Middlemarch, Page 71

  CHAPTER LXXI.

  Clown. . . . 'Twas in the Bunch of Grapes, where, indeed, you have a delight to sit, have you not? Froth. I have so: because it is an open room, and good for winter. Clo. Why, very well then: I hope here be truths. --Measure for Measure.

  Five days after the death of Raffles, Mr. Bambridge was standing at hisleisure under the large archway leading into the yard of the GreenDragon. He was not fond of solitary contemplation, but he had onlyjust come out of the house, and any human figure standing at ease underthe archway in the early afternoon was as certain to attractcompanionship as a pigeon which has found something worth pecking at.In this case there was no material object to feed upon, but the eye ofreason saw a probability of mental sustenance in the shape of gossip.Mr. Hopkins, the meek-mannered draper opposite, was the first to act onthis inward vision, being the more ambitious of a little masculine talkbecause his customers were chiefly women. Mr. Bambridge was rathercurt to the draper, feeling that Hopkins was of course glad to talk to_him_, but that he was not going to waste much of his talk on Hopkins.Soon, however, there was a small cluster of more important listeners,who were either deposited from the passers-by, or had sauntered to thespot expressly to see if there were anything going on at the GreenDragon; and Mr. Bambridge was finding it worth his while to say manyimpressive things about the fine studs he had been seeing and thepurchases he had made on a journey in the north from which he had justreturned. Gentlemen present were assured that when they could show himanything to cut out a blood mare, a bay, rising four, which was to beseen at Doncaster if they chose to go and look at it, Mr. Bambridgewould gratify them by being shot "from here to Hereford." Also, a pairof blacks which he was going to put into the break recalled vividly tohis mind a pair which he had sold to Faulkner in '19, for a hundredguineas, and which Faulkner had sold for a hundred and sixty two monthslater--any gent who could disprove this statement being offered theprivilege of calling Mr. Bambridge by a very ugly name until theexercise made his throat dry.

  When the discourse was at this point of animation, came up Mr. FrankHawley. He was not a man to compromise his dignity by lounging at theGreen Dragon, but happening to pass along the High Street and seeingBambridge on the other side, he took some of his long strides across toask the horsedealer whether he had found the first-rate gig-horse whichhe had engaged to look for. Mr. Hawley was requested to wait until hehad seen a gray selected at Bilkley: if that did not meet his wishes toa hair, Bambridge did not know a horse when he saw it, which seemed tobe the highest conceivable unlikelihood. Mr. Hawley, standing with hisback to the street, was fixing a time for looking at the gray andseeing it tried, when a horseman passed slowly by.

  "Bulstrode!" said two or three voices at once in a low tone, one ofthem, which was the draper's, respectfully prefixing the "Mr.;" butnobody having more intention in this interjectural naming than if theyhad said "the Riverston coach" when that vehicle appeared in thedistance. Mr. Hawley gave a careless glance round at Bulstrode's back,but as Bambridge's eyes followed it he made a sarcastic grimace.

  "By jingo! that reminds me," he began, lowering his voice a little, "Ipicked up something else at Bilkley besides your gig-horse, Mr. Hawley.I picked up a fine story about Bulstrode. Do you know how he came byhis fortune? Any gentleman wanting a bit of curious information, I cangive it him free of expense. If everybody got their deserts, Bulstrodemight have had to say his prayers at Botany Bay."

  "What do you mean?" said Mr. Hawley, thrusting his hands into hispockets, and pushing a little forward under the archway. If Bulstrodeshould turn out to be a rascal, Frank Hawley had a prophetic soul.

  "I had it from a party who was an old chum of Bulstrode's. I'll tellyou where I first picked him up," said Bambridge, with a sudden gestureof his fore-finger. "He was at Larcher's sale, but I knew nothing ofhim then--he slipped through my fingers--was after Bulstrode, nodoubt. He tells me he can tap Bulstrode to any amount, knows all hissecrets. However, he blabbed to me at Bilkley: he takes a stiff glass.Damme if I think he meant to turn king's evidence; but he's that sortof bragging fellow, the bragging runs over hedge and ditch with him,till he'd brag of a spavin as if it 'ud fetch money. A man should knowwhen to pull up." Mr. Bambridge made this remark with an air ofdisgust, satisfied that his own bragging showed a fine sense of themarketable.

