Butler Cornbury refused to call at the brewery. "The man's a liberal," he said to his wife, "and what's the use? Besides he's just the man I can't stand. We've always hated each other."
Whereupon Mrs. B. Cornbury determined to call on Mrs. Tappitt, and to see Tappitt himself if it were possible. She had heard something of the Rowan troubles, but not all. She had heard, too, of Rowan's liking for Rachel Ray, having also seen something of it, as we know. But, unfortunately for her husband's parliamentary interests, she had not learned that the two things were connected together. And, very unfortunately also for the same interests, she had taken it into her head that Rachel should be married to young Rowan. She had conceived a liking for Rachel; and being by nature busy, fond of employment, and apt at managing other people's affairs, she had put her finger on that match as one which she would task herself to further. This, I say, was unfortunate as regards her husband's present views. Her work, now in hand, was to secure Tappitt's vote; and to have carried her point in that quarter, her surest method would have been to have entered the brewery open-mouthed against Luke Rowan and Rachel Ray.
But the conversation, almost at once, led to a word in praise of Rachel, and to following words in praise of Luke. Martha only was in the room with her mother. Mrs. Cornbury did not at once begin about the vote, but made, as was natural, certain complimentary speeches about the ball. Really she didn't remember when she had seen anything better done; and the young ladies looked so nice. She had indeed gone away early; but she had done so by no means on her own account, but because Rachel Ray had been tired. Then she said a nice good-natured genial word or two about Rachel Ray and her performance on that occasion. "It seemed to me," she added, "that a certain young gentleman was quite smitten."
Then Mrs. Tappitt's brow became black as thunder, and Mrs. Cornbury knew at once that she had trodden on unsafe ground, – on ground which she should specially have avoided.
"We are all aware," Mrs. Tappitt said, "that the certain young gentleman behaved very badly, – disgracefully, I may say; – but it wasn't our fault, Mrs. Cornbury."
"Upon my word, Mrs. Tappitt, I didn't see anything amiss."
"I'm afraid everybody saw it. Indeed, everybody has been talking of it ever since. As regards him, what he did then was only of a piece with his general conduct, which it doesn't become me to name in the language which it deserves. His behaviour to Mr. T. has been shameful; – quite shameful."
"I had heard something, but I did not know there was anything like that. I'm so sorry I mentioned his name."
"He has disagreed with papa about the brewery business," said Martha.
"It's more than that, Martha, as you know very well," continued Mrs. Tappitt, still speaking in her great heat. "He has shown himself bad in every way, – giving himself airs all over the town, and then going away without paying his debts."
"I don't think we know that, mamma."
"Everybody says so. Your own father heard Sam Griggs say with his own ears that there was a shop bill left there of I don't know how long. But that's nothing to us. He came here under false pretences, and now he's been turned out, and we don't want to have any more to do with him. But, Mrs. Cornbury, I am sorry about that poor foolish girl."
"I didn't think her poor or foolish at all," said Mrs. Cornbury, who had quite heart enough to forget the vote her husband wanted in her warmth for her young friend.
"I must say, then, I did; – I thought her very foolish, and I didn't at all like the way she went on in my house and before my girls. And as for him, he doesn't think of her any more than he thinks of me. In the first place, he's engaged to another girl."
"We are not quite sure that he's engaged, mamma," said Martha.
"I don't know what you call being sure, my dear. I can't say I've ever heard it sworn to, on oath. But his sister Mary told your sister Augusta that he was. I think that's pretty good evidence. But, Mrs. Cornbury, he's one of those that will be engaged to twenty, if he can find twenty foolish enough to listen to him. And for her, who never was at a dance before, to go on with him like that; – I must say that I thought it disgraceful!"
"Well, Mrs. Tappitt," said Mrs. Cornbury, speaking with much authority in her voice, "I can only say that I didn't see it. She was under my charge, and if it was as you say I must be very much to blame, – very much indeed."
"I'm sure I didn't mean that," said Mrs. Tappitt, frightened.
"I don't suppose you did, – but I mean it. As for the young gentleman, I know very little about him. He may be everything that is bad."
"You'll find that he is, Mrs. Cornbury."
