THE SQUIRE IS VERY OBSTINATE.
Mr. Gilmore left his own home on a Thursday afternoon, and on the
Monday when the Vicar again visited the Privets nothing had been
heard of him. Money had been left with the bailiff for the Saturday
wages of the men working about the place, but no provision for
anything had been made beyond that. The Sunday had been wet from
morning to night, and nothing could possibly be more disconsolate
than the aspect of things round the house, or more disreputable if
they were to be left in their present condition. The barrows, and the
planks, and the pickaxes had been taken away, which things, though
they are not in themselves beautiful, are safeguards against the
ill-effects of ugliness, as they inform the eyes why it is that such
disorder lies around. There was the disorder at the Privets now
without any such instruction to the eye. Pits were full of muddy
water, and half-formed paths had become the beds of stagnant pools.
The Vicar then went into the house, and though there was still a
workman and a boy who were listlessly pulling about some rolls of
paper, there were ample signs that misfortune had come and that
neglect was the consequence. "And all this," said Fenwick to himself,
"because the man cannot get the idea of a certain woman out of his
head!" Then he thought of himself and his own character, and asked
himself whether, in any position of life, he could have been thus
overruled to misery by circumstances altogether outside himself.
Misfortunes might come which would be very heavy; his wife or
children might die; or he might become a pauper; or subject to some
crushing disease. But Gilmore's trouble had not fallen upon him from
the hands of Providence. He had set his heart upon the gaining of a
thing, and was now absolutely broken-hearted because he could not
have it. And the thing was a woman. Fenwick admitted to himself that
the thing itself was the most worthy for which a man can struggle;
but would not admit that even in his search for that a man should
allow his heart to give way, or his strength to be broken down.
He went up to the house again on the Wednesday, and again on the
Thursday,--but nothing had been heard from the Squire. The bailiff
was very unhappy. Even though there might come a cheque on the
Saturday morning, which both Fenwick and the bailiff thought to be
probable, still there would be grave difficulties.
"Here'll be the first of September on us afore we know where we are,"
said the bailiff, "and is we to go on with the horses?"
For the Squire was of all men the most regular, and began to get
his horses into condition on the first of September as regularly as
he began to shoot partridges. The Vicar went home and then made up
his mind that he would go up to London after his friend. He must
provide for his next Sunday's duty, but he could do that out of a
neighbouring parish, and he would start on the morrow. He arranged
the matter with his wife and with his friend's curate, and on the
Friday he started.
He drove himself into Salisbury instead of to the Bullhampton Road
station in order that he might travel by the express train. That at
least was the reason which he gave to himself and to his wife. But
there was present to his mind the idea that he might look into the
court and see how the trial was going on. Poor Carry Brattle would
have a bad time of it beneath a lawyer's claws. Such a one as Carry,
of the evil of whose past life there was no doubt, and who would
appear as a witness against a man whom she had once been engaged to
marry, would certainly meet with no mercy from a cross-examining
barrister. The broad landmarks between the respectable and the
disreputable may guide the tone of a lawyer somewhat, when he has a
witness in his power; but the finer lines which separate that which
is at the moment good and true from that which is false and bad
cannot be discerned amidst the turmoil of a trial, unless the eyes,
and the ears, and the inner touch of him who has the handling of the
victim be of a quality more than ordinarily high.
The Vicar drove himself over to Salisbury and had an hour there for
strolling into the court. He had heard on the previous day that the
case would be brought on the first thing on the Friday, and it was
half-past eleven when he made his way in through the crowd. The train
by which he was to be taken on to London did not start till half-past
twelve. At that moment the court was occupied in deciding whether
a certain tradesman, living at Devizes, should or should not be on
the jury. The man himself objected that, being a butcher, he was, by
reason of the second nature acquired in his business, too cruel, and
bloody-minded to be entrusted with an affair of life and death. To a
proposition in itself so reasonable no direct answer was made; but it
was argued with great power on behalf of the crown, which seemed to
think at the time that the whole case depended on getting this one
particular man into the jury box, that the recalcitrant juryman
was not in truth a butcher, that he was only a dealer in meat, and
that though the stain of the blood descended the cruelty did not.
Fenwick remained there till he heard the case given against the
pseudo-butcher, and then retired from the court. He had, however,
just seen Carry Brattle and her father seated side by side on a bench
in a little outside room appropriated to the witnesses, and there
had been a constable there seeming to stand on guard over them. The
miller was sitting, leaning on his stick, with his eyes fixed upon
the ground, and Carry was pale, wretched, and draggled. Sam had not
yet made his appearance.
"I'm afeard, sir, he'll be in trouble," said Carry to the Vicar.
"Let 'un alone," said the miller; "when they wants 'im he'll be here.
He know'd more about it nor I did."
