Middlemarch, Page 69

  CHAPTER LXIX.

  "If thou hast heard a word, let it die with thee." --Ecclesiasticus.

  Mr. Bulstrode was still seated in his manager's room at the Bank, aboutthree o'clock of the same day on which he had received Lydgate there,when the clerk entered to say that his horse was waiting, and also thatMr. Garth was outside and begged to speak with him.

  "By all means," said Bulstrode; and Caleb entered. "Pray sit down, Mr.Garth," continued the banker, in his suavest tone.

  "I am glad that you arrived just in time to find me here. I know youcount your minutes."

  "Oh," said Caleb, gently, with a slow swing of his head on one side, ashe seated himself and laid his hat on the floor.

  He looked at the ground, leaning forward and letting his long fingersdroop between his legs, while each finger moved in succession, as if itwere sharing some thought which filled his large quiet brow.

  Mr. Bulstrode, like every one else who knew Caleb, was used to hisslowness in beginning to speak on any topic which he felt to beimportant, and rather expected that he was about to recur to the buyingof some houses in Blindman's Court, for the sake of pulling them down,as a sacrifice of property which would be well repaid by the influx ofair and light on that spot. It was by propositions of this kind thatCaleb was sometimes troublesome to his employers; but he had usuallyfound Bulstrode ready to meet him in projects of improvement, and theyhad got on well together. When he spoke again, however, it was to say,in rather a subdued voice--

  "I have just come away from Stone Court, Mr. Bulstrode."

  "You found nothing wrong there, I hope," said the banker; "I was theremyself yesterday. Abel has done well with the lambs this year."

  "Why, yes," said Caleb, looking up gravely, "there is something wrong--astranger, who is very ill, I think. He wants a doctor, and I came totell you of that. His name is Raffles."

  He saw the shock of his words passing through Bulstrode's frame. Onthis subject the banker had thought that his fears were too constantlyon the watch to be taken by surprise; but he had been mistaken.

  "Poor wretch!" he said in a compassionate tone, though his lipstrembled a little. "Do you know how he came there?"

  "I took him myself," said Caleb, quietly--"took him up in my gig. Hehad got down from the coach, and was walking a little beyond theturning from the toll-house, and I overtook him. He remembered seeingme with you once before, at Stone Court, and he asked me to take himon. I saw he was ill: it seemed to me the right thing to do, to carryhim under shelter. And now I think you should lose no time in gettingadvice for him." Caleb took up his hat from the floor as he ended, androse slowly from his seat.

  "Certainly," said Bulstrode, whose mind was very active at this moment."Perhaps you will yourself oblige me, Mr. Garth, by calling at Mr.Lydgate's as you pass--or stay! he may at this hour probably be at theHospital. I will first send my man on the horse there with a note thisinstant, and then I will myself ride to Stone Court."

  Bulstrode quickly wrote a note, and went out himself to give thecommission to his man. When he returned, Caleb was standing as beforewith one hand on the back of the chair, holding his hat with the other.In Bulstrode's mind the dominant thought was, "Perhaps Raffles onlyspoke to Garth of his illness. Garth may wonder, as he must have donebefore, at this disreputable fellow's claiming intimacy with me; but hewill know nothing. And he is friendly to me--I can be of use to him."

  He longed for some confirmation of this hopeful conjecture, but to haveasked any question as to what Raffles had said or done would have beento betray fear.

  "I am exceedingly obliged to you, Mr. Garth," he said, in his usualtone of politeness. "My servant will be back in a few minutes, and Ishall then go myself to see what can be done for this unfortunate man.Perhaps you had some other business with me? If so, pray be seated."

  "Thank you," said Caleb, making a slight gesture with his right hand towaive the invitation. "I wish to say, Mr. Bulstrode, that I mustrequest you to put your business into some other hands than mine. I amobliged to you for your handsome way of meeting me--about the lettingof Stone Court, and all other business. But I must give it up." Asharp certainty entered like a stab into Bulstrode's soul.

  "This is sudden, Mr. Garth," was all he could say at first.

  "It is," said Caleb; "but it is quite fixed. I must give it up."

  He spoke with a firmness which was very gentle, and yet he could seethat Bulstrode seemed to cower under that gentleness, his face lookingdried and his eyes swerving away from the glance which rested on him.Caleb felt a deep pity for him, but he could have used no pretexts toaccount for his resolve, even if they would have been of any use.

  "You have been led to this, I apprehend, by some slanders concerning meuttered by that unhappy creature," said Bulstrode, anxious now to knowthe utmost.

  "That is true. I can't deny that I act upon what I heard from him."

