If he come not, the play is marred.--_Midsummer Night's Dream._
Rufus Lyon was very happy on that mild November morning appointed for
the great conference in the larger room at the Free School, between
himself and the Reverend Theodore Sherlock, B.A. The disappointment of
not contending with the rector in person, which had at first been
bitter, had been gradually lost sight of in the positive enjoyment of an
opportunity for debating on any terms. Mr. Lyon had two grand elements
of pleasure on such occasions: confidence in the strength of his case,
and confidence in his own power of advocacy. Not--to use his own
phrase--not that "he glorified himself herein;" for speech and
exposition were so easy to him, that if he argued forcibly, he believed
it to be simply because the truth was forcible. He was not proud of
moving easily in his native medium. A panting man thinks of himself as a
clever swimmer; but a fish swims much better, and takes his performance
as a matter of course.
Whether Mr. Sherlock were that panting, self-gratulating man, remained a
secret. Philip Debarry, much occupied with his electioneering affairs,
had only once had an opportunity of asking his uncle how Sherlock got
on, and the rector had said, curtly, "I think he'll do. I've supplied
him well with references. I advise him to read only, and decline
everything else as out of order. Lyon will speak to a point, and then
Sherlock will read: it will be all the more telling. It will give
variety." But on this particular morning peremptory business connected
with the magistracy called the rector away.
Due notice had been given, and the feminine world of Treby Magna was
much more agitated by the prospect than by that of any candidate's
speech. Mrs. Pendrell at the Bank, Mrs. Tiliot, and the Church ladies
generally felt bound to hear the curate, who was known, apparently by an
intuition concerning the nature of curates, to be a very clever young
man; and he would show them what learning had to say on the right side.
One or two Dissenting ladies were not without emotion at the thought
that, seated on the front benches, they should be brought near to old
Church friends, and have a longer greeting than had taken place since
the Catholic Emancipation. Mrs. Muscat, who had been a beauty, and was
as nice in her millinery as any Trebian lady belonging to the
Establishment, reflected that she should put on her best embroidered
collar, and that she should ask Mrs. Tiliot where it was in Duffield
that she once got her bed-hanging dyed so beautifully. When Mrs. Tiliot
was Mary Salt, the two ladies had been bosom friends; but Mr. Tiliot
looked higher and higher since his gin had become so famous; and in the
year '29 he had, in Mr. Muscat's hearing, spoken of Dissenters as
sneaks--a personality which could not be overlooked.
The debate was to begin at eleven, for the rector would not allow the
evening to be chosen, when low men and boys might want to be admitted
out of mere mischief. This was one reason why the female part of the
audience outnumbered the males. But some chief Trebians were there, even
men whose means made them as independent of theory as Mr. Pendrell and
Mr. Wace; encouraged by reflecting that they were not in a place of
worship, and would not be obliged to stay longer than they chose. There
was a muster of all Dissenters who could spare the morning time, and on
the back benches were all the aged Churchwomen who shared the remnants
of the sacrament wine, and who were humbly anxious to neglect nothing
ecclesiastical or connected with "going to a better place."
At eleven the arrival of listeners seemed to have ceased. Mr. Lyon was
seated on the school tribune or dais at his particular round table;
another round table, with a chair, awaited the curate, with whose
superior position it was quite in keeping that he should not be the
first on the ground. A couple of extra chairs were placed farther back,
and more than one important personage had been requested to act as
chairman; but no Churchman would place himself in a position so
equivocal as to dignity of aspect, and so unequivocal as to the
obligation of sitting out the discussion; and the rector had beforehand
put a veto on any Dissenting chairman.
Mr. Lyon sat patiently absorbed in his thoughts, with his notes in
minute handwriting lying before him, seeming to look at the audience,
but not seeing them. Every one else was contented that there should be
an interval in which there could be a little neighborly talk.
Esther was particularly happy, seated on a side-bench near her father's
side of the tribune, with Felix close behind her, so that she could turn
her head and talk to him. He had been very kind ever since that morning
when she had called at his home, more disposed to listen indulgently to
what she had to say, and less blind to her looks and movements. If he
had never railed at her or ignored her, she would have been less
sensitive to the attention he gave her; but as it was, the prospect of
seeing him seemed to light up her life, and to disperse the old
dullness. She looked unusually charming to-day, from the very fact that
she was not vividly conscious of anything but of having a mind near her
that asked her to be something better than she actually was. The
consciousness of her own superiority amongst the people around her was
superseded, and even a few brief weeks had given a softened expression
to her eyes, a more feminine beseechingness and self-doubt to her
manners. Perhaps, however, a little new defiance was rising in place of
the old contempt--defiance of the Trebian views about Felix Holt.