  "What's the man's name? Where can he be found?" said Mr. Hawley.

  "As to where he is to be found, I left him to it at the Saracen's Head;but his name is Raffles."

  "Raffles!" exclaimed Mr. Hopkins. "I furnished his funeral yesterday.He was buried at Lowick. Mr. Bulstrode followed him. A very decentfuneral." There was a strong sensation among the listeners. Mr.Bambridge gave an ejaculation in which "brimstone" was the mildestword, and Mr. Hawley, knitting his brows and bending his head forward,exclaimed, "What?--where did the man die?"

  "At Stone Court," said the draper. "The housekeeper said he was arelation of the master's. He came there ill on Friday."

  "Why, it was on Wednesday I took a glass with him," interposedBambridge.

  "Did any doctor attend him?" said Mr. Hawley

  "Yes. Mr. Lydgate. Mr. Bulstrode sat up with him one night. He diedthe third morning."

  "Go on, Bambridge," said Mr. Hawley, insistently. "What did thisfellow say about Bulstrode?"

  The group had already become larger, the town-clerk's presence being aguarantee that something worth listening to was going on there; and Mr.Bambridge delivered his narrative in the hearing of seven. It wasmainly what we know, including the fact about Will Ladislaw, with somelocal color and circumstance added: it was what Bulstrode had dreadedthe betrayal of--and hoped to have buried forever with the corpse ofRaffles--it was that haunting ghost of his earlier life which as herode past the archway of the Green Dragon he was trusting thatProvidence had delivered him from. Yes, Providence. He had notconfessed to himself yet that he had done anything in the way ofcontrivance to this end; he had accepted what seemed to have beenoffered. It was impossible to prove that he had done anything whichhastened the departure of that man's soul.

  But this gossip about Bulstrode spread through Middlemarch like thesmell of fire. Mr. Frank Hawley followed up his information by sendinga clerk whom he could trust to Stone Court on a pretext of inquiringabout hay, but really to gather all that could be learned about Rafflesand his illness from Mrs. Abel. In this way it came to his knowledgethat Mr. Garth had carried the man to Stone Court in his gig; and Mr.Hawley in consequence took an opportunity of seeing Caleb, calling athis office to ask whether he had time to undertake an arbitration if itwere required, and then asking him incidentally about Raffles. Calebwas betrayed into no word injurious to Bulstrode beyond the fact whichhe was forced to admit, that he had given up acting for him within thelast week. Mr Hawley drew his inferences, and feeling convinced thatRaffles had told his story to Garth, and that Garth had given upBulstrode's affairs in consequence, said so a few hours later to Mr.Toller. The statement was passed on until it had quite lost the stampof an inference, and was taken as information coming straight fromGarth, so that even a diligent historian might have concluded Caleb tobe the chief publisher of Bulstrode's misdemeanors.

  Mr. Hawley was not slow to perceive that there was no handle for thelaw either in the revelations made by Raffles or in the circumstancesof his death. He had himself ridden to Lowick village that he mightlook at the register and talk over the whole matter with Mr.Farebrother, who was not more surprised than the lawyer that an uglysecret should have come to light about Bulstrode, though he had alwayshad justice enough in him to hinder his antipathy from turning intoconclusions. But while they were talking another combination wassilently going forward in Mr. Farebrother's mind, which foreshadowedwhat was soon to be loudly spoken of in Middlemarch as a necessary"putting of two and two together." With the reasons which keptBulstrode in dread of Raffles there flashed the thought that the dreadmight have something to
do with his munificence towards his medicalman; and though he resisted the suggestion that it had been consciouslyaccepted in any way as a bribe, he had a foreboding that thiscomplication of things might be of malignant effect on Lydgate'sreputation. He perceived that Mr. Hawley knew nothing at present ofthe sudden relief from debt, and he himself was careful to glide awayfrom all approaches towards the subject.

