The Perpetual Curate · Chapter 35 (1/3)

XXXV

Mr. Wentworth’s day had been closely occupied up to this point. He had gone through a great many emotions, and transacted a good deal of business, and he went home with the comparative ease of a man whose anxieties are relieved, not by any real deliverance, but by the soothing influence of fatigue and the sense of something accomplished. He was not in reality in a better position than when he left his house in the morning, bitterly mortified, injured, and wounded at the tenderest point. Things were very much the same as they had been, but a change had come over the feelings of the Perpetual Curate. He remembered with a smile, as he went down Grange Lane, that Mr. Proctor was to dine with him, and that he had rashly undertaken to have something better than a chop. It was a very foolish engagement under the circumstances. Mr. Wentworth was cogitating within himself whether he could make an appeal to the sympathies of his aunt’s cook for something worthy of the sensitive palate of a Fellow of All Souls, when all such thoughts were suddenly driven out of his mind by the apparition of his brother Gerald⁠—perhaps the last man in the world whom he could have expected to see in Carlingford. Gerald was coming up Grange Lane in his meditative way from Mrs. Hadwin’s door. To look at him was enough to reveal to any clear-sighted spectator the presence of some perpetual argument in his mind. Though he had come out to look for Frank, his eyes were continually forsaking his intention, catching spots of lichen on the wall and clumps of herbage on the roadside. The long discussion had become so familiar to him, that even now, when his mind was made up, he could not relinquish the habit which possessed him. When he perceived Frank, he quickened his steps. They met with only such a modified expression of surprise on the part of the younger brother as was natural to a meeting of English kinsfolk. “I heard Louisa’s voice in my aunt’s drawing-room,” said Frank; “but, oddly enough, it never occurred to me that you might have come with her;” and then Gerald turned with the Curate. When the ordinary family questions were asked and answered, a silence ensued between the two. As for Frank, in the multiplicity of his own cares, he had all but forgotten his brother; and Gerald’s mind, though full of anxiety, had something of the calm which might be supposed to subdue the senses of a dying man. He was on the eve of a change, which appeared to him almost as great as death; and the knowledge of that gave him a curious stillness of composure⁠—almost a reluctance to speak. Strangely enough, each brother at this critical moment felt it necessary to occupy himself with the affairs of the other, and to postpone the consideration of his own.

“I hope you have changed your mind a little since we last met,” said Frank; “your last letter⁠—”

“We’ll talk of that presently,” said the elder brother; “in the meantime I want to know about you. What is all this? My father is in a great state of anxiety. He does not seem to have got rid of his fancy that you were somehow involved with Jack⁠—and Jack is here,” said Gerald, with a look which betokened some anxiety on his own part. “I wish you would give me your confidence. Right or wrong, I have come to stand by you, Frank,” said the Rector of Wentworth, rather mournfully. He had been waiting at Mrs. Hadwin’s for the last two hours. He had seen that worthy woman’s discomposed looks, and felt that she did not shake her head for nothing. Jack had been the bugbear of the family for a long time past. Gerald was conscious of adding heavily at the present moment to the Squire’s troubles. Charley was at Malta, in indifferent health; all the others were boys. There was only Frank to give the father a little consolation; and now Frank, it appeared, was most deeply compromised of all; no wonder Gerald was sad. And then he drew forth the anonymous letter which had startled all the Wentworths on the previous night. “This is written by somebody who hates you,” said the elder brother; “but I suppose there must be some meaning in it. I wish you would be frank with me, and tell me what it is.”

This appeal had brought them to Mrs. Hadwin’s door, which the Curate opened with his key before he answered his brother. The old lady herself was walking in the garden in a state of great agitation, with a shawl thrown over the best cap, which she had put on in honour of the stranger. Mrs. Hadwin’s feelings were too much for her at that moment. Her head was nodding with the excitement of age, and injured virtue trembled in every line of her face. “Mr. Wentworth, I cannot put up with it any longer; it is a thing I never was used to,” she cried, as soon as the Curate came within hearing. “I have shut my eyes to a great deal, but I cannot bear it any longer. If I had been a common lodging-house keeper, I could not have been treated with less respect; but to be outraged⁠—to be insulted⁠—”

“What is the matter, Mrs. Hadwin?” said Mr. Wentworth, in dismay.

