Saying this, Lady Western leaned her beautiful hand upon Mr. Vincent’s table, and looked in his face with a beseeching insinuating smile. The poor minister did all he could to preserve his virtue. He looked aside at Lady Western’s companion to fortify himself, and escape the enervating influence of that smile.
“I cannot pretend to yield the matter to your ladyship,” said Vincent, “for it had been previously arranged that this was to be the last of my lectures at present. I am sorry it did not please you.”
“But it did please me,” said the young Dowager; “only that it was so very wicked and wrong. Where did you learn such dreadful sentiments? I am so sorry I shan’t hear you again, and so glad you are finished. You never came to see me after my little fête. I am afraid you thought us stupid. Good-night: but you really must come to me, and I shall convert you. I am sure you never can have looked at the Church in the right way: why, what would become of us if we were all Dissenters? What a frightful idea! Thank you for such a charming evening. Good-night.”
And Lady Western held out that “treasured splendour, her hand,” to the bewildered Nonconformist, who only dared touch it, and let it fall, drawing back from the smile with which the syren beguiled him back again into her toils. But Mr. Vincent turned round hastily as he heard a muttered exclamation, “By Jove!” behind him, and fixed the gaze of angry and instinctive repugnance upon the tall figure which brushed past. “Make haste, Alice—do you mean to stay here all night?” said this wrathful individual, fixing his eyes with a defiant stare upon the minister; and he drew the beauty’s arm almost roughly into his own, and hurried her away, evidently remonstrating in the freest and boldest manner upon her civility. “By Jove! the fellow will think you are in love with him,” Vincent, with his quickened and suspicious ears, could hear the stranger say, with that delightful indifference to being overheard which characterises some Englishmen of the exalted classes; and the strain of reproof evidently continued as they made their way to the door. Vincent, for his part, when he had watched them out of sight, dropped into his chair, and sat there in the empty hall, looking over the vacant benches with the strangest mixture of feelings. Was it possible that his eager fervour and revolutionary warmth were diminished by these few words and that smile?—that the wrongs of Church and State looked less grievous all at once, and that it was an effort to return to the lofty state of feeling with which he had entered the place two hours ago? As he sat there in his reverie of discomfiture, he could see Tozer, a single black figure, come slowly up the hall, an emissary from the group at the door of “chapel people,” who had been enjoying the defeat of the enemy, and were now waiting for the conqueror. “Mr. Vincent,” shouted Tozer, “shall we turn off the gas, and leave you to think it all over till the morning, sir? They’re all as pleased as Punch and as curious as women down below here, and my Phœbe will have it you’re tired. I must say as it is peculiar to see you a-sitting up there all by yourself, and the lights going out, and not another soul in the place,” added the butterman, looking round with a sober grin; and in reality the lights diminished every moment as Mr. Vincent rose and stumbled down from his platform into the great empty hall with its skeleton benches. If they had left him there till the morning, it would have been a blessed exchange from that walk home with the party, that invitation to supper, and all the applauses and inquiries that followed. They had the Pigeons to supper that night at the butter-shop, and the whole matter was discussed in all its bearings—the flutter of the “Church folks,” the new sittings let during the week, the triumphant conviction of the two deacons that Salem would soon be overflowing.
“Oh, why were ‘deacons’ made so coarse,
Or parsons made so fine?”
Mr. Vincent did not bethink himself of that touching ditty. He could not see the serio-comic lights in which the whole business abounded. It was all the saddest earnest to the young pastor, who found so little encouragement or support even in the enthusiasm of his flock.
“And, oh, Mr. Vincent,” said the engaging Phœbe, in a half-whisper aside, “how did you come to be so friendly with Lady Western? How she did listen, to be sure! and smiled at you so sweetly. Ah, I don’t wonder now that you can’t see anything in the Carlingford young ladies; but do tell us, please, how you came to know her so well?”
Insensibly to himself, a gleam of gratification lighted up Mr. Vincent’s face. He was gracious to Phœbe. “I can’t pretend to know her well,” he said, with a little mock humility; whereupon the matrons of the party took up their weapons immediately.
“And all the better, Mr. Vincent—all the better!” cried Mrs. Tozer; “she didn’t come there for no good, you may be sure. Them great ladies, when they’re pretty-looking, as I don’t deny she’s pretty-looking——”
“Oh, mamma, beautiful!” exclaimed Phœbe.
“When they’re pretty-looking, as I say,” continued Mrs. Tozer, “they’re no better nor evil spirits—that’s what I tell you, Phœbe. They’ll go out o’ their way, they will, for to lay hold on a poor silly young man (which was not meaning you, Mr. Vincent, that knows better, being a minister), and when they’ve got him fast, they’ll laugh at him—that’s their sport. A minister of our connection as was well acquainted among them sort of folks would be out o’ nature. My boy shall never make no such acquaintances as long as I’m here.”
“I saw her a-speaking to the minister,” said Mrs. Pigeon, “and the thought crossed my mind as it wasn’t just what I expected of Mr. Vincent. Painted ladies, that come out of a night with low necks and flowers in their hair, to have all Carlingford a-staring at them, ain’t fit company for a good pastor. Them’s not the lambs of the flock—not so far as I understand; they’re not friends as Salem folks would approve of, Mr. Vincent. I’m always known for a plain speaker, and I don’t deceive you. It’s a deal better to draw back in time.”
“I have not the least reason to believe that Lady Western means to honour me with her friendship,” said Vincent, haughtily—“so it is premature to discuss the matter. As I feel rather tired, perhaps you’ll excuse me to-night. Come over to my rooms, Mr. Tozer, to-morrow, if you can spare a little time and we will discuss our business there. I hope Mrs. Tozer will pardon me withdrawing so early, but I am not very well—rather tired—out of sorts a little to-night.”
So saying, the young pastor extricated himself from the table, shook hands, regardless of all remonstrances, and made his way out with some difficulty from the little room, which was choke-full, and scarcely permitted egress. When he was gone, the three ladies looked at each other in dumb amazement. Phœbe, who felt herself aggrieved, was the first to break silence.
“Ma and Mrs. Pigeon,” cried the aggravated girl, “you’ve been and hurt his feelings. I knew you would. He’s gone home angry and disappointed; he thinks none of us understand him; he thinks we’re trying to humble him and keep him down, when, to tell the truth——”
Here Phœbe burst into tears.
“Upon my word,” said Mrs. Pigeon, “dear, deary me! It’s just what I said whenever I knew you had made up your minds to a young minister. He’ll come a-dangling after our girls, says I, and a-trifling with their affections. Bless my heart, Phœbe! if it had been my Maria now that’s always a-crying about something—but you! Don’t take on, dear—fretting’s no good—it’ll spoil your colour and take away your appetite, and that ain’t the way to mend matters: and to think of his lifting his eyes to my Lady Dowager! Upon my word! but there ain’t no accounting for young men’s ways no more than for girls—and being a minister don’t make a bit of difference, so far as I can see.”
“Why, what’s the matter?” cried Tozer: “the pastor’s gone off in a huff, and Phœbe crying. What’s wrong? You’ve been saying somethin’—you women with your sharp tongues.”
“It’s Phœbe and Mr. Vincent have had some words. Be quiet, Tozer—don’t you see the child’s hurt in her feelings?” said his wife.
Mr.