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Barchester Towers

by Anthony Trollope

previous: CHAPTER XVI BABY WORSHIP

CHAPTER XVII WHO SHALL BE COCK OF THE WALK?

All this time things were going on somewhat uneasily at the palace. The hint or two which Mr Slope had given was by no means thrown away upon the bishop. He had a feeling that if he ever meant to oppose the now almost unendurable despotism of his wife, he must lose no further time in doing so; that if he even meant to be himself master in his own diocese, let alone his own house, he should begin at once. It would have been easier to have done so from the day of his consecration than now, but easier now than when Mrs Proudie should have succeeded in thoroughly mastering the diocesan details. Then the proffered assistance of Mr Slope was a great thing for him, a most unexpected and invaluable aid. Hitherto he had looked on the two as allied forces; and had considered that as allied they were impregnable. He had begun to believe that his only chance of escape would be by the advancement of Mr Slope to some distant and rich preferment. But now it seemed that one of his enemies, certainly the least potent of them, but nevertheless one very important, was willing to desert his own camp. He walked up and down his little study, almost thinking that the time had come when he would be able to appropriate to his own use the big room upstairs, in which his predecessor had always sat.

As he resolved these things in his mind a note was brought to him from Archdeacon Grantly, in which that divine begged his lordship to do him the honour of seeing him on the morrow - would his lordship have the kindness to name the hour? Dr Grantly's proposed visit would have reference to the re-appointment of Mr Harding to the wardenship of Hiram's hospital. The bishop having read this note was informed that the archdeacon's servant was waiting for an answer.

Here at once a great opportunity offered itself to the bishop of acting on his own responsibility. He bethought himself of his new ally, and rang the bell for Mr Slope. It turned out that Mr Slope was not in the house; and then, greatly daring, the bishop with his own unassisted spirit wrote a note to the archdeacon saying that he would see him, and naming the hour for doing so. Having watched from his study-window that the messenger got safely off the premises with this despatch, he began to turn over in his mind what step he should next take.

To-morrow he would have to declare to the archdeacon either that Mr Harding should have the appointment, or that he should not have it. The bishop felt that he could not honestly throw over Mr Quiverful without informing Mrs Proudie, and he resolved at last to brave the lioness in her own den and tell her that circumstances were such that it behoved him to reappoint Mr Harding. He did not feel that he should at all derogate from his new courage by promising Mrs Proudie that the very first piece of available preferment at his disposal should be given to Quiverful to atone for the injury done to him. If he could mollify the lioness with such a sop, how happy would he think his first efforts had been?

Not without many misgivings did he find himself in Mrs Proudie's boudoir. He had at first thought of sending for her. But it was not at all impossible that she might choose to take such a message amiss, and then also it might be some protection to him to have his daughters present at the interview. He found her sitting with her account books before her nibbling the end of her pencil evidently mersed in pecuniary difficulties, and harassed in mind by the multiplicity of palatial expenses, and the heavy cost of episcopal grandeur. Her daughters were around her. Olivia was reading a novel, Augusta was crossing a note to her bosom friend in Baker Street, and Netta was working diminutive coach wheels for the bottom of a petticoat. If the bishop could get the better of his wife in her present mood, he would be a man indeed. He might then consider victory his own for ever. After all, in such cases the matter between husband and wife stands much the same as it does between two boys at the same school, two cocks in the same yard, or two armies on the same continent. The conqueror once is generally the conqueror for ever after. The prestige of victory is everything.

'Ahem - my dear,' began the bishop, 'if you are disengaged, I wished to speak to you.' Mrs Proudie put her pencil down carefully at the point to which she had dotted her figures, marked down in her memory the sum she had arrived at, and then looked up, sourly enough, into her helpmate's face. 'If you are busy, another time will do as well,' continued the bishop, whose courage like Bob Acres' had oozed out, now that he found himself on the ground of battle.

'What is it about, bishop?' asked the lady.

'Well - it was about those Quiverfuls - but I see you are engaged. Another time will do just as well for me.'

'What about the Quiverfuls? It is quite understood I believe, that they are to come to the hospital. There is to be no doubt about that, is there?' And as she spoke she kept her pencil sternly and vigorously fixed on the column of figures before her.

'Why, my dear, there is a difficulty,' said the bishop.

