Framley Parsonage, Anthony Trollope [popular e readers txt] 📗

of our set here, is to give it. And now it turns out that we cannot get back the same night because there is no moon; and Mrs. Bishop would not allow that my cloth should be contaminated by an hotel;⁠—very kind and considerate, is it not?

But I have a more astounding piece of news for you than this. There is to be a great party at Gatherum Castle next week, and they have talked me over into accepting an invitation which the duke sent expressly to me. I refused at first; but everybody here said that my doing so would be so strange; and then they all wanted to know my reason. When I came to render it, I did not know what reason I had to give. The bishop is going, and he thought it very odd that I should not go also, seeing that I was asked.

I know what my own darling will think, and I know that she will not be pleased, and I must put off my defence till I return to her from this ogre-land⁠—if ever I do get back alive. But joking apart, Fanny, I think that I should have been wrong to stand out, when so much was said about it. I should have been seeming to take upon myself to sit in judgment upon the duke. I doubt if there be a single clergyman in the diocese, under fifty years of age, who would have refused the invitation under such circumstances⁠—unless it be Crawley, who is so mad on the subject that he thinks it almost wrong to take a walk out of his own parish.

I must stay at Gatherum Castle over Sunday week⁠—indeed, we only go there on Friday. I have written to Jones about the duties. I can make it up to him, as I know he wishes to go into Wales at Christmas. My wanderings will all be over then, and he may go for a couple of months if he pleases. I suppose you will take my classes in the school on Sunday, as well as your own; but pray make them have a good fire. If this is too much for you, make Mrs. Podgens take the boys. Indeed I think that will be better.

Of course you will tell her ladyship of my whereabouts. Tell her from me, that as regards the bishop, as well as regarding another great personage, the colour has been laid on perhaps a little too thickly. Not that Lady Lufton would ever like him. Make her understand that my going to the duke’s has almost become a matter of conscience with me. I have not known how to make it appear that it would be right for me to refuse, without absolutely making a party matter of it. I saw that it would be said, that I, coming from Lady Lufton’s parish, could not go to the Duke of Omnium’s. This I did not choose.

I find that I shall want a little more money before I leave here, five or ten pounds⁠—say ten pounds. If you cannot spare it, get it from Davis. He owes me more than that, a good deal.

And now, God bless and preserve you, my own love. Kiss my darling bairns for papa, and give them my blessing.

Always and ever your own,

M. R.

And then there was written, on an outside scrap which was folded round the full-written sheet of paper, “Make it as smooth at Framley Court as possible.”

However strong, and reasonable, and unanswerable the body of Mark’s letter may have been, all his hesitation, weakness, doubt, and fear, were expressed in this short postscript.

V Amantium Irae Amoris Integratio

And now, with my reader’s consent, I will follow the postman with that letter to Framley; not by its own circuitous route indeed, or by the same mode of conveyance; for that letter went into Barchester by the Courcy night mail-cart, which, on its road, passes through the villages of Uffley and Chaldicotes, reaching Barchester in time for the up mail-train to London. By that train, the letter was sent towards the metropolis as far as the junction of the Barset branch line, but there it was turned in its course, and came down again by the main line as far as Silverbridge; at which place, between six and seven in the morning, it was shouldered by the Framley footpost messenger, and in due course delivered at the Framley Parsonage exactly as Mrs. Robarts had finished reading prayers to the four servants. Or, I should say rather, that such would in its usual course have been that letter’s destiny. As it was, however, it reached Silverbridge on Sunday, and lay there till the Monday, as the Framley people have declined their Sunday post. And then again, when the letter was delivered at the parsonage, on that wet Monday morning, Mrs. Robarts was not at home. As we are all aware, she was staying with her ladyship at Framley Court.

“Oh, but it’s mortial wet,” said the shivering postman as he handed in that and the vicar’s newspaper. The vicar was a man of the world, and took the Jupiter.

“Come in, Robin postman, and warm theeself awhile,” said Jemima the cook, pushing a stool a little to one side, but still well in front of the big kitchen fire.

“Well, I dudna jist know how it’ll be. The wery ’edges ’as eyes and tells on me in Silverbridge, if I so much as stops to pick a blackberry.”

“There bain’t no hedges here, mon, nor yet no blackberries; so sit thee down and warm theeself. That’s better nor blackberries I’m thinking,” and she handed him a bowl of tea with a slice of buttered toast.

Robin postman took the proffered tea, put his dripping hat on the ground, and thanked Jemima cook. “But I dudna jist know how it’ll be,” said he; “only it do pour so tarnation heavy.” Which among us, O my readers, could