“Sir,” said the old lady, who was trembling with passion, “you may think it no matter to turn a house upside down as mine has been since Easter; to bring all sorts of disreputable people about⁠—persons whom a gentlewoman in my position ought never to have heard of. I received your brother into my house,” cried Mrs. Hadwin, turning to Gerald, “because he was a clergyman and I knew his family, and hoped to find him one whose principles I could approve of. I have put up with a great deal, Mr. Wentworth, more than I could tell to anybody. I took in his friend when he asked me, and gave him the spare room, though it was against my judgment. I suffered a man with a beard to be seen stealing in and out of my house in the evening, as if he was afraid to be seen. You gentlemen may not think much of that, but it was a terrible thing for a lady in my position, unprotected, and not so well off as I once was. It made my house like a lodging-house, and so my friends told me; but I was so infatuated I put up with it all for Mr. Frank’s sake. But there is a limit,” said the aggrieved woman. “I would not have believed it⁠—I could not have believed it of you⁠—not whatever people might say: to think of that abandoned disgraceful girl coming openly to my door⁠—”

“Good heavens!” cried the Curate: he seized Mrs. Hadwin’s hand, evidently forgetting everything else she had said. “What girl?⁠—whom do you mean? For heaven’s sake compose yourself and answer me. Who was it? Rosa Elsworthy? This is a matter of life and death for me,” cried the young man. “Speak quickly: when was it?⁠—where is she? For heaven’s sake, Mrs. Hadwin, speak⁠—”

“Let me go, sir!” cried the indignant old lady; “let me go this instant⁠—this is insult upon insult. I appeal to you, Mr. Gerald⁠—to think I should ever be supposed capable of encouraging such a horrid shameless⁠—! How dare you⁠—how dare you name such a creature to me?” exclaimed Mrs. Hadwin, with hysterical sobs. “If it were not for your family, you should never enter my house again. Oh, thank you, Mr. Gerald Wentworth⁠—indeed I am not able to walk. I am sure I don’t want to grieve you about your brother⁠—I tried not to believe it⁠—I tried as long as I could not to believe it⁠—but you hear how he speaks. Do you think, sir, I would for a moment permit such a creature to enter my door?” she cried again, turning to Frank Wentworth as she leaned upon his brother’s arm.

“I don’t know what kind of a creature the poor girl is,” said the Curate; “but I know that if you had taken her in, it would have saved me much pain and trouble. Tell me, at least, when she came, and who saw her⁠—or if she left any message? Perhaps Sarah will tell me,” he said, with a sigh of despair, as he saw that handmaiden hovering behind. Sarah had been a little shy of Mr. Wentworth since the night Wodehouse disappeared. She had betrayed herself to the Curate, and did not like to remember the fact. Now she came up with a little toss of her head and a sense of equality, primed and ready with her reply.

“I hope I think more of myself than to take notice of any sich,” said Sarah; but her instincts were more vivid than those of her mistress, and she could not refrain from particulars. “Them as saw her now, wouldn’t see much in her; I never see such a changed creature,” said Sarah; “not as I ever thought anything of her looks! a bit of a shawl dragged around her, and her eyes as if they would jump out of her head. Laws! she didn’t get no satisfaction here,” said the housemaid, with a little triumph.

“Silence, Sarah!” said Mrs. Hadwin; “that is not a way to speak to your clergyman. I’ll go in, Mr. Wentworth, please⁠—I am not equal to so much agitation. If Mr. Frank will come indoors, I should be glad to have an explanation⁠—for this sort of thing cannot go on,” said the old lady. As for the Curate he did not pay the least attention either to the disapproval or the impertinence.

“At what time did she come?⁠—which way did she go?⁠—did she leave any message?” he repeated; “a moment’s common sense will be of more use than all this indignation. It is of the greatest importance to me to see Rosa Elsworthy. Here’s how it is, Gerald,” said the Curate, driven to his wit’s end; “a word from the girl is all I want to make an end of all this⁠—this disgusting folly⁠—and you see how I am thwarted. Perhaps they will answer you. When did she come?⁠—did she say anything?” he cried, turning sharply upon Sarah, who, frightened by Mr. Wentworth’s look, and dismayed to see her mistress moving away, and to feel herself alone opposed to him, burst at last into an alarmed statement.

“Please, sir, it aint no fault of mine,” said Sarah; “it was Missis as saw her. She aint been gone not half an hour. It’s all happened since your brother left. She come to the side-door; Missis wouldn’t hear nothing she had got to say, nor let her speak. Oh, Mr. Wentworth, don’t you go after her!” cried the girl, following him to the side-door, to which he rushed immediately. Not half an hour gone! Mr. Wentworth burst into the lane which led up to Grove Street, and where there was not a soul to be seen. He went back to Grange Lane, and inspected every corner where she could have hid herself. Then, after a pause, he walked impetuously up the quiet road, and into Elsworthy’s shop. Mrs. Elsworthy was there alone, occupying her husband’s place, who had gone as usual to the railway for the evening papers. She jumped up from the high stool she was seated on when the Curate entered. “Good gracious, Mr. Wentworth!” cried the frightened woman, and instinctively called the errand-boy, who was the only other individual within hearing. She was unprotected, and quite unable to defend herself if he meant anything; and it was impossible to doubt that there was meaning of the most serious and energetic kind in Mr. Wentworth’s face.

