Chapter XLI.
Mrs. Bold Confides Her Sorrow to Her Friend Miss Stanhope
When Mrs. Bold came to the end of the walk and faced the lawn, she began to bethink herself what she should do. Was she to wait there till Mr. Slope caught her, or was she to go in among the crowd with tears in her eyes and passion in her face? She might in truth have stood there long enough without any reasonable fear of further immediate persecution from Mr. Slope, but we are all inclined to magnify the bugbears which frighten us. In her present state of dread she did not know of what atrocity he might venture to be guilty. Had anyone told her a week ago that he would have put his arm round her waist at this party of Miss Thorne’s, she would have been utterly incredulous. Had she been informed that he would be seen on the following Sunday walking down the High Street in a scarlet coat and top boots, she would not have thought such a phenomenon more improbable.
But this improbable iniquity he had committed, and now there was nothing she could not believe of him. In the first place it was quite manifest that he was tipsy; in the next place it was to be taken as proved that all his religion was sheer hypocrisy; and finally the man was utterly shameless. She therefore stood watching for the sound of his footfall, not without some fear that he might creep out at her suddenly from among the bushes.
As she thus stood she saw Charlotte Stanhope at a little distance from her, walking quickly across the grass. Eleanor’s handkerchief was in her hand, and putting it to her face so as to conceal her tears, she ran across the lawn and joined her friend.
“Oh, Charlotte,” she said, almost too much out of breath to speak very plainly; “I am so glad I have found you.”
“Glad you have found me!” said Charlotte, laughing; “that’s a good joke. Why Bertie and I have been looking for you everywhere. He swears that you have gone off with Mr. Slope, and is now on the point of hanging himself.”
“Oh, Charlotte, don’t,” said Mrs. Bold.
“Why, my child, what on earth is the matter with you?” said Miss Stanhope, perceiving that Eleanor’s hand trembled on her own arm, and finding also that her companion was still half-choked by tears. “Goodness heaven! Something has distressed you. What is it? What can I do for you?”
Eleanor answered her only by a sort of spasmodic gurgle in her throat. She was a good deal upset, as people say, and could not at the moment collect herself.
“Come here, this way, Mrs. Bold; come this way, and we shall not be seen. What has happened to vex you so? What can I do for you? Can Bertie do anything?”
“Oh, no, no, no, no,” said Eleanor. “There is nothing to be done. Only that horrid man—”
“What horrid man?” asked Charlotte.
There are some moments in life in which both men and women feel themselves imperatively called on to make a confidence, in which not to do so requires a disagreeable resolution and also a disagreeable suspicion. There are people of both sexes who never make confidences, who are never tempted by momentary circumstances to disclose their secrets, but such are generally dull, close, unimpassioned spirits, “gloomy gnomes, who live in cold dark mines.” There was nothing of the gnome about Eleanor, and she therefore resolved to tell Charlotte Stanhope the whole story about Mr. Slope.
“That horrid man; that Mr. Slope,” said she. “Did you not see that he followed me out of the dining-room?”
“Of course I did, and was sorry enough, but I could not help it. I knew you would be annoyed. But you and Bertie managed it badly between you.”
“It was not his fault nor mine either. You know how I disliked the idea of coming in the carriage with that man.”
“I am sure I am very sorry if that has led to it.”
“I don’t know what has led to it,” said Eleanor, almost crying again. “But it has not been my fault.”
“But what has he done, my dear?”
“He’s an abominable, horrid, hypocritical man, and it would serve him right to tell the bishop all about it.”
“Believe me, if you want to do him an injury, you had far better tell Mrs. Proudie. But what did he do, Mrs. Bold?”
“Ugh!” exclaimed Eleanor.
“Well, I must confess he’s not very nice,” said Charlotte Stanhope.
“Nice!” said Eleanor. “He is the most fulsome, fawning, abominable man I ever saw. What business had he to come to me?—I that never gave him the slightest tittle of encouragement—I that always hated him, though I did take his part when others ran him down.”
“That’s just where it is, my dear. He has heard that and therefore fancied that of course you were in love with him.”
This was wormwood to Eleanor. It was in fact the very thing which all her friends had been saying for the last month past—and which experience now proved to be true. Eleanor resolved within herself that she would never again take any man’s part. The world, with all its villainy and all its illnature, might wag as it liked: she would not again attempt to set crooked things straight.
“But what did he do, my dear?” said Charlotte, who was really rather interested in the subject.
“He—he—he—”
“Well—come, it can’t have been anything so very horrid, for the man was not tipsy.”
“Oh, I am sure he was” said Eleanor. “I am sure he must have been tipsy.”
“Well, I declare I didn’t observe it. But what was it, my love?”
“Why, I believe I can hardly tell you. He talked such horrid stuff that you never heard the like: about religion, and heaven, and love. Oh, dear—he is such a nasty man.”
“I can easily imagine the sort of stuff he would talk. Well—and then—?”
“And then—he took hold of me.”
“Took hold of you?”
“Yes—he somehow got close to me and took hold of me—”
“By the waist?”
“Yes,” said Eleanor shuddering.
“And then—”
“Then I jumped away from him, and gave him a slap on the face, and ran away along the path till I saw you.”
“Ha, ha, ha!” Charlotte Stanhope laughed heartily at the finale to the tragedy. It was delightful to her to think that Mr. Slope had had his ears boxed. She did not quite appreciate the feeling which made her friend so unhappy at the result of the interview. To her thinking the matter had ended happily enough as regarded the widow, who indeed was entitled to some sort of triumph among her friends. Whereas to Mr. Slope would be due all those gibes and jeers which would naturally follow such an affair. His friends would ask him whether his ears tingled whenever he saw a widow, and he would be cautioned that beautiful things were made to be looked at and not to be touched.
Such were Charlotte Stanhope’s views on such matters, but she did not at the present moment clearly explain them to Mrs. Bold. Her object was to endear herself to her friend, and therefore, having had her laugh, she was ready enough to offer sympathy. Could Bertie do anything? Should Bertie speak to the man and warn him that in future he must behave with more decorum? Bertie indeed, she declared, would be more angry than anyone else when he heard to what insult Mrs. Bold had been subjected.
“But you won’t tell him?” said Mrs. Bold with a look of horror.
“Not if you don’t like it,”