Middlemarch
think. It is some pleasure,” the auctioneer went on with a rising
fervor, “to have a picture like this to show to a company of ladies and
gentlemen—a picture worth any sum to an individual whose means were on
a level with his judgment. It is a painting of the Italian school—by
the celebrated _Guydo_, the greatest painter in the world, the chief of
the Old Masters, as they are called—I take it, because they were up to
a thing or two beyond most of us—in possession of secrets now lost to
the bulk of mankind. Let me tell you, gentlemen, I have seen a great
many pictures by the Old Masters, and they are not all up to this
mark—some of them are darker than you might like and not family
subjects. But here is a _Guydo_—the frame alone is worth pounds—which
any lady might be proud to hang up—a suitable thing for what we call a
refectory in a charitable institution, if any gentleman of the
Corporation wished to show his munifi_cence_. Turn it a little, sir?
yes. Joseph, turn it a little towards Mr. Ladislaw—Mr. Ladislaw, having
been abroad, understands the merit of these things, you observe.”
All eyes were for a moment turned towards Will, who said, coolly, “Five
pounds.” The auctioneer burst out in deep remonstrance.
“Ah! Mr. Ladislaw! the frame alone is worth that. Ladies and gentlemen,
for the credit of the town! Suppose it should be discovered hereafter
that a gem of art has been amongst us in this town, and nobody in
Middlemarch awake to it. Five guineas—five seven-six—five ten. Still,
ladies, still! It is a gem, and ‘Full many a gem,’ as the poet says,
has been allowed to go at a nominal price because the public knew no
better, because it was offered in circles where there was—I was going
to say a low feeling, but no!—Six pounds—six guineas—a _Guydo_ of the
first order going at six guineas—it is an insult to religion, ladies;
it touches us all as Christians, gentlemen, that a subject like this
should go at such a low figure—six pounds ten—seven—”
The bidding was brisk, and Will continued to share in it, remembering
that Mrs. Bulstrode had a strong wish for the picture, and thinking
that he might stretch the price to twelve pounds. But it was knocked
down to him at ten guineas, whereupon he pushed his way towards the
bow-window and went out. He chose to go under the marquee to get a
glass of water, being hot and thirsty: it was empty of other visitors,
and he asked the woman in attendance to fetch him some fresh water; but
before she was well gone he was annoyed to see entering the florid
stranger who had stared at him. It struck Will at this moment that the
man might be one of those political parasitic insects of the bloated
kind who had once or twice claimed acquaintance with him as having
heard him speak on the Reform question, and who might think of getting
a shilling by news. In this light his person, already rather heating to
behold on a summer’s day, appeared the more disagreeable; and Will,
half-seated on the elbow of a garden-chair, turned his eyes carefully
away from the comer. But this signified little to our acquaintance Mr.
Raffles, who never hesitated to thrust himself on unwilling
observation, if it suited his purpose to do so. He moved a step or two
till he was in front of Will, and said with full-mouthed haste, “Excuse
me, Mr. Ladislaw—was your mother’s name Sarah Dunkirk?”
Will, starting to his feet, moved backward a step, frowning, and saying
with some fierceness, “Yes, sir, it was. And what is that to you?”
It was in Will’s nature that the first spark it threw out was a direct
answer of the question and a challenge of the consequences. To have
said, “What is that to you?” in the first instance, would have seemed
like shuffling—as if he minded who knew anything about his origin!
Raffles on his side had not the same eagerness for a collision which
was implied in Ladislaw’s threatening air. The slim young fellow with
his girl’s complexion looked like a tiger-cat ready to spring on him.
Under such circumstances Mr. Raffles’s pleasure in annoying his company
was kept in abeyance.
“No offence, my good sir, no offence! I only remember your mother—knew
her when she was a girl. But it is your father that you feature, sir. I
had the pleasure of seeing your father too. Parents alive, Mr.
Ladislaw?”
“No!” thundered Will, in the same attitude as before.
“Should be glad to do you a service, Mr. Ladislaw—by Jove, I should!
Hope to meet again.”
Hereupon Raffles, who had lifted his hat with the last words, turned
himself round with a swing of his leg and walked away. Will looked
after him a moment, and could see that he did not re-enter the
auction-room, but appeared to be walking towards the road. For an
instant he thought that he had been foolish not to let the man go on
talking;—but no! on the whole he preferred doing without knowledge from
that source.
Later in the evening, however, Raffles overtook him in the street, and
appearing either to have forgotten the roughness of his former
reception or to intend avenging it by a forgiving familiarity, greeted
him jovially and walked by his side, remarking at first on the
pleasantness of the town and neighborhood. Will suspected that the man
had been drinking and was considering how to shake him off when Raffles
said—
“I’ve been abroad myself, Mr. Ladislaw—I’ve seen the world—used to
parley-vous a little. It was at Boulogne I saw your father—a most
uncommon likeness you are of him, by Jove! mouth—nose—eyes—hair turned
off your brow just like his—a little in the foreign style. John Bull
doesn’t do much of that. But your father was very ill when I saw him.
Lord, lord! hands you might see through. You were a small youngster
then. Did he get well?”
“No,” said Will, curtly.
