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

some circumstance told him what was the hour, he was astonished to find that the day had not nearly passed away.

And then another tap was struck on the door⁠—a sound which he well recognized⁠—and his wife crept silently into the room. She came close up to him before she spoke, and put her arm within his:

“Mark,” she said, “the men are here; they are in the yard.”

“I know it,” he answered gruffly.

“Will it be better that you should see them, dearest?”

“See them; no; what good can I do by seeing them? But I shall see them soon enough; they will be here, I suppose, in a few minutes.”

“They are taking an inventory, cook says; they are in the stable now.”

“Very well; they must do as they please; I cannot help them.”

“Cook says that if they are allowed their meals and some beer, and if nobody takes anything away, they will be quite civil.”

“Civil! But what does it matter? Let them eat and drink what they please, as long as the food lasts. I don’t suppose the butcher will send you more.”

“But, Mark, there’s nothing due to the butcher⁠—only the regular monthly bill.”

“Very well; you’ll see.”

“Oh, Mark, don’t look at me in that way. Do not turn away from me. What is to comfort us if we do not cling to each other now?”

“Comfort us! God help you! I wonder, Fanny, that you can bear to stay in the room with me.”

“Mark, dearest Mark, my own dear, dearest husband! who is to be true to you, if I am not? You shall not turn from me. How can anything like this make a difference between you and me?” And then she threw her arms round his neck and embraced him.

It was a terrible morning to him, and one of which every incident will dwell on his memory to the last day of his life. He had been so proud in his position⁠—had assumed to himself so prominent a standing⁠—had contrived, by some trick which he had acquired, to carry his head so high above the heads of neighbouring parsons. It was this that had taken him among great people, had introduced him to the Duke of Omnium, had procured for him the stall at Barchester. But how was he to carry his head now? What would the Arabins and Grantlys say? How would the bishop sneer at him, and Mrs. Proudie and her daughters tell of him in all their quarters? How would Crawley look at him⁠—Crawley, who had already once had him on the hip? The stern severity of Crawley’s face loomed upon him now. Crawley, with his children half naked, and his wife a drudge, and himself half starved, had never had a bailiff in his house at Hogglestock! And then his own curate, Evans, whom he had patronized, and treated almost as a dependant⁠—how was he to look his curate in the face and arrange with him for the sacred duties of the next Sunday?

His wife still stood by him, gazing into his face; and as he looked at her and thought of her misery, he could not control his heart with reference to the wrongs which Sowerby had heaped on him. It was Sowerby’s falsehood and Sowerby’s fraud which had brought upon him and his wife this terrible anguish. “If there be justice on earth he will suffer for it yet,” he said at last, not speaking intentionally to his wife, but unable to repress his feelings.

“Do not wish him evil, Mark; you may be sure he has his own sorrows.”

“His own sorrows! No; he is callous to such misery as this. He has become so hardened in dishonesty that all this is mirth to him. If there be punishment in heaven for falsehood⁠—”

“Oh, Mark, do not curse him!”

“How am I to keep myself from cursing when I see what he has brought upon you?”

“ ‘Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord,’ ” answered the young wife, not with solemn, preaching accent, as though bent on reproof, but with the softest whisper into his ear. “Leave that to Him, Mark; and for us, let us pray that He may soften the hearts of us all;⁠—of him who has caused us to suffer, and of our own.”

Mark was not called upon to reply to this, for he was again disturbed by a servant at the door. It was the cook this time herself, who had come with a message from the men of the law. And she had come, be it remembered, not from any necessity that she as cook should do this line of work; for the footman, or Mrs. Robarts’ maid, might have come as well as she. But when things are out of course servants are always out of course also. As a rule, nothing will induce a butler to go into a stable, or persuade a housemaid to put her hand to a frying-pan. But now that this new excitement had come upon the household⁠—seeing that the bailiffs were in possession, and that the chattels were being entered in a catalogue, everybody was willing to do everything⁠—everything but his or her own work. The gardener was looking after the dear children; the nurse was doing the rooms before the bailiffs should reach them; the groom had gone into the kitchen to get their lunch ready for them; and the cook was walking about with an inkstand, obeying all the orders of these great potentates. As far as the servants were concerned, it may be a question whether the coming of the bailiffs had not hitherto been regarded as a treat.

“If you please, ma’am,” said Jemima cook, “they wishes to know in which room you’d be pleased to have the inmin-tory took fust. ’Cause, ma’am, they wouldn’t disturb you nor master more than can be avoided. For their line of life, ma’am, they is very civil⁠—very civil indeed.”

“I suppose they may go into the drawing-room,” said Mrs. Robarts, in a sad low voice. All nice women are proud of their drawing-rooms,