  "Well," he said, with a deep breath, wanting to wind up the illimitablediscussion of what might have been, though nothing could be legallyproven, "it is a strange story. So our mercurial Ladislaw has a queergenealogy! A high-spirited young lady and a musical Polish patriotmade a likely enough stock for him to spring from, but I should neverhave suspected a grafting of the Jew pawnbroker. However, there's noknowing what a mixture will turn out beforehand. Some sorts of dirtserve to clarify."

  "It's just what I should have expected," said Mr. Hawley, mounting hishorse. "Any cursed alien blood, Jew, Corsican, or Gypsy."

  "I know he's one of your black sheep, Hawley. But he is really adisinterested, unworldly fellow," said Mr. Farebrother, smiling.

  "Ay, ay, that is your Whiggish twist," said Mr. Hawley, who had been inthe habit of saying apologetically that Farebrother was such a damnedpleasant good-hearted fellow you would mistake him for a Tory.

  Mr. Hawley rode home without thinking of Lydgate's attendance onRaffles in any other light than as a piece of evidence on the side ofBulstrode. But the news that Lydgate had all at once become able notonly to get rid of the execution in his house but to pay all his debtsin Middlemarch was spreading fast, gathering round it conjectures andcomments which gave it new body and impetus, and soon filling the earsof other persons besides Mr. Hawley, who were not slow to see asignificant relation between this sudden command of money andBulstrode's desire to stifle the scandal of Raffles. That the moneycame from Bulstrode would infallibly have been guessed even if therehad been no direct evidence of it; for it had beforehand entered intothe gossip about Lydgate's affairs, that neither his father-in-law norhis own family would do anything for him, and direct evidence wasfurnished not only by a clerk at the Bank, but by innocent Mrs.Bulstrode herself, who mentioned the loan to Mrs. Plymdale, whomentioned it to her daughter-in-law of the house of Toller, whomentioned it generally. The business was felt to be so public andimportant that it required dinners to feed it, and many invitationswere just then issued and accepted on the strength of this scandalconcerning Bulstrode and Lydgate; wives, widows, and single ladies tooktheir work and went out to tea oftener than usual; and all publicconviviality, from the Green Dragon to Dollop's, gathered a zest whichcould not be won from the question whether the Lords would throw outthe Reform Bill.

  For hardly anybody doubted that some scandalous reason or other was atthe bottom of Bulstrode's liberality to Lydgate. Mr. Hawley indeed, inthe first instance, invited a select party, including the twophysicians, with Mr Toller and Mr. Wrench, expressly to hold a closediscussion as to the probabilities of Raffles's illness, reciting tothem all the particulars which had been gathered from Mrs. Abel inconnection with Lydgate's certificate, that the death was due todelirium tremens; and the medical gentlemen, who all stoodundisturbedly on the old paths in relation to this disease, declaredthat they could see nothing in these particulars which could betransformed into a positive ground of suspicion. But the moral groundsof suspicion remained: the strong motives Bulstrode clearly had forwishing to be rid of Raffles, and the fact that at this critical momenthe had given Lydgate the help which he must for some time have knownthe need for; the disposition, moreover, to believe that Bulstrodewould be unscrupulous, and the absence of any indisposition to believethat Lydgate might be as easily bribed as other haughty-minded men whenthey have found themselves in want of money. Even if the money hadbeen given merely to make him hold his tongue about the scandal ofBulstrode's earlier life, the fact threw an odious light on Lydgate,who had long been sneered at as making himself subservient to thebanker for the sake of working himself into predominance, anddiscrediting the elder members of his profession. Hence, in spite ofthe negative as to any direct sign of guilt in relation to the death atStone Court, Mr. Hawley's select party broke up with the sense that theaffair had "an ugly look."