"But as to Miss Ray, whom I've known all my life, and whose mother my father has known for all her life, I cannot allow anything of the kind to be said. She was under my charge; and when young ladies are under my charge I keep a close eye upon them, – for their own comfort's sake. I know how to manage for them, and I always look after them. On the night of your party I saw nothing in Miss Ray's conduct that was not nice, ladylike, and well-behaved. I must say so; and if I hear a whisper to the contrary in any quarter, you may be sure that I shall say so open-mouthed. How d'you do, Mr. Tappitt? I'm so glad you've come in, as I specially wanted to see you." Then she shook hands with Mr. Tappitt, who entered the room at the moment, and the look and manner of her face was altered.
Mrs. Tappitt was cowed. If her husband had not come in at that moment she might have said a word or two in her own defence, being driven to do so by the absence of any other mode of retreating. But as he came in so opportunely, she allowed his coming to cover her defeat. Strong as was her feeling on the subject, she did not dare to continue her attack upon Rachel in opposition to the defiant bravery which came full upon her from Mrs. Cornbury's eyes. The words had been bad, but the determined fire of those eyes had been worse. Mrs. Tappitt was cowed, and allowed Rachel's name to pass away without further remark.
Mrs. Cornbury saw it all at a glance; – saw it all and understood it. The vote was probably lost; but it would certainly be lost if Tappitt and his wife discussed the matter before he had pledged himself. The vote would probably be lost, even though Tappitt should, in his ignorance of what had just passed, pledge himself to give it. All that Mrs. Cornbury perceived, and knew that she could lose nothing by an immediate request.
"Mr. Tappitt," said she, "I have come canvassing. The fact is this: Mr. Cornbury says you are a liberal, and that therefore he has not the face to ask you. I tell him that I think you would rather support a neighbour from the county, even though there may be a shade of difference in politics between you, than a stranger, whose trade and religion cannot possibly recommend him, and whose politics, if you really knew them, would probably be quite as much unlike your own as are my husband's."
The little speech had been prepared beforehand, but was brought out quite as naturally as though Mrs. Cornbury had been accustomed to speak on her legs for a quarter of a century.
Mr. Tappitt grunted. The attack came upon him so much by surprise that he knew not what else to do but to grunt. If Mr. Cornbury had come with the same speech in his mouth, and could then have sided off into some general abuse of Luke Rowan, the vote would have been won.
"I'm sure Mrs. Tappitt will agree with me," said Mrs. Cornbury, smiling very sweetly upon the foe she had so lately vanquished.
"Women don't know anything about it," said Tappitt, meaning to snub no one but his own wife, and forgetting that Mrs. Cornbury was a woman. He blushed fiery red when the thought flashed upon him, and wished that his own drawing-room floor would open and receive him; nevertheless he was often afterwards heard to boast how he had put down the politician in petticoats when she came electioneering to the brewery.
"Well, that is severe," said Mrs. Cornbury, laughing.
"Oh, T.! you shouldn't have said that before Mrs. Cornbury!"
"I only meant my own wife, ma'am; I didn't indeed."
"I'll forgive your satire if you'll give me your vote," said Mrs. Cornbury, with her sweetest smile. "He owes it me now; doesn't he, Mrs. Tappitt?"
"Well, – I really think he do." Mrs. Tappitt, in her double trouble, – in her own defeat and her shame on behalf of her husband's rudeness, – was driven back, out of all her latter-day conventionalities, into the thoughts and even into the language of old days. She was becoming afraid of Mrs. Cornbury, and submissive, as of old, to the rank and station of Cornbury Grange. In her terror she was becoming a little forgetful of niceties learned somewhat late in life. "I really think he do," said Mrs. Tappitt.
Tappitt grunted again.
"It's a very serious thing," he said.
"So it is," said Mrs. Cornbury, interrupting him. She knew that her chance was gone if the man were allowed to get himself mentally upon his legs. "It is very serious; but the fact that you are still in doubt shows that you have been thinking of it. We all know how good a churchman you are, and that you would not willingly send a Jew to Parliament."
"I don't know," said Tappitt. "I'm not for persecuting even the Jews; – not when they pay their way and push themselves honourably in commerce."
"Oh, yes; commerce! There is nobody who has shown himself more devoted to the commercial interests than Mr. Cornbury. We buy everything in Baslehurst. Unfortunately our people won't drink beer because of the cider."