"What a very nice-looking young woman your minister's daughter is?" said
Mrs. Tiliot in an undertone to Mrs. Muscat, who, as she had hoped, had
found a seat next her quondam friend--"quite the lady."
"Rather too much so, considering," said Mrs. Muscat. "She's thought
proud, and that is not pretty in a girl, even if there was anything to
back it up. But now she seems to be encouraging that young Holt, who
scoffs at everything, as you may judge by his appearance. She has
despised his betters before now; but I leave you to judge whether a
young man who has taken to low ways of getting a living can pay for fine
cambric handkerchiefs and light kid gloves."
Mrs. Muscat lowered her blonde eyelashes and swayed her neat head just
perceptibly from side to side, with a sincere desire to be moderate in
her expressions, notwithstanding any shock that facts might have given
her.
"Dear, dear," said Mrs. Tiliot. "What! that is young Holt leaning
forward now without a cravat? I've never seen him before to notice him,
but I've heard Tiliot talking about him. They say he's a dangerous
character, and goes stirring up the workingmen at Sproxton. And--well,
to be sure, such great eyes and such a great head of hair--it is enough
to frighten one. What can she see in him? Quite below her."
"Yes, and brought up a governess," said Mrs. Muscat; "you'd have thought
she'd knowed better how to choose. But the minister has let her get the
upper hand sadly too much. It's a pity in a man of God. I don't deny
he's _that_."
"Well, I am sorry," said Mrs. Tiliot, "for I meant her to give my girls
lessons when they came from school."
Mr. Wace and Mr. Pendrell meanwhile were standing up and looking round
at the audience, nodding to their fellow-townspeople with the affability
due from men in their position.
"It's time he came now," said Mr. Wace, looking at his watch and
comparing it with the schoolroom clock. "This debating is a new-fangled
sort of thing; but the rector would never have given in to it if there
hadn't been good reasons. Nolan said he wouldn't come. He says this
debating is an atheistical sort of thing; the Atheists are very fond of
it. Theirs is a bad book to take a leaf out of. However, we shall hear
nothing but what's good from Mr. Sherlock. He preaches a capital
sermon--for such a young man."
"Well, it was our duty to support him--not to leave him alone among the
Dissenters," said Mr. Pendrell. "You see everybody hasn't felt that.
Labron might have shown himself, if not Lukyn. I could have alleged
business myself if I had thought proper."
"Here he comes, I think," said Mr. Wace, turning round on hearing a
movement near the small door on a level with the platform. "By George!
it's Mr. Debarry. Come now, this is handsome."
Mr. Wace and Mr. Pendrell clapped their hands, and the example was
followed even by most of the Dissenters. Philip was aware that he was
doing a popular thing, of a kind that Treby was not used to from the
elder Debarrys; but his appearance had not been long premeditated. He
was driving through the town toward an engagement at some distance, but
on calling at Labron's office he had found that the affair which
demanded his presence had been deferred, and so had driven round to the
Free School. Christian came in behind him.
Mr. Lyon was now roused from his abstraction, and, stepping from his
slight elevation, begged Mr. Debarry to act as moderator or president on
the occasion.
"With all my heart," said Philip. "But Mr. Sherlock has not arrived,
apparently?"
"He tarries somewhat unduly," said Mr. Lyon. "Nevertheless there may be
a reason of which we know not. Shall I collect the thoughts of the
assembly by a brief introductory address in the interval?"
"No, no, no," said Mr. Wace, who saw a limit to his powers of endurance.
"Mr. Sherlock is sure to be here in a minute or two."
"Christian," said Philip Debarry, who felt a slight misgiving, "just be
so good--but stay, I'll go myself. Excuse me, gentlemen: I'll drive
round to Mr. Sherlock's lodgings. He may be under a little mistake as to
the time. Studious men are sometimes rather absent-minded. You needn't
come with me, Christian."
As Mr. Debarry went out, Rufus Lyon stepped on to the tribune again in
rather an uneasy state of mind. A few ideas had occurred to him,
eminently fitted to engage the audience profitably, and so to wrest some
edification out of an unforeseen delay. But his native delicacy made him
feel that in this assembly the Church people might fairly decline any
"deliverance" on his part which exceeded the programme, and Mr. Wace's
negative had been energetic. But the little man suffered from imprisoned
ideas, and was as restless as a racer held in. He could not sit down
again, but walked backward and forward, stroking his chin, emitting his
low guttural interjections under the pressure of clauses and sentences
which he longed to utter aloud, as he would have done in his own study.