“Has Rosa come back?” he asked. “Is she here? Don’t stare at me, but speak. Has she come back? I have just heard that she was at my house half an hour ago: have you got her safe?”

It was at this moment that Wodehouse came lounging in, with his cigar appearing in the midst of his beard, and a curious look of self-exhibition and demonstration in his general aspect. When the Curate, hearing the steps, turned round upon him, he fell back for a moment, not expecting such an encounter. Then the vagabond recovered himself, and came forward with the swagger which was his only alternative.

“I thought you weren’t on good terms here,” said Wodehouse; “who are you asking after? It’s a fine evening, and they don’t seem up to much in my house. I have asked Jack Wentworth to the Blue Boar at seven⁠—will you come? I don’t want to bear any grudge. I don’t know if they can cook anything fit to be eaten in my house. It wasn’t me you were asking after?” The fellow came and stood close, shoulder to shoulder, by the Perpetual Curate. “By Jove, sir! I’ve as good a right here as you⁠—or anywhere,” he muttered, as Mr. Wentworth withdrew from him. He had to say it aloud to convince himself of the fact; for it was hard, after being clandestine for half a lifetime, to move about freely in the daylight. As for Mr. Wentworth, he fixed his eyes full on the newcomer’s face.

“I want to know if Rosa has come home,” he repeated, in the clearest tones of his clear voice. “I am told she called at Mrs. Hadwin’s half an hour ago. Has she come back?”

He scarcely noticed Mrs. Elsworthy’s answer, for, in the meantime, the cigar dropped out of Wodehouse’s beard, out of his fingers. He made an involuntary step back out of the Curate’s way. “By Jove!” he exclaimed to himself⁠—the news was more important to him than to either of the others. After a minute he turned his back upon them, and kicked the cigar which he had dropped out into the street with much blundering and unnecessary violence⁠—but turned round and stopped short in this occupation as soon as he heard Mrs. Elsworthy’s voice.

“She hasn’t come here,” said that virtuous woman, sharply. “I’ve give in to Elsworthy a deal, but I never said I’d give in to take her back. She’s been and disgraced us all; and she’s not a drop’s blood to me,” said Mrs. Elsworthy. “Them as has brought her to this pass had best look after her; I’ve washed my hands of Rosa, and all belonging to her. She knows better than to come here.”

“Who’s speaking of Rosa?” said Elsworthy, who just then came in with his bundle of newspapers from the railway. “I might have know’d as it was Mr. Wentworth. Matters is going to be cleared, sir, between me and you. If you was going to make a proposal, I aint revengeful; and I’m open to any arrangement as is honourable, to save things coming afore the public. I’ve been expecting of it. You may speak free, sir. You needn’t be afraid of me.”

“Fool!” said the Curate, hotly, “your niece has been seen in Carlingford; she came to my door, I am told, about an hour ago. Give up this folly, and let us make an effort to find her. I tell you she came to my house⁠—”

“In course, sir,” said Elsworthy; “it was the most naturalest place for her to go. Don’t you stand upon it no longer, as if you could deceive folks. It will be your ruin, Mr. Wentworth⁠—you know that as well as I do. I aint no fool but I’m open to a honourable proposal, I am. It’ll ruin you⁠—ay, and I’ll ruin you,” cried Rosa’s uncle, hoarsely⁠—“if you don’t change your mind afore tomorrow. It’s your last chance, if you care for your character, is tonight.”

Mr. Wentworth did not condescend to make any answer. He followed Wodehouse, who had shuffled out after his cigar, and stopped him on the step. “I wonder if it is any use appealing to your honour,” he said. “I suppose you were a gentleman once, and had the feelings of⁠—”

“By Jove! I’m as good a gentleman as you are,” cried the new heir. “I could buy you up⁠—you and all that belongs to you, by Jove! I’m giving Jack Wentworth a dinner at the Blue Boar tonight. I’m not a man to be cross-questioned. It appears to me you have got enough to do if you mind your own business,” said Wodehouse, with a sneer. “You’re in a nice mess, though you are the parson. I told Jack Wentworth so last night.”