"Tappitt doesn't think a bit about that, Mrs. Cornbury."
"I'm afraid I shall be called upon in honour to support my party," said Tappitt.
"Exactly; but which is your party? Isn't the Protestant religion of your country your party? These people are creeping down into all parts of the kingdom, and where shall we be if leading men like you think more of shades of difference between liberal and conservative than of the fundamental truths of the Church of England? Would you depute a Jew to get up and speak your own opinions in your own vestry-room?"
"That you wouldn't, T.," said Mrs. Tappitt, who was rather carried away by Mrs. Cornbury's eloquence.
"Not in a vestry, because it's joined on to a church," said Tappitt.
"Or would you like a Jew to be mayor in Baslehurst; – a Jew in the chair where you yourself were sitting only three years ago?"
"That wouldn't be seemly, because our mayor is expected to attend in church on Roundabout Sunday." Roundabout Sunday, so called for certain local reasons which it would be long to explain, followed immediately on the day of the mayor's inauguration.
"Would you like to have a Jew partner in your own business?"
Mrs. Butler Cornbury should have said nothing to Mr. Tappitt as to any partner in the brewery, Jew or Christian.
"I don't want any partner, and what's more, I don't mean to have any."
"Mrs. Cornbury is in favour of Luke Rowan; she takes his side," said Mrs. Tappitt, some portion of her courage returning to her as this opportunity opened upon her. Mr. Tappitt turned his head full round and looked upon Mrs. Cornbury with an evil eye. That lady knew that the vote was lost, lost unless she would denounce the man whom Rachel loved; and she determined at once that she would not denounce him. There are many things which such a woman will do to gain such an object. She could smile when Tappitt was offensive; she could smile again when Mrs. Tappitt talked like a kitchenmaid. She could flatter them both, and pretend to talk seriously with them about Jews and her own Church feelings. She could have given up to them Luke Rowan, – if he had stood alone. But she could not give up the girl she had chaperoned, and upon whom, during that chaperoning, her good-will and kindly feelings had fallen. Rachel had pleased her eye, and gratified her sense of feminine nicety. She felt that a word said against Rowan would be a word said also against Rachel; and therefore, throwing her husband over for the nonce, she resolved to sacrifice the vote and stand up for her friend. "Well, yes; I do," said she, meeting Tappitt's eye steadily. She was not going to be looked out of countenance by Mr. Tappitt.
"She thinks he'll come back to marry that young woman at Bragg's End," said Mrs. Tappitt; "but I say that he'll never dare to show his face in Baslehurst again."
"That young woman is making a great fool of herself," said Tappitt, "if she trusts to a swindler like him."
"Perhaps, Mrs. Tappitt," said Mrs. Cornbury, "we needn't mind discussing Miss Ray. It's not good to talk about a young lady in that way, and I'm sure I never said that I thought she was engaged to Mr. Rowan. Had I done so I should have been very wrong, for I know nothing about it. What little I saw of the gentleman I liked;" and as she used the word gentleman she looked Tappitt full in the face; "and for Miss Ray, I've a great regard for her, and think very highly of her. Independently of her acknowledged beauty and pleasant, ladylike manners, she's a very charming girl. About the vote, Mr. Tappitt – ; at any rate you'll think of it."
But had he not been defied in his own house? And as for her, the mother of those three finely educated girls, had not every word said in Rachel's favour been a dagger planted in her own maternal bosom? Whose courage would not have risen under such provocation?
Mrs. Cornbury had got up to go, but the indignant, injured Tappitts resolved mutually, though without concert, that she should be answered.
"I'm an honest man, Mrs. Cornbury," said the brewer, "and I like to speak out my mind openly. Mr. Hart is a liberal, and I mean to support my party. Will you tell Mr. Cornbury so with my compliments? It's all nonsense about Jews not being in Parliament. It's not the same as being mayors or churchwardens, or anything like that. I shall vote for Mr. Hart; and, what's more, we shall put him in."
"And Mrs. Cornbury, if you have so much regard for Miss Rachel, you'd better advise her to think no more of that young man. He's no good; he's not indeed. If you ask, you'll find he's in debt everywhere."
"Swindler!" said Tappitt.
"I don't suppose it can be very bad with Miss Rachel yet, for she only saw him about three times, – though she was so intimate with him at our party."
