said soonest +mended, and I will wish you good evening. You will have a wet drive +home, I am afraid, Mr. Archdeacon." + +And he put up his umbrella and went his way sturdily, while the +archdeacon, crossing to his carriage, which was in front of the inn, +entertained an uncomfortable suspicion that he had done more harm than +good by his intercession. "I am afraid," he said to himself, as he +handled the reins and sent his horses down the street in a fashion of +which he was not a little proud--"I am afraid that there is trouble in +front of that young man. I am afraid there is." + +If he had known all, he might have shaken his head still more gravely, + + + + + CHAPTER X. + + OUT WITH THE SHEEP. + + +Stephen Clode, while listening with a certain pleasure to the +archdeacon's hints, did not dream of the good turn which fortune was +about to do him. If he had foreseen it, he would probably have taken a +bolder part in the conversation, and parted from the elder clergyman +with a more jubilant step. As it was, he heard no rumor that evening, +nor was it until ten o'clock on the Sunday morning that he learned +anything was amiss. Calling at the house in the churchyard at that +hour, he was received by Mrs. Baker herself; and he remarked at once +that the housekeeper's face fell in a manner far from flattering when +she recognized him. + +"Oh, it is you, is it, Mr. Clode?" she said, her tone one of +disappointment. "You have not seen him, sir, have you?" + +"Seen whom?" the curate replied in surprise. + +"Mr. Lindo, sir?" + +"Why? Is he not here?" + +"He is not, indeed, sir," the housekeeper said, putting her head out +to look up and down. "He never came back last night, and we have not +heard of him. I sent across to the Town House to inquire, and the only +thing Mrs. Hammond could say was that Mr. Lindo was to follow them, +and they supposed he had come." + +"Well, but--who is to do the duty at the church?" Clode ejaculated. His +dismay at the moment was genuine, for he did not at once see how much +this was to his advantage. + +"There is only you, sir, unless he comes in time," the housekeeper +added despondently. + +"But I am going to the Hamlet church," said Clode, rapidly turning +things over in his mind. If there was no one at the parish church to +conduct the chief service of the week, what a talk there would be! Why +it would almost be matter for the bishop's interference! "You see I +cannot possibly neglect that," he continued, in answer as much to the +remonstrance of his own conscience as to the housekeeper. "It was the +rector's own arrangement, Mrs. Baker. You may be sure he will be here +in time for the eleven o'clock service. Mr. Homfray has kept him over +night. That is all." + +"You do not think he has met with an accident, sir? They say the +coal-pits on Baer Hill----" + +"Pooh, pooh! He will be here in a few minutes, you will see," the +curate answered. And he affected to be so cheerfully certain of this +that he would not wait even for a little while, but started at once +for the Hamlet church--a small chapel-of-ease in the outskirts of the +town. There he put on his surplice early, and was ready in excellent +time. Punctuality is a virtue. + +At half-past ten the bells of the great church began to ring, and +presently door after door in the quiet streets about it opened +silently, and little parties issued forth in their Sunday clothes +and walked stiffly and slowly toward the building. At the moment when +the High Street was dotted most thickly with these groups, and the +small bell was tinkling its impatient summons, the rattle of an old +taxed-cart was heard as the vehicle flashed quickly over the bridge at +the foot of the street. One and another of the church-goers turned in +curiosity to gaze, for such a sound was rare on a Sunday morning. +Judge of their astonishment, then, when they recognized, perched up +beside the boy who urged on the pony, no less a person than the rector +himself! As he jogged up the street in his sorry conveyance and with +his sorry companion, he had to pass under the fire of a battery of +eyes which did not fail to notice all the peculiarities of his +appearance. His tie was awry and his chin unshaven. He had a haggard, +dissipated air, as of one who had been up all night, and there was a +great smudge on his cheek. He looked dissipated---nothing less than +disreputable, some said; and he seemed aware of it, for he sat erect, +gazing straight before him, and declining to see any one. At the top +of the street he descended hastily, and, as the bell jerked out its +final note, hurried toward the vestry with a depressed and gloomy +face. + +"Well!" said Mr. Bonamy to Kate, who was walking up by his side, and +whose face for some mysterious reason was flushed and troubled, "I +think that is the coolest young man I have ever met!" + +"Eh?" said a voice behind them as they entered the porch--the speaker +was Gregg. "What do you think of that, Bonamy? A gay young spark, is +he not?" + +There was time for no more then. But as the congregation waited in +their seats through a long voluntary, many were the nods and winks, +and incessant the low mutterings, as one communicated to another the +details of the scene outside, and his or her view of them. When the +rector appeared--nine minutes late by Mr. Bonamy's watch--he looked +pale and fagged, and the sermon he preached was of the shortest. +Nine-tenths of the congregation noted only the brevity of the +discourse and drew their conclusions. But Kate Bonamy, who sat by her +father with downcast eyes and a tinge of color still in her cheeks, +and who scarcely once looked up at the weary face and tumbled hair, +fancied, heaven knows why, that she detected a new pathos and a deeper +tone of appeal in the few simple sentences; and though she had +scarcely spoken to the rector for a month, and was nursing a tiny +contempt for him, the girl felt on a sudden more kindly disposed +toward the young man. + +Not so Mr. Bonamy, He came out of church chuckling; full of a grim +delight in the fulfilment of his predictions. It was not his custom to +linger in the porch, for he was not a sociable man; but he did so +to-day, and, letting Kate and Daintry go on, formed one of a coterie +of men, who had no difficulty in coming to a conclusion about the +rector. + +"He has been studying hard, poor fellow!" said Gregg, with a +wink--there is no dislike so mean and cruel as that which the ill-bred +man feels for the gentleman--"reading the devil's books all night!" + +"Nine minutes late!" said the lawyer. "That is what comes of having a +young fellow who is always gadding about the country!" + +"He could not gad to a more congenial place than Holberton, I should +think," sneered a third. + +And then all the sins which the Homfrays had ever committed, and all +those which had ever been laid to their charge, were cited to render +the rector's case more black. To do him justice, Mr. Bonamy took but a +listener's part in this. He was a shrewd man, and he did not believe +that the rector could have had anything to do with an elopement from +Holberton which had taken place before his name was heard in the +county; but he was honestly assured that the young fellow had been +sitting over the cards half the night. And as for the other crimes, +perhaps he would commit them if he were left to follow his own foolish +devices. + +"What is ill-gotten soon goes," said one charitable person with a +sneer. "You may depend upon it that what we hear is true." + +"It is all of a piece," said another. "A man does not have a follower +of that kind for nothing?" + +"It comes over the devil's back, and goes--you know how?" said a +third. "But perhaps he is wise to make the most of it while it lasts. +He is consequential enough now, but the Homfrays will not have much to +say to him presently, you will see. A few weeks, and he will go." + +"Well, let him go for the d--d dissipated gambling parson he is!" said +Gregg coarsely, carried away by the unusual agreement with him. "And +the sooner the better, say I!" + +The man beside him, a little startled by the doctor's violence, turned +round to make sure that they were not overheard, and found himself +face to face with the rector, who, seeking to go out--as was not his +custom, for he generally used the vestry door--by the porch, had +walked into the midst of the group, even as Gregg opened his mouth. A +glance at the young man's reddening cheek and compressed lips apprised +the startled group that he had overheard something at least. + +In one way it was the crisis of Lindo's fate at Claversham. But he did +not know it. If he had been wise--if he had been such a man as his +curate, for instance; or if, without being wise, he had learned a +little of the prudence which comes of necessity with years--he would +have passed through them in silence, satisfied with such revenge as +mute contempt could give him. But he was not old, nor very wise; and +perhaps certain things had lately jarred on his nerves, so that he was +not quite himself. He did not pass by in silence, but, instead, stood +for a moment. Then, singling Gregg out with a withering glance, "I am +much obliged to you for your good opinion," he said to him; "but I +should be still more obliged if you would swear elsewhere, sir, and +not in the porch of my church. Leave the building! Go at once!" And he +pointed toward the churchyard with the air of an angry schoolmaster. + +But Gregg did not move. He was astounded by this direct attack, but he +had the courage of numbers on his side, and, though he did not dare to +answer, he did not budge. Neither did the others, though they felt +ashamed of themselves, and looked all ways at once. Only one of them +all met the rector's glance fairly, and that was Mr. Bonamy. "I think +the least said the soonest mended, Mr. Lindo," he replied, with an +acrid smile. + +"I am sorry that you did not think of that before," retorted the young +man, standing before them with his fair head thrown back, his clerical +coat hanging loose, and his brow dark with indignation--for he had +heard enough to be able to guess the cause of Gregg's remark. "Do you +come to church only to cavil and backbite?--to put the worst +construction on what you cannot understand?" + +"Speaking for myself," replied the church warden coolly, "the sole +thing with which I can charge myself is the remark that you were +somewhat late for service this morning, Mr. Lindo." + +"And if I was?" said the clergyman in his haughtiest tone. + +"Well, of course there may have been a good cause for it," the lawyer +replied drily. "But it is a thing I have not known happen here for +twenty years." + +An altercation with these men, none of whom were well disposed toward +him, and half of whom were tradespeople, was the last thing which the +young rector should have allowed himself to enter upon, and the last +thing indeed to which he would have condescended in his normal frame +of mind. But on this unlucky morning he was nervous and irritable; +and, finding himself thus bearded and defied, he spoke foolishly. "You +trouble yourself too much, Mr. Bonamy," he said impulsively, "with +things which do not concern you! The parish, among other things. You +have set yourself, as I know, to thwart and embarrass me; but I warn +you that you are not strong enough! I shall find means to----" + +"To put me down, in fact?" said Mr. Bonamy. + +The young man hesitated, his face crimson. His opponent's sallow +features, seamed with a hundred astute wrinkles, warned him, if the +covert smiles of the others did not, that, in his present mood at any +rate, he was not a match for the lawyer. He had gone too far already, +as he was now aware. "No," he replied, swallowing his rage, "but to +keep you to your proper province, as I hope to keep to mine. I wish +you good morning." + +He passed through them, and hurried away, more angry with them, and +with himself for allowing them to provoke him, than he had ever felt +in his life. He knew well that he had been foolish. He knew that he +had lowered himself in their eyes by his display of temper. But, +though he was bitterly annoyed with himself, the consciousness that +the fault had originally lain with them, and that they had grievously +misjudged him, kept his anger hot; for there is no wrath so fierce as +the indignation of the man falsely accused. He called them under his +breath an uncharitable, spiteful, tattling crew; and was so far +unnerved in thought of them that he had entered his dining-room before +he remembered that he was engaged to take the mid-day meal at the Town +House, as he had done once or twice before, and then walked up with +Laura to the schools. + +He washed and changed hurriedly, keeping his anger hot the while, and +then went across, with the tale on the tip of his tongue. Again, if he +had been wise, he would have kept what had happened to himself. But +the soothing luxury of unfolding his wrong to some one who would +sympathize was one he could not in his soreness forego. + +It was a particularly mild day for the fourth Sunday in Advent, and he +found Miss Hammond still lingering before the door, She was looking +for violets under the north wall, and he joined her, and naturally +broke out at once with the story of what had happened. She was wearing +a little close bonnet, which set off her piquant features and bright +coloring to peculiar advantage, and, as far as looks went, no young +man in trouble ever had a better listener. Only to stand beside her on +the lawn, where the old trees shut out all view of the town and the +troubles he connected with it, was a relief. Of course the search for +violets was soon abandoned. "It is abominable!" she said. But her +voice was like the cooing of a dove. She did everything softly. Even +her indignation was gentle. + +"But you have not heard yet," he protested, "why I really was late." + +"I know what is being said," she murmured, looking up at him, a gleam +of humor in her brown eyes--"that you stayed at the Homfrays' all +night, playing cards. My maid told me as we came in--after church." + +"Ha! I knew that they were saying something of the kind," he replied +savagely. He was so stern that she felt her little attempt at badinage +reproved. "The true reason was of a very different description. What +spiteful busybodies they are! I started to return last evening about +half-past nine, but as I passed Baer Hill Colliery I learned that +there had been an accident. A man going down the shaft with the night +shift had been crushed--hurt beyond help," the rector continued in a +lower voice. "He wanted to see a clergyman, and the other pitmen, some +of whom had seen me pass earlier in the day, stopped me and took me to +him." + +"How sad! How very sad!" she ejaculated. Somehow she felt ill at ease +with him in this mood. With his last words a kind of veil had fallen +between them. + +"I stayed with him the night," the rector continued. "He died at +half-past nine this morning. I came straight from that to this. And +they say these things of me!" + +His voice, though low, was hard, and yet there was a suspicious break +in it as he uttered his last words. Injustice touches a man, young and +not yet hardened, very sorely; and he was overwrought. Laura, +fingering her little bunch of violets, heard the catch in his voice, +and knew that he was not very far from tears. + +She was almost terrified. She longed to respond, to say the proper +thing, but here her powers deserted her. She was not capable of much +emotion, unless the call especially concerned herself; and she could +not rise to this occasion. She could only murmur again that it was +abominable and too bad, or, taking her cue from the young man's face, +that it was very sad. She said enough, it is true, to satisfy him, +though not herself; for he only wanted a listener. And when he went in +to lunch Mrs. Hammond more than bore him out in all his denunciations; +so that when he left to go to the schools he had fully made up his +mind to carry things through. + +This unfortunate quarrel indeed did him great injury by throwing him +into the arms of the party which his own pleasure and taste led him to +prefer. He did not demur when Mrs. Hammond--meaning little evil, but +expressing prejudices which at one time she had sedulously cultivated +(for when one lives near the town one must take especial care not to +be confounded with it)--talked of a set of butchers and bakers, and +said, much more strongly than he had, that Mr. Bonamy must be kept in +his place. A little quarrel with the lawyer, a little social +relaxation in which the young fellow had lost sight of the excellent +intentions with which he had set out, then this final quarrel--such +had been the course of events; sufficient, taken with his own +fastidiousness and inexperience, to bring him to this. + +Mrs. Hammond, standing at the drawing-room window, watched him as he +walked down the short drive. "I like that young man," she said +decisively. "He is thrown away upon those people." + +Laura, who had not gone to the schools, yawned. "He has not one-half +the brains of some one else we know, mother," she answered. + +"Who is that?" + +Laura did not reply; and probably her mother understood, for she did +not press the question. "Well," Mrs. Hammond said, after a moment's +silence, "perhaps he has not. I do not know. But at any rate he is a +gentleman from the crown of his head to the tips of his toes." + +"I dare say he is," said Laura languidly. + +Mrs. Hammond, depositing her own portly form in a suitable chair, +watched her daughter curiously. She would have given a good deal to be +able to read the girl's mind and learn her intentions; but she was too +wise to ask questions, and had always given Laura the fullest liberty. +She had watched the growth of the intimacy between her and Mr. Clode +without demur, feeling a strong liking for the man herself, though she +scarcely thought him a suitable match for her daughter. On the old +rector's death there had seemed for a few days a chance of Mr. Clode +being appointed his successor; and at that time Mrs. Hammond had +fancied she detected a shade of anxiety and excitement in her +daughter's manner. But Mr. Clode had not been appointed, and the new +rector had come; and Laura had apparently transferred her favor from +the curate to him. + +At this Mrs. Hammond had felt somewhat troubled--at first; but in a +short time she had naturally reconciled herself to the change, the +rector's superiority as a _parti_ being indisputable. Yet still Mrs. +Hammond felt no certainty as to Laura's real feelings, and, gazing at +her this afternoon, was as much in the dark as ever. That the girl was +fond of her she knew; indeed, it was quite a pretty sight to see the +daughter purring about the mother. But Mrs. Hammond was more than half +inclined to doubt now whether Laura was fond, or capable of being +fond, of any other human being except herself. + +She sighed gently as she thought of this, and rang the bell for tea. +"I think we will have it early this afternoon," she said, "I feel I +want a cup." + + + + + CHAPTER XI. + + THE DOCTOR SPEAKS. + + +The feelings with which the curate hastened on the conclusion of his +own service, to learn what had happened at the great church may be +imagined. His excitement and curiosity were not the less because he +had to hide them. If there really had been no service--if the rector +had not appeared--what a scandal, what a subject for talk was here! +Even if the rector had appeared a little late there would still be +whispering; for new brooms are expected to sweep clean. The curate +composed his dark face, and purposely made one or two sick calls at +houses which lay in his road, lest he might seem to ask the question +he had to put too pointedly. By the time he reached the rectory he had +made up his mind, judging from the absence of stir in the streets, +that nothing very unusual had happened. + +"Is the rector in?" he asked the servant. + +"No, sir; he has gone to the Town House to dinner," the girl answered. + +Involuntarily Mr. Clode frowned. "He was in time for service, I +suppose?" he asked, more abruptly than he had intended. + +"Oh, yes, sir," said the unconscious maid, who had not been to church. + +"Thank you; that is all," he answered, turning away. So nothing had +come of it after all! His heart was sick with disappointed hope as he +turned into his own dull lodgings; and he felt that the rector in +being in time had wronged him afresh, and by dining at the Town House +had added insult to injury. + +But in the course of the day he learned how late the rector had been; +and early next morning some rumor of the triangular altercation in the +church porch also reached him--of course in an exaggerated form. As a +fact, all Claversham was by this time talking of it, Mr. Bonamy's +companions, with one exception, having taken good care to make the +most of his success, and to paint the rebuff he had administered to +the clergyman in the deepest colors. The curate heard the news with a +face of grave concern, but with secret delight; and, turning over in +his mind what use he might make of it, came opportunely upon Gregg as +the latter was going his rounds. "Hallo!" he said, calling so loudly +that the doctor, who had turned away and would fain have retreated, +could not decently escape, "you are the very man I wanted to see! What +is this absurd story about the rector and you? There is not a word of +truth in it, I suppose?" + +"I am sure I cannot say until you tell me what it is," replied the +doctor snappishly. He was a little afraid of the curate, who had a +knack of being unpleasant without giving an opening in return. + +"Why, you seem rather sore about it," Clode remarked, with apparent +surprise. + +"I do not know why I should!" sneered the doctor, his face a dark red +with anger. + +"Certainly not, if there is no truth in the story," the curate +replied, looking down with his eyes half shut at the chafing little +man. "But I suppose it is all an invention, Gregg?" + +"It is not an invention that the rector was abominably rude to me," +blurted out the doctor, who scarcely knew with whom to be most +angry--his present tormentor or the first cause of his trouble. + +"Pooh!" said Clode, "it is only his way." + +"Then it is a d----, it is a most unpleasant way!" retorted the doctor +savagely. + +"He means no harm," said the curate gaily. "Why did you not answer him +back?" + +Dr. Gregg's face turned a shade redder. That was where the shoe +pinched. Why had he not answered him back as Bonamy had, and not stood +mute, acknowledging himself the smaller man? That was what was +troubling him now, and making him fancy himself the laughing-stock of +the town. "I will answer him back in a way he will not like!" he cried +viciously, striving to hide his embarrassment under a show of bluster. + +"Tut-t-tut!" said the curate provokingly, "do not go and make a fool +of yourself by saying things like that, when you know you don't mean +them, man. What can you say to the rector?" + +"I will ask him----" + +But what he would ask the rector was lost to the world, for at this +moment Mr. Bonamy, coming down the pavement behind him, touched his +sleeve. "I have just been to your house, doctor," he said. "My +youngest girl is a little out of sorts. Would you mind stepping in and +seeing her?" + +Gregg swallowed his wrath, and was perhaps thankful for the +interruption. He said he would; and the lawyer turned to Mr. Clode. +"Well," he said, "so you have made up your minds to fight?" + +"I am not quite sure," said the curate, with caution--for he knew +better than to treat Mr. Bonamy as he treated Gregg--"that I take +you." + +"You have not seen your principal this morning?" replied the lawyer, +with a smile which for him was almost benevolent. The prospect of a +fight was as the Mountains of Beulah to him. + +"Do you mean Mr. Lindo?" said the curate, with some curtness. + +The lawyer nodded. "I see you have not," he continued. "Perhaps you do +not know that he turned the sheep out of the churchyard after +breakfast this morning, and half of them were found nearly a mile down +the Red Lane!" + +"I did not know it," said the curate gravely. But it was as much as he +could do to restrain his exultation and show no sign save of concern. + +"Well, it is the fact," the lawyer replied, rubbing his hands. "It is +quite true he gave the church wardens notice to remove them a +fortnight ago; but we did not comply, because we say it is our affair +and not his. Now you may tell him from me that the only question in my +mind is the form of action." + +"I will tell him,' said the curate with dignity. + +"Just so! What do you say, Gregg?" + +But the doctor, grinning from ear to ear with satisfaction, was gone; +and the curate, not a whit less pleased in his heart, hastened to +follow his example. "Bonamy one, and Gregg two," he said softly to +himself, "and last, but not least, one who shall be nameless, three! +He has made three enemies already, and, if those be not enough, with +right on their side, to oust him from his seat when the time comes, +why, I know nothing of odds!" + +"With right on their side," said the curate, even to himself. He had +made no second attempt to pry into the rector's secrets or to bring +home to him a knowledge of the wrongfulness of his possession. But he +did still believe, or persuaded himself he believed, that Lindo was a +guilty man; or why should the young rector pension the old earl's +servant? And on this ground Clode justified to himself the secret +ill-turns he was doing him. A month's intimacy with the rector would +probably have convinced an impartial mind of his good faith. But the +curate had not, it must be remembered, an impartial mind; and we are +all very apt to believe what suits us. + +To return to the little doctor, whom we left going on his way in a +mood almost hilarious. He hoped that this fresh escapade of the +rector's would wipe out the memory of the fray in which he had himself +borne so inglorious a part. And the more he thought of it, the greater +was his admiration of the lawyer, whom he had long patronized in a +timid fashion, much as a snub-nosed King Charlie treats the butcher's +mongrel. Now he felt a positive reverence for him. He began to think +it possible that, with all his drawbacks of birth, Mr. Bonamy might +become a personage in the town, and pretty Kate not so bad a match. +The result of these musings was that, by the time he reached the +lawyer's door, an idea which he had first entertained on seeing the +young clergyman's admiration for Kate Bonamy, and which he had since +turned over more than once in his mind, had become on a sudden a +settled purpose. So much so that, as the doctor rang the bell, he +looked at his hands, which were not so clean as they might have been, +pished and pshawed, settled his light-blue scarf--which the next +minute rose again to the level of his collar--and at length went in +with a briskly juvenile air and an engaging smile. + +He found Daintry lying on the sofa in the dining-room down-stairs, her +head on a white bed-pillow. Kate was leaning over her. The room was in +some disorder--littered with this and that, a bottle of eau de +Cologne, Mr. Bonamy's papers, books, and sewing; but it looked +comfortable, for it was very evidently inhabited. A fastidious eye +might have thought it was too much inhabited; and yet proofs of +refinement were not wanting, though the sofa was covered with +horsehair, and the mirror was heavy and ugly, and the grate, +knee-high, was as old as the Georges. There were flowers on the table +and on the little cottage piano; and by the side of the last was a +violin-case. Not many people in Claversham knew that Mr. Bonamy played +the violin. Still fewer had heard him play, for he never did so out of +his own house. + +Possibly a very particular suitor might have preferred to find Kate +attending on her sister in a boudoir, free from a lawyer's papers, +furnished in a less solid and durable style, and with some livelier +look-out than through wire blinds upon a dull street. But another +might have thought that the office in which she was engaged, and the +gentleness of her touch and eye as she went about it, made up for all +deficiencies. + +Dr. Gregg was not of a nature to appreciate either the deficiencies or +the set-off; but he had eyes for the girl's grace and beauty, for the +neatness of the well-fitting blue gown and the white collar and cuffs; +and he shook hands with her and devoted himself to Daintry--who +disliked him extremely and was very fractious--with the most anxious +solicitude. "It is only a sick headache!" he said finally, with +bluntness which was meant for encouragement. "It is nothing, you +know." + +"I wish you had it, then!" Daintry wailed, burying her face in the +pillow. + +"It will be gone in the morning!" he retorted, rising and keeping his +temper by an unnatural effort. "She will be the better for it +afterward, Miss Bonamy." + +To this Daintry vouchsafed no answer, unless a muttered "Rubbish!" was +intended for one. He affected not to hear it, at any rate. He was all +good-temper this morning; the unfortunate point about this being that +his good nature was a shade more unpleasant than his usual snappish +manner. + +At any rate Kate thought it so. She felt the instinctive repulsion +which the wrong man's wooing awakens in an unspoiled girl. She was +conscious of an added dislike for the man as she held out her hand to +him at the dining-room door. But she did not divine the cause of this; +no, nor conjecture his purpose when he said in a low voice that he +wished to speak to her outside. + +"May we go in here a moment?" he muttered, when the door was closed +behind them. He pointed to the room on the other side of the hall, +which Mr. Bonamy used in summer as a kind of office. + +"There is no fire there," Kate answered. "I think it has been lighted +up-stairs, however, if you will not mind coming up, Dr. Gregg. Is +there anything"--this was when he had silently followed her into the +stiff drawing-room, where the newly lit fire was rather smoking than +burning--"serious the matter with her, then?" + +Her voice was steady, but her eyes betrayed the sudden anxiety his +manner had aroused in her. + +"With your sister?" he answered slowly. He was really pondering how he +should say what he had come to say. But, naturally, she set down his +thoughtfulness to a professional cause. + +"Yes," she said anxiously. + +"Oh, no--nothing, nothing. The truth is," continued the doctor, +following up a happy thought and smiling approval of it, "the matter +is with me, Miss Bonamy." + +"With you!" Kate exclaimed, opening her eyes in astonishment. Her +momentary anxiety had put all else out of her head. She thought the +doctor had gone mad. + +"Yes," he said jerkily, but with a grin of tender meaning. "With me. +And you are the cause of it. Now do not be frightened, Miss Kate," he +continued hastily, seeing her start of apprehension. "You must have +known for a long time what I was thinking of." + +"Indeed I have not," Kate murmured in a low voice. She did not affect +to misunderstand him. + +"Well, you easily might have known it then," he retorted, forgetting +his _role_ for an instant. "But the long and the short of it is that I +want you to marry me. I do!" he repeated, overcoming something in his +throat, and going on from this point swimmingly. "And you will please +to hear me out, and not answer in a hurry, Miss Kate. If you like--but +I should not think that you would want it--you can have until +to-morrow to think it over." + +"No," she replied impulsively, her face crimson. And then she shut her +mouth so suddenly, it seemed she was afraid to let anything escape it +except that unmistakable monosyllable. + +"Very well," he replied, comfortably settling his elbow upon the +mantel-shelf, "that is as you like. I hope it does not want much +thinking over myself. I will not boast that I am a rich man, but +I am decently off. I flatter myself that I can keep my head above +water--and yours, too, for the matter of that." + +"Oh, it is not that," she began hurriedly. + +He interrupted her. "No, no," he said jocularly---his last remarks had +put him into a state of considerable self-satisfaction, and he no more +thought it possible that she could or would refuse him than that the +sky could fall--"do not buy a pig in a poke! Hear me out first, Miss +Kate, and we shall start fair. You have been in my house, and, if +it is not quite so large a house as this, I will answer for it you +will find it a great deal more lively. You will see people you have +never seen here, nor will see while your name is Bonamy. You will +have--well, altogether a better time. Not that I mind myself," the +doctor added rather vaguely, forgetting the French proverb about those +who excuse themselves, "what your name is, not I! So don't you think +you could say Yes at once, my dear?" + +He took a step nearer, thinking he had put it rather neatly and +without any nonsense. Possibly, from his point of view of things, he +had. But Kate fell back, nevertheless, as he advanced. + +"Oh, no," she said, flushing painfully. "I could not! I could not +indeed, Dr. Gregg! I am very sorry." + +"Come, come," he said, holding out his hand, his tone one of pleasant +raillery. He had looked for some hanging back, some show of coyness +and bashfulness, and was prepared to laugh in his sleeve at it--"I +think you can, Kate. I think it is possible." That it was in woman's +nature to say No to his comfortable home and the little lift in +society he had to offer--it is only little lifts we appreciate, just +up the next floor above us--he did not believe. + +But Kate soon undeceived him. "I am afraid it is not possible," she +said firmly. "Indeed, I may say at once, Dr. Gregg, that it is out of +the question what you ask; though I thank you, I am sure." + +His face fell ludicrously, and his thick black brows drew together in +a very ominous fashion. But he still could not believe that she meant +it. "I do not think you understand," he said, "that the house is +ready, and the furniture and servants, and there is nothing to prevent +you stepping into it all whenever you please. I will take you away +from this," he continued, darting a scornful glance round the stiff +chilly room--"I do not suppose that ten people enter this room in +the twelvemonth--and I will show you something like life. It is an +offer not many would make you. Come, Kate, do not be a little fool! +You are not going to say No, so say Yes at once. And don't let us +shilly-shally!" + +He had put out his hand as he spoke and captured hers. But she +snatched it from him again almost roughly, and stepped back. The right +man might have used the words the doctor used, and might have scolded +her with impunity, but not the wrong one. Her face, perplexed and +troubled a moment before, grew decided enough now. "I am going to say +No, nevertheless, Dr. Gregg," she replied firmly. "I thought I had +already said it. I will be as plain as you have been. I do not like +you as a wife should like her husband, nor otherwise than as a +friend." + +"A friend!" he exclaimed. He gasped as a man does who has been plunged +suddenly into cold water. His face was red with anger, and his little +black eyes glared at her banefully. "Oh, bother your friendship!" he +added violently. "I did not ask you for that!" + +"I have nothing else to give you," she replied coldly. + +He gasped again. Refused by the Bonamy girl! He had never thought of +this. He was beside himself with astonishment and anger, with +disappointment and wounded pride. "You would not have said this a +month ago!" he cried at last. "It was a pity I did not ask you then!" + +"I should have given you the same answer." + +"Oh, no," he replied ironically, swinging his hat to and fro. "Oh, no, +you would not--not at all, Miss Bonamy. You would have sung to a very +different tune if I had whistled to you before this niminy-piminy +parson showed his face here! Do not think that I am such a fool as not +to see which way the wind is blowing." + +She stood looking at him in silence. But her face was scarlet, and her +hand shook with rage. + +He saw it. "Pooh! do not think to frighten me!" he said coarsely. +"When a man has offered to marry you he has a right to speak his mind! +It will be a long time, I warrant you, before your parson will have +the same right to speak. He was very great with you once, but he has +quite another set of friends now, and I have not heard of him offering +to introduce you to them." + +"Will you go, Dr. Gregg?" she cried passionately, pointing to the +door. His taunts were torture to her. "Will you go, or do you wish to +stay and insult me further?" + +"I wish to say one thing, and I am going to say it," he replied, +nodding triumphantly. "You are pretty proud of your capture, but you +need not be. He will not be much of a match when we have stripped him +of the living he has no right to, and shown him the detected swindler +he is! Wait! Wait a little, Miss Bonamy, and when your parson is +ruined, as he will be before three months are out, high as he holds +his head now, perhaps you will be sorry that you did not take my +offer. Why," he added scornfully, "I should say you are the only +person in the parish who does not know he has no more right where he +is than I have." + +"Go!" she said, pointing to the door. Her face was white now. + +"So I will when I have said one more word----" + +"You won't say it!" cried a sharp voice behind him. "You will go now!" +He shot round, and there was Daintry with her hand on the door. Her +hair was in disorder, her cheeks were flushed, her greenish-gray eyes +were aglow with anger. He saw that she had overheard something of what +had passed, and he began to tremble. He had said more than he +intended. "You will go now, as Kate tells you," she cried, "I will not +have----" + +"Leave the room, child!" he snarled, stamping his foot. + +"I shan't!" she retorted fiercely. "And if you do not go before I +count three I will fetch the dogs." + +Dr. Gregg made a movement as if he would have put her out of the room. +But her presence had a little sobered him, and he stopped. "Look +here," he said. + +"One!" cried Daintry, who knew well that the doctor had a particular +dislike for Snorum, and that the dog's presence was at any time enough +to drive him from the house. + +He turned and looked at Kate. She had gone to the window and was +gazing out, her back to him, her figure proud and scornful. "Miss +Bonamy," he said. + +"Two!" cried Daintry. "Are you going, or shall I fetch Snorum?" + +With a muttered oath he took up his hat and went down the stairs and +out into the street. There at the door he stood a moment, grinding his +teeth, as the full sense of the calamity which had befallen him came +home to him. He had stooped and been rejected--had been rejected by +Bonamy's daughter. He walked away, and still his anger did not +decrease, but all the same he began to be a little thankful that the +child had interrupted him. Had he gone on he might have said too much. +As it was, he had an idea that perhaps he had said more than was quite +prudent. And this had presently a wonderful effect in the way of +sobering him. + + + + + CHAPTER XII. + + THE RECTOR IS UNGRATEFUL. + + +It was tea-time at Mr. Bonamy's; five-thirty, that is, for the lawyer +knew nothing of four o'clock tea. He would have stared had he been +invited into the drawing-room to take it, or had his daughters +produced one of those dainty afternoon tea-tables which were in use at +the Town House, and asked him to support his cup and saucer on his +knee. Compromises found no favor with him. Tea was a meal--he had +always so considered it; and he liked to have the dining-room table +laid for it. Possibly Kate, had she enjoyed more of her own way, +would have altered this, as she would certainly have reformed the +drawing-room. But Mr. Bonamy, who was in many things an indulgent +father, was conservative in some. Four o'clock tea, and a daily use of +the drawing-room, were refinements which he had always regarded as +peculiar to a certain set; and in his pride he would not appear to ape +its ways or affect to belong to it. + +Almost to the moment he came into the room, which was as bright and +cheerful as gaslight and firelight could make it. Laying some letters +under a weight on the mantel-shelf, he