Barchester Towers, Anthony Trollope [top business books of all time .txt] 📗

xml:lang="fr">malgré lui, to be the brother-in-law of Mr. Slope. Mr. Arabin strongly advised that Mr. Harding should take no step regarding the hospital in connection with, or in consequence of, Mr. Slope’s letter. “If the bishop really means to confer the appointment on Mr. Harding,” argued Mr. Arabin, “he will take care to let him have some other intimation than a message conveyed through a letter to a lady. Were Mr. Harding to present himself at the palace, he might merely be playing Mr. Slope’s game;” and thus it was settled that nothing should be done till the great Dr. Gwynne’s arrival, or at any rate without that potentate’s sanction.

It was droll to observe how these men talked of Mr. Harding as though he were a puppet, and planned their intrigues and small ecclesiastical manoeuvres in reference to Mr. Harding’s future position without dreaming of taking him into their confidence. There was a comfortable house and income in question, and it was very desirable, and certainly very just, that Mr. Harding should have them; but that at present was not the main point; it was expedient to beat the bishop and, if possible, to smash Mr. Slope. Mr. Slope had set up, or was supposed to have set up, a rival candidate. Of all things the most desirable would have been to have had Mr. Quiverful’s appointment published to the public and then annulled by the clamour of an indignant world, loud in the defence of Mr. Harding’s rights. But of such an event the chance was small; a slight fraction only of the world would be indignant, and that fraction would be one not accustomed to loud speaking. And then the preferment had, in a sort of way, been offered to Mr. Harding and had, in a sort of way, been refused by him.

Mr. Slope’s wicked, cunning hand had been peculiarly conspicuous in the way in which this had been brought to pass, and it was the success of Mr. Slope’s cunning which was so painfully grating to the feelings of the archdeacon. That which of all things he most dreaded was that he should be outgeneralled by Mr. Slope; and just at present it appeared probable that Mr. Slope would turn his flank, steal a march on him, cut off his provisions, carry his strong town by a coup de main, and at last beat him thoroughly in a regular pitched battle. The archdeacon felt that his flank had been turned when desired to wait on Mr. Slope instead of the bishop, that a march had been stolen when Mr. Harding was induced to refuse the bishop’s offer, that his provisions would be cut off when Mr. Quiverful got the hospital, that Eleanor was the strong town doomed to be taken, and that Mr. Slope, as Dean of Barchester, would be regarded by all the world as conqueror in the final conflict.

Dr. Gwynne was the Deus ex machina who was to come down upon the Barchester stage and bring about deliverance from these terrible evils. But how can melodramatic dénouements be properly brought about, how can vice and Mr. Slope be punished, and virtue and the archdeacon be rewarded, while the avenging god is laid up with the gout? In the meantime evil may be triumphant, and poor innocence, transfixed to the earth by an arrow from Dr. Proudie’s quiver, may lie dead upon the ground, not to be resuscitated even by Dr. Gwynne.

Two or three days after Eleanor’s departure, Mr. Arabin went to Oxford and soon found himself closeted with the august head of his college. It was quite clear that Dr. Gwynne was not very sanguine as to the effects of his journey to Barchester, and not overanxious to interfere with the bishop. He had had the gout, but was very nearly convalescent, and Mr. Arabin at once saw that had the mission been one of which the master thoroughly approved, he would before this have been at Plumstead.

As it was, Dr. Gwynne was resolved on visiting his friend, and willingly promised to return to Barchester with Mr. Arabin. He could not bring himself to believe that there was any probability that Mr. Slope would be made Dean of Barchester. Rumour, he said, had reached even his ears, not at all favourable to that gentleman’s character, and he expressed himself strongly of opinion that any such appointment was quite out of the question. At this stage of the proceedings, the master’s right-hand man, Tom Staple, was called in to assist at the conference. Tom Staple was the Tutor of Lazarus and, moreover, a great man at Oxford. Though universally known by a species of nomenclature so very undignified, Tom Staple was one who maintained a high dignity in the university. He was, as it were, the leader of the Oxford tutors, a body of men who consider themselves collectively as being by very little, if at all, second in importance to the heads themselves. It is not always the case that the master, or warden, or provost, or principal can hit it off exactly with his tutor. A tutor is by no means indisposed to have a will of his own. But at Lazarus they were great friends and firm allies at the time of which we are writing.

Tom Staple was a hale, strong man of about forty-five, short in stature, swarthy in face, with strong, sturdy black hair and crisp black beard of which very little was allowed to show itself in shape of whiskers. He always wore a white neckcloth, clean indeed, but not tied with that scrupulous care which now distinguishes some of our younger clergy. He was, of course, always clothed in a seemly suit of solemn black. Mr. Staple was a decent cleanly liver, not over-addicted to any sensuality; but nevertheless a somewhat warmish hue was beginning to adorn his nose, the peculiar effect, as his friends averred, of a certain pipe of port introduced into the cellars of Lazarus the very same year in which the tutor entered it as a freshman. There was also, perhaps, a little redolence of port wine, as it were the slightest possible twang, in