Mrs. Butler Cornbury curtseyed and smiled, and got herself out of the room. Mrs. Tappitt, as soon as she remembered herself, rang the bell, and Mr. Tappitt, following her down to the hall door, went through the pretence of putting her into her carriage.
"She's a nasty meddlesome woman," said Tappitt, as soon as he got back to his wife.
"And how ever she can stand up and say all those things for that girl, passes me!" said Mrs. Tappitt, holding up both her hands. "She was flighty herself, when young; she was, no doubt; and now I suppose she likes others to be the same. If that's what she calls manners, I shouldn't like her to take my girls about."
"And him a gentleman!" said Tappitt. "If those are to be our gentlemen I'd sooner have all the Jews out of Jerusalem. But they'll find out their gentleman; they'll find him out! He'll rob that old mother of his before he's done; you mark my words else." Comforting himself with this hope he took himself back to his counting-house.
Mrs. Cornbury had smiled as she went, and had carried herself through the whole interview without any sign of temper. Even when declaring that she intended to take Rachel's part open-mouthed, she had spoken in a half-drolling way which had divested her words of any tone of offence. But when she got into her carriage, she was in truth very angry. "I don't believe a word of it," she said to herself; "not a word of it." That in which she professed to herself her own disbelief was the general assertion that Rowan was a swindler, supported by the particular assertion that he had left Baslehurst over head and ears in debt. "I don't believe it." And she resolved that it should be her business to find out whether the accusation were true or false. She knew the ins and outs of Baslehurst life and Baslehurst doings with tolerable accuracy, and was at any rate capable of unravelling such a mystery as that. If the Tappitts in their jealousy were striving to rob Rachel Ray of her husband by spreading false reports, she would encourage Rachel Ray in her love by spreading the truth; – if, as she believed, the truth should speak in Rowan's favour. She would have considerable pleasure in countermining Mr. and Mrs. Tappitt.
As to Mr. Tappitt's vote for the election; – that was gone!
CHAPTER III.
DR. HARFORD
The current of events forced upon Rachel a delay of three or four days in answering her letter, or rather forced upon her that delay in learning whether or no she might answer it; and this was felt by her to be a grievous evil. It had been arranged that she should not write until such writing should have received what might almost be called a parochial sanction, and no idea of acting in opposition to that arrangement ever occurred to her; but the more she thought of it the more she was vexed; and the more she thought of it the more she learned to doubt whether or no her mother was placing her in safe tutelage. During these few weeks a great change came upon the girl's character. When first Mrs. Prime had brought home tidings that Miss Pucker had seen her walking and talking with the young man from the brewery, angry as she had been with her sister, and disgusted as she had been with Miss Pucker, she had acknowledged to herself that such talking and walking were very dangerous, if not very improper, and she had half resolved that there should be no more of them. And when Mrs. Prime had seen her standing at the stile, and had brought home that second report, Rachel, knowing what had occurred at that stile, had then felt sure that she was in danger. At that time, though she had thought much of Luke Rowan, she had not thought of him as a man who could possibly be her husband. She had thought of him as having no right to call her Rachel, because he could not possibly become so. There had been great danger; – there had been conduct which she believed to be improper though she could not tell herself that she had been guilty. In her outlook into the world nothing so beautiful had promised itself to her as having such a man to love her as Luke Rowan. Though her mother was not herself ascetic, – liking tea and buttered toast dearly, and liking also little soft laughter with her child, – she had preached ascetisms till Rachel had learned to think that the world was all either ascetic or reprobate. The Dorcas meetings had become distasteful to her because the women were vulgar; but yet she had half believed herself to be wrong in avoiding the work and the vulgarity together. Idle she had never been. Since a needle had come easy to her hand, and the economies of a household had been made intelligible to her, she had earned her bread and assisted in works of charity. She had read no love stories, and been taught to expect no lover. She was not prepared to deny, – did not deny even to herself, – that it was wrong that she should even like to talk to Luke Rowan.