  But this vague conviction of indeterminable guilt, which was enough tokeep up much head-shaking and biting innuendo even among substantialprofessional seniors, had for the general mind all the superior powerof mystery over fact. Everybody liked better to conjecture how thething was, than simply to know it; for conjecture soon became moreconfident than knowledge, and had a more liberal allowance for theincompatible. Even the more definite scandal concerning Bulstrode'searlier life was, for some minds, melted into the mass of mystery, asso much lively metal to be poured out in dialogue, and to take suchfantastic shapes as heaven pleased.

  This was the tone of thought chiefly sanctioned by Mrs. Dollop, thespirited landlady of the Tankard in Slaughter Lane, who had often toresist the shallow pragmatism of customers disposed to think that theirreports from the outer world were of equal force with what had "comeup" in her mind. How it had been brought to her she didn't know, butit was there before her as if it had been "scored with the chalk on thechimney-board--" as Bulstrode should say, "his inside was _that black_as if the hairs of his head knowed the thoughts of his heart, he'd tear'em up by the roots."

  "That's odd," said Mr. Limp, a meditative shoemaker, with weak eyes anda piping voice. "Why, I read in the 'Trumpet' that was what the Dukeof Wellington said when he turned his coat and went over to the Romans."

  "Very like," said Mrs. Dollop. "If one raskill said it, it's morereason why another should. But hypo_crite_ as he's been, and holdingthings with that high hand, as there was no parson i' the country goodenough for him, he was forced to take Old Harry into his counsel, andOld Harry's been too many for him."

  "Ay, ay, he's a 'complice you can't send out o' the country," said Mr.Crabbe, the glazier, who gathered much news and groped among it dimly."But by what I can make out, there's them says Bulstrode was forrunning away, for fear o' being found out, before now."

  "He'll be drove away, whether or no," said Mr. Dill, the barber, whohad just dropped in. "I shaved Fletcher, Hawley's clerk, thismorning--he's got a bad finger--and he says they're all of one mind toget rid of Bulstrode. Mr. Thesiger is turned against him, and wantshim out o' the parish. And there's gentlemen in this town says they'das soon dine with a fellow from the hulks. 'And a deal sooner Iwould,' says Fletcher; 'for what's more against one's stomach than aman coming and making himself bad company with his religion, and givingout as the Ten Commandments are not enough for him, and all the whilehe's worse than half the men at the tread-mill?' Fletcher said sohimself."

  "It'll be a bad thing for the town though, if Bulstrode's money goesout of it," said Mr. Limp, quaveringly.

  "Ah, there's better folks spend their money worse," said a firm-voiceddyer, whose crimson hands looked out of keeping with his good-naturedface.

  "But he won't keep his money, by what I can make out," said theglazier. "Don't they say as there's somebody can strip it off him? Bywhat I can understan', they could take every penny off him, if theywent to lawing."

  "No such thing!" said the barber, who felt himself a little above hiscompany at Dollop's, but liked it none the worse. "Fletcher says it'sno such thing. He says they might prove over and over again whosechild this young Ladislaw was, and they'd do no more than if theyproved I came out of the Fens--he couldn't touch a penny."

  "Look you there now!" said Mrs. Dollop, indignantly. "I thank the Lordhe took my children to Himself, if that's all the law can do for themotherless. Then by that, it's o' no use who your father and motheris. But as to listening to what one lawyer says without askinganother--I wonder at a man o' your cleverness, Mr. Dill. It's wellknown there's always two sides, if no more; else who'd go to law, Ishould like to know? It's a poor tale, with all the law as there is upand down, if it's no use proving whose child you are. Fletcher may say
that if he likes, but I say, don't Fletcher _me_!"

  Mr. Dill affected to laugh in a complimentary way at Mrs. Dollop, as awoman who was more than a match for the lawyers; being disposed tosubmit to much twitting from a landlady who had a long score againsthim.

  "If they come to lawing, and it's all true as folks say, there's moreto be looked to nor money," said the glazier. "There's this poorcreetur as is dead and gone; by what I can make out, he'd seen the daywhen he was a deal finer gentleman nor Bulstrode."