  "You are a conscientious man, Mr. Garth--a man, I trust, who feelshimself accountable to God. You would not wish to injure me by beingtoo ready to believe a slander," said Bulstrode, casting about forpleas that might be adapted to his hearer's mind. "That is a poorreason for giving up a connection which I think I may say will bemutually beneficial."

  "I would injure no man if I could help it," said Caleb; "even if Ithought God winked at it. I hope I should have a feeling for myfellow-creature. But, sir--I am obliged to believe that this Raffleshas told me the truth. And I can't be happy in working with you, orprofiting by you. It hurts my mind. I must beg you to seek anotheragent."

  "Very well, Mr. Garth. But I must at least claim to know the worstthat he has told you. I must know what is the foul speech that I amliable to be the victim of," said Bulstrode, a certain amount of angerbeginning to mingle with his humiliation before this quiet man whorenounced his benefits.

  "That's needless," said Caleb, waving his hand, bowing his headslightly, and not swerving from the tone which had in it the mercifulintention to spare this pitiable man. "What he has said to me willnever pass from my lips, unless something now unknown forces it fromme. If you led a harmful life for gain, and kept others out of theirrights by deceit, to get the more for yourself, I dare say yourepent--you would like to go back, and can't: that must be a bitterthing"--Caleb paused a moment and shook his head--"it is not for me tomake your life harder to you."

  "But you do--you do make it harder to me," said Bulstrode constrainedinto a genuine, pleading cry. "You make it harder to me by turningyour back on me."

  "That I'm forced to do," said Caleb, still more gently, lifting up hishand. "I am sorry. I don't judge you and say, he is wicked, and I amrighteous. God forbid. I don't know everything. A man may do wrong,and his will may rise clear out of it, though he can't get his lifeclear. That's a bad punishment. If it is so with you,--well, I'mvery sorry for you. But I have that feeling inside me, that I can't goon working with you. That's all, Mr. Bulstrode. Everything else isburied, so far as my will goes. And I wish you good-day."

  "One moment, Mr. Garth!" said Bulstrode, hurriedly. "I may trust thento your solemn assurance that you will not repeat either to man orwoman what--even if it have any degree of truth in it--is yet amalicious representation?" Caleb's wrath was stirred, and he said,indignantly--

  "Why should I have said it if I didn't mean it? I am in no fear ofyou. Such tales as that will never tempt my tongue."

  "Excuse me--I am agitated--I am the victim of this abandoned man."

  "Stop a bit! you have got to consider whether you didn't help to makehim worse, when you profited by his vices."

  "You are wronging me by too readily believing him," said Bulstrode,oppressed, as by a nightmare, with the inability to deny flatly whatRaffles might have said; and yet feeling it an escape that Caleb hadnot so stated it to him as to ask for that flat denial.

  "No," said Caleb, lifting his hand deprecatingly; "I am ready tobelieve better, when better is proved. I rob you o
f no good chance.As to speaking, I hold it a crime to expose a man's sin unless I'mclear it must be done to save the innocent. That is my way ofthinking, Mr. Bulstrode, and what I say, I've no need to swear. I wishyou good-day."

  Some hours later, when he was at home, Caleb said to his wife,incidentally, that he had had some little differences with Bulstrode,and that in consequence, he had given up all notion of taking StoneCourt, and indeed had resigned doing further business for him.

  "He was disposed to interfere too much, was he?" said Mrs. Garth,imagining that her husband had been touched on his sensitive point, andnot been allowed to do what he thought right as to materials and modesof work.

  "Oh," said Caleb, bowing his head and waving his hand gravely. AndMrs. Garth knew that this was a sign of his not intending to speakfurther on the subject.

  As for Bulstrode, he had almost immediately mounted his horse and setoff for Stone Court, being anxious to arrive there before Lydgate.

  His mind was crowded with images and conjectures, which were a languageto his hopes and fears, just as we hear tones from the vibrations whichshake our whole system. The deep humiliation with which he had wincedunder Caleb Garth's knowledge of his past and rejection of hispatronage, alternated with and almost gave way to the sense of safetyin the fact that Garth, and no other, had been the man to whom Raffleshad spoken. It seemed to him a sort of earnest that Providenceintended his rescue from worse consequences; the way being thus leftopen for the hope of secrecy. That Raffles should be afflicted withillness, that he should have been led to Stone Court rather thanelsewhere--Bulstrode's heart fluttered at the vision of probabilitieswhich these events conjured up. If it should turn out that he wasfreed from all danger of disgrace--if he could breathe in perfectliberty--his life should be more consecrated than it had ever beenbefore. He mentally lifted up this vow as if it would urge the resulthe longed for--he tried to believe in the potency of that prayerfulresolution--its potency to determine death. He knew that he ought tosay, "Thy will be done;" and he said it often. But the intense desireremained that the will of God might be the death of that hated man.