Then came the ball; or, rather, first came the little evening party, which afterwards grew to be a ball. She had been very desirous of going, not for the sake of any pleasure that she promised herself; not for the sake of such pleasure as girls do promise themselves at such gatherings; but because her female pride told her that it was well for her to claim the right of meeting this young man, – well for her to declare that nothing had passed between them which should make her afraid to meet him. That some other hopes had crept in as the evening had come nigh at hand, – hopes of which she had been made aware only by her efforts in repressing them, – may not be denied. She had been accused because of him; and she would show that no such accusation had daunted her. But would he, – would he give occasion for further accusation? She believed he would not; nay, she was sure; at any rate she hoped he would not. She told herself that such was her hope; but had he not noticed her she would have been wretched.
We know now in what manner he had noticed her, and we know also whether she had been wretched. She had certainly fled from him. When she left the brewery-house, inducing Mrs. Cornbury to bring her away, she did so in order that she might escape from him. But she ran from him as one runs from some great joy in order that the mind may revel over it in peace. Then, little as she knew it, her love had been given. Her heart was his. She had placed him upon her pinnacle, and was prepared to worship him. She was ready to dress herself in his eyes, to believe that to be good which he thought good, and to repudiate that which he repudiated. When she bowed her head over his breast a day or two afterwards, she could have spoken to him with the full words of passionate love had not maiden fear repressed her.
But she had not even bowed her head for him, she had not acknowledged to herself that such love was possible to her, till her mother had consented. That her mother's consent had been wavering, doubtful, expressed without intention of such expression, – so expressed that Mrs. Ray hardly knew that she had expressed it, – was not understood by Rachel. Her mother had consented, and, that consent having been given, Rachel was not now disposed to allow of any steps backwards. She seemed to have learned her rights, or to have assumed that she had rights. Hitherto her obedience to her mother had been pure and simple, although, from the greater force of her character, she had in many things been her mother's leader. But now, though she was ill inclined to rebel, though in this matter of the letter she had obeyed, she was beginning to feel that obedience might become a hardship. She did not say to herself, "They have let me love him, and now they must not put out their hands to hold back my love;" but the current of her feelings ran as though such unspoken words had passed across her mind. She had her rights; and though she did not presume that she could insist on them in opposition to her mother or her mother's advisers, she knew that she would be wronged if those rights were withheld from her. The chief of those rights was the possession of her lover. If he was taken from her she would be as one imprisoned unjustly, – as one robbed by those who should have been his friends, – as one injured, wounded, stricken in the dark, and treacherously mutilated by hands that should have protected him. During these days she was silent, and sat with that look upon her brow which her mother feared.
"I could not make Mr. Comfort come any sooner, Rachel," said Mrs. Ray.
"No, mamma."
"I can see how impatient you are."
"I don't know that I'm impatient. I'm sure that I haven't said anything."
"If you said anything I shouldn't mind it so much; but I can't bear to see you with that unhappy look. I'm sure I only wish to do what's best. You can't think it right that you should be writing letters to a gentleman without being sure that it is proper."
"Oh, mamma, don't talk about it!"
"You don't like me to ask your sister; and I'm sure it's natural I should want to ask somebody. He's nearly seventy years old, and he has known you ever since you were born. And then he's a clergyman, and therefore he'll be sure to know what's right. Not that I should have liked to have said a word about it to Mr. Prong, because there's a difference when they come from one doesn't know where."
"Pray, mamma, don't. I haven't made any objection to Mr. Comfort. It isn't nice to be talked over in that way by anybody, that's all."
"But what was I to do? I'm sure I liked the young man very much. I never knew a young man who took his tea so pleasant. And as for his manners and his way of talking, I had it in my heart to fall in love with him myself. I had indeed. As far as that goes, he's just the young man that I could make a son of."
"Dear mamma! my own dearest mamma!" and Rachel, jumping up, threw herself upon her mother's neck. "Stop there. You shan't say another word."
"I'm sure I didn't mean to say anything unpleasant."
"No, you did not; and I won't be impatient."
"Only I can't bear that look. And you know what his mother said, – and Mrs. Tappitt. Not that I care about Mrs. Tappitt; only a person's mother is his mother, and he shouldn't have called her a goose."
It must be acknowledged that Rachel's position was not comfortable; and it certainly would not have been improved had she known how many people in Baslehurst were talking about her and Rowan. That Rowan was gone everybody knew; that he had made love to Rachel everybody said; that he never meant to come back any more most professed to believe. Tappitt's tongue was loud in proclaiming his iniquities; and her follies and injuries Mrs. Tappitt whispered into the ears of all her female acquaintances.