turned round and stood with his +back to the fire-place. "How is the child?" he asked. "Has she gone to +bed?" + +"Yes," Kate answered, lifting the lid of the teapot and looking in; "I +think she will be all right after a night's rest." + +"You do not look very bright yourself, Kate," he remarked, as he sat +down. + +Her cheek flushing, she made the old old woman's excuse. "I have a +little headache," she said. "It will be better when I have had my +tea." + +He took a piece of toast and buttered it deliberately. "Gregg came and +saw her?" he asked. + +"Yes. He said it was only a sick headache, and would pass off." + +The lawyer made no comment at the moment, but went on eating his +toast. But presently he looked up. "What is the matter, Kitty?" he +said, not unkindly. + +Her face burning, she peered again quite unnecessarily into the +teapot. Then she said hurriedly, "I have something I think I ought to +tell you, father. Dr. Gregg has asked me to marry him!" + +"The deuce he has!" Mr. Bonamy answered in unmistakable surprise. For +a moment he did not know what to say, or how to feel about it. If any +one had informed the Claversham people that the lawyer's moroseness +was not natural to the man, but the product of many slights, the +informant would have lost his pains. Yet in a great measure this was +so; and first among the things which of late years had exercised Mr. +Bonamy a keen anxiety for his daughters' happiness had place. He had +never made any move toward procuring them the society of their equals; +nay, he had done many things in his pride calculated rather to prolong +their exclusion. Yet all the time he had bitterly resented it, and had +spent many a wakeful night in pondering gloomily over the dull lives +to which they were condemned. Now--strange that he had never thought +of it before--as far as Kate was concerned, he saw a way of escape +opening. Gregg had a fair practice, some private means, a good house, +a tolerable position in the town. In a word, he was perfectly +eligible. Yet Mr. Bonamy was not altogether pleased. He had no +fastidious objection to the doctor. It did not occur to him that the +doctor was not a gentleman. But he did know that he did not like him. + +So the lawyer, after one exclamation of surprise, was for a moment +silent. Then he asked, "Well Kate, and what did you say?" + +"I said No," Kate answered in a low voice. + +"He is a well-to-do man," Mr. Bonamy said, slowly stirring his tea. +"Not that you need think of that only. But you are not likely to know +many people who could make you more comfortable. I believe he is +skilful in his profession. It is a chance, girl, not to be lightly +thrown away." + +"I could not--I could not marry him," Kate stammered, her agitation +now very apparent. "I do not like him. You would not have me----" + +"I would not have you marry any one you do not like!" Mr. Bonamy +replied, almost sternly. "But are you sure that you know your own +mind?" + +"Quite," Kate said, with a shudder. + +"Hum! Well, well; there is no more to be said, then," he answered. +"Don't cry, girl." + +Kate managed to obey him. And in a moment, bravely steadying her +voice, she asked, "What is this about Mr. Lindo, father? I heard that +he had turned the sheep out of the churchyard." + +The lawyer thought she asked the question in order to change the +subject; and he answered briskly, with less reserve perhaps than he +might have exercised at another time. "It is quite true," he said. "He +is making a fool of himself, as I expected. You cannot put old heads +on young shoulders. However, what has happened has convinced me of one +thing." + +"What is that?" she asked in a low voice. + +"That he does not know himself that he has no right here." + +"But has he none?" she murmured, in the same tone. He noticed that her +manner was conscious and embarrassed; but naturally he set this down +to the former topic. He thought she was trying to avoid a scene, and +he admired her for it. + +"Well, I doubt if he has," he answered, "though I am not quite sure +that people have not lit upon a mare's nest. It is the talk of the +town that there was some mistake in his presentation, and there is a +disreputable fellow hanging on his heels, and apparently living on +him, who is said to be in the secret, and to be making the most of it. +I do not believe that now, however," the lawyer continued, falling +into a brown study and speaking as much to himself as to her. "If he +knew he were insecure he would live more quietly than he does. All the +same, he is likely to learn a lesson he will not forget." + +"How?" she asked, her spoon tinkling tremulously against the side of +the cup, and her head bent low over it, as though she saw something +interesting in the lees. + +Mr. Bonamy laughed in his out-of-door manner. "How?" he said grimly. +"Well, if there be any mistake he is going the right way to suffer by +it. If he kept quiet, and went softly, and made no enemies, very +little might be said and nothing done when the mistake came out. But +as it is--well, he has made a good many enemies, and the chances are +that he will lose the best berth he will ever get into. It will be bad +for him, but the better for the parish." + +"Don't you think," said Kate very gently, "that he means well?" + +Mr. Bonamy grunted. "Perhaps so; but he does not go the right way to +do it," he rejoined. "His good fortune has turned his head, and he has +put himself in the hands of the Hammond set, and that does not do at +Claversham." The lawyer ended with a harsh laugh, which said more +plainly than any words, that it never would do while John Bonamy was +church warden at Claversham. + +"It seems a pity," Kate said, almost under her breath. She had never +raised her eyes from the tea-tray since the subject was introduced, +and if her father had looked closely he would have seen that her very +ears were scarlet. "Could you not give him a word of warning?" + +"I!" said the lawyer, with asperity. "Certainly not; why should I?" + +Kate did not say, and her father, with another impatient word or two, +rose from the table, and presently went out. She rang the bell +mechanically and had the table cleared, and in the same mood turned to +the fire and, putting her feet on the fender, began to brood over the +coals, which were burning red and low in the grate. + +Five time's--five times only, counting the Oxford escapade as one, she +had spoken to him; and they--"they" meant Claversham, for it was her +chief misery to believe that the whole town was talking of her--had +made this of it! They had noticed his attentions, and had seen them +scornfully withdrawn when he learned who she was. Oh, it was cowardly +of him--cowardly! And yet--and yet--so her thoughts ran, taking a +fresh turn--had he ever said a word or cast a glance at her which +meant anything--which all the world might not have heard and seen? No, +never. And, with that, her anger changed its course and ran against +Gregg. Him she would never forgive. It was his evil imagination, his +base suspicions, which had built it all up; and Mr. Lindo was no more +to blame--though she a little despised him for his weakness and +conventionality--than she was herself. + +It seemed most sad that he should be ruined because no one would say a +word to warn him. Brooding over the fire, she felt a girl's pity for +the young man's ill-fortune. She forgot the last month, during which +she had spoken to him but once--and then he had seemed embarrassed and +anxious to be gone--and remembered only how frank and gay he had been +in the first blush of his hopes at Oxford, how pleasantly he had +smiled, how well and yet how quaintly his new dignity had sat upon +him, and how naively he had shaken it off at times and shown himself a +boy, with a boy's love of fun and mischief. Or, again, she remembered +how thoughtful he had been for them, how considerate, how much at home +in scenes new to them, with how lordly an air he had provided for +their comfort. Oh, it was a pity--a grievous pity, that his hopes +should end in such a disaster as Mr. Bonamy foretold! And all because +no one would say a friendly word to him! + +The next day (Tuesday) was a wet day--a sleety, blusterous winter day, +and she did not go out. But on the Wednesday, as the rector crossed +the churchyard after reading the Litany, he saw Miss Bonamy passing +his door. He fancied, with a little astonishment--for she had +constantly evinced the same avoidance of intimacy with him which had +at first piqued him--that she slightly checked her pace so as to meet +him. And, to tell the truth, the rector was half pleased and half +annoyed. He had hardened his heart and set his face to crush Mr. +Bonamy. + +He had in his pocket a letter from the lawyer, warning him that, +unless he altered his course, a writ would be served upon him. And a +dozen times to-day he had in his mind called the church warden hard +names. But yet he was not absolutely ill-pleased to see Miss Bonamy. +He felt a certain excitement in the _rencontre_ under the +circumstances. He would meet her magnanimously, and of course she +would ignore the quarrel. He hated Mr. Bonamy for a puritanical old +pettifogger; but that was no reason why he should be rude to his +daughter. + +Lindo saw, when he was a few paces from her and had raised his hat, +that her face expressed much more emotion, if not embarrassment, than +seemed to be called for by the occasion. And naturally this +communicated itself to him. "I have not seen you for a long time," he +said, as he shook hands. Perhaps the worst thing he could have said +under the circumstances. + +She assented, however. "No," she said, sloping her umbrella behind her +so as to keep off the wind and a half-frozen drizzle with which it was +laden. And, as she did this, her eyes met his gallantly. "But I am +glad, Mr. Lindo," she continued, "that I have met you to-day, because +I have something I want to say to you." + +On the instant he vowed within himself that it would be in bad taste, +in the worst taste, if she referred to the quarrel or to parish +matters. And he answered very frigidly. "What is that, Miss Bonamy?" +he said. "Pray speak on." + +She detected the change of tone, and for a second her gray eyes +flashed. But she had come to say something. She had counted the cost, +and nothing he could do should prevent her saying it. She had been +awake all night, torturing herself with imagining the things he would +think of her. But she was not to be deterred by the reality. "Do you +know, Mr. Lindo," she said steadily, "what is being said of you in the +town?" + +"A good many hard things." he answered half lightly and half bitterly. +"So I have reason to believe. But I do not think that they will affect +me one way or the other, Miss Bonamy." + +"And so," she answered, with spirit, "you will not thank any one for +telling you of them? That is what you mean, is it not?" + +He was very sore, and her interference annoyed him +excessively--possibly because he valued her good opinion. He would not +deny the feeling she imputed to him. "Possibly I do mean something of +that kind," he said. "Where ignorance is bliss--you know." + +"Yet there is one thing," she replied, "being said of you in the town, +which I think you should be told, Mr. Lindo. Your friends probably +will not hear it, or, if they do, they will not venture to tell you of +it." + +"Indeed," he answered. "You pique my curiosity." + +"It is being commonly said," she rejoined, looking down for the first +time, "that you have no right to the living, and were appointed by +some mistake, or--or fraud." + +He did not answer her at once. He was so completely taken by surprise +that he stood looking at her with his mouth open. His first and better +impulse was to laugh heartily. But what he did was to say in a very +quiet way, "Indeed. That is being said, is it? It is quite true I had +not heard it. May I ask, Miss Bonamy, if you had it from your father?" + +If his tone had been cold before, it was freezing now. But she was not +to be daunted, and she answered with considerable presence of mind, "I +heard from my father that that was the report in the town, but I also +heard him express his disbelief in the greater part of it." + +"I am much obliged to him," said the rector through his closed teeth. +"He did not think I had been guilty of fraud, then?" + +"No, he did not," Kate muttered, her voice faltering for the first +time. + +"Indeed. I am much obliged to him." + +He had received it even worse than she had expected. It was terrible +to go on in the face of such scorn and incredulity. But to stop there +was to have done only evil, as Kate knew, and she persevered. "I have +one more thing I wish to say, if you will permit me," she continued +steadying her voice and striving to speak in as indifferent a manner +as possible. + +He bowed, his face hard and contemptuous. + +The wind had shifted slightly, and, to protect herself from the small +rain which was falling, she changed her position, so as to face the +churchyard. He saw only her profile. If he looked proud, involuntarily +he remarked how proud she looked also--how pure and cold was the line +of her features, softened only by the roundness of her chin. "I am +told," she said in a low voice, "that the fewer enemies you make, and +the more quietly you proceed, the greater will be the chance of your +remaining when the mistake is found out. Pray," she said more sharply, +for he had raised his hand, as if to interrupt, "have patience for a +moment, Mr. Lindo. I shall not trouble you again. I only wish you to +know that those who have cause to dislike you--I do not mean my +father, there are others--are congratulating themselves that you are +playing into their hands, and consider that every disagreement between +you and any part of the parish is a weapon given them, to be used when +the crisis comes." + +"When the mistake is found out?" he said, grimly repeating her words. +"Or the fraud? But I forgot--Mr. Bonamy does not believe in that!" + +"You understand me, I think," she said, ignoring the latter part of +his speech. + +"And may I ask," he continued, his eyes on her face, "who my +ill-wishers are?" + +"I do not think that matters," she replied. + +"Then, at least, why am I indebted to you for this warning?" + +His tone as he asked the question was as contemptuous as before. And +yet Kate felt that this she must answer. To refuse to answer it, or to +evade it, would be to lay herself open to surmises of all kinds. + +"I thought it a pity that you should fall into a trap unwarned," she +answered, looking away at the yew-trees. "And it seemed to me that, +for several reasons, your friends were not likely to warn you." + +"There, I quite agree with you," he retorted quickly. "My friends +would not have believed in the trap." + +"Perhaps not," she said, outwardly unmoved. + +"I am astonished that you did; I am astonished that you should have +believed anything so absurd, Miss Bonamy!" he said severely. At that +moment, as it happened, two people came round the flank of the church. +The one was the curate; the other was Dr. Gregg. Kate looked at them, +and her face flamed. The rector looked, and felt only relief. They +would afford him an excuse to be gone. "Ah, there is Mr. Clode," he +said indifferently. "I was just looking for him. I think, if you will +excuse me, Miss Bonamy, I will seize the opportunity of speaking to +him now." And raising his hat, with a formality which one of the men +took to be a pretence and a sham, he left her and walked across to +them. + + + + + CHAPTER XIII. + + LAURA'S PROVISO. + + +When a mine has been laid, and the fuse lit, and the tiny thread of +smoke has begun to curl upward, it is apt to seem a long time--so I am +told by those who have stood and watched such things--before the earth +flies into the air. So it seemed to Stephen Clode. The curate looked +to see an explosion follow immediately upon the rector taking the +decisive step of turning out the sheep. But week after week elapsed, +until Christmas was some time gone, and nothing happened. Mr. Bonamy, +with a lawyer's prudence, wrote another letter, and for a time, +perhaps out of regard to the season, held his hand. There was talk of +Lord Dynmore's return, but no sign of it as yet. And Dr. Gregg snapped +and snarled among his intimates, but in public was pretty quiet. + +It was noticeable, however, that the rector was invited to none of the +whist-parties which were a feature of the town life at this season; +and to those who looked closely into things and listened to the gossip +of the place it was plain that the breach between him and the bulk of +his parishioners was growing wider. The rector was much with the +Hammonds, and carried his head high--higher than ever, one of his +parishioners thought since a talk she had had with him in the +churchyard. The habit of looking down upon a certain section of the +town, because they were not quite so refined as himself, because they +were narrow in their opinions, or because the Hammonds looked down +upon them, was growing upon him. And he yielded to it none the less +because he was all the time dissatisfied with himself. He was +conscious that he was not acting up to the standard he had set himself +on coming to the town. He was not living the life he had hoped to +live. He visited his poor and gave almost too largely in the hard +weather, and was diligent at services and sermon-writing. But there +was a flaw in his life, and he knew it; and yet he had not the +strength to set it right. + +All this Mr. Clode might have observed--he was sagacious enough; but +for the time his judgment was clouded by his jealousy, and in his +impatience he fancied that the rector's troubles were passing away. +Each visit Lindo paid to the Town House, each time his name was +coupled with Laura Hammond's, as people were beginning to couple it, +chafed the curate's sore afresh and kept it raw. So that even Stephen +Clode's self-restraint and command of temper began to fail him, and +more than once he said sharp things to his commanding-officer, which +made Lindo open his eyes in unaffected surprise. + +Clode began to feel indeed that the position was becoming intolerable; +and though he had long ago determined that the waiting-game was the +one he ought to play, he presently--in the first week of the new +year--changed his mind. + +Lindo had announced his intention of devoting the afternoon--it was +Wednesday--to his district; and, taking advantage of this, the curate +thought he might indulge himself in a call at the Town House without +fear of unpleasant interruption. He would not admit that he had any +other motive in going there than just to pay a visit--which he +certainly owed. But in truth he was in a dangerous humor. And, alas! +when he had been ushered along the thickly carpeted passage and +entered the drawing-room, there, comfortably seated in the half-light +before the fire, the tea-things gleaming beside them, were Laura and +the rector! + +The curate's face grew dark. He almost felt that Lindo, who had really +been driven in by the rain, had betrayed him; and he shook hands with +Laura and sat down in complete silence, unable to trust himself to +answer the rector's cheery greeting by so much as a word. It was all +he could do to answer "Thank you," when Miss Hammond asked him if he +would take tea. She, of course, saw that something was amiss, and felt +not a little awkward between her two friends; but luckily the rector +remained ignorant and at his ease--he saw nothing, and went on +talking. It was the best thing he could have done, only, +unfortunately, he had to do with a man whom nothing in his present +mood could please. + +"I am glad you have turned up at this particular moment," Lindo said. +"Let me have your opinion. Miss Hammond says that I am pauperizing the +town by giving too much away." + +"If you are half as generous at our bazaar on the 10th," she retorted, +"you will do twice as much good." + +"Or half as much evil!" he said lightly. + +"Have it that way, if you like," she answered laughing. + +The curate set his teeth together in impotent rage. They were so easy, +so unconstrained, on such excellent terms with one another. When +Laura, who was secretly quaking, held out the toast to him and let her +eyes dwell for an instant on his, he looked away stubbornly. "Were you +asking my opinion?" he said in a voice he vainly strove to render cold +and dispassionate. + +"To be sure," said the rector, stirring his tea and enjoying himself. +"Miss Hammond is not impartial. She is biassed by her bazaar." + +If he had known the strong passions that were at work on the other +side of the tea-table! But the curate had his back to the shaded lamp, +and only a fitful gleam of fire-light betrayed even to Laura's +suspicious eyes that he was not himself. Yet, when he spoke, Lindo +involuntarily started, so thinly veiled was the sneer in his tone. +"Well, there is one pensioner, I think, you would do well to strike +off your list," he said. "He does not do you much credit." + +"Who is that? Old Martin at the Gas House?" + +"No, the gentleman at the Bull and Staff!" replied the curate bluntly. + +"At the Bull and Staff? Who is that?" + +"Felton." + +For a moment the rector looked puzzled. He had almost forgotten +the name of Lord Dynmore's servant. Then he colored slightly. "Yes, I +know whom you mean," he said, taken aback as much by the other's +unlooked-for tone as by the mention of the man. "But I did not know he +lived at the Bull and Staff. It is not much of a place, is it?" + +"I should say that it was very nearly the worst house in the town!" +said the curate. + +"Indeed! I will speak to him about it." + +"I would speak to him about getting drunk, if I were you!" Clode +replied with a short laugh. "He is drunk six days in the week; every +day except Saturday, when he comes to you and pulls a long face above +a clean neck-cloth. He is the talk of the town!" + +The rector stared; naturally wondering what on earth had come to the +curate to induce him to take that line. He was rather surprised than +offended, however, and merely answered, "I am sorry to hear it. I will +speak to him about it." + +"Who is this person?" Miss Hammond asked hurriedly. "I do not think +that I know any one in the town of that name." The subject seemed to +be a dangerous one, but anything was better than to leave the curate +free to conduct the discussion. + +He it was, however, who answered her. "He is a _protege_ of the +rector's!" he said, with a laugh that was undisguisedly offensive. +"You had better ask him." + +"He is a servant of Lord Dynmore's," Lindo said, speaking to her with +studious politeness, and otherwise ignoring Clode's interruption. + +"But why you find him in board and lodging at the Bull and Staff free, +gratis, and for nothing," interposed the curate again with the same +rudeness, "passes my comprehension!" + +"Perhaps that is my business," said the rector, losing patience. + +Both men stood up. Laura rose, too, with a scared face, and stood +gazing at them, amazed at the storm which had so suddenly arisen. The +curate's height, as the two stood confronting one another, seemed to +give him the advantage; and his dark rugged face, kindling with +long-repressed feelings, wore the provoking smile of one who, +confident in his own powers, has wilfully thrown down the glove and is +determined to see the matter through. The rector's face, on the other +hand, was red; and, though he faced his man squarely and threw back +his head with the haughtiness of his kind, his anger was mixed with +wonder, and it was plain that he was at a loss to understand the +other's ebullition or to decide how to deal with it. There was a +moment's silence, which Laura had not the presence of mind, nor the +curate the will, to break. Then the rector said, "Perhaps we had +better let this drop for the moment, Mr. Clode." + +"As you will," replied the curate recklessly. + +"Well, I do will," Lindo rejoined, with some _hauteur_. And he looked, +still standing erect and expectant, as if he thought that Clode could +not do otherwise than take his leave. + +But that was just what the curate had not the slightest intention of +doing. Instead, with a cynical smile, he coolly sat himself down +again. His superior's eyes flashed with redoubled anger at this, which +seemed to him, after what had passed, the grossest impertinence; but +Mr. Clode in his present mood cared nothing for that, and made it very +plain that he did not. "Will you think me exacting if I ask for +another cup of tea, Miss Hammond?" he said quietly. + +That was enough to make the rector's cup run over. He did not wait to +hear Laura's answer, but himself said. "Perhaps I had better say good +evening, Miss Hammond." + +"You will not forget the bazaar?" she answered, making no demur, but +at once holding out her hand. + +There was a faint note of appeal in her voice which begged him not to +be angry, and yet he was angry. "The bazaar?" he said coldly. "Oh, +yes, I will not forget it." + +And with that he took up his hat and went, feeling much as a man does +who, walking along a well-known road, has put his foot into a hole and +fallen heavily. He was almost more astonished and aggrieved than hurt. + +When he was gone there was silence in the room. I do not know whether +Laura had been conscious, while the two men wrangled before her, that +she was the prize of the strife, and so, like the maidens of old, had +been content to stand by passive and expectant, satisfied to see the +best man win, or whether she had been too much alarmed to interpose. +But certain it is that, when she was left alone with the curate, she +felt almost as uncomfortable as she had ever felt in her life. She +tried to say something indifferent, but for once she was too nervous +to frame the words. And Mr. Clode, instead of assisting her, instead +of bridging over the awkwardness of the moment, as he should have +done, since he was the person to blame for it all, sat silent and +morose, brooding over the fire and sipping his tea. At last he spoke. +"Well," he said abruptly, turning his dark eyes suddenly on hers. +"Which is it to be, Laura?" + +He had never spoken to her in that tone before, and had any one told +her that morning that she would submit to it, she would have laughed +her informant to scorn. But there was a new-born masterfulness in the +curate's manner which cowed her. "I do not know what you mean," she +murmured, her face hot, her heart beating. + +"I think you do," he answered sternly, without removing his eyes from +her. "Is it to be the rector, or is it to be me, Laura? You must +choose between us." + +She recovered herself with a kind of gasp. "Are you not going a little +too fast?" she said, trying to smile, and speaking with something of +her ordinary manner. "I did not know that my choice was limited to the +two you mention, Mr. Clode, or that I had to choose one at all." + +"I think you must," was his only answer. "You must choose between us." +Then, with a sudden movement, he rose and stood over her. "Laura!" he +said in a different tone, in a low voice, which thrilled through her +and awoke feelings and emotions hitherto asleep. "Laura, do not play +with me! I am a man. Is he more? Is he as much? I love you with all my +being! He cares only to kill time with you! Will you throw me over +because he is a little richer, because I am the curate and he is the +rector? If so, well, tell me, and I shall understand you!" + +It was not the way she had thought he would end. The force, the +abruptness, the almost menace of the last four words took her by +surprise and subdued her afresh. If she had had any doubt before which +of the two men had her liking, she had none now. She knew that Clode's +little finger was more to her than Lindo's whole hand; for, like most +women, she had a secret admiration for force, even when exercised +without much regard to good taste. + +"You need not speak to me like that," she said, in gentle deprecation +of his manner. + +He stooped over her. "Laura," he said, "do you really mean it? Do you +mean you will----" + +"Wait, please!" she answered, recovering a little of her ascendency. +"Give me a little time. I want to think something out." + +But time to think was just what he feared--ignorant as yet of his true +position--to give her; and his face grew dark and sullen again. "No," +he said, "I will not!" + +She rose suddenly. "You will do as I ask you now," she said, asserting +herself bravely, "or I shall leave you." + +He bowed silently, and she sat down again. "Sit down, please," she +said to him. He obeyed her. "Now," she continued, raising her hand so +as to shade her eyes from the fire, "I will be candid with you, +Mr. Clode. If I had no other alternative than the one you have +mentioned--to choose between you and Mr. Lindo--I--I should certainly +prefer you. No!" she continued sharply, bidding him with her hand to +keep his seat, "hear me out, please. You have not stated the case +correctly. In the first place--well, you put me in the awkward +position of having to confess that Mr. Lindo has made no such proposal +as you seem to fancy; and, secondly, there are others in the world." + +"I do not care," the curate exclaimed, his deep voice trembling with +exultation--"I do not care though there be millions--now!" + +She moved her hand, and for a second her eyes, full of a tenderness +such as he had never seen in them before, met his. The look drew him +from his seat again, but she sent him back to it by an imperious +gesture. "I said I would be candid," she continued, "and I intend to +be so, though until a few minutes ago I never thought that I should +speak to you as I am doing." + +"You shall never repent it," he answered fondly. + +"I hope not," she rejoined. But then she paused and was silent. + +He sat waiting patiently for a while; but, as she still said nothing, +he rose. "Laura," he said. + +"Yes, I know," she answered, almost abruptly. "But candor does not +come very easily, sir, under certain circumstances. Don't you know you +have made me afraid of you?" + +He showed that he would have reassured her in the most convincing and +practical manner. But, notwithstanding her words, she had regained her +power and presence of mind, and she repelled him. + +"Wait until you have heard what I have got to say," she said. "It is +this. I would not marry Mr. Lindo because he is a rector with a living +and a position--not though he were six times a rector! But all the +same I will not marry a curate! No," she added in a lower tone, and +with a glance which intoxicated him afresh--"not though he be you!" + +He stood silent, looking down at her, waiting for more. Neither by +word nor gesture did he express dissent. It is possible he already +understood, and felt with her. + +"To marry a curate," she continued in a low voice, "is, for a girl +such as I am, failure. I have held my head rather high, and I have +stood by and seen other girls married. Therefore to marry a curate, +after all, would be an ignominious failure. Are you very angry with +me?" she continued quietly, "or do you understand?" + +"I think I understand," he answered, with just a tinge of bitterness +in his tone. + +"And despise me? Well, you must. I told you I was going to be candid, +and perhaps it is as well--as well, I mean, that you should know me," +she replied, apparently unmoved. + +"I am content," he answered, catching her spirit. + +"And so am I," she said. "To no one else in the world would I have +said as much as I have said to you. To no other man would I say, 'Win +a living, and I will be yours!' But I say it to you. Do as much as +that for me and I will marry you, Stephen. If you cannot, I cannot." + +"You are very prosaic," he replied, lapsing into bitterness again. + +"Oh, if you are not content" she retorted. + +He did not let her finish the sentence. "You will marry me on the day +I obtain a living?" he asked. + +"I will," she answered bravely. + +She was standing up now, and he too--standing where the rector had +stood an hour before. She let him pass his arm round her waist, but +when he would have drawn her closer to him, and bent his head to kiss +her, she hung back. "No," she said, blushing hotly, "I think"--with a +shy laugh--"that you are making too certain, sir." + +"Do you wish me _not_ to succeed?" he replied, looking down at her; +and it must be confessed the lover's _role_ became him better than +nine-tenths of those who knew his dark, rugged face would have +believed. + +She shook her head, smiling. + +"Then if you wish me success," he replied, "you must send me out with +some guerdon of your favor." And this time she did not resist. He drew +her to him and kissed her thrice. Then she escaped from him and took +refuge on the other side of the fireplace. + +"You must not do that again," she said, biting her lip and trying to +look at him reproachfully. "At any rate, you have had your guerdon +now. When you come back a victor I will crown you. But until then we +are friends only. You understand, sir?" + +And, though he demurred, he presently said he understood. + + + + + CHAPTER XIV. + + THE LETTERS IN THE CUPBOARD. + + +When Stephen Clode left the Town House after his interview with Laura, +he was in a state of exaltation--lifted completely out of his ordinary +cool and calculating self by what had happened. It was raining, but he +had gone some distance before he remarked it, and even then he did not +at once put up his umbrella, but strode along through the darkness, +his thoughts in a whirl of triumph and excitement. The crisis had come +suddenly, but he had not been found unequal to it. He had gone in +through the gates despondent, and come out in joy. He had pitted +himself against his rival, and had had the best of it. He had wooed, +and, almost in spite of his mistress, had won! + +He did not for the first few moments consider whether his altercation +with the rector was likely to have unpleasant consequences, nor did he +trouble himself about the manner in which he was to do Laura's +bidding. Such considerations would come later--with the reaction. For +the present they did not occur to him. It was enough that Laura might +be his--that she never could be the rector's. + +He felt the need, in his present excited mood, of some one to speak +to, and instead of turning into his own lodgings he passed on to the +reading-room, a large, barely furnished room, looking upon the top of +the town, and used as a club by the leading townsfolk and a few of the +local magnates who lived near. He entered it, and, to his surprise, +found the archdeacon seated under the naked gas-burners, interested in +the "Times." The sight filled him with astonishment, for it was seldom +the county members used the room after sunset. + +"Why, Mr. Archdeacon," he said--his tongue naturally hung loose at the +moment, and a _bonhomie_, difficult to assume at another time, came +easily to him now--"what in the world brings you here at this hour?" + +The archdeacon laid down his paper. "Upon my word I think I was +half asleep," he said. "I am in for the 'Free Foresters'' supper. I +thought the hour was half-past six, and came into town accordingly, +whereas I find it is half-past seven. I have been here the best part +of three-quarters of an hour killing time." + +"But I thought that the rector always said grace for the 'Free +Foresters,' the curate answered in some surprise. + +"It has been the custom for them to ask him," the archdeacon replied +cautiously. "By the way you did it last year, did you not?" + +"Yes, for Mr. Williams. He was confined to his room." + +"I thought so. Well, this year these foolish people seem to have taken +a fancy not to have the rector, and they came to me. I tried to +persuade them to have him, but it was no good. And so," the archdeacon +added, in a lower tone, "I thought it would look less like a slight if +I came than if any other clergyman--you, for instance--were the +clerical guest." + +"To be sure," said the curate warmly. "It was most thoughtful of you." + +The archdeacon hitched his chair a little nearer the fire. He felt the +influence of the curate's sympathy. The latter had said little, but +his manner warmed the old gentleman's heart, and his tongue also grew +more loose. "I wonder whether you know," he said genially, rubbing his +hands up and down his knees, which he was gently toasting, and looking +benevolently at his companion, "how near you were to having the +living, Clode?" + +"Do you mean Claversham?" replied the curate, experiencing a kind of +shock at this reference to the subject so near his heart. + +"Yes, of course." + +"I never thought I had a chance of it!" + +"You had so good a chance," responded the archdeacon, nodding his head +wisely, "that only one thing stood between you and it." + +"May I ask what that was?" the curate rejoined, his heart beating +fast. + +"A promise. The earl had promised his old friend that he should have +this living. Lord Dynmore told me so himself, the last time I saw him. +That would be nearly a year ago, when poor Williams was already +ailing." + +"Well, that I supposed to be the case," Clode answered, his tone one +of disappointment. "But I do not quite see how I was affected by +it--more, I mean, than others, archdeacon." + +"That is what I am going to tell you, only it must not go farther," +the archdeacon answered. "Lord Dynmore told me of this promise _a +propos_ of a resolution he had just come to--namely, that, subject to +it, he intended in future to give his livings (he has seven in all, +you know) to the curate, wherever the latter had been two years at +least in the parish, and stood well with it. I am not sure that I +agree with him; but he is a conscientious man, though an odd one, and +he had formed the opinion that that was the right course. So, come +now, if anything should happen to Lindo you would certainly drop into +it. I am not quite sure," added the archdeacon confidentially, "though +no one likes Lindo better than I do, that yours would not have been +the better appointment." + +The curate disclaimed this so warmly and loyally that the archdeacon +was more than ever pleased with him; and, half-past seven striking, +they parted at the door of the reading-room on the best of terms with +one another. The archdeacon crossed to his supper and speech, and the +curate turned into his rooms, and, throwing himself into the big +leather chair before the fire, fixed his eyes on the glowing coals, +and began to think--to apply what he had just heard to what he had +known before. + +A living? He had got to get a living. And without capital to invest in +one, or the favor of a patron, how was it to be done? The bishop? He +had no claim there. He had not been long enough in the diocese, and he +knew nothing of the bishop's wife. There was only one living he could +get, only one living upon which he had a claim, and that was +Claversham. It all came back to that--with this added, that he had now +a stronger motive than ever for ejecting Lindo from it, and the +absolute knowledge to boot that, Lindo ejected, he would be his +successor. + +Stephen Clode's face grew dark and gloomy as he reached this stage in +his reflections. He believed that the rector was enjoying what he had +no right to enjoy, but still he would fain have had no distinct part +in depriving him of it. He would have much preferred to stand by and, +save by a word here and there, by little acts scarcely palpable, and +quite incapable of proof--do nothing himself to injure him. He knew +what loyalty was, and would fain have been loyal in big things at +least. But he did not see how it could be done. He fancied that the +stir against the rector was dying away. Bonamy had not moved. Gregg +was a coward, and of this matter of the "Free Foresters" he thought +nothing. Probably they would return to their allegiance another year, +and among the poor the rector's liberality would soon make friends for +him. Altogether, the curate, getting up and walking the room +restlessly and with a knitted brow, was forced to the conviction that, +if he would be helped, he must help himself, and that now was the +time. The iron must be struck before it cooled. Something must be +done. + +But what? Clode's mind reverted first to the discharged servant, and +discussed more than one way in which he might be used. There was an +amount of danger, however, in tampering with him which the