第169章

Poor Bertie was greatly moved. 'You shall have the carriage to yourself going home,' said he, 'at least you and my father. As for me I can walk, or for the matter of that it does not much signify what I do.' He perfectly understood that part of Eleanor's grief arose from the apparent necessity of going back to Barchester in the carriage of her second suitor.

This somewhat mollified her. 'Oh, Mr Stanhope,' said she, 'why should you have made me so miserable? What will have gained by telling me all this?'

He had not even yet explained to her the most difficult part of his proposition; he had not told her that she was to be a party to the little deception which he intended to play off upon his sister.

This suggestion had still to be made, and as it was absolutely necessary, he proceeded to make it.

We need not follow him through the whole of his statement. At last, and not without considerable difficulty, he made Eleanor understand why he had let her into his confidence, seeing that he no longer intended her the honour of a formal offer. At last he made her comprehend the part which she was destined to play in this little family comedy.

But when she did understand it, she was only more angry with him than ever: more angry, not only with him, but with Charlotte also.

Her fair name was to bandied about between them in different senses, and each sense false. She was to played off by the sister against the father; and then by the brother against the sister. Her dear friend Charlotte, with all her agreeable sympathy and affection, was striving to sacrifice her for the Stanhope family welfare; and Bertie, who, as he now proclaimed himself, was over head and heels in debt, completed the compliment of owning that he did not care to have his debts paid at so great a sacrifice to himself. Then she was asked to conspire together with this unwilling suitor, for the sake of making the family believe that he had in obedience to their commands done his best to throw himself thus away!

She lifted up her face when she had finished, and looking at him with much dignity, even through her tears, she said--'I regret to say it, Mr Stanhope; but after what has passed, Ibelieve that all intercourse between your family and myself had better cease.'

'Well, perhaps it had,' said Bertie naively; 'perhaps that will be better, at any rate for a time; and then Charlotte will think you are offended at what I have done.'

'And now I will go back to the house, if you please,' said Eleanor.

'I can find my way by myself, Mr Stanhope: after what has passed,'

she added, 'I would rather go alone.'

'But I must find the carriage for you, Mrs Bold, and I must tell my father that you will return with him alone, and I must make some excuse to him for not going with you; and I must bid the servant put you down at your own house, for I suppose you will not now choose to see them again in the close.'

There was a truth about this, and a perspicuity in making arrangements for lessening her immediate embarrassment, which had some effect in softening Eleanor's anger. So she suffered herself to walk by his side over the now deserted lawn, till they came to the drawing-room window. There was something about Bertie Stanhope which gave him in the estimation of every one, a different standing from that which any other man would occupy under similar circumstances. Angry as Eleanor was, and great as was her cause for anger, she was not half as angry with him as she would have been with any one else. He was apparently so simple, so good- natured, so unaffected and easy to talk to, that she had already half-forgiven him before he was at the drawing-room window. When they arrived there, Dr Stanhope was sitting nearly alone with Mr and Miss Thorne; one or two other unfortunates were there, who from one cause or another were still delayed in getting away; but they were every moment getting fewer in number.

As soon as he had handed Eleanor over to his father, Bertie started off to the front gate, in search of the carriage, and there waited leaning patiently against the front wall, and comfortably smoking a cigar, till it came up. When he returned to the room, Dr Stanhope and Eleanor were alone with their hosts.

'At last, Miss Thorne,' said he cheerily, 'I have come to relieve you. Mrs Bold and my father are the last roses in the very delightful summer you have given us, and desirable as Mrs Bold's society always is, now at least you must be glad to see the last flowers plucked from the tree.'

Miss Thorne declared that she was delighted to have Mrs Bold and Dr Stanhope still with her; and Mr Thorne would have said the same, had he not been checked by a yawn, which he could not suppress.

'Father, will you give your arm to Mrs Bold?' said Bertie: and so the last adieux were made, and the prebendary led out Mrs Bold, followed by his son.

'I shall be home soon after you,' said he, as the two got into the carriage.

'Are you not coming in the carriage?' said the father.

'No, no; I have some one to see on the road, and shall walk. John, mind you drive to Mrs Bold's house first.'

Eleanor, looking out of the window, saw him with his hat in his hand, bowing to her with his usual gay smile, as though nothing had happened to mar the tranquillity of the day. It was many a long year before she saw him again. Dr Stanhope hardly spoke to her on her way home: and she was safely deposited by John at her own hall-door, before the carriage drove into the close.

And thus our heroine played the last act of that day's melodrama.