"I'm sorry for her," Miss Harford said, mildly. Mrs. Tappitt was calling at the rectory, and had made her way in. Mr. Tappitt was an upholder of the old rector, and there was a fellow-townsman's friendship between them.
"Oh yes; – very sorry for her," said Mrs. Tappitt.
"Very sorry indeed," said Augusta, who was with her mother.
"She always seemed to me a pretty, quiet, well-behaved girl," said Miss Harford.
"Still waters run deepest, you know, Miss Harford," said Mrs. Tappitt. "I should never have imagined it of her; – never. But she certainly met him half-way."
"But we all thought he was respectable, you know," said Miss Harford.
Miss Harford was thoroughly good-natured; and though she had never gone half-way herself, and had perhaps lost her chance from having been unable to go any part of the way, she was not disposed to condemn a girl for having been willing to be admired by such a one as Luke Rowan.
"Well; – yes; at first we did. He had the name of money, you know, and that goes so far with some girls. We were on our guard," – and she looked proudly round on Augusta, – "till we should hear what the young man really was. He has thrown off his sheep's clothing now with a vengeance. Mr. Tappitt feels quite ashamed that he should have introduced him to any of the people here; he does indeed."
"That may be her misfortune, and not her fault," said Miss Harford, who in defending Rachel was well enough inclined to give up Luke. Indeed, Baslehurst was beginning to have a settled mind that Luke was a wolf.
"Oh, quite so," said Mrs. Tappitt. "The poor girl has been very unfortunate no doubt."
After that she took her leave of the rectory.
On that evening Mr. Comfort dined with Dr. Harford, as did also Butler Cornbury and his wife, and one or two others. The chances of the election formed, of course, the chief subject of conversation both in the drawing-room and at the dinner-table; but in talking of the election they came to talk of Mr. Tappitt, and in talking of Tappitt they came to talk of Luke Rowan.
It has already been said that Dr. Harford had been rector of Baslehurst for many years at the period to which this story refers. He had nearly completed half a century of work in that capacity, and had certainly been neither an idle nor an inefficient clergyman. But, now in his old age, he was discontented and disgusted by the changes which had come upon him; and though some bodily strength for further service still remained to him, he had no longer any aptitude for useful work. A man cannot change as men change. Individual men are like the separate links of a rotatory chain. The chain goes on with continuous easy motion as though every part of it were capable of adapting itself to a curve, but not the less is each link as stiff and sturdy as any other piece of wrought iron. Dr. Harford had in his time been an active, popular man, – a man possessing even some liberal tendencies in politics, though a country rector of nearly half a century's standing. In his parish he had been more than a clergyman. He had been a magistrate, and a moving man in municipal affairs. He had been a politician, and though now for many years he had supported the Conservative candidate, he had been loudly in favour of the Reform Bill when Baslehurst was a close borough in the possession of a great duke, who held property hard by. But liberal politics had gone on and had left Dr. Harford high and dry on the standing-ground which he had chosen for himself in the early days of his manhood. And then had come that pestilent act of the legislature under which his parish had been divided. Not that the Act of Parliament itself had been violently condemned by the doctor on its becoming law. I doubt whether he had then thought much of it.
But when men calling themselves Commissioners came actually upon him and his, and separated off from him a district of his own town, taking it away altogether from his authority, and giving it over to such inexperienced hands as chance might send thither, – then Dr. Harford became a violent Tory. And my readers must not conceive that this was a question touching his pocket. One might presume that his pocket would be in some degree benefited, seeing that he was saved from the necessity of supplying the spiritual wants of a certain portion of his parish. No shilling was taken from his own income, which, indeed, was by no means excessive. His whole parish gave him barely six hundred a year, out of which he had kept always one, and latterly two curates. It was no question of money in any degree. Sooner than be invaded and mutilated he would have submitted to an order calling upon him to find a third curate, – could any power have given such order. His parish had been invaded and his clerical authority mutilated. He was no longer totus teres atque rotundus. The beauty of his life was over, and the contentment of his mind was gone. He knew that it was only left for him to die, spending such days as remained to him in vague prophecies of evil against his devoted country, – a country which had allowed its ancient parochial landmarks to be moved, and its ecclesiastical fastnesses to be invaded!