  Yet when he arrived at Stone Court he could not see the change inRaffles without a shock. But for his pallor and feebleness, Bulstrodewould have called the change in him entirely mental. Instead of hisloud tormenting mood, he showed an intense, vague terror, and seemed todeprecate Bulstrode's anger, because the money was all gone--he hadbeen robbed--it had half of it been taken from him. He had only comehere because he was ill and somebody was hunting him--somebody wasafter him, he had told nobody anything, he had kept his mouth shut.Bulstrode, not knowing the significance of these symptoms, interpretedthis new nervous susceptibility into a means of alarming Raffles intotrue confessions, and taxed him with falsehood in saying that he hadnot told anything, since he had just told the man who took him up inhis gig and brought him to Stone Court. Raffles denied this withsolemn adjurations; the fact being that the links of consciousness wereinterrupted in him, and that his minute terror-stricken narrative toCaleb Garth had been delivered under a set of visionary impulses whichhad dropped back into darkness.

  Bulstrode's heart sank again at this sign that he could get no graspover the wretched man's mind, and that no word of Raffles could betrusted as to the fact which he most wanted to know, namely, whether ornot he had really kept silence to every one in the neighborhood exceptCaleb Garth. The housekeeper had told him without the least constraintof manner that since Mr. Garth left, Raffles had asked her for beer,and after that had not spoken, seeming very ill. On that side it mightbe concluded that there had been no betrayal. Mrs. Abel thought, likethe servants at The Shrubs, that the strange man belonged to theunpleasant "kin" who are among the troubles of the rich; she had atfirst referred the kinship to Mr. Rigg, and where there was propertyleft, the buzzing presence of such large blue-bottles seemed naturalenough. How he could be "kin" to Bulstrode as well was not so clear,but Mrs. Abel agreed with her husband that there was "no knowing," aproposition which had a great deal of mental food for her, so that sheshook her head over it without further speculation.

  In less than an hour Lydgate arrived. Bulstrode met him outside thewainscoted parlor, where Raffles was, and said--

  "I have called you in, Mr. Lydgate, to an unfortunate man who was oncein my employment, many years ago. Afterwards he went to America, andreturned I fear to an idle dissolute life. Being destitute, he has aclaim on me. He was slightly connected with Rigg, the former owner ofthis place, and in consequence found his way here. I believe he isseriously ill: apparently his mind is affected. I feel bound to do theutmost for him."

  Lydgate, who had the remembrance of his last conversation withBulstrode strongly upon him, was not disposed to say an unnecessaryword to him, and bowed slightly in answer to this account; but justbefore entering the room he turned automatically and said, "What is hisname?"--to know names being as much a part of the medical man'saccomplishment as of the practical politician's.

  "Raffles, John Raffles," said Bulstrode, who hoped that whatever becameof Raffles, Lydgate would never know any more of him.

  When he had thoroughly examined and considered the patient, Lydgateordered that he should go to bed, and be kept there in as completequiet as possible, and then went with Bulstrode into another room.

  "It is a serious case, I apprehend," said the banker, before Lydgatebegan to speak.

  "No--and yes," said Lydgate, half dubiously. "It is difficult todecide as to the possible effect of long-standing complications; butthe man had a robust constitution to begin with. I should not expectthis attack to be fatal, though of course the system is in a ticklishstate. He should be well watched and attended to."

  "I will remain here myself," said Bulstrode. "Mrs. Abel and herhusband are inexperienced. I can easily remain here for the night, ifyou will oblige me by taking a note for Mrs. Bulstrode."

  "I should think that is hardly necessary," said Lydgate. "He seemstame and terrified enough. He might become more unmanageable. Butthere is a man here--is there not?"

  "I have more than once stayed here a few nights for the sake ofseclusion," said Bulstrode, indifferently; "I am quite disposed to doso now. Mrs. Abel and her husband can relieve or aid me, if necessary."

  "Very well. Then I need give my directions only to you," said Lydgate,not feeling surprised at a little peculiarity in Bulstrode.

  "You think, then, that the case is hopeful?" said Bulstrode, whenLydgate had ended giving his orders.

  "Unless there turn out to be further complications, such as I have notat present detected--yes," said Lydgate. "He may pass on to a worsestage; but I should not wonder if he got better in a few days, byadhering to the treatment I have prescribed. There must be firmness.Remember, if he calls for liquors of any sort, not to give them to him.In my opinion, men in his condition are oftener killed by treatmentthan by the disease. Still, new symptoms may arise. I shall comeagain to-morrow morning."