thinker's +astuteness did not fail to note, and which led him presently to +determine to leave Felton alone. Perhaps he had made as much capital +out of him as could be made with safety. + +From him the curate's thoughts passed naturally to the packet of +letters in the cupboard at the rectory, the letters which he had once +held in his hand, and which he could not but believe would prove the +rector's knowledge of the fraud he was committing. Those letters! +Clode, walking up and down the room, pishing and pshawing from time to +time, could not disentangle his thoughts from them. The narrow chance +which had prevented him reading them before somehow made him feel the +more certain of their value now--the more anxious to hold them again +in his hands. + +Were they still in the cupboard, he wondered. He had retained, not +with any purpose, but in pure inadvertence, the key which he had +mentioned to the rector; and he had it now. He took it from the +mantel-shelf, toyed with it, dropped it into his pocket. Then he took +up his hat, and was going abruptly from the room when the little +servant who waited on him met him. She was bringing up his simple +dinner. The curate's first impulse was to order it to be taken down +and kept warm for him. His second, to resume his seat and eat it +hastily. When he had finished--he could not have said an hour later +what he had had--he took his hat again and went out. + +Two minutes saw him at the rectory door, where he was just in time to +meet the rector going out. Lindo's face flushed as he saw who his +visitor was, and there was more than a suspicion of haughtiness in his +tone as he greeted him. "Good-evening," he said. "Do you want to see +me, Mr. Clode?" + +"If you please," the curate answered simply. "May I come in?" + +For answer, Lindo silently held the door open, and Clode passed +through the hall into the library. He was in the habit of entering +this room a dozen times a week, but he never did so after leaving his +own small lodgings without being struck by its handsome proportions, +by the grave harmonious color of its calf-lined walls, and the air of +studious quiet which always reigned within them. Of all the rector's +possessions he envied him this room the most. The very sight of the +shaded lamp standing on the revolving bookcase at the corner of the +hearth, and of the little table beside it, which still bore the +rector's coffee-cup and a tiny silver ewer and basin, aroused his +spleen afresh. But he gave no outward sign of this. He stood with his +hat in one hand, his other leaning on the table, and his head slightly +bent. "Rector," he said, "I am afraid I behaved very badly this +afternoon." + +"I certainly thought your manner rather odd," replied the rector +shortly. But he was half disarmed already. + +"I was annoyed, much annoyed, about a private matter," the curate +proceeded in an even, rather despondent tone. "It is a matter about +which I expect I shall presently have to take your opinion. But for +the present I am not at liberty to name it. However, I was in trouble, +and I foolishly wreaked my annoyance upon the first person I came +across." + +"That was, unfortunately, myself," said Lindo, smiling. + +"It would have been very unfortunate indeed for me, if you were as +some rectors I could name," the curate replied gravely, still with his +eyes cast down. "As it is--well, I think you will accept my apology." + +"Say no more about it," answered the rector hastily. There was nothing +he hated so much as a scene. "Have a cup of coffee, my dear fellow. I +will ring for a cup and saucer." And, before the curate could protest, +Lindo was at the bell and had rung it, his manner almost the manner of +a boy. + +"Sit down, sit down!" he continued. "Sarah, a cup and saucer, please." + +"But you were going out," protested the curate, as he complied. + +"Only to the post with some letters," the rector explained. "I will +send Sarah instead." + +Clode sprang up again, a peculiar flush on his dark cheek, and a glint +as of excitement in his eye. + +"No, no," he said, "I am putting you out. If you were going to the +post, pray go. You can leave me here and come back to me, if that be +all." + +The rector hesitated, his letters in his hand. He might send Sarah. +But it wanted a few minutes only of nine o'clock, and, besides, he did +not approve of the maids going out so late. "Well, I think I will do +as you say," he answered, feeling that compliance was perhaps the +truest politeness; "if you are sure that you do not mind." + +"I beg you will," the curate said warmly. + +The cup and saucer being at that moment brought in, the rector nodded +assent. "Very well; I shall not be two minutes," he said. "Take care +of yourself while I am away." + +The curate, left alone, muttered, "No, you will be at least four +minutes, my friend!" and waited, with his cup poised, until he heard +the outer door closed. Then he set it down. Assuring himself by a +steady look that the windows were shuttered, he rose and, quietly +crossing the room, as a man might who wished to examine a book, he +stood before the little cupboard among the shelves. Perhaps, because +he had done the thing before, he did not hesitate. His hand was as +steady as it had ever been. If it shook at all it was with eagerness. +His task was so easy and so devoid of danger, under the circumstances, +that he even smiled darkly, as he set the key in the lock, at the +thought of the more clumsy burglar whom he had detected there. He +turned the key and opened the door. Nothing could be more simple. The +packet he wanted lay just where he had looked to find it. He took it +out and dropped it into his breast-pocket, and, long before the time +which he had given himself was up, was back in his chair by the fire, +with his coffee-cup on his knee. + +He might have been expected to feel some surprise at his own coolness. +But, as a fact, his thoughts were otherwise employed. He was longing, +with intense eagerness, for the moment when he might take the next +step--when he might open the packet and secure the weapon he needed. +He fingered the letters as they lay in their hiding place, and could +scarcely refrain from taking them out and examining them there and +then. When Lindo returned, and broke into the room with a hearty +word about the haste he had made, the curate's answer betrayed no +self-consciousness. On the contrary, he rather underplayed his part, +his eye and voice being for, a moment so absent as to surprise his +host. The next instant he was aware of this, and conducted himself so +warily during the half-hour he remained that he entirely erased from +the rector's mind the unlucky impression of the afternoon. + +By half-past nine he was back in his own room, at his table, his +hat thrown this way, his umbrella that. It took him but a feverish +moment to turn up the lamp and settle himself in his chair. Then he +took out the packet of letters, and, untying the string which bound +them together, he opened the first--there were only six of them in +all. This was the one which he had partially read on the former +occasion--Messrs. Gearns & Baker's first letter. He read it through +now at his leisure, without interruption, once, twice, thrice, and +with a long breath laid it down again, and sat gazing, with knitted +brows, into the shadow beyond the lamp's influence. There was not a +word in it, not an expression, which helped him; nothing to show the +recipient that he was not the Reginald Lindo for whom the living was +intended. + +The curate sat awhile before he opened the second, and that one he +read more quickly. He dealt in the same way with the next, and the +next. When, in a short minute or two, he had read them all and they +lay in a disordered pile before him--some folded and some unfolded, +just as they had dropped from his hands--he leaned back in his chair, +and, folding his arms, sat frowning darkly into vacancy. There was not +a word to help him in any one of them, not a sentence which even +tended to convict the rector. He had been at all his pains for +nothing. He had---- + +The sound of a raised voice asking for him below, and the hasty tread +of a foot mounting the stairs two at a time, roused him with a start +from the dream of disappointment. In a second he was erect, +motionless, and listening, his hand upon and half covering the +letters. A hasty knock on the outside of his door, and the touch of +fingers on the handle, seemed at the last moment to nerve him to +action. It was all but too late. As the rector came hurriedly into the +room, the curate, his face pallid, and the drops of perspiration +standing on his brow, swept the letters aside and drew a newspaper +partly over them. "What--what is it?" he muttered, stooping forward, +his hands on the table. + +The rector was too full of the news he had brought to observe the +other's agitation, the more as the lamp was between them, and his eyes +were dazzled by the light. "Why, what do you think Bonamy has done?" +he answered excitedly, as he closed the door behind him. He was +breathing quickly with the haste he had made, and, uninvited, he +dropped into a chair. + +"What?" said the curate hoarsely. He dared not look down at the table +lest he should direct the other's eyes to what lay there, but he was +racked as he stood there with the fear that some damning corner of the +paper, some scrap of the writing, should still be visible. The shame +of possible discovery poured like a flood over his soul. "What is it?" +he repeated mechanically. He had not yet recovered enough presence of +mind to wonder why the rector should have paid this untimely call. + +"He has served me with a writ!" Lindo replied, his face hot with haste +and indignation, his lips curling. "At this hour of the night, too! A +writ for trespass in driving out the sheep from the churchyard." + +"A writ!" the curate echoed. "It is very late for serving writs." + +"Yes. His clerk, who handed it to me--he came five minutes after you +left--apologized, and took the blame for that on himself, saying he +had forgotten to deliver it on leaving the office." + +"For trespass!" said the curate stupidly. What a fool he had been to +meddle with those letters! Why had he not had a little patience? Here, +after all, was the catastrophe for which he had been longing. + +"Yes, in the Queen's Bench Division, and all the rest of it!" replied +the rector; and then he waited to hear what the curate had to say. + +But Clode had nothing to say, except "What shall you do?" + +"Fight!" replied Lindo briskly, getting up and approaching the table. +"That of course. And it was about that I came to you. I do not think +there is any lawyer here I should like to employ. Did not you tell me +the other day who the archdeacon's were? Some people in Birmingham, I +think?" + +"I think I did," the curate answered. He had overcome his first fear, +and, as he spoke, looked down at the table, on which he was still +leaning. His hasty movement had disordered his own papers, but none of +the tell-tale letters were visible so far as he could see. But what if +the rector took up the newspaper? Or casually put it aside? The curate +grew hot again, despite his great self-control. He felt himself on the +edge of a precipice down which he dared not cast his eye. + +"Well, can you give me their address?" the rector continued. + +"Certainly!" the curate answered. Indeed he leapt at the suggestion, +for it seemed to offer some chance of escape--at least a way by which +he might rid himself of his visitor. + +"Just write it down, that is a good fellow, then," said the rector, +unconscious of what was passing in his mind. + +The curate said he would, and tore off at random---the rector was +leaning his hand on the newspaper, and might at any moment be taken +with a fancy to raise it--the back sheet of the first stray note that +came to his fingers, and wrote the address upon it. "There, that is +it," he said; and as he gave it to Lindo--he had written it standing +up and stooping--he almost pushed him away from the table. "That will +serve you, I think. They may be trusted, I am told. The best you can +do, I am sure, will be to place the matter in their hands at once." + +"I will write before I sleep!" the younger clergyman answered heartily. +"You cannot think how the narrowness of these people provokes me! But +I will not keep you now. I see you are busy. Come round early in the +morning, will you, and talk it over?" + +"I will come the moment I have had breakfast," the curate answered, +making no attempt to detain his visitor. + +The rector thereupon going, he stood eyeing the newspaper askance +until the other's footsteps died away on the pavement outside. Then he +swept it off and stood contemplating the half-dozen letters with +abhorrence. He loathed and detested them. They had suddenly become to +him such an incubus as his victim's body becomes to the murderer. The +desire which had tempted him to the crime was gone, and he felt them +only as a burden. They were the visible proof of his shame. To keep +them was to become a thief, and yet he shrank with a nervous terror +quite new and strange to him from the task of returning them--of going +to the study at the rectory and putting them back in the cupboard. It +had been easy to get possession of them; but to return them seemed a +task so thankless, and withal so perilous, that he quailed before it. +With shaking hands he bundled them together and locked them in the +lowest drawer of his writing table. He would return them to-morrow. + + + + + CHAPTER XV. + + THE BAZAAR. + + +Long before noon on the next day the service of the writ at the +rectory was pretty well known in the town, and the course which the +churchwardens had taken was freely canvassed in more houses than one. +But they had on their side all the advantages of prescription, while +of the rector people said that there was no smoke without fire, and +that he would not have become the subject of so many comments and +strictures, and the centre of more than one dispute, without being in +fault. There had been none of these squabbles in old Mr. Williams's +time, they said. Tongues had not wagged about him. But then, they +added, he had not aspired to drive tandem with the Homfrays! The town +had been good enough for him. He had not wanted to have everything his +own way, or thought himself a little Jupiter in the place. His head +had not been turned by a little authority conferred too early, and +conferred, if all the town heard was true, in some very odd and +unsatisfactory manner. + +To know that all round you people are saying that your conceit has led +you into trouble is not pleasant. And in one way and another this +impression was brought home to the young rector more than once during +these days, so that his cheek flamed as he passed the window of the +reading-room, or caught the half-restrained sniggle in which Gregg +ventured to indulge when in company. Nor were these annoyances all +Lindo had to bear. The archdeacon scolded him roundly for placing the +matter in the hands of the lawyers without consulting him. Mrs. +Hammond looked grave. Laura seemed less friendly than a while back. +Clode's conduct was odd, too, and unsatisfactory. He was sometimes +enthusiastic and loyal enough, ready to back up his superior as warmly +as could be wished, and anon he would show himself the reverse of all +this--sullen, repellent, and absolutely unsympathetic. + +So that the rector was not having a very sunny time, albeit the heat +of conflict kept him warm; and he threw back his head and set his fair +pleasant face very hard as he strode about the town, his long-tailed +black coat flapping behind him. He hugged himself more than ever on +the one thing which his opponents could not take from him. When all +was said and done, he must still be rector of Claversham. If his +promotion had not brought him as much happiness as he had expected, if +he had not been able to do in his new position all he had hoped, the +promotion and the position were yet undeniable. Knowing so well all +the circumstances of his appointment, he never gave two thoughts to +the curious story Kate Bonamy had told him. He was sorry that he had +treated her so cavalierly, and more than once he had thought with a +regret almost tender of the girl and the interview. But, for the rest, +he treated it as the ignorant invention of the enemy. Possibly on the +strength of certain 'Varsity prejudices he was a little too prone to +exaggerate the ignorance of Claversham. + +On the day before the bazaar a visitor arrived in Claversham, in the +shape of a small, dark, sharp-featured man, with a peculiarly alert +manner, whom the reader will remember to have met in the Temple. Jack +Smith, for he it was--we parted from him last at Euston Station--may +have come over on his own motion, or acting upon a hint from Mr. +Bonamy, who, since the refusal of Gregg's offer, had thought more and +more of the future which lay before his girls. The house had seemed +more and more dull, not to him as himself, but to him considering it +in the night-watches through their eyes. Hitherto the lawyer had not +encouraged the young Londoner's visits, perhaps because he dreaded the +change in his way of life he might be forced to make. But now, whether +he had given him a hint to come or not, he received him with undoubted +cordiality. + +Almost the first question Jack asked, Daintry hanging over the back of +his chair and Kate smiling in more subdued radiance opposite him, was +about his friend, the rector. Fortunately, Mr. Bonamy was not in the +room. "And how about Lindo?" he asked. "Have you seen much of him, +Kate?" + +"No, we have not seen much of him," she answered, getting up to put +something straight which was not much awry before. + +"Father has served him with a writ, though," Daintry explained, +nodding her head seriously. + +Jack whistled. "A writ!" he exclaimed. "What about?" + +"About the sheep in the churchyard. Mr. Lindo turned them out," Kate +explained hurriedly, as if she wished to hear no more upon the +subject. + +But Jack was curious; and gradually he drew from them the story of the +rector's iniquities, and acquired, in the course of it, a pretty +correct notion of the state of things in the parish. He whistled still +more seriously then. "It seems to me that the old man has been putting +his foot in it here," he said. + +"He has," Daintry answered solemnly, nodding any number of times. "No +end!" + +"And yet he is the very best of fellows," Jack replied, rubbing his +short black hair in honest vexation. "Don't you like him?" + +"I did," said Daintry, speaking for both of them. + +"And you do not now?" + +The child reddened, and rubbed herself shyly against Kate's chair. +"Well, not so much!" she murmured, Jack's eyes upon her. "He is too +big a swell for us." + +"Oh, that is it, is it?" Jack said contemptuously. + +He pressed it no farther, and appeared to have forgotten the subject; +but presently, when he was alone with Kate, he recurred to it. "So, +Lindo has been putting on airs, has he?" he observed. "Yet, I thought +when Daintry wrote to me, after you left us, that she seemed to like +him." + +"He was very kind and pleasant to us on our journey," Kate answered, +compelling herself to speak with indifference. "But--well, you know, +my father and he have not got on well; so, of course, we have seen +little of him lately." + +"Oh, that is all, is it?" Jack answered, moving restlessly in his +chair. + +"That is all," said Kate quietly. + +This seemed to satisfy Jack, for at tea he surprised her--and, for +Daintry, she fairly leapt in her seat--by calmly announcing that he +proposed to call on the rector in the course of the evening. "You have +no objection, sir, I hope," he said, coolly looking across at his +host. "He has been a friend of mine for years, and though I hear you +and he are at odds at present, it seems to me that that need not make +mischief between us." + +"N--no," said Mr. Bonamy slowly. "I do not see why it should." +Nevertheless, he was greatly astonished. He had heard that Jack and +Mr. Lindo were acquainted, but had thought nothing of it. It is +possible that the discovery of this friendship existing between the +two led him to take new views of the rector. He continued, "I dare say +in private he is not an objectionable man." + +"Quite the reverse, I should say!" Jack answered stoutly. + +"You have known him well?" + +"Very well." + +"Umph! Then it seems to me it was a pity he did not confine himself to +private life," ejaculated the lawyer, with some scorn. "As a rector I +do not like him." + +"I am sorry for that," Jack answered cheerfully. "But I have not known +much of him as a rector, though indeed, as it happened, he brought the +offer of the living straight to me, and I was the first person who +congratulated him on his promotion." + +Mr. Bonamy lifted his eyes slowly from the teacup he was raising to +his lips, and looked fixedly at his visitor, an expression much +resembling strong curiosity in his face. If a question was on the tip +of his tongue he refrained from putting it, however, and Jack, who by +no means wished to hear the tale of his friend's shortcomings +repeated, said no more until they rose from the table. Then he +remarked, "Lindo dines late, I expect." + +He put the question to Kate, but the lawyer answered it. "Oh, yes, he +does everything which is fashionable," he answered drily. And Jack, +putting this and that together, began to see still more clearly how +the land lay, and on what shoals his friend had wrecked his +popularity. + +About half-past eight he went to the rectory, but found that Lindo was +not at home. The door was opened to him, however, by Mrs. Baker, who +had often seen the barrister in the East India Dock Road, and knew him +well; and she pressed him to walk in and wait. "He dined at home, +sir," she explained. "I think he has only slipped out for a few +minutes." + +He followed her accordingly across the panelled hall to the study, +where for a moment a whimsical smile played upon his face as he viewed +its spacious comfort. The curtains were drawn, the fire was burning +redly, and the lamp was turned half down. The housekeeper made as if +she would have turned it up, but he prevented her. "I like it as it +is," he said genially. "This is better than No. 383, Mrs. Baker?" + +"Well, sir," she answered, looking round with an air of modest +proprietorship, "it is a bit more like." + +"What would you have, Mrs. Baker?" he asked, laughing. "The bishop's +palace?" + +"We may come to that in time, sir," she answered, folding her arms +demurely. "But I do not know that I would wish it! He has a peck of +troubles now, and there would be more in a palace, I doubt." + +"I agree with you," Jack replied, laughing. "Troubles come thick about +an apron, Mrs. Baker." + +"Ay, the men see to that!" retorted the good lady, getting the last +word and going away delighted. + +Left alone, Jack lay back in an arm-chair, and, nursing his hat, +wondered what Mrs. Baker would say when she discovered his connection +with the Bonamys. He had not been seated in this posture two minutes +before he heard the door of the house open and shut, and a man's tread +cross the hall. The next moment the study door opened, and a tall man +appeared at it, and stood holding it and looking into the room. The +hall lamp was behind the newcomer, and Jack, seeing that he was not +the rector, sat still. + +The stranger, satisfied apparently that the room was empty, stepped in +and closed the door behind him; and, rapidly crossing the floor, stood +before one of the bookcases. He took something--a key Jack judged by +what followed--from his pocket, and with it he swiftly threw open a +cupboard among the books. + +There was nothing remarkable in the action; but the stranger's manner +was hurried and nervous, and the looker-on leaned forward, curious to +learn what he was about. He expected to see him take something from +the cupboard. Instead, the man appeared to put something in. What it +was, however, Jack could not discern, for, leaning forward too far in +his anxiety to do so, he upset his hat with some noise on to the +floor. + +The man turned on the instant as if he had been subjected to a +galvanic shock, and stood gazing in the direction of the sound. Jack +heard him draw in his breath with the sharp sound of sudden fear, and +even by that light could see that his face was drawn and white. The +barrister rose quietly in the gloom, the stranger at sight of him +leaning back against the book-case as if his legs refused to support +him. Yet he was the first to speak. "Who is there?" he said, almost in +a whisper. + +"A visitor," Jack answered simply. "I have been waiting to see Mr. +Lindo." + +The curate--for he it was--drew a long breath, apparently of relief, +and in reality of such heartfelt thankfulness as he had never known +before. "What a start you gave me!" he murmured, his voice as yet +scarcely under his control. "I am Mr. Clode, Mr. Lindo's curate. I was +putting up some parish papers, and thought the room was empty." + +"So I saw," Jack answered drily. "I am afraid your nerves are a little +out of order." The curate muttered something which was inaudible, and, +raising his hand to the book-case, locked the cupboard door and put +the key in his pocket. Then he went to the lamp and turned it up. At +the same moment Jack, recovering his hat, advanced into the circle of +light, and the two men looked at one another. "I am afraid if you wish +to see the rector you will be disappointed," the curate said, with +something of hauteur in his voice, assumed to hide his mistrust. "He +was to spend the evening at Mrs. Hammond's. I doubt if he will be back +before midnight." + +"Then I must call another time," said Jack practically. + +"If I see him first, can I tell him anything for you?" the curate +persisted. Who was this man? Could he be a detective? he was +wondering. + +But Jack was so far from being a detective that he had already +dismissed the suspicions he had at first entertained. "I think not, +thank you," he answered; "I will call again." + +"Can I give him any name?" Clode asked in despair. + +"Well, you might say Jack Smith called," the barrister answered, "if +you will be so kind." + +They parted at the door, and Clode went back into the house, where he +speedily learned all that Mrs. Baker knew of Mr. Smith. It dispelled +his first fear. The man was not a detective; still it sent him home +gloomy and ill at ease. What if so intimate a friend of the rector's +as this Smith seemed to be should tell him of his curate's visit to +the cupboard and the excuse which on the spur of the moment he had +invented? It might go ill with him then. What explanation could he +give? He tried to consider such a mishap impossible, or at all events +unlikely; but not with complete success. More than ever he wished that +he had not interfered with the letters. + +To return to Jack. Such mild festivities as the bazaar were not +uncommon in Claversham, but the Bonamy household at any rate had not +been wont to look forward to them with anything approaching +exhilaration. It is wonderful how some children growing up in any kind +of social shadow learn the fact; and Daintry Bonamy, scarcely less +than her sister, had come to regard the annual flower-show, the school +sports, and the regatta with distaste and repugnance, as occasions of +little pleasure and much humiliation. It was Mr. Bonamy's will, +however, that they should attend, though he never went himself; and +times innumerable they had done so, outwardly in pretty dresses and +becoming hats, inwardly in sack-cloth and ashes. + +Jack's presence changed all this, and for once the girls went up to +dress quite gaily. If Kate reflected that Jack's intimacy with the +rector would be likely to bring them also into contact with him, she +said nothing; and from Jack--for the present at least--it was +mercifully hidden that, with all his kindness, his unfailing +good-humor, his wit, his devotion to her, his chief attraction in the +girl's eyes lay in the fact that he was another man's friend. + +When they entered the Assembly Room it was already well filled, the +main concourse being about the two stalls at the end of the room over +which the archdeacon's wife and Mrs. Hammond respectively ruled. Here +the great people were mainly to be seen; and an acute observer would +soon have discovered that between those who habitually hung about this +end and those who surrounded the four lower stalls there was a great +gulf fixed. Those on the one side of this examined the dresses of +those on the other with indulgent interest, and, for the most part, +through double eyeglasses; while those on the other hand either +returned the compliment and made careful notes, or looked about +deferentially for a glance of recognition. The man who should have +bridged that gulf, who should have been equally at home with Mrs. +Archdeacon and the hotel-keeper's wife, was the rector. But as the +rector had entered, the unlucky word "writ" had caught his ears, and +he was in his most unpleasant humor. He felt that the whole room was +talking of him--the majority with a narrow dislike, a few with +sympathy. Was it unnatural that, forgetting his situation, he should +throw in his lot with his friends, who were ever so much the +pleasanter, the wittier, the more amusing, and present a smiling front +of defiance to his opponents or those whom he thought to be such? At +any rate, that was what he was doing, and no one could remark the +carriage of his head or the direction of his eyes without feeling that +there was something in the town complaint that the new clergyman was +above his work. + +Jack and his party did not at once come across him. They found enough +to amuse them at the lower end of the room--the more as to the +barrister the great and little with whom he rubbed shoulders were all +one. Strange to say, he did not discern any great difference even in +their dress! With Daintry hanging on his arm and Kate at his side he +was content, until, turning suddenly in the thick of the crowd to +speak to the elder girl, he saw her face turn crimson. At the same +moment she bowed slightly to some one behind him. He looked round +quickly, with a sharp jealous pang at his heart, to see who had called +forth this show of emotion, and found himself face to face with the +rector. + +Lindo had looked forward to this meeting; he had prepared himself +for it; and yet, occurring in this way, it shook him out of his +self-possession. He colored almost as deeply as the girl had, and, +though he held out his hand with scarcely a perceptible pause, the +action was nervous and jerky. "By Jove! is it you, Jack?" he +exclaimed, his tone a mixture of old cordiality and new antagonism. +"How do you do, Miss Bonamy?" and he held out his hand to the girl +also, who just touched it with her fingers and drew back. "It is +pleasant to see your cousin's face again," he went on more glibly, yet +clearly not at his ease even now. "I was sorry that I was not in last +night when he called." + +"Yes, I was sorry to miss you," Jack answered slowly, his eyes on his +friend's face. He could not quite understand matters. The girl's +embarrassment had been almost a revelation to him, and yet it flashed +across his mind now that the cause of it might have been only the +quarrel between her father and the rector. The same thing might +account for Lindo's shy, ungenial manner. And yet--and yet he could +not quite understand it, and, whether he would or no, his face grew +hard. "You heard I had looked in?" he added. + +"Yes; Mrs. Baker told me," Lindo answered, moving to let some one pass +him, and glancing aside to smile a recognition. + +"She looks the better for the change, I think." + +"Yes; she gets more fresh air now." + +"It does not seem to have done you much good." + +"No?" + +Certainly there was something amiss. These were old, tried college +friends, or had been so a few weeks back, and they had nothing more to +say to one another than this! The rector's self-consciousness began to +infect the other, sowing in his mind he knew not what suspicions. So +that, if ever words of Daintry's were welcome, they were welcome now. +"Jack is going to stay a week," she said inconsequently, standing on +one leg the while with her arm through Jack's and her big eyes on the +rector's face. + +"I am very glad to hear it," Lindo rejoined. "He will find me at home +more than once in the week, I hope." + +"I will come and try," said Jack. + +"Of course you will!" replied the rector, with a flash of his old +manner. "I shall be glad if you will remind him of his promise, Miss +Bonamy." + +Kate murmured that she would. + +"You like your house?" said Jack. + +"Oh, very much--very much indeed." + +"It is an improvement on No. 383?" continued the barrister, rather +drily. + +"It is--very much so!" + +The words were natural. They were the words Jack would have expected. +But, unfortunately, Gregg at that moment passed the rector's elbow, +and the latter's manner was cold and shy--almost as if he resented the +reference to his old life. Jack thought he did, and his lip curled. +Fortunately, Daintry again intervened. "Here is Miss Hammond," she +said. "She is looking for you, Mr. Lindo." + +The rector turned as Laura, threading her way through the press, came +smiling toward him. She glanced with some curiosity at Jack, and then +nodded graciously to Kate, whom she knew at the Sunday school and from +meeting her on such occasions as this. "How do you do, Miss Bonamy?" +she said pleasantly. "Will you pardon me carrying off the rector? We +want him to come to tea." + +Kate bowed, and the rector took off his hat to the girls. Then he +waved an awkward farewell toward Jack, muttered "See you soon!" and +went off with his captor. + +And that was all! Jack turned away with his cousins to the nearest +stall, and bought and chatted. But he did both at random. His thoughts +were elsewhere. He was a keen observer, and he had seen too much for +comfort, yet not enough for comprehension. Nor did the occasional +glance which he shot at Kate's preoccupied face, as she bent over the +wool-work and "guaranteed hand-paintings," tend to clear up his doubts +or render his mood more cheerful. + +Meanwhile the rector's frame of mind, as he rejoined his party, was +not a whit more enviable. He was angry with himself, angry with his +friend. The sight of Jack standing by Kate's side had made his own +conduct to the girl at his last interview with her appear in a worse +light than before--more churlish, more ungrateful. He wished now--but +morosely, not with any tenderness of regret--that he had sought some +opportunity of saying a word of apology to her. And then Jack? He +fancied he saw condemnation written on Jack's face, and that he too, +to whom, in the old days, he had confided his aspirations and +resolves, was on the enemy's side--was blaming him for being on bad +terms with his church wardens and for having already come to blows +with half the parish. + +It was not pleasant. But the more unpleasant things he had to +face, the higher he would hold his head. He disengaged himself +presently--the Hammonds had already preceded him--from the throng and +bustle of the heated room, and went down the stairs alone. Outside it +was already dark, and small rain was falling. The outlook was +wretched, and yet in his present mood he found a tiny satisfaction in +the respect with which the crowd of ragamuffins about the door fell +back to give him passage. With it all, he was some one. He was rector +of the town. + +At the Hammond's door he found a carriage waiting in the rain. It was +not one he knew, and as he laid down his umbrella he asked the servant +whose it was. + +"It is Lord Dynmore's, sir," the man answered, in his low trained +voice. "His lordship is in the drawing-room, sir." + + + + + CHAPTER XVI. + + "LORD DYNMORE IS HERE." + + +When Lord Dynmore, a few minutes before the rector found his carriage +at the door, trotted at the heels of the servant into Mrs. Hammond's +drawing-room, his entrance, unexpected as it was, caused a flutter +among those assembled there. Lords are still lords in the country, and +in the case of his hostess the sensation was wholly one of pleasure. +She was pleased to see him. She was still more pleased that he had +chosen to call at so opportune a moment, when his light would not be +hidden, and James had on his best waistcoat. Consequently she rose to +meet him with a beaming smile, and a cordiality only chastened by the +knowledge that Mrs. Homfray and the archdeacon's wife were observing +her with critical jealousy. "Why, Lord Dynmore," she exclaimed, "this +is most kind of you!" + +"How d'ye do? how d'ye do?" said the peer as he advanced. He was a +slight, short man with bushy gray whiskers and grizzled hair which, +being rather long, strayed over the fur collar of his overcoat. A +noble aquiline nose and keen eyes helped to give him, despite his +shortness, an air of being somebody. "How d'ye do? Why," he continued, +locking round, "you are quite _en fete_ here." + +"We have been at a bazaar, Lord Dynmore," Laura answered. She was +rather a favorite with him and could "say things." "I think you ought +to have been there too, to patronize it. We did not know that you were +in the country, but we sent you a card." + +"Never heard a word of it!" replied his lordship positively. + +"But you must have had the card," Laura persisted. + +"Never heard a word of it!" repeated his lordship, who had by this +time shaken hands with everyone in the room. When the company was not +too large he made a rule of doing this, thereby obviating the ill +results of a bad memory, and earning considerable popularity. +"Archdeacon, you are looking very well," he continued. + +"I think I may say the same of you," answered the clerical dignitary. +"You have had good sport?" + +"Capital! capital!" replied the peer in his jerky way. "But it won't +last my time! In two years there will not be a head of buffalo in the +States! By the way, I saw your nephew." + +"My nephew!" echoed the archdeacon. + +"Yes. Had him up to dinner in Kansas city. A good fellow--a very good +fellow. He put me up to one or two things worth knowing." + +"But, Lord Dynmore, you must be thinking of some one else!" replied +the archdeacon in a fretful tone. "It could not be my nephew: I have +not a nephew out there." + +"No?" replied the earl. "Then it must have been the dean's. Or perhaps +it was old Canon Frampton's--I am not sure now. But he was a good +fellow, an excellent fellow!" And my lord looked round and wagged his +head knowingly. + +The archdeacon's niece, a young lady who had not seen the peer before, +nor indeed any peers, and who consequently was busy making a study of +him, looked astonished. Not so the others who knew him and his ways. +It was popularly believed that Lord Dynmore could keep two things, and +two only, in his mind--the head of game he had killed in each and +every year since he first carried a gun, and the amount of his annual +income from the time of the property coming to him. + +"There have been changes in the parish since you were here last," said +Mrs. Hammond, deftly intervening. She saw that the archdeacon looked a +little put out. "Poor Mr. Williams is gone." + +"Ah! to be sure! to be sure!" replied the earl. "Poor old chap. He was +a friend of my fathers', and now you have a friend of mine in his +place. From generation to generation, you know. I remember now," he +continued, tugging at his whiskers peevishly, "that I meant to see +Lindo before I called here. I must look him up by-and-by." + +"I hope he will save you the trouble," Mrs. Hammond answered. "I am +expecting him every minute." + +"Capital! capital! He is a good fellow now, isn't he? A really good +fellow! I am sure you ought to be much obliged to me for sending you +such a cheery soul, Mrs. Hammond. And he is not so very old," the earl +added waggishly. "Not too old, you know, Miss Hammond. Young for his +years, at any rate." + +Laura laughed and colored a little--what would offend in a commoner is +in a peer pure drollery; and, as it happened, at this moment the +rector came in. The news of the earl's presence had kindled a spark of +elation in his eye. He had not waited for the servant to announce him; +and as he stood a second at the door, closing it, he confronted the +company with an air of modest dignity which more than one remarked. +His glance rested momentarily upon the figure of the earl, who was the +only stranger in the room, so that he had no difficulty in identifying +him; and he seemed in two minds whether he should address him. On +second thoughts he laid aside the intention, and advanced to Mrs. +Hammond. "I am afraid I scarcely deserve any tea," he said pleasantly, +"I am so late." + +Laura, who had risen, touched his arm. "Lord Dynmore is here," she +said in a low voice, which was nevertheless distinctly heard by all. +"I do not think you have seen him." + +He took it as an informal introduction, and turned to Lord Dynmore, +who was leaning against the fireplace, toying with his teacup and +talking to Mrs. Homfray. The young rector advanced a step and held out +his hand, a slight flush on his cheek. "There is no one whom I ought +to be better pleased to see than yourself, Lord Dynmore," he said with +some feeling. "I have been looking forward for some time to this +meeting." + +"Ah, to be sure," replied the peer, holding out his hand readily, +though he was somewhat mystified by the other's earnestness. "I am +pleased to meet you, I am sure. Greatly pleased." + +The listeners, who had heard what he had just said about his great +friend, the rector, stared. Only the person to whom the words were +addressed saw nothing odd in them. "You have not long returned to +England, I think?" he answered. + +"No; came back last Saturday night. And how is the rector? Where is +he? Why does he not show up? I understood Mrs. Hammond to say he was +coming." + +The archdeacon, Mrs. Hammond, and the others were dumb with +astonishment. Even Lindo was surprised, thinking it very dull in the +earl not to guess at once that he was the new incumbent. So no one +answered, and the peer, glancing sharply round, discerned that every +one was at a loss. "Eh! Oh, I see," he resumed in a different tone. +"You are not one of his curates? I made a mistake, I suppose. Took you +for one of his curates, do you see? That was all. Beg your pardon. Beg +your pardon, I am sure. But where is he?" + +"This _is_ the rector, Lord Dynmore," said the archdeacon in an +uncertain, puzzled way. + +"No, no, no, no," replied the great man fretfully. "I mean the old +rector--my old friend." + +"He has forgotten that poor Mr. Williams is dead," Laura murmured to +her mother, amid the general pause of astonishment. + +He overheard her. "Nothing of the kind, young lady!" he answered +irritably. "Nothing of the kind. Bless my soul, do you think I do not +know whom I present to my own livings? My memory is not so bad as +that! I thought this gentleman was Lindo's curate, that was all. That +was all." + +They stared at one another in awkward silence. The rector was the +first to speak. "I am afraid we are somehow at cross purposes still, +Lord Dynmore," he stammered, his manner constrained. "I am not my own +curate--well, because I am myself Reginald Lindo, whom you were kind +enough to present to this living." + +"To Claversham, do you mean?" + +"Yes." + +"And do you say you are Reginald Lindo?" The peer grew very red in the +face as he put this question. + +"Yes, certainly I am." + +"Then, sir, I say that certainly you are not!" was the rapid and +startling answer. "Certainly you are not! You are no more Reginald +Lindo than I am!" the peer repeated, striking his hand upon the table +by his side. "What do you mean by saying that you are, eh? What do you +mean by it?" + +"Lord Dynmore----" + +But the peer would not listen. "Who are you, sir? Answer me that +question first!" he cried. He was a choleric man, and he saw already +that there was something seriously amiss; so that the shocked, +astonished faces round him tended rather to increase than lessen his +wrath. "Answer me that!" + +"I think, Lord Dynmore, that you must be mad," replied the rector, his +lips quivering. "I am as certainly Reginald Lindo as you are Lord +Dynmore!" + +"But what are you doing here?" retorted the other, storming down the +interruption which the archdeacon would have effected. "That is what I +want to know. Who made you rector of Claversham?" + +"The bishop, my lord," answered the young man sternly. + +"Ay, but on whose presentation?" + +"On yours." + +"On mine?" + +"Most assuredly," replied the clergyman doggedly--"as the archdeacon +here, who indicted me, can bear witness." + +"It is false!" Lord Dynmore almost screamed. He turned to the +panic-stricken listeners, who had instinctively grouped themselves +round the two, and appealed to them. "I presented a man nearly thrice +his age, do you hear!