'A difficulty!' said Mrs Proudie, 'What difficulty? The place has been promised to Mr Quiverful, and of course he must have it. He has made all his arrangements. He has written for a curate for Puddingdale, he has spoken to the auctioneer about selling his farm, horses, and cows, and in all respects considers the place as his own. Of course he must have it.'

Now, bishop, look well to thyself, and call up all the manhood that is in thee. Think how much is at stake. If now thou art not true to thy guns, no Slope can hereafter aid thee. How can he who deserts his own colours at the final smell of gunpowder expect faith in any ally. Thou thyself hast sought the battlefield; fight out the battle manfully now thou art there. Courage, bishop, courage! Frowns cannot kill, nor can sharp words break any bones. After all the apron is thine own. She can appoint no wardens, give away no benefices, nominate no chaplains, an' thou art but true to thyself. Up, man, and at her with a constant heart.

Some little monitor within the bishop's breast so addressed him. But then there was another monitor there which advised him differently, and as follows. Remember, bishop, she is a woman, and such a woman is the very mischief. Were it not better for thee to carry on this war, if it must be waged, from behind thine own table in thine own study? Does not every cock fight best on is own dunghill? Thy daughters also are here, the pledges of thy love, the fruits of thy loins; is it well that they should see thee in the hour of thy victory over their mother? Nay, is it well that they should see thee in the possible hour of thy defeat? Besides, hast thou not chosen thy opportunity with wonderful little skill, indeed with no touch of sagacity for which thou art famous? Will it not turn out that thou art wrong in this matter, and thine enemy right; that thou hast actually pledged thyself in this matter of the hospital, and that now thou wouldst turn upon thy wife because she requires from thee but the fulfilment of thy promise? Art thou not a Christian bishop, and is not thy word to be held sacred whatever be the result? Return, bishop, to thy sanctum on the lower floor, and postpone thy combative propensities for some occasion in which at least thou mayest fight the battle against odds less tremendously against thee.

All this passed within the bishop's bosom while Mrs Proudie stall sat with her fixed pencil, and the figures of her sum still enduring on the tablets of her memory. 'L4 17s 7d,' she said to herself. 'Of course Mr Quiverful must have the hospital,' she said out loud to her lord.

'Well, my dear, I merely wanted to suggest to you that Mr Slope seems to think that if Mr Harding be not appointed, public feeling in the matter would be against us and that the press might perhaps take it up.'

'Mr Slope seems to think!' said Mrs Proudie, in a tone of voice which plainly showed the bishop that he was right in looking for a breach in that quarter. 'And what has Mr Slope to do with it? I hope, my lord, you are not going to allow yourself to be governed by a chaplain.' and now in her eagerness the lady lost her place in her account.

'Certainly not, my dear. Nothing I can assure you is less probable. But still Mr Slope may be useful in finding how the wind blows, and I really thought that if we could give something good to Mr Quiverful - '

'Nonsense,' said Mrs Proudie; 'it would be years before you could give them anything else that could suit them half as well, and as for the press and the public, and all that, remember there are two ways of telling a story. If Mr Harding is fool enough to tell his tale, we can also tell ours. The place was offered to him, and he refused it. It has now been given to someone else, and there's an end of it. At least, I should think so.'

'Well, my dear, I rather believe you are right;' said the bishop, and sneaking out of the room, he went down stairs, troubled in his mind as to how he should receive the archdeacon on the morrow. He felt himself not very well just at present; and began to consider that he might, not improbably, be detained in his room the next morning by an attack of bile. He was, unfortunately, very subject to bilious annoyances.

'Mr Slope, indeed! I'll Slope him,' said the indignant matron to her listening progeny. 'I don't know what has come to Mr Slope. I believe he thinks he is to be Bishop of Barchester himself, because I have taken him by the hand, and got your father to make him his domestic chaplain.'

'He was always full of impudence,' said Olivia; 'I told you so once before, mamma.' Olivia, however, had not thought him too impudent when once before he had proposed to make her Mrs Slope.

'Well, Olivia, I always thought you liked him,' said Augusta, who at that moment had some grudge against her sister. 'I always disliked the man because I think him thoroughly vulgar.'

'There you're wrong,' said Mrs Proudie; 'he's not vulgar at all; and what is more, he is a soul-stirring, eloquent preacher; but he must be taught to know his place if he is to remain in this house.'

