“Very well,” said Priscilla, smiling; “on those conditions I will forgive you.” And from that time there sprang up something like a feeling of friendship between Priscilla and Mrs. Trevelyan. Nevertheless Priscilla was still of opinion that the Clock House arrangement was dangerous, and should never have been made; and Mrs. Stanbury, always timid of her own nature, began to fear that it must be so, as soon as she was removed from the influence of her son. She did not see much even of the few neighbours who lived around her, but she fancied that people looked at her in church as though she had done that which she ought not to have done, in taking herself to a big and comfortable house for the sake of lending her protection to a lady who was separated from her husband. It was not that she believed that Mrs. Trevelyan had been wrong; but that, knowing herself to be weak, she fancied that she and her daughter would be enveloped in the danger and suspicion which could not but attach themselves to the lady’s condition, instead of raising the lady out of the cloud,—as would have been the case had she herself been strong. Mrs. Trevelyan, who was sharpsighted and clear-witted, soon saw that it was so, and spoke to Priscilla on the subject before she had been a fortnight in the house. “I am afraid your mother does not like our being here,” she said.
“How am I to answer that?” Priscilla replied.
“Just tell the truth.”
“The truth is so uncivil. At first I did not like it. I disliked it very much.”
“Why did you give way?”
“I didn’t give way. Hugh talked my mother over. Mamma does what I tell her, except when Hugh tells her something else. I was afraid, because, down here, knowing nothing of the world, I didn’t wish that we, little people, should be mixed up in the quarrels and disagreements of those who are so much bigger.”
“I don’t know who it is that is big in this matter.”
“You are big,—at any rate by comparison. But now it must go on. The house has been taken, and my fears are over as regards you. What you observe in mamma is only the effect, not yet quite worn out, of what I said before you came. You may be quite sure of this,—that we neither of us believe a word against you. Your position is a very unfortunate one; but if it can be remedied by your staying here with us, pray stay with us.”
“It cannot be remedied,” said Emily; “but we could not be anywhere more comfortable than we are here.”
Chapter XV.
What They Said About It in the Close
When Miss Stanbury, in the Close at Exeter, was first told of the arrangement that had been made at Nuncombe Putney, she said some very hard words as to the thing that had been done. She was quite sure that Mrs. Trevelyan was no better than she should be. Ladies who were separated from their husbands never were any better than they should be. And what was to be thought of any woman, who, when separated from her husband, would put herself under the protection of such a Paladin as Hugh Stanbury? She heard the tidings of course from Dorothy, and spoke her mind even to Dorothy plainly enough; but it was to Martha that she expressed herself with her fullest vehemence.
“We always knew,” she said, “that my brother had married an addlepated, silly woman, one of the most unsuited to be the mistress of a clergyman’s house that ever a man set eyes on; but I didn’t think she’d allow herself to be led into such a stupid thing as this.”
“I don’t suppose the lady has done anything amiss,—any more than combing her husband’s hair, and the like of that,” said Martha.
“Don’t tell me! Why, by their own story, she has got a lover.”
“But he ain’t to come after her down here, I suppose. And as for lovers, ma’am, I’m told that the most of ‘em have ‘em up in London. But it don’t mean much, only just idle talking and gallivanting.”
“When women can’t keep themselves from idle talking with strange gentlemen, they are very far gone on the road to the devil. That’s my notion. And that was everybody’s notion a few years ago. But now, what with divorce bills, and women’s rights, and penny papers, and false hair, and married women being just like giggling girls, and giggling girls knowing just as much as married women, when a woman has been married a year or two she begins to think whether she mayn’t have more fun for her money by living apart from her husband.”
“Miss Dorothy says—”
“Oh, bother what Miss Dorothy says! Miss Dorothy only knows what it has suited that scamp, her brother, to tell her. I understand this woman has come away because of a lover; and if that’s so, my sister-in-law is very wrong to receive her. The temptation of the Clock House has been too much for her. It’s not my doing; that’s all.”
That evening Miss Stanbury and Dorothy went out to tea at the house of Mrs. MacHugh, and there the matter was very much discussed. The family of the Trevelyans was known by name in these parts, and the fact of Mrs. Trevelyan having been sent to live in a Devonshire village, with Devonshire ladies who had a relation in Exeter so well esteemed as Miss Stanbury of the Close, were circumstances of themselves sufficient to ensure a considerable amount of prestige at the city tea-table for the tidings of this unfortunate family quarrel. Some reticence was of course necessary because of the presence of Miss Stanbury and of Dorothy. To Miss Stanbury herself Mrs. MacHugh and Mrs. Crumbie, of Cronstadt House, did not scruple to express themselves very plainly, and to whisper a question as to what was to be done should the lover make his appearance at Nuncombe Putney; but they who spoke of the matter before Dorothy, were at first more charitable, or, at least, more forbearing. Mr. Gibson, who was one of the minor canons, and the two Miss Frenches from Heavitree, who had the reputation of hunting unmarried clergymen in couples, seemed to have heard all about it. When Mrs. MacHugh and Miss Stanbury, with Mr. and Mrs. Crumbie, had seated themselves at their whist-table, the younger people were able to express their opinions without danger of interruption or of rebuke. It was known to all Exeter by this time, that Dorothy Stanbury’s mother had gone to the Clock House, and that she had done so in order that Mrs. Trevelyan might have a home. But it was not yet known whether anybody had called upon them. There was Mrs. Merton, the wife of the present parson of Nuncombe, who had known the Stanburys for the last twenty years; and there was Mrs. Ellison of Lessboro’, who lived only four miles from Nuncombe, and who kept a pony-carriage. It would be a great thing to know how these ladies had behaved in so difficult and embarrassing a position. Mrs. Trevelyan and her sister had now been at Nuncombe Putney for more than a fortnight, and something in that matter of calling must have been done,—or have been left undone. In answer to an ingeniously-framed question asked by Camilla French, Dorothy at once set the matter at rest. “Mrs. Merton,” said Camilla French, “must find it a great thing to have two new ladies come to the village, especially now that she has lost you, Miss Stanbury?”
“Mamma tells me,” said Dorothy, “that Mrs. Trevelyan and Miss Rowley do not mean to know anybody. They have given it out quite plainly, so that there should be no mistake.”
“Dear, dear,” said Camilla French.
“I dare say it’s for the best,” said Arabella French, who was the elder, and who looked very meek and soft. Miss French almost always looked meek and soft.
“I’m afraid it will make it very dull for your mother,—not seeing her old friends,” said Mr. Gibson.
“Mamma won’t feel that at all,” said Dorothy.
“Mrs. Stanbury, I suppose, will see her own friends at her own house just the same,” said Camilla.
“There would be great difficulty in that, when there is a lady who is to remain unknown,”