--a man of sixty. As for this--this Reginald +Lindo, I never heard of him in my life! Never! If he had letters of +presentation, I did not give them to him." + +The young clergyman's eyes flashed, and his face grew hard as a stone. +He guessed already the misfortune which had happened to him, and his +heart was sore, as well as full of wrath. But in his pride he betrayed +only the anger. "Lord Dynmore," he said fiercely, "you will have to +answer for these insinuations. If there has been any error, the fault +has not lain with me!" + +"An error, you call it, do you? Let me----" + +"Oh, Lord Dynmore!" Mrs. Hammond gasped. + +"One moment, Lord Dynmore, if you please." This from the archdeacon; +and he pressed his interruption, placing himself between the two +men, and almost laying his hands on the excited peer. "If there has +been a mistake," he urged, "a few words will make it clear. I fully +believe--nay, I feel sure, that my friend here is not in fault, +whoever is." + +"Ask your questions," grunted my lord, breathing hard, and eyeing the +young clergyman as a terrier eyes the taller dog it means to attack. +"He will not answer them, trust me!" + +"I think he will," replied the archdeacon with decision. His _esprit +de corps_ was rising. The earl's rude insistance disgusted him. He +remarked, his eyes wandering for a moment while he considered how he +should frame his question, that another person, Mr. Clode, had +silently entered the room, and was listening with a darkly thoughtful +face. It occurred to the archdeacon to suggest that the ladies should +withdraw, but then again it seemed fair that, as they had heard the +charges, they should hear what answer the rector had to make; and he +proceeded. "First, Lord Dynmore," he said, "I must ask you whom you +intended to present." + +"My old friend, Reginald Lindo, of course." + +"His address, please," continued the archdeacon rather curtly. + +"Somewhere in the East End of London," the earl answered. "Oh, I +remember now, St. Gabriel's, Aldgate." + +The archdeacon turned silently to the clergyman. "He was my uncle," +Lindo explained gravely. "He died a year ago last October." + +"Died!" The exclamation was Lord Dynmore's. + +"Yes, died," the young man retorted bitterly. "Your lordship keeps a +watchful eye upon your friends!" + +The shaft went home. The earl caught a quick breath, and his face +changed. The words awoke a slumbering chord in his memory and +recalled--not as might have been expected, old days of frolic and +sport spent with the friend whose death was thus coldly flung in +his face--but a scene in another world. He saw upon the instant a +rock-bound valley, inclosed by hills that rose in giant steps to the +snowy line of the Andes; and in its depths a tiny hunter's camp. He +saw an Indian fishing in the brook, and near him a white man wandering +away--a letter in his hand. Then had come a shot, an alarm, a hasty +striking of the tent, and for many hours--even days--a rapid, +dangerous march. In the excitement the letter had been forgotten, to +be recalled with its tidings here--and now. + +He winced, and muttered, "Good heavens, and I had heard it." The +clergyman caught the words, and his resentment waxed hot. "My uncle's +death," he continued grimly, in the tone of one rather making than +answering an accusation, "occurred a year before the presentation was +offered to me by your solicitors!" + +"Lord help us!" said the peer in a helpless, bewildered tone. "But are +you a clergyman, sir?" + +"That is a fresh insult, Lord Dynmore!" he replied warmly. + +"Hoity-toity!" retorted my lord, recovering himself, "you are a fine +man to talk of insults! And you in my living, without a shadow of +title to it! You must have had some suspicion, sir, that all was not +right." + +"I think I can answer for Mr. Lindo, there!" interposed the curate, +stepping forward for the first time. His face was deeply flushed, and +he spoke hurriedly, not looking up; perhaps, because all eyes were on +him. "When Mr. Lindo came here, I had reason to expect an older man. I +heard by chance from him--I think it was on the evening of his +arrival--that he had not long lost an uncle of the same name, and it +occurred to me then as just possible that there might have been a +mistake. But I particularly observed that he was perfectly free from +any suspicion of that kind himself." + +"Pooh! There is nothing in that!" replied the archdeacon snappishly. + +"I think there is!" cried the earl in triumph. "A great deal in it. If +the idea occurred to a stranger, is it possible that the incumbent's +own mind could be free from it?" + +"Is it possible," the rector answered viciously, a ring as of steel in +his voice, "that a man who had had his dear friend's death announced +to him could forget the news in a year, and think of him as still +alive?" + +The earl gasped with passion. By a tremendous effort he refrained from +using bad words, and even forbore, in view of the alarmed looks of the +ladies and the archdeacon's hasty expostulation, to call his opponent, +a villain or a scoundrel. He stammered only, "You--you--are you going +to give up my living?" + +"No," was the answer. + +"You are not?" + +"Certainly I am not!" the rector answered. "If you had treated me +differently, Lord Dynmore," he continued, speaking with his arms +crossed and his lip curling with scorn and defiance, "my answer might +have been different! Now, though the mistake has been with yourself or +your people, you have accused me of fraud! You have treated me as an +impostor! You have dared to ask me, though I have been ministering to +the people in this parish for months, whether I am a clergyman! You +have insulted me grossly, and, so doing, have put it out of my power +to resign had I been so minded! And you may be sure I shall not +resign." + +He looked handsome enough as he flung down his defiance. But the earl +cared nothing for his looks. "You will not?" he stuttered. + +"No! I acknowledge no authority whatever in you," was the answer. "You +are _functus officio_. I am subject to the bishop, and to him only." + +"Give me my hat," mumbled the peer, turning abruptly away; and, +tugging up the collar of his fur coat, he began to grope about in a +manner which at another time would have been laughable. "Give me my +hat, some one," he repeated. "Let me get out before I swear. I am +_functus officio_, am I? I have never been so insulted in my life! +Never, so help me heaven! Never! Let me get out!" + +His murmurs died away in the hall, Mr. Clode with much presence of +mind opening the door for him and letting him out. When they ceased, +in the room he had left there was absolute silence. The men avoided +one another's eyes. The women, their lips parted, looked each at her +neighbor. Mrs. Homfray, the young wife of an old husband, was the +first to speak. "Well, I never!" she sighed. + +That broke the spell. The rector, who had hitherto gazed darkly, with +flushed brow and compressed lips, at the hearth-rug, roused himself. +"I think I had better go," he said, his tone hard and ungracious, "You +will excuse me, I am sure, Mrs. Hammond. Good-night. Good-night." + +The archdeacon took a step forward, with the intention of intercepting +him, but thought better of it, and stopped, seeing that the time was +not propitious. So, save to murmur an answer to his general farewell, +no one spoke, and he left the room under the impression, though he +himself had set the tone, that he stood alone among them; that he had +not their sympathies. Afterward he remembered this, and it added to +his unhappiness, and to the pride with which he endured it. But at the +moment he was scarcely aware of the impression. The blow had fallen so +swiftly, it was so unexpected and so crushing, that he went out into +the darkness stunned and bewildered, conscious only, as are men whom +some sudden accident has befallen, that in a moment all was changed +with him. + +An hour later Mrs. Hammond and her daughter alone remained. The last +of the visitors had departed, the dinner hour was long past, but they +still sat on, fascinated by the topic, reproducing for one another's +benefit the extraordinary scene they had witnessed, and discussing its +probable consequences. "I am sure, quite sure, poor fellow, that he +knew nothing about it," Mrs. Hammond declared for the twentieth time. + +"So the archdeacon seemed to think, mamma," Laura answered. "And yet +he said that probably Mr. Lindo would have to go." + +"Because of the miserable attacks these people have made upon him!" +her mother rejoined with indignation. "But think of the pity of it! +Think of the income! And such a house as it is!" + +"It _is_ a nice house," Laura assented, thoughtfully gazing into the +fire, a slight access of color in her cheeks. + +"I think it is abominable!" + +"And then," Laura said, continuing her chain of reflection, "there is +the view from the drawing-room windows." + +"Oh, it is too bad! It is really too bad! I declare I am quite upset, +I am so sorry for him. Lord Dymnore ought to be ashamed of himself!" + +"Yes," Laura assented rather absently, "I quite agree with you. And as +for the hall, with a Persian rug or two it would be quite as good as +another room." + +"What hall? Oh, at the rectory?" + +"Yes." + +Mrs. Hammond rose with a quick, pettish air of annoyance. "Upon my +word, Laura," she exclaimed, drawing a little shawl about her +comfortable shoulders, "you seem to think more of the house than of +the poor fellow himself! Let us go to dinner. It is half-past eight, +and more." + + + + + CHAPTER XVII. + + THE LAWYER AT HOME. + + +If Mr. Clode, when he stepped forward to open the door for +Lord Dynmore, had any thought beyond that of facilitating his +departure--if, for instance, as is just possible, he had set his mind +on having a little private talk with the peer--he was disappointed. +Lord Dynmore, after what had happened, was in no mood for +conversation. As, still muttering and mumbling, he seized his hat from +the hall table, he did indeed notice his companion, but it was with +the red angry glare of a bull about to charge. The next moment he +plunged headlong into his brougham, and roared "Home." + +The carriage plunged away into the darkness of the drive, as if it +would reach the Park at a leap. But it had barely cleared Mrs. +Hammond's gates, and was still rattling over the stony pavement of the +top of the town, when the footman heard his master lower the window +and shout "Stop!" The horses were pulled up as suddenly as they had +been started, and the man got down and went to the door. "Do you know +where Mr. Bonamy the lawyer's offices are?" Lord Dynmore said curtly. + +"Yes, my lord." + +"Then drive there!" + +The footman got upon the box again. "What has bitten him now, I +wonder?" he grumbled to his companion as he passed on the order. "He +is in a fine tantrum in there!" + +"Who cares?" retorted the coachman, with a coachman's fine +independence. "If old Bonamy is in, there will be a pair of them!" + +Mr. Bonamy was in. In that particular Lord Dynmore had better luck +than he perhaps deserved. Late as it was for business--it was after +seven--the gas was still burning in the lawyer's offices, illuminating +the fanlight over the door and the windows of one of the rooms on the +ground floor--the right-hand room. The servant jumped down and rapped, +and his summons was answered almost immediately by Mr. Bonamy himself, +who jerked open the door, and stood holding it ajar, with the air of a +man interrupted in the middle of his work, and bent on sending the +intruder off with a flea in his ear. Catching sight of the earl's +carriage, however, and the servant murmuring that my lord wished to +see him on business, the lawyer stepped forward, his expression +changing to one of extreme surprise. + +The Dynmore business had been hitherto monopolized by the London +solicitors to the estate. In cases where a country agent had been +necessary they had invariably employed a firm in Birmingham. Neither +Mr. Bonamy nor the other Claversham lawyer had ever risen to the +dignity of being concerned for Lord Dynmore, nor could Mr. Bonamy +recall any occasion in the past on which the great man had crossed the +threshold of his office. + +His appearance now, therefore, was almost as welcome as it was +unexpected. Yet from some cause, probably the lateness of the hour, +though that seems improbable, there was a visible embarrassment in the +lawyer's manner as he recognized him; and Mr. Bonamy only stepped +aside to make way for him to enter upon hearing from his own lips that +he desired to speak with him. + +Then he opened the door of the room on the left of the hall. "If your +lordship will take a seat here," he said, "I will be with you in a +moment." + +The room was in darkness, but he struck a match and lit the gas, +placing a chair for Lord Dynmore, who, fretting and fuming and more +than half inclined as he took it to walk out again, said sharply that +he had only a minute to spare. + +"I shall not be a minute, my lord," the lawyer answered. He retired at +once with that, closing the door behind him, and went, as his visitor +could hear, into the opposite room. Lord Dynmore looked round +impatiently. He had not so high as opinion of his own importance as +have some who are no peers. But he was choleric and accustomed to have +his own way, and he thought that at least this local man whom he was +going to patronize might receive him with more respect. + +Mr. Bonamy, however, was as good as his word. In less than a minute he +was back. Closing the door carefully behind him, he sat down at the +table. "I am entirely at your lordship's service now," he said, bowing +slightly. + +The earl laid his hat on the table. "Very well," he answered abruptly. +"I have heard that you are a sharp fellow, Mr. Bonamy, and a good +lawyer, and that is why I have come to you--that and the fact that my +business will not wait and I have a mind to punish those confounded +London people who have let me into this mess!" + +That it was rather impatience than anything else which had brought him +he betrayed by getting up and striding across the room. Meanwhile the +lawyer, golden visions of bulky settlements and interminable leases +floating before his eyes, murmured his anxiety to be of service, and +waited to hear more. + +"It is about that confounded sneak of a rector of yours!" my lord +exclaimed, coming to a stand before the table. + +Mr. Bonamy started, his visions fading rapidly away. "What rector?" he +replied, gazing at his client in great astonishment. "Our rector, my +lord?" + +"The man who calls himself your rector!" the earl growled. "He is no +more a rector than I am, and pretty fools you were to be taken in by +him!" + +"Now that is odd!" the lawyer answered. He spoke absently, his eyes +resting on the peer's face as if his thoughts were far away. + +"Odd or not," Lord Dynmore replied, stamping on the floor with +undiminished irritation, "it is the fact, sir! And now if you will +listen to me I will tell you what I want you to do." + +The lawyer bowed slightly again, and the earl proceeded to tell his +tale. Passing lightly over his own forgetfulness and negligence, he +laid stress on all the facts which seemed to show that Lindo could not +have accepted the living in good faith. He certainly made out a +plausible case, but his animus in telling it was so apparent that, +when he had finished and wound up by announcing his firm resolve to +eject the young man from his cure, Mr. Bonamy only shook his head with +a doubtful smile. "You will have to prove guilty knowledge on his +part, my lord," he said gravely. + +"So I will!" quoth the earl roundly. + +Mr. Bonamy seemed for a moment inclined to shake his head again, but +he thought better of it. "Well, you may be right, my lord," he +answered. "At any rate--without going further into the matter at this +moment, or considering what course your lordship, could or should +adopt--I think I can do one thing. I can lay some information on this +point before you at once." + +"What! To show that he knew?" cried the earl eagerly. + +"Yes, I think so. But as to its weight----" + +"What is it? What is it? Let me hear it!" was the impatient +interruption. The earl was on his feet in a moment. "Why, gadzooks, we +may have him in a corner before the day is out, Mr. Bonamy," he +continued. "True? I will be bound it is true!" + +Mr. Bonamy looked as if he very much doubted that, but he offered no +further opposition. Begging Lord Dynmore--who could not look upon him +with sufficient admiration, so much was he struck with this strange +preparedness--to excuse him for a moment, he left the room. He +returned almost immediately, however, followed by a man whom the earl +at once recognized, and recognized with the utmost astonishment. "Why, +you confounded rascal!" he gasped. "What are you doing here?" + +It was Felton. Yet not the same Felton whose surreptitious visit to +the rectory had been cut short by Mr. Clode. A few weeks of idleness +and drinking, a month or two at the Bull and Staff had much changed +the once sleek and respectable servant. Had he gone to the rectory for +help now, his tale could not have passed muster even for a moment. His +coat had come to hang loosely about him, and he wore no tie. His hands +were dirty and tremulous, his eyes shifty and bloodshot. His pasty +face had grown puffy and was stained with blotches which it was +impossible to misinterpret. He had gone down the hill fast. + +Seeing his old master before him he began to whimper, but the lawyer +cut him short. "This man, who says he was formerly your servant, has +come to me with a strange story, Lord Dynmore," he said. + +"Ten to one it's a lie!" replied the peer, scowling darkly at the poor +wretch. + +"So I think likely!" Mr. Bonamy rejoined with the utmost dryness. +"However, what he says is this: that when he landed in England without +a character he considered what he should do, and, remembering that he +had heard you say that Mr. Lindo the elder, whom he knew, had been +appointed to this living, he came down here to see what he could get +out of him." + +"That is likely enough!" cried the peer scornfully. + +"When he called at the rectory, however, he found Mr. Lindo, the +younger, in possession. He had an interview with him, and he states +that Mr. Lindo, to purchase his silence, undertook to pay him ten +shillings a week until your return." + +"Phaugh!" my lord exclaimed in astonishment. + +The servant mistook his astonishment for incredulity. "He did, my +lord!" he cried passionately. "It is heaven's own truth I am telling! +I can bring half a dozen witnesses to prove it." + +"You can?" + +"I can, my lord." + +"Yes, but to prove what?" said the lawyer sharply. + +"That he paid me ten shillings a week down to last week, my lord." + +"That will do! That will do!" cried the earl in great glee. "Set a +thief to catch a thief--that is the plan!" + +Mr. Bonamy looked displeased. "I think you are a little premature, my +lord," he said with some sourness. + +"Premature? How?" + +"At present you have only this man's word for what is on the face of +it a very improbable story." + +"Improbable? I do not see it," replied the peer quickly, but with less +heat. "He says that he has witnesses to prove that this fellow paid +him the money. If that be so, explain the payment if you can. And, +mark you, Mr. Bonamy, the allowance stopped last week--on my arrival, +that is." + +The man cried eagerly that that was so; the earl at once bidding him +be silent for a confounded rascal as he was. Mr. Bonamy stood rubbing +his chin thoughtfully and looking on the floor, but said nothing; so +that the great man presently lost patience. "Don't you agree with me?" +he cried irascibly. + +"I think we had better get rid of our friend here before we discuss +the matter, my lord," the lawyer answered bluntly. "Do you hear, +Felton?" he continued, turning to the servant. "You may go now. Come +to me to-morrow morning at ten o'clock, and I will tell you what Lord +Dynmore proposes to do." + +The ex-valet would have demurred to being thus set aside, but the earl +roaring "Go, you scoundrel!" in a voice he had been accustomed to +obey, and Mr. Bonamy opening the door for him, he submitted and went. +The streets were wet and gloomy, and he was more sober than he had +been for a week. In other words, his nerves were shaky, and he soon +began, as he slunk homeward, to torment himself with doubts. Had he +made the best of his story? Might it not have been safer to make a +last appeal to the rector? Above all, would Mr. Clode, whose game he +did not understand, hold his hand, or play the trump by disclosing +that little burglary we know of? Altogether Felton was not happy, and +saw before him but one resource--to get home as quickly as possible +and get drunk. + +Meanwhile the lawyer, left alone with his client, seemed as much +averse as before to speaking out. Lord Dynmore had again to take the +initiative. "Well, it is good enough, sir, is it not?" he said, +frowning impatiently on his new adviser. "There is a clear case, I +suppose!" + +"I think your lordship had better hear first," Mr. Bonamy answered, +"how your late servant came to bring his story to me." He proceeded to +explain the course which the young clergyman had pursued in the parish +from the first, and the opposition and ill-will it had provoked. He +told the story from his own point of view, but with more fairness than +might have been expected, although, as was natural, when he came to +the matter of the sheep-grazing and the writ he took care to make his +own case good. The earl listened and chuckled, and at last interrupted +him. + +"So you have been at him already?" he said, grinning. + +"Yes," the lawyer answered slowly. "I may say, indeed, that I have +been in constant opposition to him since his arrival. Felton (the man +who has just left us) knew that, and it led him to bring his tale to +me this evening." + +"When he could get no more money out of the parson!" the earl replied +with a sneer. "But, now, what is to be done, Mr. Bonamy?" + +Mr. Bonamy did not at once answer, but stood looking much disturbed. +His doubt and uneasiness, in fact, visibly increased as the seconds +flew by, and still Lord Dynmore's gaze, bent on him at first in +impatience and later in surprise, seemed to be striving to probe his +thoughts. He looked down at the table and frowned, as if displeased by +the scrutiny; and when he at length spoke, his voice was harsher than +usual. "I do not think, my lord," he said, "that I can answer that +question." + +"Do you want to take counsel's opinion?" + +"No, my lord," Mr. Bonamy answered curtly. "I mean something +different. I do not think, in fact, that I can act for your lordship +in this matter." + +"Cannot act for me?" the earl gasped. + +"That is what I mean," Mr. Bonamy answered doggedly, a slight flush as +of shame on his sallow cheek. "I have explained, my lord, that I have +been constantly opposed to this young man, but my opposition has been +of a public nature and upon principle. I have no doubt that he and +others consider me his chief enemy in the place, and to that I have no +objection. But I am unwilling that he or others should think that +private interest has had any part in my opposition, and therefore, +being churchwarden, I would prefer, though I must necessarily offend +your lordship, to decline undertaking the business." + +"But why? Why?" cried the earl, between anger and astonishment. + +"I have tried to explain," Mr. Bonamy rejoined with firmness. "I am +afraid I cannot make my reasons clearer." + +The earl swore softly and took up his hat. He really was at a loss to +understand; principally because, knowing that Mr. Bonamy had risen +from the ranks, he did not credit him with any fineness of feeling. He +had heard only that he was a clever and rather sharp practitioner, and +a man who might be trusted to make things unpleasant for the other +side. So he took up his hat and swore softly. "You are aware," he +said, turning at the door and looking daggers at the solicitor, "that +by taking this course you are throwing away a share of my work?" + +Mr. Bonamy, wearing a rather more gaunt and grim air than usual, +simply bowed. + +"You will act for the other side, I suppose?" my lord snarled. + +"I shall not act professionally for any one, my lord!" + +"Then you are a damned quixotic fool--that is all I have to say!" was +the earl's parting shot. Having fired it, he flung out of the room and +in great amaze roared for his carriage. + +A man is seldom so much inclined--on the surface, at any rate--to +impute low motives to others as when he has just done something which +he suspects to be foolish and quixotic. When Mr. Bonamy, a few minutes +later, entered his rarely used drawing-room and discovered Jack and +the two girls playing at Patience, he was in his most cynical mood. He +stood for a moment on the hearth-rug, his coat-tails on his arms, and +presently he said to Jack, "I am surprised to see you here." + +Jack looked up. The girls looked up also. "I wonder you are not at the +rectory," Mr. Bonamy continued ironically, "advising your friend how +to keep out of jail!" + +"What on earth do you mean, sir?" Jack exclaimed, laying down his +cards and rising from the table. He saw that the lawyer had some news +and was anxious to tell it. + +"I mean that he is in very considerable danger of going there!" was +Mr. Bonamy's answer. "There has been a scene at Mrs. Hammond's this +afternoon. By this time the story must be all over the town. Lord +Dynmore turned up there and met him--denounced him as a scoundrel, and +swore he had never presented him to the living." + +For a brief moment no one spoke. Then Daintry found her voice. "My +goody!" she exclaimed, her eyes like saucers. "Who told you, father?" + +"Never you mind, young lady!" Mr. Bonamy retorted with good-humored +sharpness. "It is true. What is more, I am informed that Lord Dynmore +has evidence that Mr. Lindo has been paying a man, who was aware of +this, a certain sum every week to keep his mouth shut." + +"My goody!" cried Daintry again. "I wonder, now, what he paid him! +What do you think, Jack?" And she turned to Jack to learn what he was +doing that he did not speak. + +Poor Jack! Why did he not speak? Why did he stand silent, gazing hard +into the fire? Because he resented his friend's coldness? Because he +would not defend him? Because he thought him guilty? No, but because +in the first moment of Mr. Bonamy's disclosure he had looked into +Kate's face--his cousin's face, who the moment before had been +laughing over the cards at his side, in all things so near to him--and +he had read in it, with the keen insight, the painful sympathy which +love imparts, her secret. Poor Kate! No one else had seen her face +fall or discovered her embarrassment. A few seconds later even her +countenance had regained its ordinary calm composure, even the blood +had gone back to her heart. But Jack had seen and read aright. He +knew, and she knew that he knew. When at last--but not before Mr. +Bonamy's attention had been drawn to his silence--he turned and spoke, +she avoided his eyes. "That is rather a wild tale, sir, is it not?" he +said with an effort and a pale smile. + +If Mr. Bonamy had not been a man of great shrewdness, he would have +been tempted to think that Jack had been in the secret all the time. +As it was, he only answered, "I have reason to think that there is +something in it, wild as it sounds. At any rate, the man in question +has himself told the story to Lord Dynmore." + +"The pensioner?" + +"Precisely." + +"Well, I should like to ask him a few questions," Jack answered +drearily. But for the chill feeling at his heart, but for the +knowledge he had just gained, he would have treated the matter very +differently. He would have thought of his friend only--his feelings, +his possible misery. He would not have condescended in this first +moment to the evidence. But he could not feel for his friend. He could +not even pity him. He needed all his pity for himself. + +"I do not answer for the story," Mr. Bonamy continued. "But there is +no doubt of one thing--that Mr. Lindo was appointed in error, whether +he was aware of the mistake or not. I do not know," the lawyer added +thoughtfully, "that I shall pity him greatly. He has been very +mischievous here. And he has held his head very high." + +"He is the more likely to suffer now," Jack answered almost cynically. + +"Possibly," the lawyer replied. Then he added, "Daintry, fetch me my +slippers, there is a good girl. Or, stay. Get me a candle and take +them to my room." + +He went out after her, leaving the cousins alone. Neither spoke. Jack +stood near the corner of the mantel-shelf, gazing rigidly, almost +sullenly, into the fire. What was Lindo to him? Why should he be sorry +for him? A far worse thing had befallen himself. He tried to harden +his heart, and to resolve that nothing of his suffering should be +visible even to her. But he had scarcely formed the resolution when, +his eyes wandering despite his will to the pale set face on the other +side of the hearth, he sprang forward and, almost kneeling, took her +hand in both his own. "Kate," he whispered, "is it so? Is there no +hope for me, then?" + +She, too, had been looking into the fire. She could feel for him now. +She no longer thought his attentions "nonsense" as at the station a +while back. But she could not speak. She could only shake her head, +the tears in her eyes. + +Jack laid down the hand and rose and went back to the fire, and stood +looking into it sorrowfully; but his thoughts were no longer wholly of +himself. Brave heart, the rarest of gentlemen, though he was neither +six feet high nor an Adonis, he had scarcely felt the weight of the +blow which had fallen on himself, before he began to think what he +could do to help her. Presently he put his thought into words. "Kate," +he said, in a voice scarcely above a whisper, "can I do anything?" + +She had made no attempt to deny the inference he had drawn. She seemed +content, indeed, that he should have her secret, though the knowledge +of it by another would have covered her with shame. But at the sound +of his question she only shook her head with a sorrowful smile. + +It was all dark to him. He knew nothing of the past--only that the +faint suspicion he had felt at the bazaar was justified, and that Kate +had given away her heart. He did not dare to ask whether there was any +understanding between her and his friend; and, not knowing that, what +could he do? Nothing, he was afraid. + +Then a noble thought came into his head. "I am afraid," he said +slowly, looking at his watch, "that Lindo is in great trouble. I think +I will go to him. It is not ten o'clock." + +He tried not to look at her as he spoke, but all the same he saw the +crimson tide rise slowly over cheek and brow, which his prayer had +left so pure and pale. Her lip trembled and she rose hurriedly, +muttering something inaudible. Poor Jack! + +For a moment self got the upper hand, and he stood still, frowning. +Then he said gallantly, "Yes, I think I will go. Will you let my uncle +know in case I should be late." + +He did not look at her again, but hurried out of the room. It was a +stiff, formal room, we know--a set, comfortless, middle-class room, +which had given the rector quite a shock on his first introduction to +it--but if it had grafted all the grace of the halls of Abencerrages +upon the stately comfort of a sixteenth-century dining-hall it would +have been no more than worthy of the man who quitted it. + + + + + CHAPTER XVIII. + + A FRIEND IN NEED. + + +I have heard that the bitterest pang a boy feels on returning to +school after his first holidays is reserved for the moment when he +opens his desk and recalls the happy hour, full of joyous +anticipation, when he had closed that desk with a bang. Oh, the pity +of it! The change from that boy to this, from that morning to this +evening! How meanly, how inadequately--so it seems to the urchin +standing with smudged cheeks before the well-remembered grammar--did +the lad who turned the key estimate his real happiness! How little did +he enter into it or deserve it! + +Just such a pang shot through the young rector's heart as he +passed into the rectory porch after that momentous scene at Mrs. +Hammond's. His rage had had time to die down. With reflection +had come a full sense of his position. As he entered the house he +remembered--remembered only too well, grinding his teeth over the +recollection--how secure, how free from embarrassments, how happy had +been his situation when he last issued from that door a few, a very +few, hours before. Such troubles as had then annoyed him seemed +trifles light as air now. Mr. Bonamy's writ, the dislike of one +section in the parish--how could he have let such things as these make +him miserable for a moment? + +How, indeed? Or, if there were anything grave in his situation then, +what was it now? He had held his head high; henceforward he would be a +by-word in the parish, a man under a cloud. The position in which he +had placed himself would still be his, perhaps, but only because he +would cling to it to the last. Under no circumstances could it any +longer be a source of pride to him. He had posed, will he, nill he, +as the earl's friend; he must submit in the future to be laughed at +by the Greggs and avoided by the Homfrays. It seemed to him indeed +that his future in Claversham could be only one long series of +humiliations. He was a proud man, and as he thought of this he sprang +from his chair and strode up and down the room, his cheeks flaming. +Had there ever been such a fall before! + +Mrs. Baker, as yet ignorant of it all, though the news was by this +time spreading through the town, brought him his dinner, and he ate +something in the dining-room. Then he went back to the study and sat +idle and listless before his writing-table. There was a number of +"Punch" lying on it, and he took this up and read it through drearily, +extracting a faint pleasure from its witticisms, but never for an +instant forgetting the cloud of trouble brooding over him. Years +afterward he could recall some of the jokes in that "Punch"--with a +shudder. Presently he laid it down and began to think. And then, +before his thoughts became quite insufferable, they were interrupted +by the sound of a voice in the hall. + +He rose and stood with his back to the fire, and as he waited, his +eyes on the door, his face grew hot, his brow defiant. He had little +doubt that the visitor was Clode. He had expected the curate before, +and even anticipated the relief of pouring his thoughts into a +friendly ear. None the less, now the thing had come, he dreaded the +first moment of meeting, scarcely knowing how to bear himself in these +changed circumstances. + +It was not Clode, however, who entered, but Jack Smith. The rector +started, and, uncertain whether the barrister had heard of the blow +which had fallen on him or no, stepped forward awkwardly, and held out +his hand in a constrained fashion. Jack, on his side, had his own +reasons for being ill at ease with his friend. But the moment the +men's hands met they somehow closed on one another in the old hearty +fashion, and the grip told the rector that the other knew all. "You +have heard?" he muttered. + +"Mr. Bonamy told me," the barrister answered. "I came across almost at +once." + +"You do not believe that I was aware of the earl's mistake, then?" +Lindo said, with a faint smile. + +"I should as soon believe that I knew of it myself!" Jack replied +warmly. He was glad beyond measure now that he had come. As he and +Lindo stood half facing one another, each with an elbow on the +mantel-shelf, he felt that he could defy the chill at his own +heart--that, notwithstanding all, his old friend was still dear to +him. Perhaps if the rector had been prospering as before, if no cloud +had arisen in his sky, it might have been different. But as it was, +Jack's generous heart went out to him. "Tell me what happened, old +fellow," he said cheerily--"that is, if you have no objection to +taking me into your confidence." + +"I shall be only too glad of your help," Lindo answered thankfully, +feeling indeed--so potent is a single word of sympathy--happier +already. "I would ask you to sit down, Jack," he continued, in a tone +of rather sheepish raillery, "and have a cup of coffee or some +whiskey, but I do not know whether I ought to do so, now that Lord +Dynmore says the things are not mine." + +"I will take the responsibility," Jack answered, briskly ringing the +bell. "Was my lord very rude?" + +"Confoundedly!" the rector answered, and proceeded to tell his story. +Jack was surprised to find him at first more placable than he had +expected, but presently he learned that this moderation was only +assumed. The rector rose as he went on, and began to pace the room, +and, the motion freeing his tongue, he gradually betrayed the +indignation and resentment which he really felt. Jack asked him, with +a view to clearing the ground, whether he had quite made up his mind +not to resign, and was astonished by the force and anger with which he +repudiated the thought of doing so. "Resign? No never!" he cried, +standing still, and almost glaring at his companion. "Why should I? +What have I done? Was it my mistake, that I am to suffer for it? Was +it my fault, that for penalty I am to have the tenor of my life +broken? Do you think I can go back to the Docks the same man I left +them? I cannot. Nor is that all, or nearly all," he added still more +warmly--"I have been called a swindler and an impostor. Am I by +resigning to plead guilty to the charge?" + +"No!" said Jack, himself catching fire, "certainly not! I did not +intend for a moment to advise that course. I think you would be acting +very foolishly if you resigned under these circumstances." + +"I am glad of that," the rector said, sitting down with a sigh of +relief. "I feared you did not quite enter into my feelings." + +"I do thoroughly," the barrister answered, with feeling, "but I want +to do more--I want to help you. You must not go into this business +blindly, old man. And, first, I think you ought to take the archdeacon +or some other clergyman into your confidence. Show him the whole of +your case, I mean, and----" + +"And act upon his advice?" said the young rector, rebellion already +flashing in his eye. + +"No, not necessarily," the barrister answered, skilfully adapting +his tone to the irritability of his patient. "Of course your _bona +fides_ at the time you accepted the living is the point of importance +to you, Lindo. You did not see their solicitors--the earl's people, I +mean--did you?" + +"No," the rector answered somewhat sullenly. + +"Then their letter conveyed to you all you knew of the living and the +offer?" + +"Precisely." + +"Let us see them, then," replied Jack, rising briskly from his chair. +He had already determined to say nothing of the witness whom Mr. +Bonamy had mentioned to him as asserting that the rector had bribed +him. He knew enough of his friend to utterly disbelieve the story, and +he considered it as told to him in confidence. "There is no time like +the present," he continued. "You have kept the letters, of course?" + +"They are here," Lindo answered, rising also, and unlocking as he +spoke the little cupboard among the books; "I made them into a packet +and indorsed them soon after I came. They have been here ever since." + +He found them after a moment's search and without himself examining +them, pitched them to Jack, who had returned to his seat. The +barrister untied the string and glancing quickly at the dates of the +letters, arranged them in order and flattened them out on his knee. +"Now," he said, "number one! That I think I have seen before." He +mumbled over the opening sentences, and turned the page. "Hallo!" he +exclaimed, holding the letter from him, and speaking in a tone of +surprise--almost of consternation--"how is this?" + +"What?" said the rector. + +"You have destroyed the latter part of this letter! Why on earth did +you do that?" + +"I never did," Lindo answered incredulously. Obeying Jack's gesture he +came, and, standing by his chair, looked over his shoulder. Then he +saw that part of the latter half of the sheet had been torn off. The +signature and the last few words of the letter, were gone. He looked +and wondered. "I never did it," he said positively, "whoever did. You +may be sure of that." + +"You are certain?" + +"Absolutely certain," the rector answered with considerable warmth. "I +remember arranging and indorsing the packet. I am quite sure that this +letter was intact then, for I read over every one. That was a few +evenings after I came here." + +"Have you ever shown the letters to any one?" Jack asked suspiciously. + +"Never," said the rector; "they have never been removed from this +cupboard, to my knowledge, since I put them there." + +"Think! I want you to be quite sure," Jack rejoined, pressing his +point steadily; "you see this letter is rendered utterly worthless by +the mutilation. Indeed, to produce it would be to raise a natural +suspicion that the last sentence of the letter was not in our favor, +and we had got rid of it. Of course the chances are that the earl's +solicitors have copies, but for the present that is not our business." + +"Well," said the rector somewhat absently--he had been rather thinking +than listening--"I do remember now a circumstance which may account +for this. A short time after I came a man broke into the house and +ransacked this cupboard. Possibly he did it." + +"A burglar, do you mean? Was he caught?" the barrister asked, +figuratively pricking up his ears. + +"No--or, rather, I should say yes," the rector answered. And then he +explained that his curate, taking the man red-handed, had let him go, +in the hope that, as it was his first offence, he would take warning +and live honestly. + +"But who was the burglar?" Jack inquired. "You know, I suppose? Is he +in the town now?" + +"Clode never told me his name," Lindo answered. "The man made a point +of that, and I did not press for it. I remember that Clode was +somewhat ashamed of his clemency." + +"He had need to be," Jack snorted. "It sounds an extraordinary story. +All the same, Lindo, I am not sure it has any connection with this." +He held the letter up before him as though drawing inspiration from +it. "This letter, you see," he went on presently, "being the first in +date would be inside the packet. Why should a man who wanted perhaps a +bit of paper for a spill or a pipe-light unfasten this packet and take +the innermost letter? I do not believe it." + +"But no one else save myself," Lindo urged, "has had access to the +letter. And there it is torn." + +"Yes, here it is torn," Jack admitted, gazing thoughtfully at it; +"that is true." + +For a few moments the two sat silent, Jack fingering the letter, Lindo +with his eyes fixed gloomily on the fire. Suddenly the rector broke +out without warning or preface. "What a fool I have been!" he +exclaimed, his tone one of abrupt overwhelming conviction. "Good +heavens, what a fool I have been!" + +His friend looked at him in surprise, and saw that his face was +crimson. "Is it about the letter?" he asked, leaning forward, his tone +sharp with professional impatience. "You do not mean to say, Lindo, +that you really----" + +"No, no!" replied the young clergyman, ruthlessly interrupting him. +"It has nothing to do with the letter." + +He said no more, and Jack waited for further light, but none came, and +the barrister reapplied his thoughts to the problem before him. He had +only just hit upon a new idea, however, when he was again diverted by +an interruption from Lindo. "Jack," said the latter impressively, "I +want you to give a message for me." + +"Not a cartel to Lord Dynmore, I hope?" the barrister muttered. + +"No," Lindo answered, getting up and poking the fire +unnecessarily--what a quantity of embarrassment has been liberated +before now by means of pokers--"no, I want you to give a message to +your cousin---Miss Bonamy, I mean." The rector paused, the poker still +in his hand, and stole a sharp glance at his companion; but, reassured +by the discovery that he was to all appearance buried in the letter, +he continued: "Would you mind telling her that I am sorry I misjudged +her a short time back--she will understand--and behaved, I feel, very +ungratefully to her? She warned me that there was a rumor afloat that +something was amiss with my title, and I am afraid' I was very rude to +her. I should like you to tell her, if you will, that I--that I am +particularly ashamed of myself," he added, with a gulp. + +He did not find the words easy of utterance--far from it; but the +effort they cost him was slight and trivial compared with that which +poor Jack found himself called upon to make. For a moment, indeed, he +was silent, his heart rebelling against the task assigned to him. To +carry his message to her! Then his nobler self answered to the call, +and he spoke. His words, "Yes, I'll tell her," came, it is true, a +little late, in a voice a trifle thick, and were uttered with a +coldness which Lindo would have remarked had he not been agitated +himself. But they came--at a price. The Victoria Cross for moral +courage can seldom be gained by a single act of valor. Many a one has +failed to gain it who had strength enough for the first blow. "Yes, I +will tell her," Jack repeated a few seconds later, folding up the +letter and laying it on the table, but so contriving that his face was +hidden from his friend. "To-morrow will do, I suppose?" he added, the +faintest tinge of irony in his tone. He may be pardoned if he thought +the apology he was asked to carry came a little late. + +"Oh, yes, to-morrow will do," Lindo answered with a start; he had +fallen into a reverie, but now roused himself. "I am afraid you are +very tired, old fellow," he continued, looking gratefully at his +friend. "A friend in need is a friend indeed, you know. I cannot tell +you"--with a sigh--"how very good I think it was of you to come to +me." + +"Nonsense!" Jack said briskly. "It was all in the day's work. As it +is, I have done nothing. And that reminds me," he continued, facing +his companion with a smile--"what of the trouble between my uncle and +you? About the sheep, I mean. You have put it in some lawyer's hands, +have you not?" + +"Yes," Lindo answered reluctantly. + +"Quite right, too," said the barrister. "Who are they?" + +"Turner & Grey, of Birmingham." + +"Well, I will write," Jack answered, "if you will let me, and tell +them to let the matter stand for the present. I think that will be the +best course. Bonamy won't object." + +"But he has issued a writ," the rector explained. A writ seemed to him +a formidable engine. As well dally before the mouth of a cannon. + +But Jack knew better. The law's delays were familiar to him. He was +aware of many a pleasant little halting-place between writ and +judgment. "Never mind about that," he answered, with a confident +laugh. "Shall I settle it for you? I shall know better, perhaps, what +to say to them." + +The rector assented gladly; adding: "Here is their address." It was +stuck in the corner of a picture hanging over the fireplace. He took +it down as he spoke and gave it to Jack, who put it carelessly into +his pocket, and, seizing his hat, said he must go at once--that it was +close on twelve. The rector would have repeated his thanks; but Jack +would not stop to hear them, and in a moment was gone. + +Reginald Lindo returned to the study after letting him out, and, +dropping into the nearest chair, looked round with a sigh. Yet, the +sigh notwithstanding, he was a hundredfold less unhappy now than he +had been at dinner or while looking over that number of "Punch." His +friend's visit had both cheered and softened him. His thoughts no, +longer dwelt on the earl's injustice, the desertion of his friends, or +the humiliations in store for him; but went back again to the warning +Kate Bonamy had given him. Thence it was not unnatural that they +should revert to the beginning of his acquaintance with her. He +pictured her at Oxford, he saw her scolding Daintry in the stiff +drawing-room, or coming to meet him in the Red Lane; and, the veil of +local prejudice torn from his eyes by the events of the day, he began +to discern that this girl, with all the drawbacks of her surroundings, +was the fairest, bravest, and noblest girl he had met at Claversham, +or, for aught he could remember, elsewhere. His eyes glistened. He was +sure--so sure that he would have staked his life on the result--that +for all the earls in England Kate Bonamy would not have deserted him! + +He had reached this point, and Jack had been gone some five minutes or +more, when he was startled by a loud rap at the house door. He stood +up and, wondering who it could be at this hour, took a candle and went +into the hall. Setting the candlestick on a table, he opened the door, +and there, to his astonishment, was Jack come back again! + +"Capital!" said the barrister, slipping in and shutting the door +behind him, as though his return were not in the least degree +extraordinary, "I thought it was you. Look here; there is one thing I +forget to ask you, Lindo. Where did you get the address of those +lawyers?" + +He asked the question so earnestly, and his face, now it could be seen +by the strong light of the candle at his elbow, wore so curious an +expression, that the rector was for a moment quite taken aback. "They +are good people, are they not?" he said, wondering much. + +"Oh, yes, the firm is good enough," Jack answered impatiently. "But +who gave you their address?" + +"Clode," the rector answered. "I went round to his lodgings and he +wrote it down for me." + +"At his lodgings?" cried the barrister. + +"To be sure." + +"Ah! then look here," Jack replied, laying his hand on Lindo's sleeve +and looking up at him with an air of peculiar seriousness--"just tell +me once more, so that I may have no doubt about it: Are you sure that +from the time you docketed those letters until now you have never +removed them--from this house, I mean?" + +"Never!" + +"Never let them go out of the house?" + +"Never!" answered the rector firmly. "I am as certain of it as a man +can be certain of anything." + +"Thanks!" Jack cried. "All right. Good night." And that was all; for, +turning abruptly, in a twinkling he had the door open and was gone, +leaving the rector to go to bed in such a state of mystification as +made him almost forget his fallen fortunes. + + + + + CHAPTER XIX. + + THE DAY AFTER. + + +Oddly enough, the rector's first thought on rising next morning was of +his curate. He had expected, as we have seen, that Clode would call +before bedtime. Disappointed in this, he still felt so certain that +the curate would hasten as soon as possible to offer his sympathy and +assistance that after breakfast he repaired to his study for the +express purpose of receiving him. To find one friend in need is good, +but to find two is better. The young clergyman felt, as people in +trouble of a certain kind do feel, that though he had told Jack all +about it, it would be a relief to tell Stephen all about it also; +the more as Jack, whom he had told, was his personal friend, while +Clode was identified with the place and his unabated confidence and +esteem--of retaining which the rector made no doubt--would go some way +toward soothing the latter's wounded pride. + +It was well, however, that Lindo, sitting down at his writing-table to +await his visitor, found there some scattered notes upon which he +could employ his thoughts, and which without any great concentration +of mind he could form into a sermon. For otherwise his time would have +been wasted. Ten o'clock came, and eleven, and half-past eleven; but +no curate. + +Mr. Clode, in fact, was engaged elsewhere. About half-past ten he +turned briskly into the drive leading to Mrs. Hammond's house and +walked up it at a good pace, with the step of a man who has news to +tell, and is going to tell it. The morning was bright and sunny, the +air crisp and fresh, yet not too cold. The gravel crunched pleasantly +under his feet, while the hoar-frost melting on the dark green leaves +of the laurels bordered his path with a million gems as brilliant as +evanescent. Possibly the pleasure he took in these things, possibly +some thought of his own, lent animation to the curate's face and +figure as he strode along. At any rate, Miss Hammond, meeting him +suddenly at a turn in the approach, saw a change in him, and, reading +the signs aright, blushed. + +"Well?" she said, smiling a question as she held out her hand. They +had scarcely been alone together since the afternoon when the rector's +inopportune call had brought about an understanding between them. + +"Well?" he answered, retaining her hand. "What is it, Laura?" + +"I thought you were going to tell me," she said, glancing up with shy +assurance. The morning air was not fresher. She was so bright and +piquant in her furs and with her dazzling complexion, that other eyes +than her lover's might have been pardoned for likening her to the +frost drops on the laurels. At any rate, she sparkled as they did. + +He looked down at her, fond admiration in his eyes. Had he not come up +on purpose to see her? + +"I think it is all right," he said, in a slightly lower tone. "I think +I may answer for it, Laura, that we shall not have much longer to +wait." + +She gazed at him, seeming for the moment startled and taken by +surprise. "Have you heard of a living, then?" she murmured, her eyes +wide, her breath coming and going. + +He nodded. + +"Where?" she asked, in the same low tone. "You do not mean--here!" + +He nodded again. + +"At Claversham!" she exclaimed. "Then will he have to go, really?" + +"I think he will," Clode replied, a glow of triumph warming his dark +face and kindling his eyes. "When Lord Dynmore left here yesterday he +drove straight to Mr. Bonamy's. You hardly believe it, do you? Well, +it is true, for I had it from a sure source. And, that being so, I do +not think Lindo will have much chance against such an alliance. It is +not as if he had many friends here, or had got on well with the +people." + +"The poor people like him," she urged. + +"Yes," Clode answered sharply. "He has spent money among them. It was +not his own, you see." + +It was a brutal thing to say, and she cast a glance of gentle reproof +at him. She did not remonstrate, however, but, slightly changing the +subject, asked, "But even if Mr. Lindo goes, are you sure of the +living?" + +"I think so," he answered, smiling confidently down at her. + +She looked puzzled. "How do you know?" she asked. "Did Lord Dynmore +promise it to you?" + +"No; I wish he had," he answered. "All the same, I think I am fairly +sure of it without the promise." And then he related to her what the +archdeacon had told him as to Lord Dynmore's intention of presenting +the curates in future. "Now do you see, Laura?" he asked. + +"Yes, I see," she answered, looking down and absently poking a hole in +the gravel with the point of her umbrella. + +"And you are content?" + +"Yes," she answered, looking up brightly from a little dream of the +rectory as it should be, when feminine taste had transformed it with +the aid of Persian rugs and old china and the hundred knickknacks +which are half a woman's life--"Yes, I am content, Mr. Clode." + +"Say 'Stephen.'" + +"I am quite content, Stephen," she answered obediently, a bright blush +for a moment mingling with her smile. + +He was about to make some warm rejoinder, when the sound of footsteps +approaching from the house diverted his attention, and he looked up. +The new-comer was Mrs. Hammond, also on her way into the town. She +waved her hand to him. "Good morning," she cried in her cheery +voice--"you are just the person I wanted to see, Mr. Clode. This is +good luck. Now, how is he?" + +"Who? Mrs. Hammond," said the curate, quite taken by surprise. + +"Who?" she replied warmly, reproach in her tone. She was a +kind-hearted woman, and the scene in her drawing-room had really cost +her a few minutes' sleep. "Why, Mr. Lindo, to be sure. Whom else +should I mean? I suppose you went in last night at once and told him +how much we all sympathized with him? Indeed, I hope you did not leave +him until you saw him well to bed, for I am sure he was hardly fit to +be left alone, poor fellow!" + +Mr. Clode stood silent, and looked troubled. Really, if it had +occurred to him, he would have called to see Lindo. But it had not +occurred to him, after what had happened--perhaps because he had been +busied about things which "seemed worth while." He regretted now, +since Mrs. Hammond seemed to think it so much a matter of course, that +he had not done so; the more as the omission compelled him to choose +his side earlier than he need have done. However, it was too late now. +So he shook his head. "I have not seen him, Mrs. Hammond," he said +gravely. "I have not been to the rectory." + +"What! you have not seen him?" she cried in amazement. + +"No, I have not," he answered, a slight tinge of hauteur in his +manner. After all, he reflected that he would have found it painful to +play another part before Laura after disclosing so much of his mind to +her. "What is more, Mrs. Hammond," he continued, "I am not anxious to +see him; for, to tell you the truth, I fear that the meeting could +only be a painful one." + +"Why, you do not mean to say," the lady answered in a low, +awe-stricken voice, "that you think he knew anything about it, Mr. +Clode?" + +"At any rate," the curate replied firmly, "I cannot acquit him." + +"Not acquit him!--Mr. Lindo!" she stammered. + +"No, I cannot," Clode replied, striving to express in his voice and +manner his extreme conscientiousness and the gloomy sense of +responsibility under which he had arrived at his decision. "I cannot +get out of my head," he continued, "Lord Dynmore's remark that, if the +circumstances aroused suspicion in my mind, they could scarcely fail +to apprise Mr. Lindo, who was more nearly concerned, of the truth, or +something like the truth. Mind!" the curate added with a great show of +candor, "I do not say, Mrs. Hammond, that Mr. Lindo knew. I only say I +think he suspected." + +"Well, _that_ is very good of you!" Mrs. Hammond exclaimed, displaying +a spirit and a power of sarcasm he had not expected. "I dare say Mr. +Lindo will be much obliged to you for _that!_ But, for my part, I +think it is a distinction without a difference!" + +"Oh, no!" the curate protested hastily. + +"Well, I think it is, at any rate!" retorted the lady, very red in the +face, and with all the bugles in her bonnet shaking. "However, +everyone to his opinion. But that is not mine, and I am sorry it is +yours. Why, you are his curate!" she added in a tone of indignant +wonder, which brought the blood to Clode's cheeks, and made him bite +his lip in impotent anger. "You ought to be the last person to doubt +him!" + +"Can I help it if I do?" he answered sullenly. + +"Mother," said Laura quickly, intercepting the angry reply which was +on Mrs. Hammond's lips, "if Mr. Clode thinks in that way, can he be +blamed for telling us? We are not the town. What he has told us he has +told us in confidence." + +"A confidence Mrs. Hammond has made me bitterly regret," he rejoined, +taking skilful advantage of her intervention. + +Mrs. Hammond grunted. She was still angry, but she felt herself +baffled. "Well, I do not understand these things, perhaps," she said. +"But I do not agree with Mr. Clode, and I am not going to pretend to." + +"I am sure he does not wish you to," said Laura sweetly. "Only you did +not quite understand, I think, that he was only giving us his private +opinion. Of course he would not tell it to the town." + +"Well, that makes a difference, of course," Mrs. Hammond allowed. "But +now, however, I will say good-morning! I shall go straight to the +rectory now and inquire. Are you coming, Laura?" + +Laura thought it better to go and with a bright little nod, tripped +off after her mother. Mr. Clode, thus deserted, walked slowly down the +drive, wondering whether he had been premature in his revolt. He did +not think so; and yet he wished he had not been so hasty--that he had +not shown his hand quite so early. The truth was, he had been a little +carried away by the events of the previous afternoon. But, even now, +the more he thought of it, the more hopeless seemed the rector's +position. Openly denounced by his patron as an impostor, at war with +his church-warden, disliked by a powerful section of the parish, one +action already commenced against him and another threatened--what else +could he do but resign? "He may say he will not to-day and to-morrow," +the curate thought, smiling darkly to himself, "but they will be too +much for him the day after." + +And whether Mr. Clode told this opinion of his in the own or not, it +was certainly a very common one. Never had Claversham been treated to +such a dish of gossip as this. On the evening of the bazaar, before +the unsold goods had been cleared from the tables, the wildest rumors +were already afloat in the town. The rector had been arrested; he had +decamped; he was to be tried for fraud; he was not in holy orders at +all; Mrs. Bedford would have to be married over again! With the +morning these reports died away, and something like the truth came to +be known--to the inexpressible satisfaction of Dr. Gregg and his like. +The doctor was in and out of half the houses in the town that day. +"Resign!" he would say with a shriek--"of course he will resign! And +glad to escape so easily!" Dr. Gregg, indeed, was in his glory now. +The parts were reversed. It was for him now to meet the rector with a +patronizing nod; only, for some reason best known to himself, and +perhaps connected with an essential distinction between the two men, +he preferred to celebrate his triumph figuratively, and behind Lindo's +back. + +What was said, and how it was said, can well be imagined. When a man +who for some cause has held his head a little above his neighbors +stumbles and falls, we know what is likely to be said of him. And the +young rector knew, and in his heart and in his study suffered +horribly. All the afternoon of the day after the bazaar he walked the +town with a smile on his face, ostensibly visiting in his district, +really vindicating his pride and courage. He carried his head as high +as ever, and the skirts of his long black coat fluttered as bravely as +before. Dr. Gregg, who saw him from the reading-room window, gave it +as his opinion that he did not know what shame meant. But at heart the +young man was unutterably miserable. He knew that inquisitive eyes +were upon his every gesture; that he was watched, jeered at, worst of +all--pitied. He guessed, as the day wore on, drawing the inference +from the curate's avoidance of him, that even Clode had deserted him; +and this, perhaps, almost as much as the resentment he harbored +against Lord Dynmore, hardened him in his resolve not to resign or +abate one tittle of his rights. + +He fancied he stood alone. But, of course, there were some who +sympathized with him, and some who held their tongues and declined to +commit themselves to any opinion. Among the latter Mr. Bonamy was +conspicuous--to the intense disgust of Dr. Gregg, whose first +expression, indeed, on hearing the news had been, "What nuts for +Bonamy!" As a fact, however, the snappish little doctor had never +found his friend so morose and unpleasant as when he tried to sound +him on this subject. He espied him on the other side of the street, +and rushed across, stuttering almost before he reached him, "Well? He +will have to resign, won't he?" + +"Who?" said Mr. Bonamy, standing still, and fixing his cold gray eyes +on the excited little man. "Who will have to resign?" + +"Why, the rector, to be sure!" rejoined Gregg, feeling the check +unpleasantly. + +"Will he?" + +"Well, I should say so," urged the doctor, now quite taken aback, and +gazing at the other with eyes of surprise. "But I suppose you know +best, Bonamy." + +"Then I am going to keep my knowledge to myself!" snarled the lawyer; +and, rattling a handful of silver in his pocket, he stalked away, his +hat on the back of his head, and his lank figure more ungainly than +usual. He was in the worst of tempers; angry with Lord Dynmore and +dissatisfied with himself--given to calling himself, half a dozen +times in an hour, a quixotic fool for having thrown away the earl's +business for the sake of a scruple that was little more than a whim. +It is all very well to have a queer rugged code of honor of one's own, +and to observe it; but when the observance sends away business--such +business as brings with it the social considerations which men prize +most highly when they most affect to despise it--why then a man is apt +to take out his self-denial in ill-temper. Mr. Bonamy did so. + +Dr. Gregg went away calling the lawyer a bear and an ill-bred fellow +who did not know his own friends. Alas! the same thing might have been +said, and with greater justice, of the rector. The archdeacon sat an +hour in his study, waiting patiently for him to return from his +district, and after all got but a sorry reception. The elder man +expressed, and expressed very warmly--he had come to do so--his full +belief in Lindo's honesty and good faith, and was greatly touched by +the effect his words produced upon the young fellow, who had come into +the room, after learning his visitor's presence, with set lips and +eyes of challenge, but had by-and-by to turn his back on his friend +and look out of the window, while in a very low tone he murmured his +thanks. But, alas! the archdeacon went farther, and let drop something +about concession, and then the boat was over! + +"Concession!" said the young man, turning as on a pivot, with every +hair of his whiskers bristling, and his voice clear enough now. "What +kind of concession do you mean?" + +"Well," said the archdeacon persuasively, "the earl is a choleric +man--a most passionate man, I know; and, when excited, utterly foolish +and wrong-headed. But in his cooler moments I do not know any one more +just or, indeed, more generous. And I feel sure that if you could +prevail on yourself to meet him half-way----" + +"By resigning?" snapped the rector, interrupting him point-blank with +the question. + +"Oh, no, no," said the archdeacon, "I do not mean that." + +"Then in what way? How?" + +But as the archdeacon really meant by resigning, he could not answer +the question, and the interview ended in Lindo roundly declaring, as +he walked up and down the room, "I will not resign! Understand that, +archdeacon! I will not resign! If Lord Dynmore can put me out, well +and good--let him. If not, I stay. He may be just or generous," +continued the young man scornfully--"all I know is that he insulted me +grossly, and as no gentleman would have insulted another." + +"He is passionate, and was taken by surprise," the archdeacon ventured +to say. But Lindo would not listen; and his visitor had presently to +go, fearing that he had done more harm than good by his mediation. As +for the rector, he was severely scolded later in the evening by Jack +Smith for having omitted to lay the letters offering him the living +before the archdeacon, or to explain to him the precise circumstances +under which he had accepted it. + +"But he said he did not doubt me," the rector urged rather +fractiously. + +"Pooh! that is not the point," the barrister retorted. "Of course he +does not. He knows you. But I want to put him in possession of such a +case as he may lay before others who do not know you. Look here, you +are acquainted with a man called Felton, are you not?" + +"Yes," Lindo answered, with a slight start. + +"Well, perhaps you are not aware that he has been to Lord Dynmore--so +the tale runs in the town, and I know it is true--and stated that you +have been for weeks bribing him to keep the secret." + +The rector sat motionless, staring at his friend. "I did not know it," +he said at last, quite quietly. He was becoming accustomed to +surprises of this kind. "It is a wicked lie, of course." + +"Of course," Jack assented tossing one leg easily over the other, and +thrusting his hands deep into his trousers' pockets. "But what do you +say to it?" + +"The man came to me," Lindo answered steadily, "and told me that he +was Lord Dynmore's servant, and that, crossing from America, he had +foolishly lost his money at play. He begged me to assist him until +Lord Dynmore's return, and I did so. Some ten days ago I discovered +that he was leading a disreputable life, and I stopped the allowance." + +"Thanks," said Jack, nodding his head. "That is precisely what I +thought. But the mischief of it is, you see, that the man's tale may +be true in his eyes. He may have believed that he was blackmailing +you. And therefore, since we cannot absolutely refute his story, it is +the more important that we should show as good a case as possible +_aliunde_. Nor does it make any difference," Jack continued drily, +"that the man, after seeing Lord Dynmore last night, has taken himself +quietly off this morning." + +"What! Felton?" the rector exclaimed, coming suddenly upright. + +"Yes. There is no doubt he has absconded. Bonamy's clerk has been +after him all day, and has discovered that he begged half-a-crown from +your curate, to whom he was seen speaking at the Top of the Town about +ten this morning. Since that time he has not been seen." + +"He may turn up yet," said the rector. + +"I do not think he will," the barrister replied, with a shrewd gleam +in his eyes. "But you must not flatter yourself that his disappearance +will do you any good. Of course some people will say that he was +afraid to remain and support a false statement. But more, I fear, will +lean to the opinion that he was got out of the way by some one--you, +for instance." + +"I see," said Lindo slowly, after a long pause. "Then it is the more +imperative that I should not dream of resigning." + +"I think so," said Jack. + + + + + CHAPTER XX. + + A SUDDEN CALL. + + +"Kate," said Daintry, looking up from a lesson book as her sister +entered the dining-room a few mornings after the bazaar, "are you +_never_ going to see old Peggy Jones again? I am sure that you have +not been near her for a fortnight?" + +"I ought to go, I know," Kate answered, pausing by the sideboard, with +a big bunch of keys dangling from her fingers and an absent expression +in her gray eyes. "I have not been for some time." + +"I should think you had not!" quoth Daintry severely. "You have hardly +been out of the house the last four days." + +A faint color stole into the elder girl's face, and, seeming suddenly +to recollect what she wanted, she turned and began to search in the +drawer behind her. She knew quite well that what Daintry said was +true--that she had not been out for four days. Jack had delivered the +rector's message to her, and she had listened with downcast eyes and a +grave composure--a composure so perfect that even the messenger who +held the clue in his hand was almost deceived by it. All the same, it +had made her very happy. The young rector appreciated at last the +motive which had led her to give him that strange warning. He was +grateful to her, and anxious to make her understand his gratitude. And +while she dwelt on this with pleasure, she foresaw with a strange +mingling of joy and fear, of anticipation and shrinking, that the +first time she met him abroad he would strive to make it still more +clear to her. + +So for four days, lest she should seem even to herself to be +precipitating the meeting, she had refrained from going out. Now, when +Daintry remarked upon the change in her habits, she blushed at the +thought that she might all the time have been exaggerating a trifle; +and, though she did not go out at once, in the course of the afternoon +she did issue forth, and called upon old Peggy. Coming back she had to +pass through the churchyard, and there, on the very spot where she had +once forced herself to address him, she met the rector. + +She saw him while he was still some way off, and before he saw her, +and she looked eagerly for any trace of the trouble of the last few +days. It had not changed him, at any rate. It had rather accentuated +him, she thought. He looked more boyish, more impetuous, more +independent than ever, as he came swinging along, his blond head +thrown back, his eyes roving this way and that, his long skirts +flapping behind him. Of defeat or humiliation he betrayed not a trace; +and the girl wondered, seeing him so calm and strong, if he had really +sent her that message--which seemed to have come from a man hard +pressed. + +A glance told her all this; and then he saw her, and, a flash of +recognition sweeping across his face, quickened his steps to meet her. +He seemed to be shaking hands with her before he had well considered +what he would say, for when he had gone through that ceremony, and +said "Good morning." he stood awkwardly silent. Then he said +hurriedly, "I have been waiting for some time to speak to you, Miss +Bonamy." + +"Indeed?" she said calmly. She wondered at her own self-control. + +"Yes," he answered, his color rising. "And I could not have met you in +a better place." + +"Why?" she asked. As if she did not know! The simplest woman is an +actress by nature. + +"Because," he answered, "it is well that I should do penance where I +sinned, Miss Bonamy," he continued impetuously, yet in a low voice, +and with his eyes on the ground. "I owe you a deep apology for my rude +thanklessness when I met you here last. You were right and I was +wrong; but if it had been the other way, still I ought not to have +behaved to you as I did. I thought--that is--I----" + +He faltered and stopped. He meant that he had thought that she was +playing into her father's hands, but he could hardly tell her that. +She understood, however, or guessed, and for the first time she +blushed. "Pray, do not say any more about it," she said hurriedly. + +"I did send you a message," he answered. + +"Oh, yes, yes," she replied, anxious only to put an end to his +apologies. + +"Well," he rejoined with a smile which did not completely veil his +earnestness, "I do find it a little more pleasant to look farther back +to our Oxford visit. But you are going this way. May I turn with you?" + +"I am only going home," Kate answered coldly. He had been humble +enough to her. He had said and looked all she had expected. But he was +not at all the crushed, beaten man whom she had looked to meet. He +was, outwardly at least, the same man who had once sought her society +for a few weeks and had then slighted her and shunned her to consort +with the Homfreys and their class. He had not said he was sorry for +_that_. + +He read her tone aright, and he colored furiously, growing in a second +a thousand times more confused than before. It was on the cards that +he would accept the rebuff, and leave her in resentment. Indeed, that +was his first impulse. But the consciousness, which the next moment +filled his mind, that he had deserved this, and perhaps the charm of +her gray eyes and proud downturned face, overcame him. "I will come a +little way with you, if you will let me," he said, turning and walking +by her side. + +Kate's heart gave a great leap. She understood both the first thought +and the second, the weaker impulse and the stronger one which mastered +it, and she would not have been a woman had she not felt her triumph. +She hastened to find something to say, and could think only of the +bazaar. She asked him if it had been a success. + +"The bazaar?" he said. "To tell you the truth, I am afraid I hardly +know. I should say so, now you ask me, but I have not given much +thought to it since. I have been too fully occupied with other +things," he added, a note of bitterness in his voice. "Ah! Miss +Bonamy," with a fresh change of tone, "what a good fellow your cousin +is!" + +"Yes, he is indeed!" she answered heartily. + +"I cannot tell you," he continued, "what generous help and support he +has given me during the last few days. He has been the greatest +possible comfort to me." + +She looked up at him impulsively. "He is Daintry's hero," she said. + +"Yes," he answered laughing, "I remember that her praise made me +almost jealous of him. That was when I first knew you--when I was +coming to Claversham, you remember, Miss Bonamy, full of pleasant +anticipations and hopes. The reality has been different. Jack has told +you, of course, of Lord Dynmore's strange attack upon me? But +perhaps," he added, checking himself, and glancing at her, "I ought +not to speak to you about it, as your father is acting for him." + +"I do not think he is," she murmured, looking straight before her. + +"But--it is true the only communication I have had since has been from +London--still I thought--I mean I was under the impression that Lord +Dynmore had at once gone to your father." + +"I think he saw him at the office," Kate answered, "but I believe my +father is not acting for him." + +"Do you know why?" said the rector bluntly. "Why he is not, I mean?" + +"No," she said--that and nothing more. She was too proud to defend her +father, though he had let drop enough in the family circle to enable +her to come to a conclusion, and she might with truth have made out a +story which would have set the lawyer in a light differing much from +that in which the rector was accustomed to view him. + +Reginald Lindo walked on considering the matter. Suddenly he said, +"The archdeacon thinks I ought to resign. What do you think, Miss +Bonamy?" + +Her heart began to beat quickly. He was seeking her advice!