  "Finer gentleman! I'll warrant him," said Mrs. Dollop; "and a farpersonabler man, by what I can hear. As I said when Mr. Baldwin, thetax-gatherer, comes in, a-standing where you sit, and says, 'Bulstrodegot all his money as he brought into this town by thieving andswindling,'--I said, 'You don't make me no wiser, Mr. Baldwin: it's setmy blood a-creeping to look at him ever sin' here he came intoSlaughter Lane a-wanting to buy the house over my head: folks don'tlook the color o' the dough-tub and stare at you as if they wanted tosee into your backbone for nothingk.' That was what I said, and Mr.Baldwin can bear me witness."

  "And in the rights of it too," said Mr. Crabbe. "For by what I canmake out, this Raffles, as they call him, was a lusty, fresh-coloredman as you'd wish to see, and the best o' company--though dead he liesin Lowick churchyard sure enough; and by what I can understan', there'sthem knows more than they _should_ know about how he got there."

  "I'll believe you!" said Mrs. Dallop, with a touch of scorn at Mr.Crabbe's apparent dimness. "When a man's been 'ticed to a lone house,and there's them can pay for hospitals and nurses for half thecountry-side choose to be sitters-up night and day, and nobody to comenear but a doctor as is known to stick at nothingk, and as poor as hecan hang together, and after that so flush o' money as he can pay offMr. Byles the butcher as his bill has been running on for the best o'joints since last Michaelmas was a twelvemonth--I don't want anybody tocome and tell me as there's been more going on nor the Prayer-book'sgot a service for--I don't want to stand winking and blinking andthinking."

  Mrs. Dollop looked round with the air of a landlady accustomed todominate her company. There was a chorus of adhesion from the morecourageous; but Mr. Limp, after taking a draught, placed his flat handstogether and pressed them hard between his knees, looking down at themwith blear-eyed contemplation, as if the scorching power of Mrs.Dollop's speech had quite dried up and nullified his wits until theycould be brought round again by further moisture.

  "Why shouldn't they dig the man up and have the Crowner?" said thedyer. "It's been done many and many's the time. If there's been foulplay they might find it out."

  "Not they, Mr. Jonas!" said Mrs Dollop, emphatically. "I know whatdoctors are. They're a deal too cunning to be found out. And thisDoctor Lydgate that's been for cutting up everybody before the breathwas well out o' their body--it's plain enough what use he wanted tomake o' looking into respectable people's insides. He knows drugs, youmay be sure, as you can neither smell nor see, neither before they'reswallowed nor after. Why, I've seen drops myself ordered by DoctorGambit, as is our club doctor and a good charikter, and has broughtmore live children into the world nor ever another i' Middlemarch--Isay I've seen drops myself as made no difference whether they was inthe glass or out, and yet have griped you the next day. So I'll leaveyour own sense to judge. Don't tell me! All I say is, it's a mercythey didn't take this Doctor Lydgate on to our club. There's many amother's child might ha' rued it."

  The heads of this discussion at "Dollop's" had been the common themeamong all classes in the town, had been carried to Lowick Parsonage onone side and to Tipton Grange on the other, had come fully to the earsof the Vincy family, and had been discussed with sad reference to "poorHarriet" by all Mrs. Bulstrode's friends, before Lydgate knewdistinctly why people were looking strangely at him, and beforeBulstrode himself suspected the betrayal of his secrets. He had notbeen accustomed to very cordial relations with his neighbors, and hencehe could not miss the signs of cordiality; moreover, he had been takingjourneys on business of various kinds, having now made up his mind thathe need not quit Middlemarch, and feeling able consequently todetermine on matters which he had before left in suspense.

  "We will make a journey to Cheltenham in the course of a month or two,"he had said to his wife. "There are great spiritual advantages to behad in that town along with the air and the waters, and six weeks therewill be eminently refreshing to us."

  He really believed in the spiritual advantages, and meant that his lifehenceforth should be the more devoted because of those later sins whichhe represented to himself as hypothetic, praying hypothetically fortheir pardon:--"if I have herein transgressed."