There was a low buzz in the room which helped to deepen the minister's
sense that the thoughts within him were as divine messengers unheeded or
rejected by a trivial generation. Many of the audience were standing;
all, except the old Churchwomen on the back seats, and a few devout
Dissenters who kept their eyes shut and gave their bodies a gentle
oscillating motion, were interested in chat.
"Your father is uneasy," said Felix to Esther.
"Yes; and now, I think, he is feeling for his spectacles. I hope he has
not left them at home: he will not be able to see anything two yards
before him without them;--and it makes him so unconscious of what people
expect or want."
"I'll go and ask him whether he has them," said Felix, striding over the
form in front of him, and approaching Mr. Lyon, whose face showed a
gleam of pleasure at this relief from his abstracted isolation.
"Miss Lyon is afraid that you are at a loss for your spectacles, sir,"
said Felix.
"My dear young friend," said Mr. Lyon, laying his hand on Felix Holt's
fore-arm, which was about on a level with the minister's shoulder, "it
is a very glorious truth, albeit made somewhat painful to me by the
circumstances of the present moment, that as a counterpoise to the
brevity of our mortal life (wherein, as I apprehend, our powers are
being trained not only for the transmission of an improved heritage, as
I have heard you insist, but also for our own entrance into a higher
initiation in the Divine scheme)--it is, I say, a very glorious truth,
that even in what are called the waste minutes of our time, like those
of expectation, the soul may soar and range, as in some of our dreams
which are brief as a broken rainbow in duration, yet seem to comprise a
long history of terror or joy. And again, each moment may be a beginning
of a new spiritual energy; and our pulse would doubtless be a coarse and
clumsy notation of the passage from that which was not to that which is,
even in the finer processes of the material world--and how much
more----"
Esther was watching her father and Felix, and though she was not within
hearing of what was being said, she guessed the actual state of the
case--that the enquiry about the spectacles had been unheeded, and that
her father was losing himself and embarrassing Felix in the intricacies
of a dissertation. There was not the stillness around her that would
have made a movement on her part seem conspicuous, and she was impelled
by her anxiety to step on the tribune and walk up to her father, who
paused a little startled.
"Pray see whether you have forgotten your spectacles, father. If so, I
will go home at once and look for them."
Mr. Lyon was automatically obedient to Esther, and he began immediately
to feel in his pockets.
"How is it that Miss Jermyn is so friendly with the Dissenting parson?"
said Christian to Quorlen, the Tory printer, who was an intimate of his.
"Those grand Jermyns are not Dissenters surely?"
"_What_ Miss Jermyn?"
"Why--don't you see?--that fine girl who is talking to him."
"Miss Jermyn! Why, that's the little parson's daughter."
"His daughter!" Christian gave a low brief whistle, which seemed a
natural expression of surprise that "the rusty old ranter" should have a
daughter of such distinguished appearance.
Meanwhile the search for the spectacles had proved vain. "'Tis a
grievous fault in me, my dear," said the little man, humbly; "I become
thereby sadly burdensome to you."
"I will go at once," said Esther, refusing to let Felix go instead of
her. But she had scarcely stepped off the tribune when Mr. Debarry
re-entered, and there was a commotion which made her wait. After a
low-toned conversation with Mr. Pendrell and Mr. Wace, Philip Debarry
stepped on to the tribune with his hat in his hand and said, with an air
of much concern and annoyance--
"I am sorry to have to tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that--doubtless
owing to some accidental cause which I trust will soon be explained as
nothing serious--Mr. Sherlock is absent from his residence and is not to
be found. He went out early, his landlady informs me, to refresh himself
by a walk on this agreeable morning, as is his habit, she tells me, when
he has been kept up late by study; and he has not returned. Do not let
us be too anxious. I shall cause enquiry to be made in the direction of
his walk. It is easy to imagine many accidents, not of a grave
character, by which he might nevertheless be absolutely detained against
his will. Under these circumstances, Mr. Lyon," continued Philip,
turning to the minister, "I presume that the debate must be adjourned."
"The debate, doubtless," began Mr. Lyon; but his farther speech was
drowned by a general rising of the Church people from their seats, many
of them feeling that, even if the cause were lamentable, the adjournment
was not altogether disagreeable.
"Good gracious me!" said Mrs. Tiliot, as she took her husband's arm, "I
hope the poor young man hasn't fallen into the river or broken his leg."