'He has the horridest eyes I ever saw in a man's head,' said Netta; 'and I tell you what, he's terribly greedy; did you see the current pie he ate yesterday?'

When Mr Slope got home he soon learnt from the bishop, as much from his manner as his words, that Mrs Proudie's behests in the matter of the hospital were to be obeyed. Dr Proudie let fall something as to 'this occasion only,' and 'keeping all affairs about patronage exclusively in his own hands.' But he was quite decided about Mr Harding; and as Mr Slope did not wish to have both the prelate and the prelatess against him, he did not at present see that he could do anything but yield.

He merely remarked that he would of course carry out the bishop's views, and that he was quite sure that if the bishop trusted to his own judgment things in the diocese would certainly be well ordered. Mr Slope knew that if you hit a nail on the head often enough, it will penetrate at last.

He was sitting alone in his room on the same evening when a light knock was made on his door, and before he could answer it the door was opened, and his patroness appeared. He was all smiles in a moment, but so was not she also. She took, however, the chair that was offered to her, and thus began her expostulation :-

'Mr Slope, I did not at all approve your conduct the other night with that Italian woman. Any one would have thought that you were her lover.'

'Good gracious, my dear madam,' said Mr Slope, with a look of horror. 'Why, she is a married woman.'

'That's more than I know,' said Mrs Proudie; 'however she chooses to pass for such. But married or not married, such attention as you paid her was improper. I cannot believe that you would wish to give offence in my drawing-room, Mr Slope; but I owe it to myself and my daughters to tell you that I disapprove your conduct.'

Mr Slope opened wide his huge protruding eyes, and stared out of them with a look of well-dignified surprise. 'Why, Mrs Proudie,' said he, 'I did but fetch her something to eat when she was hungry.'

'And you have called on her since,' continued she, looking at the culprit with the stern look of a detective policeman in the act of declaring himself.

Mr Slope turned over in his mind whether it would be well for him to tell this termagant at once that he should call on whom he liked, and do what he liked; but he remembered that his footing in Barchester was not yet sufficiently firm, and that it would be better for him to pacify her.

'I certainly called since at Dr Stanhope's house, and certainly saw Madame Neroni.'

'Yes, and you saw her alone,' said the episcopal Argus.

'Undoubtedly I did,' said Mr Slope, 'but that was because nobody else happened to be in the room. Surely it was no fault of mine if the rest of the family were out.'

'Perhaps not; but I assure you, Mr Slope, you will fall greatly in my estimation if I find that you allow yourself to be caught by the lures of that woman. I know women better than you do, Slope, and you may believe me that that signora, as she calls herself, is not a fitting companion for a strict evangelical, unmarried young clergyman.'

How Mr Slope would have liked to laugh at her, had he dared! But he did not dare. So he merely said, 'I can assure you, Mrs Proudie, the lady in question is nothing to me.'

'Well, I hope not, Mr Slope. But I have considered it my duty to give you this caution; and now there is another thing I feel myself called upon to speak about; it is your conduct to the bishop, Mr Slope.'

'My conduct to the bishop,' said he, now truly surprised and ignorant what the lady alluded to.

'Yes, Mr Slope; your conduct to the bishop. It is by no means what I would wish to see it.'

'Has the bishop said anything, Mrs Proudie?'

'No, the bishop has said nothing. He probably thinks that any remarks on the matter will come better from me, who first introduced you to his lordship's notice. The fact is, Mr Slope, you are a little inclined to take too much upon yourself.'

An angry spot showed itself upon Mr Slope's cheeks, and it was with difficulty that he controlled himself. But he did do so, and sat quite silent while the lady went on.

'It is the fault of many young men in your position, and therefore the bishop is not inclined at present to resent it. You will, no doubt, soon learn what is required from you, and what is not. If you will take my advice, however, you will be careful not to obtrude advice upon the bishop in any matter concerning patronage. If his lordship wants advice, he knows where to look for it.' And then having added to her counsel a string of platitudes as to what was desirable and what not desirable in the conduct of a strictly evangelical, unmarried young clergyman, Mrs Proudie retreated, leaving the chaplain to his thoughts.

The upshot of his thoughts was this, that there certainly was not room in the diocese for the energies of both himself and Mrs Proudie, and that it behoved him quickly to ascertain whether his energies or hers would prevail.

Turn to the next chapter: CHAPTER XVIII THE WIDOW'S PERSECUTION