  As to the Hospital, he avoided saying anything further to Lydgate,fearing to manifest a too sudden change of plans immediately on thedeath of Raffles. In his secret soul he believed that Lydgatesuspected his orders to have been intentionally disobeyed, andsuspecting this he must also suspect a motive. But nothing had beenbetrayed to him as to the history of Raffles, and Bulstrode was anxiousnot to do anything which would give emphasis to his undefinedsuspicions. As to any certainty that a particular method of treatmentwould either save or kill, Lydgate himself was constantly arguingagainst such dogmatism; he had no right to speak, and he had everymotive for being silent. Hence Bulstrode felt himself providentiallysecured. The only incident he had strongly winced under had been anoccasional encounter with Caleb Garth, who, however, had raised his hatwith mild gravity.

  Meanwhile, on the part of the principal townsmen a strong determinationwas growing against him.

  A meeting was to be held in the Town-Hall on a sanitary question whichhad risen into pressing importance by the occurrence of a cholera casein the town. Since the Act of Parliament, which had been hurriedlypassed, authorizing assessments for sanitary measures, there had been aBoard for the superintendence of such measures appointed inMiddlemarch, and much cleansing and preparation had been concurred inby Whigs and Tories. The question now was, whether a piece of groundoutside the town should be secured as a burial-ground by means ofassessment or by private subscription. The meeting was to be open, andalmost everybody of importance in the town was expected to be there.

  Mr. Bulstrode was a member of the Board, and just before twelve o'clockhe started from the Bank with the intention of urging the plan ofprivate subscription. Under the hesitation of his projects, he had forsome time kept himself in the background, and he felt that he shouldthis morning resume his old position as a man of action and influencein the public affairs of the town where he expected to end his days.Among the various persons going in the same direction, he saw Lydgate;they joined, talked over the object of the meeting, and entered ittogether.

  It seemed that everybody of mark had been earlier than they. But therewere still spaces left near the head of the large central table, andthey made their way thither. Mr. Farebrother sat opposite, not farfrom Mr. Hawley; all the medical men were there; Mr. Thesiger was inthe chair, and Mr. Brooke of Tipton was on his right hand.

  Lydgate noticed a peculiar interchange of glances when he and Bulstrodetook their seats.

  After the business had been fully opened by the chairman, who pointedout the advantages of purchasing by subscription a piece of groundlarge enough to be ultimately used as a general cemetery, Mr.Bulstrode, whose rather high-pitched but subdued and fluent voice thetown was used to at meetings of this sort, rose and asked leave todeliver his opinion. Lydgate could see again the peculiar interchangeof glances before Mr. Hawley started up, and said in his firm resonantvoice, "Mr. Chairman, I request that before any one delivers hisopinion on this point I may be permitted to speak on a question ofpublic feeling, which not only by myself, but by many gentlemenpresent, is regarded as preliminary."

  Mr. Hawley's mode of speech, even when public decorum repressed his"awful language," was formidable in its curtness and self-possession.Mr. Thesiger sanctioned the request, Mr. Bulstrode sat down, and Mr.Hawley continued.

  "In what I have to say,
Mr. Chairman, I am not speaking simply on myown behalf: I am speaking with the concurrence and at the expressrequest of no fewer than eight of my fellow-townsmen, who areimmediately around us. It is our united sentiment that Mr. Bulstrodeshould be called upon--and I do now call upon him--to resign publicpositions which he holds not simply as a tax-payer, but as a gentlemanamong gentlemen. There are practices and there are acts which, owingto circumstances, the law cannot visit, though they may be worse thanmany things which are legally punishable. Honest men and gentlemen, ifthey don't want the company of people who perpetrate such acts, havegot to defend themselves as they best can, and that is what I and thefriends whom I may call my clients in this affair are determined to do.I don't say that Mr. Bulstrode has been guilty of shameful acts, but Icall upon him either publicly to deny and confute the scandalousstatements made against him by a man now dead, and who died in hishouse--the statement that he was for many years engaged in nefariouspractices, and that he won his fortune by dishonest procedures--or elseto withdraw from positions which could only have been allowed him as agentleman among gentlemen."

