Dr. Wortle's School Part 10

"And he did not reproach you."

"Not a word."

"Nor me?"

"He declared that had it been he who was in question he would have clung to you for ever and ever."

"Did he? Then will he leave us here?"

"That does not follow. I should think not. He will know that others must know it. Your brother-in-law will not tell him only. Lefroy, when he finds that he can get no money here, from sheer revenge will tell the story everywhere. When he left the rectory, he was probably as angry with the Doctor as he is with me. He will do all the harm that he can to all of us."

"We must go, then?"

"I should think so. Your position here would be insupportable even if it could be permitted. You may be sure of this;--everybody will know it."

"What do I care for everybody?" she said. "It is not that I am ashamed of myself."

"No, dearest; nor am I,--ashamed of myself or of you. But there will be bitter words, and bitter words will produce bitter looks and scant respect. How would it be with you if the boys looked at you as though they thought ill of you?"

"They would not;--oh, they would not!"

"Or the servants,--if they reviled you?"

"Could it come to that?"

"It must not come to that. But it is as the Doctor said himself just now;--a man cannot isolate the morals, the manners, the ways of his life from the morals of others. Men, if they live together, must live together by certain laws."

"Then there can be no hope for us."

"None that I can see, as far as Bowick is concerned. We are too closely joined in our work with other people. There is not a boy here with whose father and mother and sisters we are not more or less connected. When I was preaching in the church, there was not one in the parish with whom I was not connected. Would it do, do you think, for a priest to preach against drunkenness, whilst he himself was a noted drunkard?"

"Are we like that?"

"It is not what the drunken priest might think of himself, but what others might think of him. It would not be with us the position which we know that we hold together, but that which others would think it to be. If I were in Dr. Wortle's case, and another were to me as I am to him, I should bid him go."

"You would turn him away from you; him and his--wife?"

"I should. My first duty would be to my parish and to my school. If I could befriend him otherwise I would do so;--and that is what I expect from Dr. Wortle. We shall have to go, and I shall be forced to approve of our dismissal."

In this way Mr. Peac.o.c.ke came definitely and clearly to a conclusion in his own mind. But it was very different with Dr. Wortle. The story so disturbed him, that during the whole of that afternoon he did not attempt to turn his mind to any other subject. He even went so far as to send over to Mr. Puddicombe and asked for some a.s.sistance for the afternoon service on the following day. He was too unwell, he said, to preach himself, and the one curate would have the two entire services unless Mr.

Puddicombe could help him. Could Mr. Puddicombe come himself and see him on the Sunday afternoon? This note he sent away by a messenger, who came back with a reply, saying that Mr. Puddicombe would himself preach in the afternoon, and would afterwards call in at the rectory.

For an hour or two before his dinner, the Doctor went out on horseback, and roamed about among the lanes, endeavouring to make up his mind. He was. .h.i.therto altogether at a loss as to what he should do in this present uncomfortable emergency. He could not bring his conscience and his inclination to come square together. And even when he counselled himself to yield to his conscience, his very conscience,--a second conscience, as it were,--revolted against the first. His first conscience told him that he owed a primary duty to his parish, a second duty to his school, and a third to his wife and daughter. In the performance of all these duties he would be bound to rid himself of Mr. Peac.o.c.ke. But then there came that other conscience, telling him that the man had been more "sinned against than sinning,"--that common humanity required him to stand by a man who had suffered so much, and had suffered so unworthily. Then this second conscience went on to remind him that the man was pre-eminently fit for the duties which he had undertaken,--that the man was a G.o.d-fearing, moral, and especially intellectual a.s.sistant in his school,--that were he to lose him he could not hope to find any one that would be his equal, or at all approaching to him in capacity. This second conscience went further, and a.s.sured him that the man's excellence as a schoolmaster was even increased by the peculiarity of his position. Do we not all know that if a man be under a cloud the very cloud will make him more attentive to his duties than another? If a man, for the wages which he receives, can give to his employer high character as well as work, he will think that he may lighten his work because of his character. And as to this man, who was the very ph[oe]nix of school a.s.sistants, there would really be nothing amiss with his character if only this piteous incident as to his wife were unknown. In this way his second conscience almost got the better of the first.

But then it would be known. It would be impossible that it should not be known. He had already made up his mind to tell Mr. Puddicombe, absolutely not daring to decide in such an emergency without consulting some friend.

Mr. Puddicombe would hold his peace if he were to promise to do so.

Certainly he might be trusted to do that. But others would know it; the Bishop would know it; Mrs. Stantiloup would know it. That man, of course, would take care that all Broughton, with its close full of cathedral clergymen, would know it. When Mrs. Stantiloup should know it there would not be a boy's parent through all the school who would not know it. If he kept the man he must keep him resolving that all the world should know that he kept him, that all the world should know of what nature was the married life of the a.s.sistant in whom he trusted. And he must be prepared to face all the world, confiding in the uprightness and the humanity of his purpose.

In such case he must say something of this kind to all the world; "I know that they are not married. I know that their condition of life is opposed to the law of G.o.d and man. I know that she bears a name that is not, in truth, her own; but I think that the circ.u.mstances in this case are so strange, so peculiar, that they excuse a disregard even of the law of G.o.d and man." Had he courage enough for this? And if the courage were there, was he high enough and powerful enough to carry out such a purpose? Could he beat down the Mrs. Stantiloups? And, indeed, could he beat down the Bishop and the Bishop's phalanx;--for he knew that the Bishop and the Bishop's phalanx would be against him? They could not touch him in his living, because Mr. Peac.o.c.ke would not be concerned in the services of the church; but would not his school melt away to nothing in his hands, if he were to attempt to carry it on after this fas.h.i.+on? And then would he not have destroyed himself without advantage to the man whom he was anxious to a.s.sist?

To only one point did he make up his mind certainly during that ride.

Before he slept that night he would tell the whole story to his wife. He had at first thought that he would conceal it from her. It was his rule of life to act so entirely on his own will, that he rarely consulted her on matters of any importance. As it was, he could not endure the responsibility of acting by himself. People would say of him that he had subjected his wife to contamination, and had done so without giving her any choice in the matter. So he resolved that he would tell his wife.

"Not married," said Mrs. Wortle, when she heard the story.

"Married; yes. They were married. It was not their fault that the marriage was nothing. What was he to do when he heard that they had been deceived in this way?"

"Not married properly! Poor woman!"

"Yes, indeed. What should I have done if such had happened to me when we had been six months married?"

"It couldn't have been."

"Why not to you as well as to another?"

"I was only a young girl."

"But if you had been a widow?"

"Don't, my dear; don't! It wouldn't have been possible."

"But you pity her?"

"Oh yes."

"And you see that a great misfortune has fallen upon her, which she could not help?"

"Not till she knew it," said the wife who had been married quite properly.

"And what then? What should she have done then?"

"Gone," said the wife, who had no doubt as to the comfort, the beauty, the perfect security of her own position.

"Gone?"

"Gone away at once."

"Whither should she go? Who would have taken her by the hand? Who would have supported her? Would you have had her lay herself down in the first gutter and die?"

"Better that than what she did do," said Mrs. Wortle.

"Then, by all the faith I have in Christ, I think you are hard upon her.

Do you think what it is to have to go out and live alone;--to have to look for your bread in desolation?"

"I have never been tried, my dear," said she, clinging close to him. "I have never had anything but what was good."

"Ought we not to be kind to one to whom Fortune has been so unkind?"

"If we can do so without sin."