That afternoon Fenwick went to the club of which he and Gilmore were
both members, and found that his friend was in London. He had been
so, at least, that morning at nine o'clock. According to the porter
at the club door, Mr. Gilmore called there every morning for his
letters as soon as the club was open. He did not eat his breakfast
in the house, nor, as far as the porter's memory went, did he even
enter the club. Fenwick had lodged himself at an hotel in the
immediate neighbourhood of Pall-Mall, and he made up his mind that
his only chance of catching his friend was to be at the steps of
the club door when it was opened at nine o'clock. So he eat his
dinner,--very much in solitude, for on the 28th of August it is not
often that the coffee rooms of clubs are full,--and in the evening
took himself to one of the theatres which was still open. His club
had been deserted, and it had seemed to him that the streets also
were empty. One old gentleman, who, together with himself, had
employed the forces of the establishment that evening, had told him
that there wasn't a single soul left in London. He had gone to his
tailor's and had found that both the tailor and the foreman were out
of town. His publisher,--for our Vicar did a little in the way of
light literature on social subjects, and had brought out a pretty
volume in green and gold on the half-profit system, intending to give
his share to a certain county hospital,--his publisher had been in
the north since the 12th, and would not be back for three weeks. He
found, however, a confidential young man who was able to tell him
that the hospital need not increase the number of its wards on this
occasion. He had dropped down to Dean's Yard to see a clerical
friend,--but the house was shut up and he could not even get an
answer. He sauntered into the Abbey, and found them mending the
organ. He got into a cab and was driven hither and thither because
all the streets were pulled up. He called at the War-Office to
see a young clerk, and found one old messenger fast asleep in
his arm-chair. "Gone for his holiday, sir," said the man in the
arm-chair, speaking amidst his dreams, without waiting to hear the
particular name of the young clerk who was wanted. And yet, when he
got to the theatre, it was so full that he could hardly find a seat
on which to sit. In all the world around us there is nothing more
singular than the emptiness and the fullness of London.
He was up early the next morning and breakfasted before he went out,
thinking that even should he succeed in catching the Squire, he would
not be able to persuade the unhappy man to come and breakfast with
him. At a little before nine he was in Pall-Mall, walking up and down
before the club, and as the clocks struck the hour he began to be
impatient. The porter had said that Gilmore always came exactly at
nine, and within two minutes after that hour the Vicar began to feel
that his friend was breaking an engagement and behaving badly to him.
By ten minutes past, the idea had got into his head that all the
people in Pall-Mall were watching him, and at the quarter he was
angry and unhappy. He had just counted the seconds up to twenty
minutes, and had begun to consider that it would be absurd for him to
walk there all the day, when he saw the Squire coming slowly along
the street. He had been afraid to make himself comfortable within the
club, and there to wait for his friend's coming, lest Gilmore should
have escaped him, not choosing to be thus caught by any one;--and
even now he had his fear lest his quarry should slip through his
fingers. He waited till the Squire had gone up to the porter and
returned to the street, and then he crossed over and seized him
by the arm. "Harry," he said, "you didn't expect to see me in
London;--did you?"
"Certainly not," said the other, implying very plainly by his looks
that the meeting had given him no special pleasure.
"I came up yesterday afternoon, and I was at Cutcote's the tailor's,
and at Messrs. Bringémout and Neversell's. Bringémout has retired,
but it's Neversell that does the business. And then I went down to
see old Drybird, and I called on young Dozey at his office. But
everybody is out of town. I never saw anything like it. I vote that
we take to having holidays in the country, and all come to London,
and live in the empty houses."
"I suppose you came up to look after me?" said Gilmore, with a brow
as black as a thunder-cloud.
Fenwick perceived that he need not carry on any further his lame
pretences. "Well, I did. Come, old fellow, this won't do, you know.
Everything is not to be thrown overboard because a girl doesn't know
her own mind. Aren't your anchors better than that?"
"I haven't an anchor left," said Gilmore.
"How can you be so weak and so wicked as to say so? Come, Harry, take
a turn with me in the park. You may be quite sure I shan't let you go
now I've got you."
"You'll have to let me go," said the other.
"Not till I've told you my mind. Everybody is out of town, so I
suppose even a parson may light a cigar down here. Harry, you must
come back with me."
"No;--I cannot."
"Do you mean to say that you will yield up all your strength, all
your duty, all your life, and throw over every purpose of your
existence because you have been ill-used by a wench? Is that your
idea of manhood,--of that manhood you have so often preached?"
"After what I have suffered there I cannot bear the place."
"You must force yourself to bear it. Do you mean to say that because
you are unhappy you will not pay your debts?"
"I owe no man a shilling;--or, if I do, I will pay it to-morrow."
"There are debts you can only settle by daily payments. To every man
living on your land you owe such a debt. To every friend connected
with you by name, or blood, or love, you owe such a debt. Do you
suppose that you can cast yourself adrift, and make yourself a
by-word, and hurt no one but yourself? Why is it that we hate a
suicide?"
"Because he sins."
"Because he is a coward, and runs away from the burden which he ought
to bear gallantly. He throws his load down on the roadside, and does
not care who may bear it, or who may suffer because he is too poor
a creature to struggle on! Have you no feeling that, though it may
be hard with you here,"--and the Vicar, as he spoke, struck his
breast,--"you should so carry your outer self, that the eyes of those
around you should see nothing of the sorrow within? That is my idea
of manliness, and I have ever taken you to be a man."