  All eyes in the room were turned on Mr. Bulstrode, who, since the firstmention of his name, had been going through a crisis of feeling almosttoo violent for his delicate frame to support. Lydgate, who himselfwas undergoing a shock as from the terrible practical interpretation ofsome faint augury, felt, nevertheless, that his own movement ofresentful hatred was checked by that instinct of the Healer whichthinks first of bringing rescue or relief to the sufferer, when helooked at the shrunken misery of Bulstrode's livid face.

  The quick vision that his life was after all a failure, that he was adishonored man, and must quail before the glance of those towards whomhe had habitually assumed the attitude of a reprover--that God haddisowned him before men and left him unscreened to the triumphant scornof those who were glad to have their hatred justified--the sense ofutter futility in that equivocation with his conscience in dealing withthe life of his accomplice, an equivocation which now turned venomouslyupon him with the full-grown fang of a discovered lie:--all thisrushed through him like the agony of terror which fails to kill, andleaves the ears still open to the returning wave of execration. Thesudden sense of exposure after the re-established sense of safetycame--not to the coarse organization of a criminal but to--thesusceptible nerve of a man whose intensest being lay in such masteryand predominance as the conditions of his life had shaped for him.

  But in that intense being lay the strength of reaction. Through allhis bodily infirmity there ran a tenacious nerve of ambitiousself-preserving will, which had continually leaped out like a flame,scattering all doctrinal fears, and which, even while he sat an objectof compassion for the merciful, was beginning to stir and glow underhis ashy paleness. Before the last words were out of Mr. Hawley'smouth, Bulstrode felt that he should answer, and that his answer wouldbe a retort. He dared not get up and say, "I am not guilty, the wholestory is false"--even if he had dared this, it would have seemed tohim, under his present keen sense of betrayal, as vain as to pull, forcovering to his nakedness, a frail rag which would rend at every littlestrain.

  For a few moments there was total silence, while every man in the roomwas looking at Bulstrode. He sat perfectly still, leaning hard againstthe back of his chair; he could not venture to rise, and when he beganto speak he pressed his hands upon the seat on each side of him. Buthis voice was perfectly audible, though hoarser than usual, and hiswords were distinctly pronounced, though he paused between sentence asif short of breath. He said, turning first toward Mr. Thesiger, andthen looking at Mr. Hawley--

  "I protest before you, sir, as a Christian minister, against thesanction of proceedings towards me which are dictated by virulenthatred. Those who are hostile to me are glad to believe any libeluttered by a loose tongue against me. And their consciences becomestrict against me. Say that the evil-speaking of which I am to be madethe victim accuses me of malpractices--" here Bulstrode's voice roseand took on a more biting accent, till it seemed a low cry--"who shallbe my accuser? Not men whose own lives are unchristian, nay,scandalous--not men who themselves use low instruments to carry outtheir ends--whose profession is a tissue of chicanery--who have beenspending their income on their own sensual enjoyments, while I havebeen devoting mine to advance the best objects with regard to this lifeand the next."

  After the word chicanery there was a growing noise, half of murmurs andhalf of hisses, while four persons started up at once--Mr. Hawley, Mr.Toller, Mr. Chichely, and Mr. Hackbutt; but Mr. Hawley's outburst wasinstantaneous, and left the others behind in silence.

  "If you mean me, sir, I call you and every one else to the inspectionof my professional life. As to Christian or unchristian, I repudiateyour canting palavering Christianity; and as to the way in which Ispend my income, it is not my principle to maintain thieves and cheatoffspring of their due inheritance in order to support religion and setmyself up as a saintly Killjoy. I affect no niceness of conscience--Ihave not found any nice standards necessary yet to measure your actionsby, sir. And I again call upon you to enter into satisfactoryexplanations concerning the scandals against you, or else to withdrawfrom posts in which we at any rate decline you as a colleague. I say,sir, we decline to co-operate with a man whose character is not clearedfrom infamous lights cast upon it, not only by reports but by recentactions."