  After waiting for the note to be carried to Mrs. Bulstrode, Lydgaterode away, forming no conjectures, in the first instance, about thehistory of Raffles, but rehearsing the whole argument, which had latelybeen much stirred by the publication of Dr. Ware's abundant experiencein America, as to the right way of treating cases of alcoholicpoisoning such as this. Lydgate, when abroad, had already beeninterested in this question: he was strongly convinced against theprevalent practice of allowing alcohol and persistently administeringlarge doses of opium; and he had repeatedly acted on this convictionwith a favorable result.

  "The man is in a diseased state," he thought, "but there's a good dealof wear in him still. I suppose he is an object of charity toBulstrode. It is curious what patches of hardness and tenderness lieside by side in men's dispositions. Bulstrode seems the mostunsympathetic fellow I ever saw about some people, and yet he has takenno end of trouble, and spent a great deal of money, on benevolentobjects. I suppose he has some test by which he finds out whom Heavencares for--he has made up his min
d that it doesn't care for me."

  This streak of bitterness came from a plenteous source, and keptwidening in the current of his thought as he neared Lowick Gate. Hehad not been there since his first interview with Bulstrode in themorning, having been found at the Hospital by the banker's messenger;and for the first time he was returning to his home without the visionof any expedient in the background which left him a hope of raisingmoney enough to deliver him from the coming destitution of everythingwhich made his married life tolerable--everything which saved him andRosamond from that bare isolation in which they would be forced torecognize how little of a comfort they could be to each other. It wasmore bearable to do without tenderness for himself than to see that hisown tenderness could make no amends for the lack of other things toher. The sufferings of his own pride from humiliations past and tocome were keen enough, yet they were hardly distinguishable to himselffrom that more acute pain which dominated them--the pain of foreseeingthat Rosamond would come to regard him chiefly as the cause ofdisappointment and unhappiness to her. He had never liked themakeshifts of poverty, and they had never before entered into hisprospects for himself; but he was beginning now to imagine how twocreatures who loved each other, and had a stock of thoughts in common,might laugh over their shabby furniture, and their calculations how farthey could afford butter and eggs. But the glimpse of that poetryseemed as far off from him as the carelessness of the golden age; inpoor Rosamond's mind there was not room enough for luxuries to looksmall in. He got down from his horse in a very sad mood, and went intothe house, not expecting to be cheered except by his dinner, andreflecting that before the evening closed it would be wise to tellRosamond of his application to Bulstrode and its failure. It would bewell not to lose time in preparing her for the worst.

  But his dinner waited long for him before he was able to eat it. Foron entering he found that Dover's agent had already put a man in thehouse, and when he asked where Mrs. Lydgate was, he was told that shewas in her bedroom. He went up and found her stretched on the bed paleand silent, without an answer even in her face to any word or look ofhis. He sat down by the bed and leaning over her said with almost acry of prayer--

  "Forgive me for this misery, my poor Rosamond! Let us only love oneanother."

  She looked at him silently, still with the blank despair on her face;but then the tears began to fill her blue eyes, and her lip trembled.The strong man had had too much to bear that day. He let his head fallbeside hers and sobbed.

  He did not hinder her from going to her father early in the morning--itseemed now that he ought not to hinder her from doing as shepleased. In half an hour she came back, and said that papa and mammawished her to go and stay with them while things were in this miserablestate. Papa said he could do nothing about the debt--if he paid this,there would be half-a-dozen more. She had better come back home againtill Lydgate had got a comfortable home for her. "Do you object,Tertius?"

  "Do as you like," said Lydgate. "But things are not coming to a crisisimmediately. There is no hurry."

  "I should not go till to-morrow," said Rosamond; "I shall want to packmy clothes."

  "Oh, I would wait a little longer than to-morrow--there is no knowingwhat may happen," said Lydgate, with bitter irony. "I may get my neckbroken, and that may make things easier to you."

  It was Lydgate's misfortune and Rosamond's too, that his tendernesstowards her, which was both an emotional prompting and awell-considered resolve, was inevitably interrupted by these outburstsof indignation either ironical or remonstrant. She thought themtotally unwarranted, and the repulsion which this exceptional severityexcited in her was in danger of making the more persistent tendernessunacceptable.

  "I see you do not wish me to go," she said, with chill mildness; "whycan you not say so, without that kind of violence? I shall stay untilyou request me to do otherwise."

  Lydgate said no more, but went out on his rounds. He felt bruised andshattered, and there was a dark line under his eyes which Rosamond hadnot seen before. She could not bear to look at him. Tertius had a wayof taking things which made them a great deal worse for her.