第17章

'Good heavens!' exclaimed the archdeacon, as he placed his foot on the gravel walk of the close, and raising his hat with one hand, passed the other somewhat violently over his now grizzled locks;smoke issued from the uplifted beaver as it were a cloud of wrath, and the safety-valve of his anger opened, and emitted a visible steam, preventing positive explosion and probably apoplexy. 'Good heavens!'--and the archdeacon looked up to the gray pinnacles of the cathedral tower, making a mute appeal to that still living witness which had looked down on the doings of so many bishops of Barchester.

'I don't think I shall ever like that Mr Slope,' said Mr Harding.

'Like him!' roared the archdeacon, standing still for a moment to give more force to his voice; 'like him!' All the ravens of the close cawed their assent. The old bells of the tower, in chiming the hour, echoed the words; and the swallows flying out from their nests mutely expressed a similar opinion. Like Mr Slope! Why no, it was not very probable that any Barchester-bred living thing should like Mr Slope!

'Nor Mrs Proudie either,' said Mr Harding.

The archdeacon thereupon forgot himself. I will not follow his example, nor shock my readers by transcribing the term in which he expressed his feelings as to the lady who had been named. The ravens and the last lingering notes of the clock bells were less scrupulous, and repeated in corresponding echoes the very improper exclamation. The archdeacon again raised his hat; and another salutary escape of steam was effected.

There was a pause, during which the precentor tried to realise the fact that the wife of the bishop of Barchester had been thus designated, in the close of the cathedral, by the lips of its own archdeacon: but he could not do it.

'The bishop seems a quiet man enough,' suggested Mr Harding, having acknowledged to himself his own failure.

'Idiot!' exclaimed the doctor, who for the nonce was not capable of more than spasmodic attempts at utterance.

'Well, he did not seem very bright,' said Mr Harding, 'and yet he has always had the reputation of a clever man. I suppose he's cautious and not inclined to express himself very freely.'

The new bishop of Barchester was already so contemptible a creature in Dr Grantly's eyes, that he could not condescend to discuss his character. He was a puppet to be played by others; a mere wax doll, done up in an apron and a shovel hat, to be stuck on a throne or elsewhere and pulled about by wires as others chose. Dr Grantly did not choose to let himself down low enough to talk about Dr Proudie;but he saw that he would have to talk about the other members of his household, the coadjutor bishops, who had brought his lordship down, as it were, in a box, and were about to handle the wires as they willed. This in itself was a terrible vexation to the archdeacon. Could he have ignored the chaplain, and have fought the bishop, there would have been, at any rate, nothing degrading in such a contest. Let the Queen make whom she would bishop of Barchester; a man, or even an ape, when once a bishop, would be a respectable adversary, if he would but fight, himself. But what was such a person as Dr Grantly to do, when such another person as Mr Slope was put forward as his antagonist?

If he, our archdeacon, refused to combat, Mr Slope would walk triumphant over the field, and have the diocese of Barchester under his heel.

If, on the other hand, the archdeacon accepted as his enemy the man whom the new puppet bishop put before him as such, he would have to talk about Mr Slope, and write about Mr Slope, and in all matters treat with Mr Slope, as a being standing, in some degree, on ground similar to his own. He would have to meet Mr Slope; to--Bah! The idea was sickening. He could not bring himself to have to do with Mr Slope.

'He is the most thoroughly bestial creature that ever I set my eyes upon,' said the archdeacon.

'Who--the bishop?'

'Bishop! No--I'm not talking about the bishop. How on earth such a creature got ordained!--they'll ordain anybody now, I know; but he's been in the church these ten years; and they used to be a little careful ten years ago.'

'Oh! You mean Mr Slope.'

'Did you ever see any animal less like a gentleman?'

'I can't say I felt myself much disposed to like him.'

'Like him!' again shouted the doctor, and the assenting ravens again cawed an echo; 'of course you don't like him; it's not a question of liking. But what are we to do with him?'

'Do with him?' asked Mr Harding.

'Yes--what are we to do with him? How are we to treat him? There he is, and there he'll stay. He has put his foot in that palace, and he will never take it out again till he's driven. How are we to get rid of him?'

'I don't suppose he can do us much harm.'

'Not do harm!--Well I think you'll find yourself of a different opinion before a month is gone. What would you say now, if he got himself put into the hospital? Would that be harm?'

Mr Harding mused awhile, and then said he didn't think the new bishop would put Mr Slope into the hospital.

'If he doesn't put him there, he'll put him somewhere else where he'll be as bad. I tell you that that man, to all intents and purposes, will be Bishop of Barchester;' and again, Dr Grantly raised his hat, and rubbed his hand thoughtfully and sadly over his head.

'Impudent scoundrel!' he exclaimed after a while. 'To dare to cross-examine me about Sunday schools in the diocese, and Sunday travelling too: I never in my life met his equal for sheer impudence. Why, he must have thought we were two candidates for ordination.'

'I declare I thought Mrs Proudie the worst of the two,' said Mr Harding.