  "Allow me, Mr. Hawley," said the chairman; and Mr. Hawley, stillfuming, bowed half impatiently, and sat down with his hands thrust deepin his pockets.

  "Mr. Bulstrode, it is not desirable, I think, to prolong the presentdiscussion," said Mr. Thesiger, turning to the pallid trembling man; "Imust so far concur with what has fallen from Mr. Hawley in expressionof a general feeling, as to think it due to your Christian professionthat you should clear yourself, if possible, from unhappy aspersions.I for my part should be willing to give you full opportunity andhearing. But I must say that your present attitude is painfullyinconsistent with those principles which you have sought to identifyyourself with, and for the honor of which I am bound to care. Irecommend you at present, as your clergyman, and one who hopes for yourreinstatement in respect, to quit the room, and avoid further hindranceto business."

  Bulstrode, after a moment's hesitation, took his hat from the floor andslowly rose, but he grasped the corner of the chair so totteringly thatLydgate felt sure there was not strength enough in him to walk awaywithout support. What could he do? He could not see a man sink closeto him for want of help. He rose and gave his arm to Bulstrode, and inthat way led him out of the room; yet this act, which might have beenone of gentle duty and pure compassion, was at this moment unspeakablybitter to him. It seemed as if he were putting his sign-manual to thatassociation of himself with Bulstrode, of which he now saw the fullmeaning as it must have presented itself to other minds. He now feltthe conviction that this man who was leaning tremblingly on his arm,had given him the thousand pounds as a bribe, and that somehow thetreatment of Raffles had been tampered with from an evil motive. Theinferences were closely linked enough; the town knew of the loan,believed it to be a bribe, and believed that he took it as a bribe.

  Poor Lydgate, his mind struggling under the terrible clutch of thisrevelation, was all the while morally forced to take Mr. Bulstrode tothe Bank, send a man off for his carriage, and wait to accompany himhome.

  Meanwhile the business of the meeting was despatched, and fringed offinto eager discussion among various groups concerning this affair ofBulstrode--and Lydgate.

  Mr. Brooke, who had before heard only imperfect hints of it, and wasvery uneasy that he had "gone a little too far" in countenancingBulstrode, now got himself fully informed, and felt some benevolentsadness in talking to Mr. Farebrother about the ugly light in whichLydgate had come to be regarded. Mr. Farebrother was going to walkback to Lowick.

  "Step into my carriage," said Mr. Brooke. "I am going round to seeMrs. Casaubon. She was to come back from Yorkshire last night. Shewill like to see me, you know."
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  So they drove along, Mr. Brooke chatting with good-natured hope thatthere had not really been anything black in Lydgate's behavior--ayoung fellow whom he had seen to be quite above the common mark, whenhe brought a letter from his uncle Sir Godwin. Mr. Farebrother saidlittle: he was deeply mournful: with a keen perception of humanweakness, he could not be confident that under the pressure ofhumiliating needs Lydgate had not fallen below himself.

  When the carriage drove up to the gate of the Manor, Dorothea was outon the gravel, and came to greet them.

  "Well, my dear," said Mr. Brooke, "we have just come from a meeting--asanitary meeting, you know."

  "Was Mr. Lydgate there?" said Dorothea, who looked full of health andanimation, and stood with her head bare under the gleaming Aprillights. "I want to see him and have a great consultation with himabout the Hospital. I have engaged with Mr. Bulstrode to do so."

  "Oh, my dear," said Mr. Brooke, "we have been hearing bad news--badnews, you know."

  They walked through the garden towards the churchyard gate, Mr.Farebrother wanting to go on to the parsonage; and Dorothea heard thewhole sad story.

  She listened with deep interest, and begged to hear twice over thefacts and impressions concerning Lydgate. After a short silence,pausing at the churchyard gate, and addressing Mr. Farebrother, shesaid energetically--

  "You don't believe that Mr. Lydgate is guilty of anything base? I willnot believe it. Let us find out the truth and clear him!"

  BOOK VIII.

  SUNSET AND SUNRISE.