But some of the more acrid Dissenters, whose temper was not controlled
by the habits of retail business, had begun to hiss, implying that in
their interpretation the curate's absence had not depended on any injury
to life or limb.
"He's turned tail, sure enough," said Mr. Muscat to the neighbor behind
him, lifting his eyebrows and shoulders, and laughing in a way that
showed that, deacon as he was, he looked at the affair in an entirely
secular light.
But Mrs. Muscat thought it would be nothing but right to have all the
waters dragged, agreeing in this with the majority of the Church ladies.
"I regret sincerely, Mr. Lyon," said Philip Debarry, addressing the
minister with politeness, "that I must say good-morning to you, with the
sense that I have not been able at present to contribute to your
satisfaction as I had wished."
"Speak not of it in the way of apology, sir," said Mr. Lyon, in a tone
of depression. "I doubt not that you yourself have acted in good faith.
Nor will I open any door of egress to constructions such as anger often
deems ingenious, but which the disclosure of the simple truth may expose
as erroneous and uncharitable fabrications. I wish you good-morning,
sir."
When the room was cleared of the Church people, Mr. Lyon wished to
soothe his own spirit and that of his flock by a few reflections
introductory to a parting prayer. But there was a general resistance to
this effort. The men mustered round the minister and declared their
opinion that the whole thing was disgraceful to the Church. Some said
that the curate's absence had been contrived from the first. Others more
than hinted that it had been a folly in Mr. Lyon to set on foot any
procedure in common with Tories and clergymen, who, if they ever aped
civility to Dissenters, would never do anything but laugh at them in
their sleeves. Brother Kemp urged in his heavy bass that Mr. Lyon should
lose no time in sending an account of the affair to the _Patriot_; and
brother Hawkins, in his high tenor, observed that it was an occasion on
which some stinging things might be said with all the extra effect of an
_apropos_.
The position of receiving a many-voiced lecture from the members of his
church was familiar to Mr. Lyon; but now he felt weary, frustrated, and
doubtful of his own temper. Felix, who stood by and saw that this man of
sensitive fibre was suffering from talkers whose noisy superficiality
cost them nothing, got exasperated. "It seems to me, sirs," he burst in,
with his predominant voice, "that Mr. Lyon has hitherto had the hard
part of the business, while you of his congregation have had the easy
one. Punish the Church clergy, if you like--they can take care of
themselves. But don't punish your own minister. It's no business of
mine, perhaps, except so far as fair-play is everybody's business; but
it seems to me the time to ask Mr. Lyon to take a little rest, instead
of setting on him like so many wasps."
By this speech Felix raised a displeasure which fell on the minister as
well as on himself; but he gained his immediate end. The talkers dropped
off after a slight show of persistence, and Mr. Lyon quitted the field
of no combat with a small group of his less imperious friends, to whom
he confided his intention of committing his argument fully to paper,
and forwarding it to a discriminating editor.
"But regarding personalities," he added, "I have not the same clear
showing. For, say that this young man was pusillanimous--I were but
ill-provided with arguments if I took my stand even for a moment on so
poor an irrelevancy as that because one curate is ill furnished
therefore Episcopacy is false. If I held up any one to just obloquy, it
would be the well-designated Incumbent of this parish, who, calling
himself one of the Church militant, sends a young and weak-kneed
substitute to take his place in the fight."
Mr. Philip Debarry did not neglect to make industrious enquiry
concerning the accidents which had detained the Reverend Theodore
Sherlock on his morning walk. That well-intentioned young divine was
seen no more in Treby Magna. But the river was not dragged, for by the
evening coach the rector received an explanatory letter. The Reverend
Theodore's agitation had increased so much during his walk, that the
passing coach had been a means of deliverance not to be resisted; and,
literally at the eleventh hour, he had hailed and mounted the cheerful
Tally-ho! and carried away his portion of the debate in his pocket.
But the rector had subsequently the satisfaction of receiving Mr.
Sherlock's painstaking production in print, with a dedication to the
Reverend Augustus Debarry, a motto from St. Chrysostom, and other
additions, the fruit of ripening leisure. He was "sorry for poor
Sherlock, who wanted confidence"; but he was convinced that for his own
part he had taken the course which under the circumstances was the least
compromising to the Church. Sir Maximus, however, observed to his son
and brother that he had been right and they had been wrong as to the
danger of vague, enormous expressions of gratitude to a Dissenting
preacher, and on any differences of opinion seldom failed to remind them
of that precedent.