第129章

The archdeacon was by no means satisfied; but he knew his wife too well, and himself too well, and the world too well, to insist on the immediate gratification of his passion. Over his bosom's mistress he did exercise a certain marital control--which was, for instance, quite sufficiently fixed to enable him to look down with thorough contempt on such a one a Bishop Proudie; but he was not a despot who could exact a passive obedience to every fantasy. His wife would not have written the letter for him on that day, and he knew very well that she would not do so. He knew also that she was right;--and yet he regretted his want of power.

His anger at the present moment was very hot--so hot that he wished to wreak it. He knew that it would cool before the morrow;--and, no doubt, knew also theoretically, that it would be most fitting that it should be cool. But not the less was it a matter of regret to him that so much good hot anger should be wasted, and that he could not have his will of his disobedient son while it lasted. He might, no doubt, have written himself, but to have done so would not have suited him. Even in his anger he could not have written to his son without using the ordinary terms of affection, and in his anger he could not bring himself to use those terms. 'You will find that I shall be of the same mind tomorrow--exactly,' he said to his wife. 'I have resolved about it long since; and it is not likely that I shall change in a day.' Then he went out, about his parish, intending to continue to think of his son's iniquity, so that he might keep his anger hot--red hot. Then he remembered that the evening would come, and that he would say his prayers; and he shook his head in regret--in a regret of which he was only half conscious, though it was very keen, and which he did not attempt to analyse--as he reflected that his rage would hardly be able to survive that ordeal. How common with us it is to repine that the devil is not stronger over than he is.

The archdeacon, who was a very wealthy man, had purchased a property at Plumstead, contiguous to the glebe-land, and had thus come to exercise in the parish the double duty of rector and squire. And of this estate in Barsetshire, which extended beyond the confines of Plumstead into the neighbouring parish of Stogpingum--Stoke Pinguium would have been the proper name had not the barbarous Saxon tongues clipped it of its proper proportions--he had always intended that his son Charles should enjoy the inheritance. There was other property, both in land and in money, for his elder son, and other again for the maintenance of his wife, for the archdeacon's father had been for many years Bishop of Barchester, and such a bishopric as that of Barchester had been in those days worth money. Of his intention in this respect he had never spoken in plain language to either of his sons; but the major had for the last year or two enjoyed the shooting of the Barsetshire covers, giving what orders he pleased about the game; and the father had encouraged him to take something like the management of the property into his hands. There might have been some fifteen hundred acres of it altogether, and the archdeacon had rejoiced over it with his wife scores of times, saying that there was many a squire in the county whose elder son would never find himself so well placed as would his own younger son. Now there was a string of narrow woods called Plumstead Coppices which ran from a point near the church right across the parish, dividing the archdeacon's land from the Ullathorne estate, and these coppices, or belts of woodland, belonged to the archdeacon. On the morning of which we are speaking, the archdeacon mounted on his cob, still thinking of his son's iniquity and of his own fixed resolve to punish him as he had said that he would punish him, opened with his whip a woodland gate, from which a green muddy lane led through the trees up to the house of the gamekeeper. The man's wife was ill, and in his ordinary way of business the archdeacon was about to call and ask after her health. At the door of the cottage he found the man, who was woodman as well as gamekeeper, and was responsible for fences and faggots, as well as for the foxes and pheasants' eggs.

'How's Martha, Flurry?' said the archdeacon.

'Thanking your reverence, she be a deal improved since the mistress was here--last Tuesday it was, I think.'

'I'm glad of that. It was only rheumatism, I suppose?'

'Just a tich of fever with it, your reverence, the doctor said,'

'Tell her I was asking after it. I won't mind getting down today, as Iam rather busy. She has had what she wanted from the house?'

'The mistress has been very good in that way. She always is, God bless her!'

'Good-day to you, Flurry. I'll ask Mr Sims to come and read to her a bit this afternoon, or tomorrow morning.' The archdeacon kept two curates, and Mr Sims was one of them.'

'She'll take it very kindly, your reverence. But while you are here, sir, there's just a word I'd like to say. I didn't happen to catch Mr Henry when he was here the other day.'

'Never mind Mr Henry--what is it you have to say?'

'I do think, I do indeed, sire, that Mr Thorne's man ain't dealing fairly along of the foxes. I wouldn't say a word about it, only that Mr Henry is so particular.'

'What about the foxes? What is he doing with the foxes?'

'Well, sire, he's a trapping on 'em. He is, indeed, your reverence. Iwouldn't speak if I warn't well nigh mortal sure.'