--asking +her opinion in this matter so utterly important to him, so absolutely +vital! For a moment she could not speak, she was so filled with +surprise. Then she said gently, her eyes on the pavement, "I do not +think I can judge." + +"But you must have heard--more I dare say than I have!" he rejoined +with a forced laugh. "Will you tell me what you think?" + +She looked before her, her face troubled. Then she spoke bravely. + +"I think you should judge for yourself," she said in a low tone, full +of serious feeling. "The responsibility is yours. I do not think that +you should depend entirely on any one's advice, but should try to do +right according to your conscience--not acting hastily, but coolly, +and on reflection." + +They were almost at Mr. Bonamy's door when she said this, and he +traversed the remainder of the distance without speaking. At the steps +he halted and held out his hand. "Thank you," he said simply. "I hope +I shall use this advice to better purpose than the last you gave me. +Please remember me to your sister. Good-by." + +She bowed silently and went in, and he turned back and walked up the +street. The dusk was falling. A few yards in front of him the lame +lamplighter was going his rounds, ladder on shoulder. In every other +shop the gas was beginning to gleam. The night was coming, was almost +come, yet still above the houses the sky, a pale greenish-blue, was +bright with daylight, against which the great tower of the church +stood up bulky and black. The young man was in a curious mood. Though +he walked the common pavement, he felt himself, as he gazed upward, +alone with his thoughts which went back, will he nill he, to his first +evening in Claversham. He remembered how free from reproach or +stumbling-blocks his path had seemed then, to what blameless ends he +had in fancy devoted himself. What works of thanksgiving, small but +beneficent as the tiny rills which steal downward through the ferns to +the pasture, he had planned. And in the centre of that past dream of +the future he pictured now--Kate Bonamy. Well, the reality had been +different. + +He was just beginning to wonder when he would be likely to meet her +again, and to dwell with curious pleasure on some of the details of +her dress and appearance, when the sudden clatter of hoofs behind him +caused him to turn his head. Far down the street a rider had just +turned the corner, and was now galloping up the middle of the roadway, +the manner in which he urged on his pony speaking loudly of disaster +and ill news. Opposite the rector he pulled up and cried out, "Where +is the doctor's, sir?" + +Lindo turned sharply round and rang the bell of the house behind him, +which happened to be Gregg's. + +"Here," he said briefly. "What is it, my man?" + +"An explosion in the Big Pit at Baerton," the man replied, almost +blubbering with excitement and the speed at which he had come. "There +is like to be fifty killed and as many hurt, I was told. But I came +straight off." + +"When did it happen?" Lindo asked, a wave of wild excitement following +his first impulse of horror. + +"About an hour and a quarter ago, as near as I can say," the +messenger, a farm laborer called from the plough, answered. + +Dr. Gregg was out, and the clergyman walked by the side of the horse, +a crowd gathering behind him as the news spread, to the house of Mr. +Keogh the other doctor, who fortunately lived close by. He was at +home, and, the messenger going in to tell him the particulars, in five +minutes his gig was at the door, The rector, who had gone in too, came +out with him, and, without asking leave, climbed to the seat beside +him. + +"Hallo!" said the surgeon, an elderly man, stout and white-haired, +"are you coming, too, Mr. Lindo?" + +"I think," the rector answered, "that there may be cases in which you +can do little and I much. Mr. Walker, the vicar of Baerton, is ill in +bed, I know; and as the news has come to me first, I think I ought to +go." + +"Right you are!" said Mr. Keogh gruffly. "Let go!" + +In another moment the fast trotting cob was whirling the two men down +the street. They turned the corner sharply, and as the breeze met them +on the bridge, compelling Lindo to turn up the collar of his coat and +draw the rug more closely round him, the church clock in the town +behind them struck the half-hour. "Half-past five," said the rector. +The surgeon did not answer. They were in the open country now, the +hedges speeding swiftly by them in the light of the lamps, and the +long outline of Bear Hill, a huge misshapen hump which rose into a +point at one end, lying dim and black before them. A night drive is +always impressive. In the gloom, in the sough of the wind, in the sky +serenely star-lit, in a tumult of hurrying clouds, in the rattle of +the wheels, in the monotonous fall of the hoofs, there is an appeal to +the sombre side of a man. How much more when the sough of the wind +seems to the imagination a cry of pain, and the night is a dark +background on which the fancy paints dying faces! At such a time the +cares of life, which day by day rise one beyond another and prevent us +dwelling over-much on the end, sink into pettiness, leaving us face to +face with weightier issues. + +"There have been accidents here before?" the clergyman asked, after a +long silence. + +"Thirty-five years ago there was one!" his companion answered, with a +groan which betrayed his apprehensions. "Good heavens, sir, I remember +it now! I was young then and fresh from the hospitals; but it was +almost too much for me!" + +"I hope that this one has been exaggerated," Lindo replied, entering +fully into the other's feelings. "I did not quite understand the man's +account; but, as far as I could follow it, one of the two shafts--the +downcast shaft I think it was---was jammed full of rubbish and +rendered quite useless." + +"Just what I expected!" ejaculated his companion. + +"And they could now communicate with the workings only through the +upcast shaft, in which they had rigged up some temporary lifting +gear." + +"Ay, and it is the deepest pit here," the surgeon chimed in, as the +horse began to breast the steeper part of the ascent, and the furnace +fires, before and above them, began to flicker and glow, now sinking +into darkness, now flaming up like beacon-fires. "The workings are two +thousand feet below the surface, man!" + +"Stop!" Lindo said. "Here is some one looking for us, I think." + +Two women with shawls over their heads came to the side of the gig. +"Be you the doctors?" said one of them; and then in another minute the +two were following her up the side of the cutting which here confined +the road. The hillside gained, they were hurried round pit-banks and +slag-heaps, and under cranes and ruinous sinking walls, and over and +under mysterious obstacles, sometimes looming large in the gloom and +sometimes lying unseen at their feet--until they emerged at length +with startling abruptness into a large circle of dazzling light. Four +great fires were burning close together, and round them, motionless +and for the most part silent, in appearance almost apathetic, stood +hundreds of dark shadows--men and women waiting for news. + +The silence and inaction of so large a crowd struck a chill to +Lindo's heart. When he recovered himself, he was standing in the midst +of a dozen rough fellows, some half-stripped, some muffled up in +pilot-jackets or coarse shiny clothes. The crowd seemed to be watching +them, and they spoke now and then to one another in a desultory +expectant fashion, from which he judged they were in authority. + +"It is a bad job--a very bad job!" his companion was saying nervously. +"Is there anything I can do yet?" + +"Well, that depends, doctor," answered one of the men, his manner of +speaking proving that he was not a mere working collier. "There is no +one up yet," he added, eyeing the doctor dubiously. "But it does not +exactly follow that you can do nothing. Some of us have just come up, +and there is a shift of men exploring down there now. Three bodies +have been recovered, and they are at the foot of the shaft; and three +poor fellows have been found alive, of whom one has since died. The +other two are within fifty yards of the shaft, and as comfortable as +we can make them. But they are bad--too bad to come up in a bucket; +and we can rig up nothing bigger at present so there they are fixed. +The question is, will you go down to them?" + +Mr. Keogh's face fell, and he shook his head. He was no longer young, +and to descend a sheer depth of five hundred yards in a bucket +dangling at the end of a makeshift rope was not in his line. "No, +thank you," he said, "I could not do it." + +"Come, doctor," the man persisted--he was the manager of a neighboring +colliery--"you will be there in no time." + +"Just so," said the surgeon drily. "It is the coming back is the rub, +you see, Mr. Peat. No, thank you, I could not." + +The other still urged him. "These poor fellows are about as bad as +they can be, and you know if the mountain will not go to Mahomet, +Mahomet must go to the mountain." + +"I know; and if it were a mountain, well and good," Mr. Keogh +answered, smiling in sickly fashion as his eye strayed to a black +well-like hole close at hand--a mere hole in some loose planks +surmounted by a windlass and fringed with ugly wreckage. "But it is +not. It is quite the other thing, you see." + +Mr. Peat, the manager, shrugged his shoulders, and glanced at his +companions rather in sorrow than surprise. Lindo, standing behind the +doctor, saw the look. Till then he had stood silent. Now he pressed +forward. "Did I hear you say that one of the injured men died after he +was found?" he asked. + +"Yes, that is so," the manager answered, looking keenly at him, and +wondering who he was. + +"The others that are hurt--are their lives in danger?" + +"I am afraid so," the man replied. + +"Then I have a right to be with them," the rector answered quickly. "I +am a clergyman, and I have hastened here, fearing this might be the +case. But I have also attended an ambulance class, and I can dress a +burn. Besides, I am a younger man than our friend here, and, if you +will let me down, I will go." + +"By George, sir!" exclaimed the manager, looking round for approval +and smiting his thigh heavily, "you are a man as well as a parson, and +down you shall go, and thank you! You may make the men more +comfortable, and any way you will put heart into them, for you have +some to spare yourself. As for danger, there is none!--Jack!"--this in +a louder voice to some one in the background--"just twitch that rope! +And get that tub up, will you? Look slippery now." + +Lindo felt a hand on his arm and, obeying the silent gesture of the +nearest gaunt figure, stepped aside. In a twinkling the man stripped +off the parson's long coat and put on him the pilot jacket from his +own shoulders; a second man gave Lindo a peaked cap of stiff leather +in place of his soft hat and a third fastened a pit lamp round his +neck, explaining to him how to raise the wick without unlocking the +lamp, and also showing him that, if it hung too much on one side or +were upset, its flame would expire of itself. And upon one thing Lindo +was never tired of dwelling afterward--the kindly tact of these rough +men, and how by seemingly casual words, and even touches, the roughest +sought to encourage him, while ignoring the possibility of his feeling +alarm. + +Meanwhile Mr. Keogh, standing in a state of considerable perplexity +and discomfiture where the rector had left him, heard a well-known +voice at his elbow, and turned to find that Gregg had arrived. The +younger doctor was not the man to be awed into silence, and, as he +came up, was speaking loudly. "Hallo, Mr. Keogh!" he said. "Heard you +were before me. Have you got them all in hand? Cuts or burns mostly, +eh?" + +"They are not above ground yet," Mr. Keogh answered. He and Gregg were +not on speaking; terms, but such an emergency as this was allowed to +override their estrangement. + +"Oh, then we shall have to wait," Gregg answered, looking round on the +scene with a mixture of curiosity and professional _aplomb_. "I wish I +had spared my horse. Any other medical man here?" + +"No; and they want one of us to go down in the bucket," Keogh +explained. "There are some injured men at the foot of the shaft. I +have a wife and children, and I thought that perhaps you----" + +"Would not mind breaking my neck!" Gregg retorted with decision. "No, +thank you, not for me I hope to have a wife and children some day, and +I will keep my neck for them. Go down!" he repeated, looking round +with extreme scorn. "Pooh! No one can expect us to do it! It is these +people's business, and they are used to it; but there is not a sane +man in the kingdom, besides, would go down that place after what has +just happened. It is a quarter of a mile as a stone falls, if it is an +inch!" + +"It is all that," assented the other, much relieved. + +"And a height makes me giddy," Dr. Gregg added. + +"I feel the same now," said his elder. + +"No; every man to his trade," Gregg concluded, settling the matter to +his satisfaction. "Let them bring them up, and we will doctor them. +But while they are below ground---- Hallo!" + +His last word was an oath of surprise and anger. Happening to glance +round, the doctor saw Lindo coming forward to the shaft, and +recognized him in spite of his disguise. One look, and Gregg would +cheerfully have given ten pounds either to have had the rector away, +or to have arrived a little later himself. He had reckoned already in +his own mind that, if no outsider went down, he could scarcely be +blamed for taking care of himself. But, if the rector went down, the +matter would wear a different aspect. And Dr. Gregg saw this so +clearly that he turned pale with rage and chagrin, and swore more +loudly than before. + + + + + CHAPTER XXI. + + IN PROFUNDIS. + + +The young clergyman's face, as he walked forward to the shaft, formed +no index to his mind, for while it remained calm and even wore a faint +smile, he was inwardly conscious of a strong desire to take hold of +anything which presented itself, even a straw. He stepped gravely into +the tub amid a low murmur, and, clutching the iron bar above it, felt +himself at a word of command lifted gently into the air, and swung +over the shaft. For an uncomfortable five seconds or so he remained +stationary; then there was a jerk--another--and the dark figures, the +lines of faces, and the glare of the fires leapt suddenly above his +head. He found himself dropping through space with a swift, sickening +motion, as of one falling away from himself. His heart rose into his +throat. There was a loud buzzing in his ears, and yet above this he +heard the dull rattling sound of the rope being paid out. Every other +sense was spent in the stern clutch of his hands on the bar above his +head. + +In a few seconds the horrible sensation of falling passed away. He was +no longer in space with nothing stable about him, but in a small tub +at the end of a tough rope. Except for a slight swaying motion, he +hardly knew that he was still descending; and presently a faint light, +more diffused than his own lamp, grew visible. Then he came gently to +a standstill, and some one held up a lantern to his face. With +difficulty he made out two huge figures standing beside him, who laid +hold of his tub and pulled it toward them until it rested on something +solid. "You are welcome," growled one, as, aided by a hand of each, +Lindo stepped out. "You will be the doctor, I suppose, master? Well, +this way. Catch hold of my jacket." + +Lindo obeyed, being only too glad of the help thus given him; for +though the men seemed to move about with ease and certainty, he could +make out nothing but shapeless gloom. "Now you sit right down there," +continued the collier, when they had moved a few yards, "and you will +get the sight of your eyes in a bit." + +He did as he was bid, and one by one the objects about him became +visible. His first feeling was one of astonishment. He had put a +quarter of a mile of solid earth between himself and the sunlight, and +yet, for all he could see, he might be merely in a cellar under a +street. He found himself seated on a rough bench, in a low-roofed, +windowless, wooden cabin, strangely resembling a very dirty London +office in a fog. True, everything was black--very black. On another +bench, opposite him, sat the two colliers who had received him, their +lamps between their knees. His first impulse was to tell them +hurriedly that he was not the doctor. "I am afraid you must be +disappointed," he added, "but I hope one will follow me down. I am a +clergyman, and I want to do something for those poor fellows, if you +will take me to them." + +The two men betrayed no surprise, but he who had spoken before quietly +poked up the wick of his lamp and held the lantern up so as to get a +good view of his face. "Ay, ay," he said, nodding, as he lowered it +again. "I thought you weren't unbeknown to me. You are the parson we +fetched to poor Lucas a while ago. Well, Jim will have a rare cageful +of his friends with him to-night." + +The rector shuddered. Such apathy, such matter-of-factness was new to +him. But though his heart sank as the collier rose and, swinging his +lamp in his hand, passed through the doorway, he made haste to follow +him; and the man's next words, "You had best look to your steps, +master, for there is a deal of rubbish come down"--pointing as they +did to a material danger--brought him, in the diversion of his +thoughts, something like relief. + +The road on which he found himself, being the main heading or highway +of the pit, was a good wide one. It was even possible to stand upright +in it. Here and there, however, it was partially blocked by falls of +coal caused by the explosion, and over one of these his guide put out +his hand to assist him. Lindo's lamp was by this time burning low. The +pitman silently took it and raised the wick, a grim smile distorting +his face as he handed it back. "You will be about the first of the +gentry," he muttered, "as has been down this pit without paying his +footing." + +Lindo took the words for a hint, and was shocked by the man's +insensibility. "My good fellow," he answered, "if that is all, you +shall have what you like another time. But for heaven's sake let us +think of these poor fellows now." + +The man turned on him and swore furiously. "Do you think I meant +that?" he cried, with another violent oath. + +The rector recoiled, not at the sound of the man's profanity, but in +disgust at his own mistake. Then he held out his hand. "My man," he +said, "I beg your pardon. It was I who was wrong." + +The giant looked at him with another stare, but made no answer, and a +dozen steps brought them to another cabin. Across the doorway--there +was no door--hung a rough curtain of matting. This the man raised, +and, holding his lamp over the threshold, invited the rector to look +in. "I guess," he added significantly, "that you would not have made +that mistake, master, after seeing this." + +Lindo peered in. On the floor, which was little more than six feet +square, lay four quiet figures, motionless, and covered with coarse +sacking. No human eye falling on them could have taken them for +anything but what they were. The visitor shuddered, as his guide let +the curtain fall again and muttered with a backward jerk of the head, +"Two of them I came down with this morning--in the cage." + +The rector had nothing to answer, and the man, preceding him to a +cabin a few yards farther on, invited him by a sign to enter, and +himself turned back the way they had come. A faint moaning warned +Lindo, before he raised the matting, what he must expect to see. +Instinctively, as he stepped in, his eyes sought the floor; and +although three pitmen crouching upon one of the benches rose and made +way for him, he hardly noticed them, so occupied was he with pitiful +looking at the two men lying on coarse beds on the floor. They were +bandaged and muffled almost out of human form. One of them was rolling +his sightless face monotonously to and fro, pouring out an unceasing +stream of delirious talk. The other, whose bright eyes met the +newcomer's with eager longing, paused in the murmur which seemed to +ease his pain, and whispered, "Doctor!" so hopefully that the sound +went straight to Lindo's heart. + +To undeceive him, and to explain to the others that he was not the +expected surgeon, was a bitter task with which to begin his +ministrations; but he was greatly cheered to find that, even in their +disappointment, they took his coming as a kindly thing, and eyed him +with surprised gratitude. He told them the latest news from the +bank--that a cage would be rigged up in a few hours at farthest--and +then, conquering his physical shrinking, he knelt down by the least +injured man and tried to turn his surgical knowledge to account. It +was not much he could do, but it certainly eased the poor man's +present sufferings. A bandage was laid more smoothly here, a little +cotton-wool readjusted there, a change of posture managed, a few +hopeful words uttered which helped the patient to fight against the +shock--so that presently he sank into a troubled sleep. Lindo tried to +do his best for the other also, terrible as was the task; but the +man's excitement and unceasing restlessness, as well as his more +serious injuries, made help here of little avail. + +When he rose, he found one of the watchers holding a cup of brandy +ready for him; and, sitting down upon the bench behind, he discovered +a coat laid there to make the seat more comfortable, though no one +seemed to have done it, or to be conscious of his surprise. They +talked low to him, and to one another, in a disjointed taciturn +fashion, with immense gaps and long intervals of silence. He learned +that there were twenty-seven men yet missing, but it was thought that +the afterdamp had killed them all. Those already found alive had been +in the main heading, where the current of air gave them a better +chance. + +One or other of the workers was continually going out to listen for +the return of the party who were exploring the workings near the foot +of the other shaft; and once or twice a member of this party, +exhausted or ill, looked in for a dose of tea or brandy, and then +stumbled out again to get himself conveyed to the upper air. These +looked curiously at the stranger, but, on some information being +muttered in their ears, made a point on going out of giving him a nod +which was full of tacit acknowledgment. + +In a quiet interval he looked at his watch and wound it up, finding +the time to be half-past two. The familiar action carried his mind +back to his neat, spotless bedroom at the rectory and the cares and +anxieties of everyday life, which had been forgotten for the last five +hours. Could it be so short a time, he asked himself, since he was +troubled by them? It seemed years ago. It seemed as if a gulf, deep as +the shaft down which he had come, divided him from them. And yet the +moment his thoughts returned to them the gulf became less, and +presently, although his eyes were still fixed upon the poor collier's +unquiet head and the murky cabin with its smoky lamp, he was really +back in Claversham, busied with those thoughts again, and pondering on +the time when he should be above ground. The things that had been +important before rose into importance again, but their relative +values among themselves were altered, in his eyes at any rate. With +what he had seen and heard in the last few hours fresh in his mind, +with the injured men lying still in his sight--one of them never to +see the sun again--he could not but take a different, a wider, a less +selfish view of life and its aims. His ideal of existence grew higher +and purer, his notion of success more noble. In the light of his own +self-forgetting energy and of others' pain he saw things as they +affected his neighbor rather than himself and so presently--not in +haste, but slowly in the watches of the night--he formed a resolution +which shall be told presently. The determinations to which men come at +such times are, in nine cases out of ten, as transitory as the +emotions on which they are based. But this time, and with this man, it +was not to be so. Kate Bonamy's words, bringing before his mind the +responsibility which rested upon him, had in a degree prepared him to +examine his position gravely and from a lofty standpoint; so that the +considerations which now assailed him could scarcely fail to have due +and lasting weight with him, and to leave impressions both deep and +permanent. + +He was presently roused from his reverie by a sound which caused his +companions to rise to their feet with the first signs of excitement +they had betrayed in their manner. It was the murmur of voices in the +heading, which, beginning far away, rapidly approached and gathered +strength. Going to the door of the cabin, he saw lights in the gallery +becoming each instant more clear. Then the forms of men coming on by +twos and threes rose out of the darkness. And so the procession wound +in, and Lindo found himself suddenly surrounded--where a moment before +no sounds but painful ones had been heard--by the hum and bustle, the +quick question and answers, of a crowd. For the men brought good news. +The missing were found; and though many of them were burned or +scorched, and others were suffering from the effects of the afterdamp, +the explorers brought back with them no still, ominous burden, nor +even any case of hopeless injury, such as that of the poor fellow in +delirium over whom his mates bent with the strange impassive patience +which seems to be a quality peculiar to those who get their living +underground. + +Not that Lindo at the time had leisure to consider their behavior. The +injured were brought to him as a matter of course, and he did what he +could with simple bandages and liniment to keep the air from their +wounds, and to enable the men to reach the surface with as little pain +as possible. For more than an hour, as he passed from one to the +other, his hands were never empty; he could think only of his work. +The deputy-manager, who had been leading the rescue party, was +thoroughly prostrated. The rest never doubted that the stranger was a +surgeon, and it was curious to see their surprise when the general +taciturnity allowed the news to spread that he was only a parson. They +were like savants with a specimen which, known to belong to a +particular species, has none of the class attributes, and sets at +defiance all preconceived ideas upon the subject. He, too, when he was +at length free to look about him, found matter for astonishment in his +own sensations. The cabin and the roadway outside, where the men sat +patiently waiting their turns to ascend, had become almost homelike in +his eyes. The lounging figures here thrown into relief by a score of +lamps, there lost in the gloom of the background, had grown familiar. +He knew that this was here and that was there, and had his receptacles +and conveniences, his special attendants and helpers. In a word, he +had made the place his own, yet without forgetting old habits--for +more than once he caught himself looking at his watch, and wondering +when it would be day. + +Toward seven o'clock a message directed to him by name came down. A +cage would be rigged up within the hour. Before that period elapsed, +however, he was summoned to see the poor fellow die who had been +delirious ever since he was found and who now passed away in the +same state. It was a trying scene coming just when the clergyman's +wrought-up nerves were beginning to feel a reaction--the more trying +as all looked to him to do anything that could be done. But that was +nothing; and he felt gravely thankful when the poor man's sufferings +were over and the throng of swarthy faces melted from the open +doorway. + +He sat apart a little after that until a commotion outside the cabin +and a cheery voice asking for Mr. Lindo summoned him to the door, +where he found the same manager who had sent him down the night +before, and who now greeted him warmly. "It is not for me to thank +you," Mr. Peat said--"I have nothing to do with this pit--the owner, +to whom what has happened will be reported, will do that; but +personally I am obliged to you, Mr. Lindo, and I am sure the men are." + +"I wanted only to be of help," the clergyman answered simply. "There +was not much I could do." + +"Well, that is a matter of opinion," the manager replied. "I have +mine, and I know that the men who have come up have theirs. However, +here is the cage; perhaps you will not mind going up with poor +Edwards?" + +"Not at all," said the rector; and, following the manager to the cage, +he stepped into it without any suspicion that this was a trick on the +part of Mr. Peat to insure his volunteer's services being recognized. + +He found the ascent a very different thing from the descent. The +steady upward motion was not unpleasant, and long before the surface +was reached his eyes, accustomed to darkness, detected a pale gleam of +light stealing downward, and could distinguish the damp brickwork +gliding by. Presently the light grew stronger--grew dazzling in its +wonderful whiteness. "We are going up nicely," his companion murmured, +remembering in his gratitude that the ascent, which was a trifle to +him even with shattered nerves, might be unpleasant to the other--"we +are nearly there." + +And so they were; and slowly and gently they rose into the broad +daylight and the sunshine which seemed to proclaim to the rector's +heart that sorrow may endure for a night, but joy comes in the +morning. + +Standing densely packed round the pit's mouth was a great crowd--a +crowd, at any rate, of many hundreds. They greeted the appearance of +the cage with a quick drawing-in of the breath and a murmur of pity. +Lindo's face and hands were as black as any collier's; his dress +seemed at the first glance as theirs. But as he helped to lift his +injured companion out and carry him to the stretcher which stood at +hand, the word who he was ran round; and, though no one spoke, the +loudest tribute could scarcely have been more eloquent than the +respect with which the rough assemblage fell away to right and left +that he might pass out to the trap which had been thoughtfully +provided--first to carry him to the vicarage for a wash, and afterward +to take him home. His heart was full as he walked down the lane, every +man standing uncovered, and the women gazing on him with unspoken +blessings in their eyes. + +A very few hours before he had felt at war with the world. He had +said, not perhaps that all men were liars, but that they were unjust, +full of prejudice and narrowness, and ill-will; that, above all, they +judged without charity. Now, as the pony-cart rattled down the road +through the cutting, and the sunny landscape, the winding river, and +the plain round Claversham opened before him, he felt far otherwise. +He longed to do more for others than he had done. He dwelt with wonder +on the gratitude which services so slight had evoked from men so rough +as those from whom he had just parted; and unconsciously he placed the +balance in their favor to the general account of the world, and +acknowledged himself its debtor. + + + + + CHAPTER XXII. + + THE RECTOR'S DECISION. + + +The church clock was striking nine as the rector, jogging along behind +the little pony, came in sight of the turnpike-house outside the town. +He had no overcoat, and the drive had chilled him; and, anxious at +once to warm himself and to reach the rectory as quietly as possible, +he bade the driver stop at the gate and set him down. The lad had been +strictly charged to see the parson home, and would have demurred, but +Lindo persisted good-humoredly, and had his way. In two minutes he was +striding briskly along the road, his shoulders squared, and the +night's reflections still running like a rich purple thread through +the common stuff of his every-day thoughts. + +In this mood, which the pure morning air and crisp sunshine tended to +favor and prolong, he came at a corner plump upon Mr. Bonamy, who, +like all angular, uncomfortable men, was an early riser, and had this +morning chosen to extend his before-breakfast walk in the direction of +Baerton. The lawyer's energy had already been rewarded. He had met Mr. +Keogh, and learned not only the earlier details of the accident--which +were, indeed, known to all Claversham, for the town had sat up +into the small hours listening for wheels and discussing the +catastrophe--but had further received a minute description of the +rector's conduct. Consequently his thoughts were already busy with the +clergyman when, turning a corner, he came unexpectedly upon him. + +Lindo met his glance and looked away hastily. The rector had +been anxious to avoid, by going home at once, any appearance of +parading what he had done, and he would have passed on with a brief +good-morning. But the lawyer seemed to be differently disposed. He +stopped short in the middle of the path, so that the clergyman could +not pass him without rudeness, and nodded a jerky greeting. "You have +not walked all the way, I suppose, Mr. Lindo?" he said, his keen small +eyes reading the other's face like a book. + +"No," the rector answered, coloring uncomfortably under his gaze. "I +drove as far as the turnpike, Mr. Bonamy." + +"Well, you may think yourself lucky to be well out of it," the lawyer +rejoined, with a dry smile. "To be here at all, indeed," he continued, +with a gesture of the hand which seemed meant to indicate the sunshine +and the upper air. "When a man does a foolhardy thing he does not +always escape, you know." + +The younger man reddened. But this morning he had his temper well +under control and he merely answered, "I thought I was called upon to +do what I did, Mr. Bonamy. But of course that is a matter of opinion. +Perhaps I was wrong, perhaps right. I did what I thought best at the +moment, and I am satisfied." + +Mr. Bonamy shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, well, every man to his +notion," he said. "I do not approve, myself, of people running risks +which do not lie within the scope of their business. And as nothing +has happened to you----" + +"The risk of anything happening," the rector rejoined, with warmth, +"was so small that the thing is not worth discussing, Mr. Bonamy. +There is a matter, however," he continued, changing the subject on a +sudden impulse, "which I think I may as well mention to you now as +later. You, as churchwarden, have in fact, a right to be informed of +it. I----" + +"You are cold," said Mr. Bonamy abruptly. "Allow me to turn with you." + +The rector bowed and complied. The request, however, had checked the +current of his speech, even the current of his thoughts, and he did +not finish his sentence. He felt, indeed, for a moment a temptation as +sudden as it was strong. He saw at a glance what his resolve meant. He +discerned that what had appeared to him in the isolation of the night +an act of dignified self-surrender must, and would, seem to others an +acknowledgment of defeat--almost an acknowledgment of dishonor. He +recalled, as in a flash, all the episodes of the struggle between +himself and his companion. And he pictured the latter's triumph. He +wavered. + +But the events of the night had not been lost upon him, and, after a +brief hesitation, he set the seal on his purpose. "You are aware, I +know, Mr. Bonamy," he said, "of the circumstances under which, in Lord +Dynmore's absence, I accepted the living here." + +"Perfectly," said the lawyer drily. + +"He has made those circumstances the subject of a grave charge against +me," the rector continued, a touch of hauteur in his tone. "That you +have heard also, I know. Well, I desire to say once more that I +repudiate that charge in the fullest and widest sense." + +"So I understand," Mr. Bonamy murmured. He walked along by his +companion's side, his face set and inscrutable. If he felt any +surprise at the communication now being made to him he had the skill +to hide it. + +"I repudiate it, you understand!" the clergyman repeated, stepping out +more quickly in his excitement, and glaring angrily into vacancy. "It +is a false and wicked charge! But it does not affect me. I do not care +a jot for it. It does not in any sense force me to do what I am going +to do. If that were all, I should not dream of resigning the living, +but, on the contrary, would hold it, as a few days ago I had +determined to hold it, in the face of all opposition. However," he +continued, lowering his tone, "I have now examined my position in +regard to the parish rather than the patron, and I have come to a +different conclusion, Mr. Bonamy--namely, to place my resignation in +the proper hands as speedily as possible." + +Mr. Bonamy nodded gently and silently. He did not speak, he did not +even look at the clergyman; and this placid acquiescence irritated the +young man into adding a word he had not intended to say. "I tell you +this as my church-warden, Mr. Bonamy," he continued stiffly, "and not +as desiring or expecting any word of sympathy or regret from you. On +the contrary," he added, with some bitterness, "I am aware that my +departure can be only a relief to you. We have been opposed to one +another since my first day here." + +"Very true," said Mr. Bonamy. "I suppose you have considered----" + +"What?" + +"The effect which last night's work may have on the relations between +you and Lord Dynmore?" + +"I do not understand you," the rector answered haughtily, and yet with +some wonder. What did the man mean? + +"You know, I suppose," Mr. Bonamy retorted, turning slightly so as to +command a view of his companion's face, "that he is the owner of the +Big Pit at Baerton from which you have just come?" + +"Lord Dynmore is?" + +"To be sure." + +A flush of crimson swept over the rector's brow and left him red and +frowning. "I did not know that!" he said, his teeth set together. + +"So I perceive," the lawyer replied, with a nod. "But I can reassure +you. It is not at all likely to affect the earl's plans. He is an +obstinate man, though in some points a good-natured one, and he will +most certainly accept your resignation if you send it in. But here you +are at home." He paused, standing awkwardly by the clergyman's side. +Then he added, "It is a comfortable house. I do not think that there +is a more comfortable house in Claversham." + +He retired a few steps into the churchyard as he spoke, and stood +looking up at the massive old-fashioned front of the rectory, as if he +had never seen the house before. The clergyman, anxious to be indoors +and alone, shot