“Ah! Well! I’ve often wondered what became of your mother. She ran away
from her friends when she was a young lass—a proud-spirited lass, and
pretty, by Jove! I knew the reason why she ran away,” said Raffles,
winking slowly as he looked sideways at Will.
“You know nothing dishonorable of her, sir,” said Will, turning on him
rather savagely. But Mr. Raffles just now was not sensitive to shades
of manner.
“Not a bit!” said he, tossing his head decisively. “She was a little
too honorable to like her friends—that was it!” Here Raffles again
winked slowly. “Lord bless you, I knew all about ’em—a little in what
you may call the respectable thieving line—the high style of
receiving-house—none of your holes and corners—first-rate. Slap-up
shop, high profits and no mistake. But Lord! Sarah would have known
nothing about it—a dashing young lady she was—fine boarding-school—fit
for a lord’s wife—only Archie Duncan threw it at her out of spite,
because she would have nothing to do with him. And so she ran away from
the whole concern. I travelled for ’em, sir, in a gentlemanly way—at a
high salary. They didn’t mind her running away at first—godly folks,
sir, very godly—and she was for the stage. The son was alive then, and
the daughter was at a discount. Hallo! here we are at the Blue Bull.
What do you say, Mr. Ladislaw?—shall we turn in and have a glass?”
“No, I must say good evening,” said Will, dashing up a passage which
led into Lowick Gate, and almost running to get out of Raffles’s reach.
He walked a long while on the Lowick road away from the town, glad of
the starlit darkness when it came. He felt as if he had had dirt cast
on him amidst shouts of scorn. There was this to confirm the fellow’s
statement—that his mother never would tell him the reason why she had
run away from her family.
Well! what was he, Will Ladislaw, the worse, supposing the truth about
that family to be the ugliest? His mother had braved hardship in order
to separate herself from it. But if Dorothea’s friends had known this
story—if the Chettams had known it—they would have had a fine color to
give their suspicions a welcome ground for thinking him unfit to come
near her. However, let them suspect what they pleased, they would find
themselves in the wrong. They would find out that the blood in his
veins was as free from the taint of meanness as theirs.
CHAPTER LXI.
“Inconsistencies,” answered Imlac, “cannot both be right, but imputed
to man they may both be true.”—_Rasselas_.
The same night, when Mr. Bulstrode returned from a journey to Brassing
on business, his good wife met him in the entrance-hall and drew him
into his private sitting-room.
“Nicholas,” she said, fixing her honest eyes upon him anxiously, “there
has been such a disagreeable man here asking for you—it has made me
quite uncomfortable.”
“What kind of man, my dear,” said Mr. Bulstrode, dreadfully certain of
the answer.
“A red-faced man with large whiskers, and most impudent in his manner.
He declared he was an old friend of yours, and said you would be sorry
not to see him. He wanted to wait for you here, but I told him he could
see you at the Bank to-morrow morning. Most impudent he was!—stared at
me, and said his friend Nick had luck in wives. I don’t believe he
would have gone away, if Blucher had not happened to break his chain
and come running round on the gravel—for I was in the garden; so I
said, ‘You’d better go away—the dog is very fierce, and I can’t hold
him.’ Do you really know anything of such a man?”
“I believe I know who he is, my dear,” said Mr. Bulstrode, in his usual
subdued voice, “an unfortunate dissolute wretch, whom I helped too much
in days gone by. However, I presume you will not be troubled by him
again. He will probably come to the Bank—to beg, doubtless.”
No more was said on the subject until the next day, when Mr. Bulstrode
had returned from the town and was dressing for dinner. His wife, not
sure that he was come home, looked into his dressing-room and saw him
with his coat and cravat off, leaning one arm on a chest of drawers and
staring absently at the ground. He started nervously and looked up as
she entered.
“You look very ill, Nicholas. Is there anything the matter?”
“I have a good deal of pain in my head,” said Mr. Bulstrode, who was so
frequently ailing that his wife was always ready to believe in this
cause of depression.
“Sit down and let me sponge it with vinegar.”
Physically Mr. Bulstrode did not want the vinegar, but morally the
affectionate attention soothed him. Though always polite, it was his
habit to receive such services with marital coolness, as his wife’s
duty. But to-day, while she was bending over him, he said, “You are
very good, Harriet,” in a tone which had something new in it to her
ear; she did not know exactly what the novelty was, but her woman’s
solicitude shaped itself into a darting thought that he might be going
to have an illness.
“Has anything worried you?” she said. “Did that man come to you at the
Bank?”
“Yes; it was as I had supposed. He is a man who at one time might have
done better. But he has sunk into a drunken debauched creature.”
“Is he quite gone away?” said Mrs. Bulstrode, anxiously; but for
certain reasons she refrained from adding, “It was very disagreeable to
hear him calling himself a friend of yours.” At that moment she would
not have liked to say anything which implied her habitual consciousness
that her husband’s earlier connections were not quite on a level with
her own. Not that she knew much about them. That her husband had at
first been employed in a bank, that he had afterwards entered into what
he called city business and gained a fortune before he was
three-and-thirty, that he had married a widow who was much older than
himself—a Dissenter, and in other ways probably of that disadvantageous
quality usually perceptible in a first wife if inquired into with the
dispassionate judgment of a second—was almost as much as she had cared