"We work for the esteem of others while we desire it. I desire
nothing now. She has so knocked me about that I should be a liar if
I were to say that there is enough manhood left in me to bear it. I
shan't kill myself."
"No, Harry, you won't do that."
"But I shall give up the place, and go abroad."
"Whom will you serve by that?"
"It is all very well to preach, Frank. Bad as I am I could preach to
you if there were a matter to preach about. I don't know that there
is anything much easier than preaching. But as for practising, you
can't do it if you have not got the strength. A man can't walk if you
take away his legs. If you break a bird's wing he can't fly, let the
bird be ever so full of pluck. All that there was in me she has taken
out of me. I could fight him, and would willingly, if I thought there
was a chance of his meeting me."
"He would not be such a fool."
"But I could not stand up and look at her."
"She has left Bullhampton, you know."
"It does not matter, Frank. There is the place that I was getting
ready for her. And if I were there, you and your wife would always be
thinking about it. And every fellow about the estate knows the whole
story. It seems to me to be almost inconceivable that a woman should
have done such a thing."
"She has not meant to act badly, Harry."
"To tell the truth, when I look back at it all, I blame myself more
than her. A man should never be ass enough to ask any woman a second
time. But I had got it into my head that it was a disgraceful thing
to ask and not to have. It is that which kills me now. I do not think
that I will ever again attempt anything, because failure is so hard
to me to bear. At any rate, I won't go back to the Privets." This he
added after a pause, during which the Vicar had been thinking what
new arguments he could bring up to urge his friend's return.
Fenwick learned that Gilmore had sent a cheque to his bailiff by the
post of the preceding night. He acknowledged that in sending the
cheque he had said no more than to bid the man pay what wages were
due. He had not as yet made up his mind as to any further steps. As
they walked round the enclosure of St. James's Park together, and as
the warmth of their old friendship produced freedom of intercourse,
Gilmore acknowledged a dozen wild schemes that had passed through his
brain. That to which he was most wedded was a plan for meeting Walter
Marrable and cudgelling him pretty well to death. Fenwick pointed
out three or four objections to this. In the first place, Marrable
had committed no offence whatever against Gilmore. And then, in all
probability, Marrable might be as good at cudgelling as the Squire
himself. And thirdly, when the cudgelling was over, the man who began
the row would certainly be put into prison, and in atonement for that
would receive no public sympathy. "You can't throw yourself on the
public pity as a woman might," said the Vicar.
"D---- the public pity," said the Squire, who was not often driven to
make his language forcible after that fashion.
Another scheme was that he would publish the whole transaction. And
here again his friend was obliged to remind him, that a man in his
position should be reticent rather than outspoken. "You have already
declared," said the Vicar, "that you can't endure failure, and yet
you want to make your failure known to all the world." His third
proposition was more absurd still. He would write such a letter to
Mary Lowther as would cover her head with red hot coals. He would
tell her that she had made the world utterly unbearable to him, and
that she might have the Privets for herself and go and live there. "I
do not doubt but that such a letter would annoy her," said the Vicar.
"Why should I care how much she is annoyed?"
"Just so;--but everyone who saw the letter would know that it was
pretence and bombast. Of course you will do nothing of the kind."
They were together pretty nearly the whole day. Gilmore, no doubt,
would have avoided the Vicar in the morning had it been possible;
but now that he had been caught, and had been made to undergo
his friend's lectures, he was rather grateful than otherwise for
something in the shape of society. It was Fenwick's desire to induce
him to return to Bullhampton. If this could not be done, it would no
doubt be well that some authority should be obtained from him as to
the management of the place. But this subject had not been mooted
as yet, because Fenwick felt that if he once acknowledged that the
runaway might continue to be a runaway, his chance of bringing the
man back to his own home would be much lessened. As yet, however, he
had made no impression in that direction. At last they parted on an
understanding that they were to breakfast together the next morning
at Fenwick's hotel, and then go to the eleven o'clock Sunday service
at a certain noted metropolitan church. At breakfast, and during
the walk to church, Fenwick said not a word to his friend about
Bullhampton. He talked of church services, of ritual, of the
quietness of a Sunday in London, and of the Sunday occupations of
three millions of people not a fourth of whom attend divine service.
He chose any subject other than that of which Gilmore was thinking.
But as soon as they were out of church he made another attack upon
him. "After that, Harry, don't you feel like trying to do your duty?"
"I feel that I can't fly because my wing is broken," said the Squire.
They spent the whole of the afternoon and evening together, but no
good was done. Gilmore, as far as he had a plan, intended to go
abroad, travel to the East, or to the West,--or to the South, if so
it came about. The Privets might be let if any would choose to take
the place. As far as he was concerned his income from his tenants
would be more than he wanted. "As for doing them any good, I never
did them any good," he said, as he parted from the Vicar for the
night. "If they can't live on the land without my being at home, I am
sure they won't if I stay there."