an impatient glance at him, and waited for him to go. +But he did not go, and presently something in his intent gaze drew +Lindo, too, into the churchyard, and the two ill-assorted companions +looked up together at the old gray house. The early sun shone aslant +on it, burnishing the half-open windows. In the porch a robin was +hopping to and fro. "It is a comfortable, roomy house," the lawyer +repeated. + +"It is," the rector answered slowly, as if the words were wrung from +him. And he, too, stood looking up at it as if he were fascinated. + +"A man might grow old in it," murmured Mr. Bonamy. There was a slight, +but very unusual, flush on his parchment-colored face, and his eyes, +when he turned with an abrupt movement to his companion, did not rise +above the latter's waistcoat. "Comfortably too, I should say," he +added querulously, rattling the money in his pockets. "I think if I +were you I would reconsider my determination. I think I would, do you +know? As it is, what you have told me will not go any farther. You did +one foolish thing last night. I would not do another to-day, if I were +you, Mr. Lindo." + +And he turned abruptly away--his head down, his coat-tails swinging, +and both his hands thrust deep into his trouser-pockets--such a +shrewd, angular, ungainly figure as only a small country town can +show. He left the rector standing before his rectory in a state of +profound surprise and bewilderment. The young man felt something very +like a lump in his throat as he turned to go in. He discerned that the +lawyer had meant to do a kind, nay, a generous action; and yet if +there was a man in the world whom he had judged incapable of such +magnanimity it was Mr. Bonamy! He went in not only touched, but +ashamed. Here, if he had not already persuaded himself that the world +was less ill-conditioned than he had lately thought it, was another +and a surprising lesson! + +Meanwhile Mr. Bonamy went home, and finding his family already at +breakfast, sat down to the meal in a very snappish humor. The girls +were quick to detect the cloud on his brow, and promptly supplied his +wants, forbearing, whatever their curiosity, to make any present +attempt to satisfy it. Jack was either less observant or more hardy. +He remarked that Mr. Bonamy was late, and elicited only a grunt. A +further statement that the morning was more like April than February +gained no answer at all. Still undismayed, Jack tried again, plunging +into the subject which the three had been discussing before the lawyer +entered. "Did you hear anything of Lindo, sir?" he asked, buttering +his toast. + +"I saw him," the lawyer said curtly. + +"Was he ail right?" + +"More right than he deserved to be!" Mr. Bonamy snarled. "What right +had he down the pit at all? Gregg did not go." + +"More shame to Gregg, I think!" Jack said. + +Mr. Bonamy prudently shifted his ground, and got back to the rector. +"Well, all I can say is that a more foolish, reckless, useless piece +of idiocy I never heard of in my life!" he declared in a tone of +scorn. + +"I call it glorious!" said Daintry, looking dreamily across the table +and slowly withdrawing an egg-spoon from her mouth. "I shall never say +anything against him again." + +Mr. Bonamy looked at her for an instant as if he would annihilate her. +And then he went on with his breakfast. + +Apparently, however, the outburst had relieved him, for presently he +began on his own account. + +"Has your friend any private means?" he asked, casting an ungracious +glance at the barrister, and returning at once to his buttered toast. + +"Who? Lindo, do you mean?" Jack replied in surprise. + +"Yes." + +"Something, I should say. Perhaps a hundred a year. Why?" + +"Because, if that is all he has," the lawyer growled, buttering a +fresh piece of toast and frowning at it savagely, "I think that you +had better see him and prevent him making a fool of himself. That is +all." + +His tone meant more than his words expressed. Kate's eyes sought +Jack's in alarm, only to be instantly averted. Though she had the urn +before her, she turned red and white, and had to bury her face in her +cup to hide her discomposure. Yet she need not have feared. Mr. Bonamy +was otherwise engaged, and as for Jack, her embarrassment told him +nothing of which he was not already aware. He knew that his service +was and must be a thankless and barren service--that to him fell the +empty part of the slave in the triumph. Had he not within the last few +hours--when the news that the rector had descended the Big Fit to tend +the wounded and comfort the dying first reached the town, and a dozen +voices were loud in his praise--had he not seen Kate's face now bright +with triumph and now melting with tender anxiety. Had he not felt a +bitter pang of jealousy as he listened to his friend's praises? and +had he not crushed down the feeling manfully, bravely, heroically, and +spoken as loudly, ay, and as cordially after an instant's effort, as +the most fervent? + +Yes, he had done all this and suffered all this, being one of those +who believe that + + + Loyalty is still the same, + Whether it win or lose the game: + True as the dial to the sun, + Although it be not shone upon. + + +And he was not going to flinch now. He put no more questions to Mr. +Bonamy, but, when breakfast was finished, he got up and went out. It +needed not the covert glance which he shot at Kate as he disappeared, +to assure her that he was going about her unspoken errand. + +Five minutes saw him face to face with the rector on the latter's +hearth-rug. Or, rather, to be accurate, five minutes saw him staring +irate and astonished at his host while Lindo, with one foot on the +fender and his eyes on the fire, seemed very willing to avoid his +gaze. "You have made up your mind to resign!" Jack exclaimed, in +accents almost awe-stricken. "You are joking!" + +But the rector, still looking down, shook his head. "No, Jack, I am +not," he said slowly. "I am in earnest." + +"Then may I ask when you came to this extraordinary resolution?" the +barrister retorted. "And why?" + +"Last night; and because--well, because I thought it right," was the +answer. "You thought it right?" + +Jack's tone was a fine mixture of wonder, contempt, and offence. It +made Lindo wince, but it did not shake his resolution. "Yes," he said +firmly. "That is so." + +"And that is all you are going to tell me, is it? You put yourself in +my hands a few days ago. You took my advice and acted upon it, and +now, without a word of explanation, you throw me over! Good heavens! I +have no patience with you!" Jack added, beginning to walk up and down +the room. "Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday? Tell me +that." + +"Well," the rector began, turning and speaking slowly, "the truth +is----" + +"No!" cried the barrister, interrupting him ruthlessly. "Tell me this +first. Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday?" + +"It is, but the view I take of it is different," the young clergyman +answered earnestly. "Let me explain, Jack. When I agreed with you a +few days ago that the proper course for me to follow, the course which +would most fitly assert my honesty and good faith, was to retain the +living in spite of threats and opposition, I had my own interests and +my own dignity chiefly in view. I looked upon the question as one +solely between Lord Dynmore and myself; and I felt, rightly as I still +think, that, as a man falsely accused by another man, I had a right to +repel the charge by the only practical means in my power--by +maintaining my position and defying him to do his worst." + +He paused. + +"Well," said Jack drily. + +But the rector did not continue at once, and when he did speak it was +with evident effort. He first went back to the fire, and stood gazing +into it in the old attitude, with his head slightly bowed and his foot +on the fender. The posture was one of humility, and so unlike the man, +that it struck Jack and touched him strangely. At last Lindo did +continue. "Well," he said slowly, "that was all right as far as it +went. My mistake lay in taking too narrow a view. I thought only of +myself and Lord Dynmore, when I should have been thinking of the +parish and of--a word I know you are not very fond of--the Church. I +should have remembered that with this accusation hanging over me I +could not hope to do much good among my people; and that to many of +them I should seem an interloper, a man clinging obstinately to +something not his own nor fairly acquired. In a word, I ought to +have remembered that for the future I should be useless for good and +might, on the other hand, become a stumbling-block and occasion for +scandal--both inside the parish and outside. You see what I mean, I am +sure." + +"I see," quoth Jack contemptuously, "that you need a great many words +to make out your case. What I do not think you have considered is the +inference which will be drawn from your resignation--you will be taken +to have confessed yourself in the wrong." + +"I cannot help that." + +"Will not that be a scandal?" + +"It will, at any rate, be one soon forgotten." + +"Now, I tell you what!" Jack exclaimed, standing still and confronting +the other with the air of a man bent on speaking his mind though the +heavens should fall. "This is just a piece of absurd Quixotism, Lindo. +You are a poor man, without means and without influence; and you are +going, for the sake of a foolish idea--a mere speculative scruple--to +give up an income and a house and a useful sphere of work such as you +will never get again! You are going to do that, and go back--to what? +To a miserable curacy--don't wince, my friend, for that is what you +are going to do--and an income one-fifth of that which you have been +spending for the last six months! Now the sole question is, are you +quite an idiot?" + +"You are pretty plain-spoken," said the rector, smiling feebly. + +"I mean to be!" was Jack's uncompromising retort. "I have asked you, +and I want an answer--are you a fool?" + +"I hope not." + +"Then you will give up this fool's notion?" Jack replied viciously. + +But the rector's only answer was a shake of the head. He did not look +round. Had he done so, he would have seen that, though Jack's keen +face was flushed with anger and annoyance, his eyes were moist and +wore an expression at variance with his tone. + +He missed that, however; and Jack made one more attempt. "Look here," +he said bluntly; "have you considered that if you stop you will find +your path a good deal smoothed by last night's work?" + +"No, I have not," the rector answered stubbornly. + +"Well, you will find it so, you may be sure of that! Why, man alive!" +Jack continued with vehemence, "you are going to be the hero of the +place for the time. No one will believe anything against you, except, +perhaps, Gregg and a few beasts of his kind. Whereas, if you go now, +do you know who will get your berth?" + +"No." + +Jack rapped out the name. "Clode! Clode, and no one else, I will be +bound!" he said. "And you do not love him." + +The rector had not expected the reply. He started, and, removing his +foot from the fender, turned sharply so as to face his friend. "No," +he said slowly, "I do not think I do like him. I consider that he has +behaved badly, Jack. He has not stood by me as he should have done, or +as I would have stood by him had our positions been reversed. I do not +think he has called here once since the bazaar, except on business, +and then I was out. I had planned, indeed, to see him to-day and ask +him what it meant, and, if I found he had come to an adverse opinion +in my matter, to give him notice. But now----" + +"You will make him a present of the living instead," Jack said grimly. + +"I do not know why he should get it," the rector answered, with a +frown, "more than any one else." + +"It is the common report that he will," Jack retorted. "As for that, +however----" + +But why follow him through all the resources of his art? He put forth +every effort--perhaps against his own better judgment, for a man will +do for his friend what he will not do for himself--to persuade the +rector to recall his decision. And he failed. He succeeded, indeed, in +wringing the young clergyman's heart and making him wince at the +thought of his barren future and his curate's triumph; but there his +success ended. He made no progress toward inducing him to change his +mind; and presently he found that all the arguments he advanced were +met by a set formula, to which the rector seemed to cling as in +self-defence. + +"It is no good, Jack," he answered--and if he said it once, he said it +half a dozen times--"it is no good! I cannot take any one's advice on +this subject. The responsibility is mine, and I cannot shift it! I +must try to do right according to my own conscience!" + +Jack did not know that the words were Kate's, and that every time the +rector repeated them he had Kate in his mind. But he saw that they +were unanswerable; and when he had listened to them for the sixth time +he took up his hat in a huff. "Well, have our own way!" he said. +"After all, you are right. It is your business and not mine. Give +Clode the living if you like!" + +And he went out sharply. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIII. + + THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS. + + +Seldom, if ever, had the curate passed a week so harassing as that +which was ushered in by the bazaar, and was destined to end--though he +did not know this--in the colliery accident. During these seven days +he managed to run through a perfect gamut of feelings. He rose each +day in a different mood. One day he was hopeful, confident, assured of +success; the next fearful, despondent, inclined to give up all for +lost. One day he went about telling himself that the rector would not +resign; that he would not resign himself in his place; that people +were mad to say he would; that men do not resign livings so easily; +that the very circumstances of the case must compel the rector to +stand his ground. The next he saw everything in a different light. He +appreciated the impossibility of a man attacked on so many sides +maintaining his position for any length of time. One hour he bitterly +regretted that he had cut himself off from his chief, the next he +congratulated himself as sincerely on being untrammelled by any but a +formal bond. Why, people might even have expected him, had he strongly +supported the rector, to refuse the living! + +He saw Laura several times during the week, but he did not open to her +the extent of his hopes and fears. He shrank from doing so out of a +natural prudent reticence; which after all meant only the refraining +from putting into words things perfectly understood. To some extent he +kept up between them the thin veil of appearances, which many who go +through life in closest companionship, preserve to the end, though +each has long ago found it transparent. But though he said nothing, +confining the tumult of his feelings to his own breast, he was not +blind, and he soon perceived that Laura shared his suspense, and was +watching the rector's fortunes with an interest as selfish and an eye +as cold as his own. Which, far from displeasing him, rather increased +his ardor. + +As the days passed by, however, bringing only the sickness of hope +deferred and tidings of the rector's sturdy determination to hold what +he had got, the curate began, not in a mere passing mood, but, on +grounds of reason and calculation, to lose hope. Every tongue in the +town was wagging about Lindo. My lord was, or was supposed to be, +setting the engines of the law in motion. Mr. Bonamy was believed, +probably with less reason, to be contemplating an appeal to the bishop +and the Court of Arches. In a word, all the misfortunes which Clode +had foreseen were accumulating about the devoted head; and yet--and +yet it was a question whether the owner of the head was a penny the +worse! Perhaps some day he might be. The earl was a great man, with a +long purse, and he might yet have his way. But this was not likely to +happen, as the curate now began to see, until long after the Rev. +Stephen Clode's connection with the parish and claim upon the living +should have become things of the past. + +On the top of this conviction, which sufficiently depressed him, came +the news of the colliery accident--news which did not reach him until +late at night. It plunged him into the depth's of despair. He cursed +the ill-luck which had withheld from him the opportunity of +distinguishing himself, and had granted it to the rector. He saw how +fatally the affair would strengthen the latter's hands. And in effect +he gave up. He resigned himself to despair. He had not the spirit to +go out, but sat until long after noon, brooding miserably over the +fire, his table littered with unremoved breakfast things, and his mind +in a similar state of slovenly disorder. That was a day, a miserable +day, he long remembered. + +About half-past two he made an effort to pull himself together. +Mechanically putting a book in his pocket, he took his hat and went +out, with the intention of paying two or three visits in his district. +He had pride enough left to excite him to the effort, and sufficient +sense to recognize its supreme importance. But, even so, before he +reached the street he was dreaming again--the old dreary dreams. He +started when a voice behind him said brusquely, "Going your rounds, I +see! Well, there is nothing like sticking to business, whatever is on +foot. Shall I have to congratulate you this time?" + +He knew the voice and turned round, a scowl on his dark face. The +speaker was Gregg--Gregg wearing an air of unusual jauntiness and +gaiety. It fell from him, however, as he met the other's eyes, leaving +him, metaphorically speaking, naked and ashamed. The doctor stood in +wholesome dread of the curate's sharp tongue and biting irony, nor +would he have accosted him in so free-and-easy a manner now, had he +not been a little lifted above himself by something he had just +learned. + +"Congratulate me? What do you mean?" Clode replied, turning on him +with the uncompromising directness which is more "upsetting" to a man +uncertain of himself than any retort, however discourteous. + +"What do I mean?" the doctor answered, striving to cover his +discomfiture with a feeble smile. "Well, no harm, at any rate, Clode. +I hope I shall have to congratulate you. But if you are going to----" + +"On what?" interrupted the curate sternly. "On what are you going to +congratulate me?" + +"Haven't you heard the news?" Gregg said in surprise. + +"What news? Of the pit accident?" Clode answered, restraining with +difficulty a terrible outburst of passion. "Why I should think there +is not a fool within three counties has not heard it by this time!" + +He almost swore at the man, and was turning away, when something in +the doctor's "No, no!" struck him, excited as he was, as peculiar. +"Then what is it?" he said, hanging on his heel, half curious and half +in scorn. + +"You have not heard about the rector?" + +The curate glared. "About the rector?" he said in a mechanical way. A +sudden stillness fell on his face and tone at mention of the name. +"No, what of him?" he continued, after another pause. + +"You have not heard that he is resigning?" Gregg asked. + +The curate's eyes flashed with returning anger. "No," he said grimly. +"Nor any one else out of Bedlam!" + +"But it is so! It is true, I tell you!" the doctor answered in the +excitement of conviction. "I have just seen a man who had it from the +archdeacon, who left the rectory not an hour ago. He is going to +resign at once." + +The curate did not again deny the truth of the story. But he seemed to +Gregg, watching eagerly for some sign of appreciation, to take the +news coolly, considering how important it was to him. He stood silent +a moment, looking thoughtfully down the street, and then shrugged his +shoulders. That was all. Gregg did not see the little pulse which +began to beat so furiously and suddenly in his cheek, nor hear the +buzzing which for a few seconds rendered him deaf to the shrill cries +of the schoolboys playing among the pillars of the market hall. + +"Mr. Lindo has changed his mind since yesterday, then," Clode said at +last, speaking in his ordinary rather contemptuous tone. + +"Yes, I heard he was talking big then," replied the doctor, delighted +with his success. "Defying the earl, and all the rest of it. That was +quite in his line. But I never heard that much came of his talking. +However, you are bound to stick up for him, I suppose." + +The curate frowned a little at that--why, the doctor did not +understand--and then the two parted. Gregg went on his way to carry +the news to others, and Clode, after standing a moment in thought, +turned his steps toward the Town House. The sky had grown cloudy, the +day cold and raw. The leafless avenue and silent shrubberies through +which he strode presented but a wintry prospect to the common eye, but +for him the air was full of sunshine and green leaves and the songs of +birds. From despair to hope, from a prison to a palace, he had leapt +at a single bound. In the first intoxication of confidence he could +even spare a moment to regret that his hands were not _quite_ clean. +He felt a passing remorse for the doing of one or two things, as +needless, it now turned out, as they had been questionable. Nay, he +could afford to shudder, with a luxurious sense of danger safely +passed, at the risks he had been so foolish as to run; thanking +Providence that his folly had not landed him, as he now saw that it +easily might have landed him, in such trouble as would have +effectually tripped up his rising fortunes. + +He reached the Town House in a perfect glow of moral worth and +self-gratulation; and he was already half-way across the drawing-room +before he perceived that it contained, besides Mrs. Hammond and her +daughter, a third person. The third person was the rector. Except in +church the two men had not met since the day of the bazaar, and both +were unpleasantly surprised. Lindo rose slowly from a seat in one of +the windows, and, without stepping forward, stood silently looking at +his curate, as one requiring an explanation, not offering a greeting; +while Clode felt something of a shock, for he discerned at once that +the situation would admit of no half measures. In the presence of Mrs. +Hammond, to whom he had expressed his view of the rector's conduct, he +could not adopt the cautious apologetic tone which he would probably +have used had he met Lindo alone. He was fairly caught. But he was not +a coward, and before the tell-tale flush had well mounted to his brow +he had determined on his _role_. + +Half-way across the room he stopped, and looked at Mrs. Hammond. "I +thought you were alone," he said with an air of constraint, partly +real, partly assumed. + +"There is only the rector here," she answered bluntly. And then she +added, with a little spice of malice, for Mr. Clode had not been a +favorite with her since his defection, "I suppose you are not afraid +to meet him?" + +"Certainly not," the curate answered, thus challenged. And he turned +haughtily to meet the rector's angry gaze. "I am not aware that I have +any need to be. I am glad to see that you are none the worse for your +gallant conduct last night," he added with perfect _aplomb_. + +"Thank you," Lindo answered, choking down his indignation with an +effort. For a week--for a whole week--this, his chosen lieutenant, had +not been near him in his trouble! "I am much obliged to you," he +continued, "but I am rather surprised that your anxiety on my account +did not lead you to come and see me at the rectory." + +"I called, and failed to find you," Clode answered, sitting resolutely +down. + +Lindo followed his example. "I believe you did once," he replied +contemptuously. Had a friend been about to succeed him, he could have +borne even to congratulate him. But the thought of this man entering +on the enjoyment of all the good things he was resigning was well-nigh +unendurable. Though he knew that it would best consort with his +dignity to be silent, he could not refrain from pursuing the subject. +"You thought," he went on, the same gibe in his tone, "that a +non-committal policy was best, I suppose?" + +The curate for a moment sat silent, his dark face glowing with +resentment. "If you mean," he said at last, neither Mrs. Hammond nor +her daughter venturing to interfere--the former because she thought he +was only getting his deserts, and the latter because she felt no call +to champion him at present--"if you mean that I did not wish to +publish my opinion, you are right, Mr. Lindo." + +"I think you published it sufficiently for your purpose'" the young +rector retorted with bitterness. + +"Then why throw my non-committal policy in my teeth?" replied the +curate deftly. Thereby winning at least a logical victory. + +Lindo sneered and grew, of course, twice as angry as before. "Very +neatly put!" he said. "I do not doubt that you would have got out of +your confession of faith--or lack of faith--as cleverly, if +circumstances had required it." + +The words were scarcely out of his mouth before Miss Hammond rose in a +marked way and left the room; while Clode for a moment glared at him +as though he would resent the insult--for it was little less--in a +practical manner. Fortunately the curate's, calculating brain told him +that nothing could be gained by this, and with an admirable show of +patience and forbearance he waved the words aside. "I really do not +understand you," he said with a maddening air of superiority. "I +cannot be blamed for having formed an opinion of my own on a subject +which affected me. Then, having formed it, what was I to do? Publish +it, or keep it to myself? As a fact, I did not publish it." + +"Except by your acts," said the rector. + +"Take it that way, then," the curate replied, still with patience. "Do +I gather that you would have had me, though I held an opinion adverse +to you, come to you as before, be about you, treat you in all respects +as if I were on your side? Is that your complaint? That I did not play +the hypocrite?" + +The rector felt that he was fairly defeated and out-man[oe]uvred; so +much so that Mrs. Hammond, whose sympathies were entirely on his side, +expected him to break into a furious passion. But the very skill and +coolness of his adversary acted as a warning and an example, and by a +mighty effort he controlled himself. He rose from his chair with +outward calmness, and, saying contemptuously, "Well, I am glad that I +know what your opinion is--an open foe is less dangerous than a secret +one," he turned from Clode. Holding out his hand to his hostess, he +muttered some form of leave-taking, and walked out of the room with as +much dignity as he could muster. He had certainly had the worst of the +encounter. + +And he felt very bitter about it, as he crossed the top of the town. +Whether the curate knew of his intention of resigning or not, his +conduct in turning upon him and openly expressing his disbelief in his +honesty was alike cruel and brutal. The man was false. The rector felt +sure of it. But the pain which he experienced on this account--the +pain of a generous man misunderstood and ill-requited--soon gave way +to self-reproach. He had brought the thing on himself by his +indiscreet passion. He had acted like a boy! He was not fit to be in a +responsible position. + +While he was still full of this, chewing the cud of his imprudence, he +saw a slender figure, which he recognized, crossing the street a +little way before him. He knew it at the first glance. In a moment he +recognized the graceful lines, the half-proud, half-gentle carriage of +the head, the glint of the cold February sun in the fair hair. It was +Kate Bonamy; and the rector, as he increased his pace, became +conscious, with something like a shock, of the pleasure it gave him to +see her, though he had parted from her not twenty-four hours before. +In a moment he was at her side, and she, turning suddenly, saw him +with a start of glad surprise. "Mr. Lindo!" she stammered, holding out +her hand before he offered his, and uttering the first words which +rose to her lips, "I am so glad!" + +She was thinking of the pit accident, of the risk and his safety, and +perhaps a little of his good name. And he understood. But he affected +not to do so. "Are you indeed, Miss Bonamy?" he answered. "Glad that I +am going?" + +His eyes met hers, and then both his and hers fell. "No," she said +gently and slowly. "But I am very glad, Mr. Lindo, that you have done +what seemed right to you without considering your own advantage." + +"I have done a great deal since I saw you yesterday," he answered, +taking refuge in a jest. + +"You have, indeed." + +"Including taking your advice." + +"I am quite sure you had made up your mind before you asked my +opinion," she answered earnestly. + +"No," he said, "I am sure I had not. It was your hint which led me to +think the position out from the beginning. When I did so it struck me +that, irritated by Lord Dynmore's words and manner, I had considered +the question only as it affected him and myself. Going on to think of +the parish, I came to the conclusion, that I was quite unfit for the +position." + +Kate started. The end of his sentence was a surprise to her. They were +walking along side by side now--very slowly--and she looked at him, +mute interrogation in her eyes. + +"I am too young," he said. "Your father, you know, was of that opinion +from the first." + +"Oh, but"--she answered hurriedly, "I----" + +"You do not think so?" he said with a droll glance. "Well, I am glad +of that. What? You were not going to say that, Miss Bonamy?" + +"No," she answered, blushing. "I was going to say that my father's +opinion might not now be the same, Mr. Lindo." + +"I expect it is. However, the opinion on which I acted was my own. I +have a very hasty temper, do you know. This very afternoon I have been +quarrelling, and have put my foot into it! I confess I thought when I +came here that I could manage. Now I see I am not fit for it--for the +living, I mean." + +"Perhaps," she answered slowly and in a low voice, "you are the more +fit because you feel unfit." + +"Well, I do not think I dare act on that," he cried gaily. "So you now +see before you, Miss Bonamy, a very humble personage--a kind of +clerical man-of-all-work out of place! You do not know an incumbent of +easy temper who wants a curate, do you?" + +He spoke lightly, without any air of seeking or posing for admiration. +Yet there was a little inflection of bitterness in his voice which did +not escape her ear, and perhaps spoke to it--and to her heart--more +loudly, because it was not intended for either. She suddenly looked at +him, and her face quivered, and then she looked away. But he had seen +and understood. He marked the color rising to the roots of her hair, +and was as sure as if he had seen them that her eyes were wet with +tears. + +And then he knew. He felt a sudden answering yearning toward her, a +forgetfulness of all her surroundings, and of all his surroundings +save herself alone. What a fool, what an ingrate, what a senseless +clod he had been, not to have seen months before--when it was in his +power to win her, when he might have asked for something besides her +pity, when he had something to offer her--that she was the fairest, +purest, noblest of women! Now, when it was too late, and he had +sacrificed all to a stupid conventionality, a social prejudice--what +was her father to her save the natural crabbed foil of her grace and +beauty--now he felt that he would give all, only he had nothing to +give, to see her wide gray eyes grow dark with tenderness, and--and +love. + +Yes, love. That was it. He knew now. "Miss Bonamy," he said hurriedly. +"Will you----" + +Kate started. "Here is my cousin," she said quietly, and yet with +suspicious abruptness. "I think he is looking for me, Mr. Lindo." + + + + + CHAPTER XXIV. + + THE CUP AT THE LIP. + + +The ten days which followed the events just described were long +remembered in Claversham with fondness and regret. The accident at +Baerton, and the strange position of affairs at the rectory, falling +out together, created intense excitement in the town. The gossips had +for once as much to talk about as the idlest could wish, and found, +indeed, so much to say on the one side and the other that the grocer, +it was rumored, ordered in a fresh supply of tea, and the two bakers +worked double tides at making crumpets and Sally Lunns, and still +lagged behind the demand. Old Peggy from the almshouse hung about the +churchyard half the day, noting who called at the rector's, and took +as much interest in her task as if her weekly dole had depended on Mr. +Lindo's fortunes; while every one who could lay the least claim to +knowing more than his neighbors became for the time the object of as +many attentions as a London belle. + +The archdeacon drove in and out daily. Once the rumor got abroad that +he had gone to see Lord Dynmore; and more than once it was said that +he was away at the palace conferring with the bishop. Those most +concerned walked the streets with the faces of sphinxes. The curate +and the rector were known to be on the most distant terms; and to put +an edge on curiosity, already keen, Mrs. Hammond was twice seen +talking to Mr. Bonamy in the street. + +Even the poor colliers' funeral, though a great number of the townsmen +trooped out to the bleak little churchyard on Baer Hill to witness +it--and to be rewarded by the sight of the young rector reading the +service in the midst of a throng of bareheaded pitmen such as no +Claversham eye had ever seen before--even this, which in ordinary +times would have furnished food for talk for a month, at least, went +for little now. It was discussed, indeed, for an evening, and then +recalled only for the sake of the light which it was supposed to throw +upon the rector's fate. + +That gentleman, indeed, continued to present to the public an unmoved +face. But in private, in the seclusion of his study--the lordly room +which he had prized and appreciated from the first, taking its +spacious dignity as the measure of his success--he wore no mask. +There he had--as all men have, the man of destiny and the conscript +alike--his solitary hours of courage and depression, anxiety and +resignation. Of hope also; for even now--let us not paint him greater +than he was--he clung to the possibility that Lord Dynmore, whom every +one agreed in describing as irascible and hasty, but generous at +bottom, would refuse to receive his resignation of the living, and +this in such terms as would enable him to remain without sacrificing +his self-respect. There would be a victory indeed, and at times he +could not help dwelling on the thought of it. + +Consequently, when Mrs. Baker, four days after the funeral, ushered in +the archdeacon, and the young rector, turning at his writing-table, +read his fate in the old gentleman's eyes, the news came upon him with +crushing weight. Yet he did not give way. He rose and welcomed his +visitor with a brave face. "So the bearer of the bow-string has come +at last!" he said lightly, as the two met on the hearth-rug. + +The archdeacon held his hand a few seconds longer than was necessary. +"Yes," he said, "I am afraid that is about what I am. I am sorry to +bring you such news, Lindo--more sorry than I can tell you." And, +having got so far, he dropped his hat and picked it up again in a +great hurry, and for a moment did not look at his companion. + +"After all," the rector said manfully, "it is the only news I had a +right to expect." + +"There is something in that," the archdeacon admitted, sitting down. +"That is so, perhaps. All the same," he went on, looking about him +unhappily, and rubbing his head in ill-concealed irritation, "if I had +known how the earl would take it, I should not have advised you to +make any concessions. No, I should not. But, there, he is an odd +man--odder than I thought." + +"He accepts my offer to resign, of course?" + +"Yes." + +"And that is all?" the rector said, a little huskiness in his tone. +"That is all," the archdeacon replied, rubbing his head again. It was +plain that he had hard work to keep his vexation within bounds. + +"Well, I must not complain because he has taken me at my word," the +rector said, recovering himself a little. + +"Well, I hoped the bishop might have had a word to say to it," the +archdeacon grumbled. "But he had not, and I could not get to see his +wife. He spoke very highly of your conduct, but he did not see his way +clear, he said, to interfering." + +"I scarcely see how he could," Lindo answered slowly. + +"Well, I do not know. Bonamy's representation in the church-wardens' +names was very strong--very strong indeed, coming from them, you +know." + +Lindo reddened. "There is an odd man for you, if you like," he said +impulsively. He was glad, perhaps, to change the subject. "He has +scarcely said a civil word to me since I came. He even began an action +against me. Yet when this happened he turned round and in his way +fought for me." + +"Well, that is Bonamy all over!" the archdeacon answered, almost with +enthusiasm. "He is rough and crabbed, but he has the instincts of a +gentleman, which are the greater credit to him, since he is a +self-made man. I think I can tell you something about him, though, +which you do not know." + +"Indeed?" said Lindo mechanically. + +"Yes. It has to do with your letter, too. I had it from Lord Dynmore. +In the first flush of his anger, it seems, he went to Bonamy and +directed him to take the necessary steps to eject you. He is not the +earl's solicitor, and he must have seen an excellent opportunity of +getting hold of the Dynmore business through this. He could not but +see it. Nevertheless, he declined." + +"Why?" asked the rector shortly. + +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders. "Ah! that I cannot say," he +answered. "I only know that he did, putting forward some scruple or +other which sent the earl off almost foaming with rage; and, of +course, sent off with him Bonamy's chance of his business." + +"He is a strange man!" Lindo sighed as he spoke. + +The archdeacon took a turn up the room. "Now," he said, coming back, +"I want to talk to you about another man." + +"Clode?" muttered the rector. + +"Well, yes; you have guessed it," the elder clergyman assented. "The +truth is, I am to offer him the living if you report well of him." + +"I do not like him," Lindo said briefly. + +"To be candid," replied the other as briefly, "neither do I, now." + +To that Lindo for a moment said nothing. The young man had fallen into +an old attitude, and stood with his foot on the fender, his head bent, +his eyes fixed on the fire. He was passing through a temptation. Here +was a brave vengeance ready to his hand. The man who had behaved +badly, heartlessly, disloyally to him, who had taken part against him, +and been hard and unfriendly from the moment of Lord Dynmore's return, +was now in his power. He had only to say that he distrusted Clode, +that he suspected him of being unscrupulous, even that their +connection had not been satisfactory to himself--and the thing was +done. Clode would not have the living. + +Yet he hesitated to say those words. He felt that the thing was a +temptation. + +He remembered that Clode had worked well in the parish, and that his +only offence was a private one. And, not at once, but after a pause, +he gulped down the temptation, and, looking up with a flushed face, +spoke. "Yes," he said, "I must report well of him--in the parish, that +is. He is a good worker. I am bound to say as much as that, I think." + +The archdeacon shrugged his shoulders once more. "Right!" he said, +with a certain curtness which hid his secret disgust. "I suppose that +is all, then. Will you come with me and tell him?" + +"No," the rector answered very decidedly, "certainly I will not." + +"It will look well," the other still suggested. + +"No," Lindo replied again, almost in anger, "I cannot sincerely +congratulate the man, and I will not!" + +Nor would he budge from that resolve; and when the archdeacon called +at the curate's lodgings a few minutes later, he called alone. The man +he sought was out, however. "Mr. Clode is at the Reading-Room, I +think, sir," the landlady said, with her deepest courtesy. And +thither, accordingly, after a moment's hesitation, the archdeacon +went. + +The gas in the big, barely-furnished room, which we have visited more +than once, had just been lit, but the blinds still remained up; and in +this mingling of lights the place looked less home-like and more +uncomfortable than usual. There were three people in the room when the +archdeacon entered. Two sat reading by the fire, their backs to the +door. The third--the future rector--was standing up near one of the +windows, taking advantage of the last rays of daylight to read the +_Times_, which he held open before him. The archdeacon cast a casual +glance at the others, and then stepped across to him and touched him +on the shoulder. + +Clode turned with a start. He had not heard the approaching footstep. +One glance at the newcomer's face, however, set his blood in a glow. +It told him, or almost told him, all; and instinctively he dropped his +eyes, that the other might not read in them his triumph and +exultation. + +The archdeacon's first words confirmed him in his hopes. "I have some +good news for you, Mr. Clode," he said, smiling benevolently. He had +of late distrusted the curate, as we have seen; but he was a man of +kindly nature, and such a man cannot convey good tidings without +entering into the recipient's feelings. "I saw Lord Dynmore +yesterday," he continued. + +"Indeed," said the curate a little thickly. His face had grown hot, +but the increasing darkness concealed this. + +"Yes," the archdeacon resumed, in a confidential tone which was yet +pretty audible through the room. "You have heard, no doubt, that Mr. +Lindo has resigned the living?" + +The curate nodded. At that moment he dared not speak. A dreadful +thought was in his mind. What if the archdeacon's good news was news +that the earl declined to receive the resignation? Some people might +call that good news! The mere thought struck him dumb. + +The archdeacon's next words resolved his doubts. "Frankly," the elder +man said in a genial tone, "I am sorry--sorry that circumstances have +forced him to take so extreme a step. But having said that, Mr. Clode, +I have done for the present with regret, and may come to pleasanter +matter. I have to congratulate you. I am happy to say that Lord +Dynmore, whom I saw yesterday, has authorized me to offer the living +to you." + +The newspaper rustled in the curate's grasp, and for a moment he did +not answer. Then he said huskily, "To me?" + +"Yes," the archdeacon answered expansively--it was certainly a +pleasant task he had in hand, and he could not help beaming over it. +"To you, Mr. Clode. On one condition only," he continued, "which is +usual enough in all such cases, and I venture to think is particularly +natural in this case. I mean that you have your late rector's good +word." + +"Mr. Lindo's good word?" the curate stammered. + +"Of course," the unconscious archdeacon answered. + +The curate's jaw dropped; but by an effort he forced a ghastly smile. +"To be sure," he said. "There will be no difficulty about that, I +think." + +"No," replied the other, "for I have just seen him, and can say at +once that he is prepared to give it you. He has behaved throughout in +a most generous manner, and the consequence is that I have nothing +more to do except to offer you my congratulations on your preferment." + +For a moment Clode could scarcely believe in his happiness. In the +short space of two minutes he had tasted to the full both the pleasure +of hope and the pang of despair. Could it be that all that was over +already? That the period of waiting and uncertainty was past and gone? +That the prize to which he had looked so long--and with the prize the +woman he loved--was his at last?