When she reached the parsonage, Mark was there, and they were of course expecting her. "Well," said she, in her short, hurried manner, "is Puck ready again? I have no time to lose, and I must go and pack up a few things. Have you settled about the children, f.a.n.n.y?"
"Yes; I will tell you directly; but you have seen Lady Lufton?"
"Seen her! Oh, yes, of course I have seen her. Did she not send for me? and in that case it was not on the cards that I should disobey her."
"And what did she say?"
"How green you are, Mark; and not only green, but impolite also, to make me repeat the story of my own disgrace. Of course she told me that she did not intend that I should marry my lord, her son; and of course I said that under those circ.u.mstances I should not think of doing such a thing."
"Lucy, I cannot understand you," said f.a.n.n.y, very gravely. "I am sometimes inclined to doubt whether you have any deep feeling in the matter or not. If you have, how can you bring yourself to joke about it?"
"Well, it is singular; and sometimes I doubt myself whether I have.
I ought to be pale, ought I not? and very thin, and to go mad by degrees? I have not the least intention of doing anything of the kind, and, therefore, the matter is not worth any further notice."
"But was she civil to you, Lucy?" asked Mark; "civil in her manner, you know?"
"Oh, uncommonly so. You will hardly believe it, but she actually asked me to dine. She always does, you know, when she wants to show her good-humour. If you"d broken your leg, and she wished to commiserate you, she"d ask you to dinner."
"I suppose she meant to be kind," said f.a.n.n.y, who was not disposed to give up her old friend, though she was quite ready to fight Lucy"s battle, if there were any occasion for a battle to be fought.
"Lucy is so perverse," said Mark, "that it is impossible to learn from her what really has taken place."
"Upon my word, then, you know it all as well as I can tell you. She asked me if Lord Lufton had made me an offer. I said, yes. She asked next, if I meant to accept it. Not without her approval, I said. And then she asked us all to dinner. That is exactly what took place, and I cannot see that I have been perverse at all." After that she threw herself into a chair, and Mark and f.a.n.n.y stood looking at each other.
"Mark," she said, after a while, "don"t be unkind to me. I make as little of it as I can, for all our sakes. It is better so, f.a.n.n.y, than that I should go about moaning, like a sick cow;" and then they looked at her, and saw that the tears were already br.i.m.m.i.n.g over from her eyes.
"Dearest, dearest Lucy," said f.a.n.n.y, immediately going down on her knees before her, "I won"t be unkind to you again." And then they had a great cry together.
CHAPTER x.x.xVI.
KIDNAPPING AT HOGGLESTOCK.
The great cry, however, did not take long, and Lucy was soon in the pony-carriage again. On this occasion her brother volunteered to drive her, and it was now understood that he was to bring back with him all the Crawley children. The whole thing had been arranged; the groom and his wife were to be taken into the house, and the big bedroom across the yard, usually occupied by them, was to be converted into a quarantine hospital until such time as it might be safe to pull down the yellow flag. They were about half way on their road to Hogglestock when they were overtaken by a man on horseback, whom, when he came up beside them, Mr. Robarts recognized as Dr.
Arabin, Dean of Barchester, and head of the chapter to which he himself belonged. It immediately appeared that the dean also was going to Hogglestock, having heard of the misfortune that had befallen his friends there; he had, he said, started as soon as the news reached him, in order that he might ascertain how best he might render a.s.sistance. To effect this he had undertaken a ride of nearly forty miles, and explained that he did not expect to reach home again much before midnight.
"You pa.s.s by Framley?" said Robarts.
"Yes, I do," said the dean.
"Then of course you will dine with us as you go home; you and your horse also, which will be quite as important." This having been duly settled, and the proper ceremony of introduction having taken place between the dean and Lucy, they proceeded to discuss the character of Mr. Crawley.
"I have known him all my life," said the dean, "having been at school and college with him, and for years since that I was on terms of the closest intimacy with him; but in spite of that, I do not know how to help him in his need. A prouder-hearted man I never met, or one less willing to share his sorrows with his friends."
"I have often heard him speak of you," said Mark.
"One of the bitterest feelings I have is that a man so dear to me should live so near to me, and that I should see so little of him.
But what can I do? He will not come to my house; and when I go to his he is angry with me because I wear a shovel hat and ride on horseback."
"I should leave my hat and my horse at the borders of the last parish," said Lucy, timidly.
"Well; yes, certainly; one ought not to give offence even in such matters as that; but my coat and waistcoat would then be equally objectionable. I have changed,--in outward matters I mean,--and he has not. That irritates him, and unless I could be what I was in the old days, he will not look at me with the same eyes;" and then he rode on, in order, as he said, that the first pang of the interview might be over before Robarts and his sister came upon the scene.
Mr. Crawley was standing before his door, leaning over the little wooden railing, when the dean trotted up on his horse. He had come out after hours of close watching to get a few mouthfuls of the sweet summer air, and as he stood there he held the youngest of his children in his arms. The poor little baby sat there, quiet indeed, but hardly happy. This father, though he loved his offspring with an affection as intense as that which human nature can supply, was not gifted with the knack of making children fond of him; for it is hardly more than a knack, that apt.i.tude which some men have of gaining the good graces of the young. Such men are not always the best fathers or the safest guardians; but they carry about with them a certain duc ad me which children recognize, and which in three minutes upsets all the barriers between five and five-and-forty.
But Mr. Crawley was a stern man, thinking ever of the souls and minds of his bairns--as a father should do; and thinking also that every season was fitted for operating on these souls and minds--as, perhaps, he should not have done either as a father or as a teacher.
And consequently his children avoided him when the choice was given them, thereby adding fresh wounds to his torn heart, but by no means quenching any of the great love with which he regarded them.
He was standing there thus with a placid little baby in his arms--a baby placid enough, but one that would not kiss him eagerly, and stroke his face with her soft little hands, as he would have had her do--when he saw the dean coming towards him. He was sharp-sighted as a lynx out in the open air, though now obliged to pore over his well-fingered books with spectacles on his nose; and thus he knew his friend from a long distance, and had time to meditate the mode of his greeting. He too doubtless had come, if not with jelly and chicken, then with money and advice;--with money and advice such as a thriving dean might offer to a poor brother clergyman; and Mr. Crawley, though no husband could possibly be more anxious for a wife"s safety than he was, immediately put his back up and began to bethink himself how these tenders might be rejected.
"How is she?" were the first words which the dean spoke as he pulled up his horse close to the little gate, and put out his hand to take that of his friend.
"How are you, Arabin?" said he. "It is very kind of you to come so far, seeing how much there is to keep you at Barchester. I cannot say that she is any better, but I do not know that she is worse.
Sometimes I fancy that she is delirious, though I hardly know. At any rate her mind wanders, and then after that she sleeps."
"But is the fever less?"
"Sometimes less and sometimes more, I imagine."
"And the children?"
"Poor things; they are well as yet."
"They must be taken from this, Crawley, as a matter of course."
Mr. Crawley fancied that there was a tone of authority in the dean"s advice, and immediately put himself into opposition.
"I do not know how that may be; I have not yet made up my mind."
"But, my dear Crawley--"
"Providence does not admit of such removals in all cases," said he.
"Among the poorer cla.s.ses the children must endure such perils."
"In many cases it is so," said the dean, by no means inclined to make an argument of it at the present moment; "but in this case they need not. You must allow me to make arrangements for sending for them, as of course your time is occupied here."
Miss Robarts, though she had mentioned her intention of staying with Mrs. Crawley, had said nothing of the Framley plan with reference to the children.
"What you mean is that you intend to take the burden off my shoulders--in fact, to pay for them. I cannot allow that, Arabin.
They must take the lot of their father and their mother, as it is proper that they should do."
Again the dean had no inclination for arguing, and thought it might be well to let the question of the children drop for a little while.
"And is there no nurse with her?" said he.
"No, no; I am seeing to her myself at the present moment. A woman will be here just now."