--was actually in his grasp? + +His head reeled, great as was his self-control, and a haze rose before +his eyes. As this passed away he became conscious that the archdeacon +was shaking his hand with great heartiness, and that the thing was +real! He was rector, or as good as rector, of Claversham. The object +of his ambition was his! He was happy: perhaps it was the happiest +moment of his life. He had even time to wonder whether he could not do +Lindo a good turn--whether he could not somehow make it up to him. + +"You are very good," he muttered, gratefully pressing the archdeacon's +hand. + +"I am glad it is not a stranger," that gentleman replied heartily. +"Oh," he continued, turning and speaking in a different tone, "is that +you, Mr. Bonamy? Well, there can be no harm in your hearing the news +also. You are people's warden, of course, and have a kind of claim to +hear it early. To be sure you have." + +"What is the news?" Mr. Bonamy asked rather shortly. He had risen and +drawn near unnoticed, Jack Smith behind him. "Do I understand that +Lord Dynmore has accepted the rector's resignation?" + +"That is so." + +"And that he proposes to present Mr. Clode?" the lawyer continued, +looking at the curate as he named him. + +"Precisely," replied the archdeacon, without hesitation. + +"I hope you have no objection, Mr. Bonamy," said the curate, bowing +slightly with a gracious air. He could afford to be gracious now. He +even felt good--as men in such moments do. + +But in the lawyer's response there was no graciousness, nor much +apparent goodness. "I am afraid," he said, standing up gaunt and +stiff, with a scowl on his face, "that I must take advantage of that +saving clause, Mr. Clode. I am people's warden, as the archdeacon +says, and frankly I object to your appointment--to your appointment as +rector here." + +"You object!" the curate stammered, between wrath and wonder. + +"Bless me!" exclaimed the archdeacon in unmixed astonishment. "What do +you mean?" + +"Just what I say. I object," repeated the lawyer firmly. This time +Clode said nothing, but his eyes flashed, and he drew himself up, his +face dark with passion. "Shall I state my objection now?" Mr. Bonamy +continued, with the utmost gravity. "It is not quite formal, but--very +well, I will do so. I have rather a curious story to tell, and I must +go back a short time. When Mr. Lindo's honesty in accepting the living +was called in question about a month ago, he referred to the letters +in which Lord Dynmore's agents conveyed the offer to him. He had those +letters by him. Naturally, he had preserved them with care, and he +began to regard them in the light of valuable evidence on his behalf, +since they showed the facts brought to his knowledge when he accepted +the living. I have said that he had preserved them with care; and, +indeed, he is prepared to say to-day, that from the time of his +arrival here until now, they have never, with his knowledge or +consent, passed out of his possession." + +The lawyer's rasping voice ceased for a moment. Stephen Clode's face +was a shade paler, but away from the gas-jets this could not be +distinguished. He was arming himself to meet whatever shock was to +come, while below this voluntary action of the brain his mind ran in +an undercurrent of fierce, passionate anger against himself--anger +that he had ever meddled with those fatal letters. Oh, the folly, the +uselessness, the danger of that act, as he saw them now! + +"Nevertheless," Mr. Bonamy resumed in the same even, pitiless tone, +"when Mr. Lindo referred to these letters--which he kept, I should +add, in a locked cupboard in his library--he found that the first in +date, and the most important of them all, had been mutilated." + +The curate's brow cleared. "What on earth," he broke out, "has this to +do with me, Mr. Bonamy?" And he laughed--a laugh of relief and +triumph. The lawyer's last words had lifted a weight from his heart. +They had found a mare's nest after all. + +"Quite so!" the archdeacon chimed in with good-natured fussiness. +"What has all this to do with the matter in hand, or with Mr. Clode, +Mr. Bonamy? I fail to see." + +"In a moment I will show you," the lawyer answered. Then he paused, +and, taking a letter-case form his pocket, leisurely extracted from it +a small piece of paper. "I will first ask Mr. Clode," he continued, +"to tell us if he supplied Mr. Lindo with the names of a firm of +Birmingham solicitors." + +"Certainly I did," replied the curate haughtily. + +"And you gave him their address, I think?" + +"I did." + +"Perhaps you can tell me, then, whether that is the address you wrote +for him," continued the lawyer smoothly, as he held out the paper for +the curate's inspection. + +"It is," Clode answered at once. "I wrote it for Mr. Lindo, in my own +room, and gave it him there. But I fail to see what all this has to do +with the point you have raised," he continued with considerable heat. + +"It has just this to do with it, Mr. Clode," the lawyer answered +drily, a twinkle in his eyes--"that this address is written on the +reverse side of the very piece of paper which is missing from Mr. +Lindo's letter--the important letter I have described. And I wish to +ask you, and I think it will be to your interest to give as clear an +answer to the question as possible, how you came into possession of +this scrap of paper." + +The curate glared at his questioner. "I do not understand you," he +stammered. And he held out his hand for the paper. + +"I think you will when you look at both sides of the sheet," replied +the lawyer, handing it to him. "On one side there is the address you +wrote. On the other are the last sentence and signature of a letter +from Messrs. Gearns & Baker to Mr. Lindo. The question is a very +simple one. How did you get possession of this piece of paper?" + +Clode was silent--silent, though he knew that the archdeacon was +looking at him, and that a single hearty spontaneous denial might +avert suspicion. He stood holding the paper in his hand, and gazing +stupidly at the damning words, utterly unable to comprehend for the +moment how they came to be there. Little by little, however, as the +benumbing effects of the surprise wore off, his thoughts went back to +the evening when the address was written, and he remembered how the +rector had come in and surprised him, and how he had huddled away the +letters. In his disorder, no doubt, he had left one lying among his +own papers, and made the fatal mistake of tearing from it the scrap on +which he had written the address. + +He saw it all as he stood there, still gazing at the piece of paper, +while his rugged face grew darkly red and then again a miserable +sallow, and the perspiration sprang out upon his forehead. He felt +that the archdeacon's eyes were upon him, that the archdeacon was +waiting for him to speak. He saw the mistake he had made, but his +brain, usually so ready, failed to supply him with the explanation he +required. + +"You understand?" Mr. Bonamy said slowly. "The question is, how this +letter came to be in your room that evening, Mr. Clode. That is the +question." + +"I cannot say," he answered huskily. He was so shaken by the +unexpected nature of the attack, and by the strange and ominous way +in which the evidence against him had arisen, that he had not the +courage to look up and face his accuser. "I think--nay, I am sure, +indeed--that the rector must have given me the paper," he explained, +after an awkward pause. + +"He is positive he did not," Mr. Bonamy answered. + +Then Clode recovered himself and looked up. After all, it was only his +word against another's. "Possibly he is," he said, "and yet he may be +mistaken. I cannot otherwise see how the paper could have come into my +hands. You do not really mean," he continued with a smile, which was +almost easy, "to charge me with stealing the letter, I suppose?" + +"Well, to be quite candid, I do," Mr. Bonamy replied curtly. Nor was +this unexpected slap in the face rendered more tolerable by the +qualification he hastened to add--"or getting it stolen." + +The curate started. "This is not to be borne," he cried hotly. He +looked at the archdeacon as if expecting him to interfere. But he +found that gentleman's face grave and troubled, and, seeing he must +expect no help from him at present, he continued, "Do you dare to make +so serious an accusation on such evidence as this, Mr. Bonamy?" + +"On that," the lawyer replied, pointing to the paper, "and on other +evidence besides." + +The curate flinched. Had they found Felton, the earl's servant? Had +they any more scraps of paper--any more self-wrought damning evidence +of that kind? It was only by an effort, which was apparent to one at +least of his hearers, that he gathered himself together, and answered, +with a show of promptitude and ease, "Other evidence? What, I ask? +Produce it!" + +"Here it is," said Mr. Bonamy, pointing to Jack Smith, who had been +standing at his elbow throughout the discussion. + +"What has he to do with it?" Clode muttered with dry lips. + +"Only this," the barrister said quietly, addressing himself to the +archdeacon. "That some time ago I saw Mr. Clode replace a packet in +the cupboard in the rector's library. He only discovered my presence +in the room when the cupboard door was open, and his agitation on +observing me struck me as strange. Afterward I made inquiries of Mr. +Lindo, without telling him my reason, and learned that Mr. Clode had +no business at that cupboard--which was, in fact, devoted to the +rector's private papers." + +"Perhaps, Mr. Clode, you will explain that," said the lawyer with +quiet triumph. + +He might have denied it had he spoken out at once. He might have given +Jack the lie. But he saw with sudden and horrible clearness how this +thing fitted that other thing, and this evidence corroborated that; +and he lost his presence of mind, and for a moment stood speechless, +glaring at his new accuser. He did not need to look at the archdeacon +to be sure that his face was no longer grave only, but stern and +suspicious. The gas-jets flared before his eyes and dazzled him. The +room seemed to be turning. He could not answer. It was only when he +had stood for an age, as it seemed to him, dumb and self-convicted +before those three faces, that he summoned up courage to mutter, "It +is false. It is all false, I say!" and to stamp his foot on the floor. + +But no one answered him, and he quailed. His nerves were shaken. He, +who on ordinary occasions prided himself on his tact and management, +dared not now urge another word in his own defence lest some new piece +of evidence should arise to give him the lie. The meaning silence of +his accusers and his own conscience were too much for him. And, +suddenly snatching up his hat, which lay on a chair beside him, he +rushed from the room. + +He had not gone fifty yards along the pavement before he recognized +the mad folly of this retreat--the utter surrender of all his hopes +and ambitions which it meant. But it was too late. The strong man had +met a stronger. His very triumph and victory had gone some way toward +undoing him, by rendering him more open to surprise and less prepared +for sudden attack. Now it was too late to do more than repent. He saw +that. Hurrying through the darkness, heedless whither he went, he +invented a dozen stories to explain his conduct. But always the +archdeacon's grave face rose before him, and he rejected the clever +fictions and the sophisms in support of them, which his ingenuity was +now so quick to suggest. + +How he cursed the madness, the insensate folly, which had wrecked him! +Had he only let matters take their own course and stood aside, he +would have gained his ends! For a minute and a half he had been as +good as rector of Claversham. And now! + +Laura Hammond, crossing the hall after tea, heard the outer door open +behind her, and, feeling the cold gust of air which entered, stopped +and turned, and saw him standing on the mat. He had let himself in in +this way on more than one occasion before, and it was not that which +in a moment caused her heart to sink. She had been expecting him all +day, for she knew the crisis was imminent, and had been hourly looking +for news. But she had not been expecting him in this guise. There was +a strange disorder in his air and manner. He was wet and splashed with +mud. He held his hat in his hand, as if he had been walking bareheaded +in the rain. His eyes shone with a wild light, and he looked at her +oddly. She turned and went toward him. "Is it you?" she said timidly. + +"Oh, yes, it is I," he answered, with a forced laugh. "I want to speak +to you." And he let drop the _portiere_, which he had hitherto held in +his hand. + +There was a light in the breakfast-room, which opened on the hall, and +she led the way into that room. He followed her and closed the door +behind him. She pointed to a chair, but he did not take it. "What is +it?" she said, looking up at him in real alarm. "What is the matter, +Stephen?" + +"Everything!" he answered, with another laugh. "I am leaving +Claversham." + +"You are leaving?" she said incredulously. + +"Yes, leaving!" he answered. + +"To-night?" she stammered. + +"Well, not to-night," he answered, with rude irony. "To-morrow. I have +been within an ace of getting the living, and I--I have lost it. That +is all." + +Her cheek turned a shade paler, and she laid one hand on the table to +steady herself. "I am so sorry," she murmured. + +He did not see her tremor; he heard only her words, and he resented +them bitterly. "Have you nothing more to say than that?" he cried. + +She had much more to say--or, rather, had she said all that was +in her mind she would have had. But his tone helped her to recover +herself--helped her to play the part on which she had long ago +decided. In her way she loved this man, and her will had melted at +sight of him, standing downcast and defeated before her. Had he +attacked her on the side of her affections he might have done much--he +might have prevailed. But his hard words recalled her to her natural +self. "What would you have me say?" she answered, looking steadily +across the table at him. Something, she began to see, had happened +besides the loss of the living--something which had hurt him sorely. +And as she discerned this, she compared his dishevelled, untidy dress +with the luxury of the room, and shivered at the thought of the +precipice on the brink of which she had paused. + +He did not answer. + +"What would you have me say?" she repeated more firmly. + +"If you do not know, I cannot teach you," he retorted, with a sneer. + +"You have no right to say that," she replied bravely. "You remember +our compact." + +"You intend to keep to it?" he answered scornfully. + +She had no doubt about that now, and she summoned up her courage by an +effort. "Certainly I do," she murmured. "I thought you understood me. +I tried to make my meaning clear." + +Clode did not answer her at once. He stood looking at her, his eyes +glowing. He knew that his only hope, if hope there might be, lay in +gaining some word from her now--now, before any rumor to his +disadvantage should get abroad in the town. But his temper, long +restrained, was so infuriated by disappointment and defeat, that for +the moment love did not prevail with him. He knew that a tender word +might do much, but he could not frame it. When he did at last find +tongue it was only to say, "And that is your final decision?" + +"It is," she answered in a low voice. She did not dare to look up at +him. + +"And all you have to say to me?" + +"Yes. Except that I wish you well. I shall always wish you well, Mr. +Clode," she muttered. + +"Thank you," he answered coldly. + +So coldly, and with so much composure, that she did not guess the gust +of hatred of all things and all men which was in his heart. He was +beside himself with love, rage, disappointment. For a moment longer he +stood gazing at her downcast face. But she did not look up at him; and +presently, in a strange silence, he turned and went out of the room. + + + + + CHAPTER XXV. + + HUMBLE PIE. + + +The success of reticence is great. Mr. Bonamy and his nephew, as they +went home to tea after their victory, plumed themselves not a little +upon the proof of this which they had just given Mr. Clode. They said +little, it is true; even to one another, but more than once Mr. Bonamy +chuckled in a particularly dry manner, and at the top of the street +Jack made an observation "You think the archdeacon was satisfied?" he +asked, turning to his companion for a moment. + +"Absolutely," quoth Mr. Bonamy; and he strode on with one hand in his +pocket, his coat-tails flying, and his money jingling in a manner +inimitable by any other Claversham person. + +At tea they were both silent upon the subject, but the lawyer +presently let drop the fact that the earl had accepted the rector's +resignation. Jack, watchfully jealous, poor fellow, yet in his +jealousy loyal to the core, glanced involuntarily at Kate to see what +effect the news produced upon her; and then glanced swiftly away +again. Not so swiftly, however, that the change in the girl's face +escaped him. He saw it flush with mingled pride and alarm, and then +grow grave and thoughtful. After that she kept her eyes averted +from him, and he talked busily to Daintry. "I must be leaving you +to-morrow," he said by-and-by, as they rose from the table. + +"You will be coming back again?" Mr. Bonamy answered, interrupting a +loud wail from Daintry. It should be explained that Jack had not +stayed through the whole of these weeks at Claversham, but had twice +left for some days on circuit business. Mr. Bonamy thought he was +meditating another of these disappearances. + +"I should like to do so," Jack answered quietly, "but I must get back +to London now." + +"Well, your room will be ready for you whenever you like to come to +us," Mr. Bonamy replied with crabbed graciousness. And he fully meant +what he said. He had grown used to Jack's company. He saw, too, the +change his presence had made in the girls' lives, and possibly he +entertained some thoughts of a greater change which the cousin might +make in the life of one of them. + +So he was sorry to lose Jack. But Daintry was inconsolable. When she +and Kate were alone together she made her moan, sitting in a great +chair three sizes too big for her, with her legs sprawling before her, +her hands on the chair-arms, and her eyes on the fire. "Oh, dear, what +shall we do when he is gone, Kate?" she said disconsolately. "Won't it +be miserable?" + +Kate, who was bending over her work, and had been unusually silent for +some time, looked up with a start and a rush of color to her cheeks. +"When who is gone--oh, you mean Jack!" she said rather incoherently. + +"Of course I do," Daintry answered crossly. "But you never did care +for Jack." + +"You have no right to say that," Kate answered quickly, letting her +work drop for the moment. "I think Jack is one of the noblest, the +most generous--yes," she continued quickly, "the bravest man I have +ever known, Daintry." + +Her voice trembled, and Daintry saw with surprise that her eyes were +full of tears. "I never thought you felt like that about him," the +younger girl answered penitently. + +"Perhaps I did not a little while back," Kate answered gently, as she +took up her work again. "I know him better now, that is all." + +It was quite true. She knew him better now. A fellow-feeling makes us +wondrous kind. Love, which blinds our eyes to some things, opens them +to others. Had Jack offered Kate "Their Wedding Journey" now she might +still have asked him to change the book for another, but assuredly she +would not have told him it sounded silly, nor hurt his feelings by so +much as a look. + +It was quite true that she thought him all she said, that her eyes +grew moist for his sake. But his was the minute only; the hour was +another's. Daintry, proceeding to speculate gloomily on the dulness of +Claversham without Jack, thought her sister was attending to her, +whereas Kate's thoughts were far away now, centred on a fair head and +a bright boyish face, and a solitary room in which she pictured +Reginald Lindo sitting alone and despondent, the short-lived +brilliance of his Claversham career already extinguished. What were +his thoughts, she wondered. Was he regretting--for the strongest have +their hours of weakness--the step he had taken? Was he blaming her for +the advice she had given? Was he giving a thought to her at all, or +only planning the new life on which he must now enter--forming the new +hopes which must henceforth cheer him on? + +Kate let her work drop and looked dreamily before her. Assuredly the +prospect was a dull and uninviting one. Before _his_ coming there had +always been the unknown something, which a girl's future holds--a +possibility of change, of living a happier, fuller life. But now she +had nothing of this kind before her. He had come and robbed her even +of this, and given her in return only regret and humiliation, and a +few--a very few--hours of strange pleasure and sunshine and womanly +pride in a woman's influence nobly used. Yet would she have had it +otherwise? No, not for all the unknown possibilities of change, not +though Claversham life should stretch its dulness unbroken through a +century. + +She was sitting alone in the dining-room next morning, Mr. Bonamy +being at the office, and Daintry out shopping, when the maid came in +and announced that Mr. Lindo was at the door and wished to see her. +"Are you sure that he did not ask for Mr. Bonamy?" Kate said, rising +and laying down her work with outward composure and secret agitation. + +"No; he asked particularly for you, miss," the servant answered, +standing with her hand on the door. + +"Very well; you can show him in here," Kate replied, casting an eye +round her, but disdaining to remove the signs of domestic employment +which met its scrutiny. "He has come to say good-by," she thought to +herself; and she schooled herself to play her part fitly and close the +little drama with decency and reserve. + +He came in looking very thoughtful. She need not have feared for her +father's papers, her sister's dog's-eared Ollendorf, or her own +sewing. He did not so much as glance at them. She thought she saw +business in his eye, and she said as he advanced, "Did you wish to see +me or my father, Mr. Lindo?" + +"You, Miss Bonamy," he answered, shaking hands with her. "You have +heard the news, I suppose?" + +"Yes," she replied soberly. "I am so very sorry. I fear--I mean I +regret now, that when you----" + +"Asked for advice"--he continued, helping her out with a grave smile. +He had taken the great leather-covered easy-chair on the other side of +the fireplace, and was sitting forward in it, toying with his hat. + +"Yes," she said, coloring--"if you like to put it in that very +flattering form--I regret now that I presumed to give it, Mr. Lindo." + +"I am sorry for that," he answered, looking up at her as he spoke. + +She felt herself coloring anew. "Why?" she asked rather tremulously. + +"Because I have come to ask your advice again. You will not refuse to +give it me?" + +She looked at him in surprise; with a little annoyance even. It was +absurd. Why should he come to her in this way? Why, because on one +occasion, when circumstances had impelled him to speak and her to +answer, she had presumed to advise--why should he again come to her of +set purpose? It was ridiculous of him. "I think I must refuse," she +said gravely and a little formally. "I know nothing of business." + +"It is not upon a matter of business," he answered. + +She uttered a sigh of impatience. "I think you are very foolish, Mr. +Lindo. Why do you not go to my father?" + +"Well, because it is--because it is on a rather delicate matter," he +answered impulsively. + +"Still I do not see why you should bring it to me," she objected, with +a flash in her gray eyes, and many memories in her mind. + +"Well, I will tell you why I bring it to you," he answered bluntly. +"Because I acted on your advice the other day; and that, you see, Miss +Bonamy, has put me in this fix; and--and, in fact, made other advice +necessary, don't you see?" + +"I see you are inclined to be somewhat ungenerous," she answered. "But +if it must be so, pray go on." + +He rose slowly and stood leaning against the mantel-shelf in his +favorite attitude, his foot on the fender. "I will be as short as I +can," he said, a nervousness she did not fail to note in his manner. +"Perhaps you will kindly hear me to the end before you solve my +problem for me. It will help me a little, I think, if I may put my +case in the third person. Miss Bonamy"--he paused on the name and +cleared his throat, and then went on more quickly--"a man I know, +young and keen, and at the time successful--successful beyond his +hopes, so that others of his age and standing looked on him with envy, +came one day to know a girl, and, from the moment of knowing her, to +admire and esteem her. She was not only very beautiful, but he thought +he saw in her, almost from the first hour of their acquaintance, such +noble and generous qualities as all men, even the weakest, would fain +imagine in the woman they love." + +Kate moved suddenly in her chair as if to rise. Then she sat back +again, and he went on. + +"This was a weak man," he said in a low voice. "He had had small +experience; let that be some excuse for him. He entered at this time +on a new field of work in which he found himself of importance and +fancied himself of greater importance. There he had frequent +opportunities of meeting the woman I have mentioned, who had already +made an impression on him. But his head was turned. He discovered that +for certain small and unworthy reasons her goodness and her fairness +were not recognized by those among whom he mixed, and he had the +meanness to swim with the current and to strive to think no more of +the woman to whom his heart had gone out. He acted like a cur, in +fact, and presently he had his reward. Evil times came upon him. The +position he loved was threatened. Finally he lost it, and found +himself again where he had started in life--a poor curate without +influence or brilliant prospects. Then--it seems an ignoble, a mean, +and a miserable thing to say--he found out for certain that he loved +this woman, and could imagine no greater honor or happiness than to +have her for his wife." + +He paused a moment, and stole a glance at her. Kate sat motionless and +still, her lips compressed and her eyes hidden by their long lashes, +her gaze fixed apparently on the fire. Save that her face was slightly +flushed, and that she breathed quickly, he might have fancied that she +did not understand, or even that she had not heard. When he spoke +again, after waiting anxiously and vainly for any sign, his voice was +husky and agitated. "Will you tell me, Miss Bonamy, what he should +do?" he said. "Should he ask her to forgive him and to trust him, or +should he go away and be silent?" + +She did not speak. + +"Kate, will you not tell me? Can I not hope to be forgiven?" He was +stooping beside her now, and his hand almost touched her hair. + +Then, at last, she looked up at him. "Will not my advice come a little +late?" she whispered tremulously and yet with a smile--a smile which +was at once bright and tearful and eloquent beyond words. + +Afterward she thought of a dozen things she should have said to +him--about his certainty of himself, about her father; but at the time +none of these occurred to her. If he had come to her with his hands +full, it would certainly have been otherwise. But she saw him poor +through his own act, and her pride left her. When he took her in his +arms and kissed her, she said not a word. And he said only, "My +darling!" + + + * * * * * + + +The rich can afford to be niggardly. Lindo did not stay long, the +question he had to put once answered, his claim to happiness once +allowed. When Mr. Bonamy came in half an hour later, he found Kate +alone. There was an austere elation in his eye which for a moment led +her to think that he had heard her news. His first words, however, +dispelled the idea. "I have just seen Lord Dynmore," he said, taking +his coat-skirts on his arms and speaking with a geniality which showed +that he was moved out of his every-day self. "He has--he has +considerably surprised me." + +"Indeed?" said Kate, blushing and conscious, half-attentive and half +given up to thinking how she should tell her own tale. + +"Yes. He has very much surprised me. He has asked me to undertake the +agency of his property in this part of the country." + +Kate dropped her sewing in genuine surprise "No?" she said. "Has he, +indeed?" + +Mr. Bonamy, pursing up his lips to keep back the smile of complacency +which would force its way, let his eyes rove round the room. "Yes," he +said, "I do not mind saying here that I am rather flattered. Of course +I should not say as much out of doors." + +"Oh, papa, I am so glad," she cried, rising. An unwonted softness in +her tone touched and pleased him. + +"Yes," he continued, "I am to go over to the park to-morrow to lunch +with him and talk over matters. He told me something else which will +astonish you. He has behaved very handsomely to Mr. Lindo. It seems he +saw him early this morning, after having an interview with the +archdeacon, and offered him the living of Pocklington, in +Oxfordshire--worth, I believe, about five hundred a year. He is going +to give the vicar of Pocklington the rectory here." + +Kate's face was scarlet. "But I thought--I understood," she stammered, +"that Mr. Clode was to be rector here?" + +"Not at all," said Mr. Bonamy, with some asperity. "The whole thing +was settled before ten o'clock this morning. Mary told me at the door +that Lindo had been here since, so I supposed he had told you +something about it." + +"He did not tell me a word of it!" Kate answered impulsively, the +generous trick her lover had played breaking in upon her mind in all +its fulness. "Not a word of it! But papa"--with a pause and then a +rush of words--"he asked me to be his wife, and I--I told him I +would." + +For a moment Mr. Bonamy stared at his daughter as if he thought she +had lost her wits. Probably since his boyhood he had never been so +much astonished. "I was talking of Mr. Lindo," he said at length, +speaking with laborious clearness. "You are referring to your cousin, +I fancy." + +"No," Kate said, striving with her happy confusion. "I mean Mr. Lindo, +papa." + +"Indeed! indeed!" Mr. Bonamy answered after another pause, speaking +still more slowly, and gazing at her as if he had never seen her +before, nor anything at all like her. "You have a good deal surprised +me. And I am not easily surprised, I think. Not easily, I think." + +"But you are not angry with me, papa?" she murmured rather tearfully. + +For a moment he still stared at her in silence, unable to overcome his +astonishment. Then by a great effort he recovered himself. "Oh, no," +he said, with a smack of his old causticity, "I do not see why I +should be angry with you, Kate. Indeed, I may say I foretold this. I +always said that young man would introduce great changes, and he has +done it. He has fulfilled my words to the letter, my dear!" + + + + + CHAPTER XXVI. + + LOOSE ENDS. + + +Dr. Gregg was one of the first persons in the town to hear of the late +rector's engagement. His reception of the news was characteristic. "I +don't believe it!" he shrieked. "I don't believe it! It is all +rubbish! What has he got to marry upon, I should like to know?" + +His informant ventured to mention the living of Pocklington. + +"I don't believe it!" the little doctor shrieked. "If he had got that +he would see her far enough before he would marry her. Do you think I +am such a fool as to believe that?" + +"But you see, Bonamy--the earl's agency will be rather a lift in the +world for him. And he has money." + +"I don't believe it!" shrieked Gregg again. But, alas! he did. He knew +that these things were true, and when he next met Bonamy he smiled a +wry smile, and tried to swallow his teeth, and grovelled, still with +the native snarl curling his lips at intervals. The doctor, indeed, +had to suffer a good deal of unhappiness in these days. Clode, about +whom he had boasted largely, was conspicuous by his absence. Lord +Dynmore's carriage might be seen any morning in front of the Bonamy +offices. And rumor said that the earl had taken a strange fancy to the +young clergyman whom he had so belabored. Things seemed to Gregg and +to some other people in Claversham to be horribly out of joint at this +time. + +Among others, poor Mrs. Hammond found her brain somewhat disordered. +To the curate's unaccountable withdrawal, as to the translation of the +late rector to Pocklington, she could easily reconcile herself. But to +Mr. Lindo's engagement to the lawyer's daughter, and to the surprising +intimacy between the earl and Mr. Bonamy, she could not so readily +make up her mind. Why, it was reported that the earl had walked into +town and taken tea at Mr. Bonamy's house! Still, facts are stubborn +things, nor was it long before Mrs. Hammond was heard to say that the +lawyer's conduct in supporting Mr. Lindo in his trouble had produced a +very favorable impression on her mind, and prepared her to look upon +him in a new light. + +And Laura? Laura, during these changes, showed herself particularly +bright and sparkling. She was not of a nature to feel even defeat very +deeply, or to philosophize much over past mistakes. Her mother saw no +change in her--nay, she marvelled, recalling her daughter's intimacy +with Mr. Clode and the obstinacy she had exhibited in siding with him, +that Laura could so completely put him out of her mind and thoughts. +But the least sensitive feel sometimes. The most thoughtless have +their moments of care. Even the cat, with its love of home and +comfort, will sometimes wander on a wet night. And there are times +when Laura, doubting the future and weary of the present, wishes she +had had the courage to do as her heart bade her, and make the plunge, +careless what the world, and her rivals, might say of her marriage to +a curate. For Clode's rugged face and masculine will dominate her +still. Though a year has elapsed, and she has not heard of him, nor +probably will hear of him now, she thinks of him with regret and +soreness. She had not much to give, but to her sorrow she knows now +that she gave it to him, and that in that struggle for supremacy both +were losers. + +The good wine last. Kate broke the news to Jack herself, and found it +no news. "Yes, I have just seen Lindo," he answered quietly, taking +her hand, and looking her in the face with dry eyes. "May he make you +very happy, Kate, and--well, I can wish you nothing better than that." +Then Kate broke down and cried bitterly. When she recovered herself +Jack was gone. + +If you were to describe that scene to Jack Smith's friends in the +Temple they would jeer at you. They would cover you with ridicule and +gibes. There is no one so keen, so sharp, so matter-of-fact, so +certain to succeed as he, they say. They have only one fault to find +with him, that he works too hard; that he bids fair to become one of +those legal machines which may be seen any evening taking in fuel at +solitary club tables, and returning afterward to dusty chambers, with +the regularity of clockwork. But there is one thing even in his +present life which his Temple friends do not know, and which gives me +hope of him. Week by week there comes to him a letter from the country +from a long-limbed girl in short frocks, whose hero he is. Time, +which, like Procrustes' bed, brings frocks and legs to the same length +at last, heals wounds also. + +When a day not far distant now shall show him Daintry in the bloom of +budding womanhood, is it to be thought that Jack will resist her? I +think not. But, be that as it may, with no better savor than that of +his loyalty, the silent loyalty of an English friend, could the +chronicle of a Bayard--much less the tale of a country town--come to +an end. + + + + THE END. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The New Rector, by Stanley J. Weyman + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NEW RECTOR *** + +***** This file should be named 39215.txt or 39215.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/2/1/39215/ + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the +Web Archive (Harvard University) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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