But he deeply grieved over his own stumbling, and from time to time, as his periods of penitence came upon him, he resolved that he would once more put his shoulder to the wheel as became one who fights upon earth that battle for which he had put on his armour. Over and over again did he think of those words of Mr. Crawley, and now as he walked up and down the path, crumpling Mr. Sowerby’s letter in his hand, he thought of them again—“It is a terrible falling off; terrible in the fall, but doubly terrible through that difficulty of returning.” Yes; that is a difficulty which multiplies itself in a fearful ratio as one goes on pleasantly running down the path—whitherward? Had it come to that with him that he could not return—that he could never again hold up his head with a safe conscience as the pastor of his parish! It was Sowerby who had led him into this misery, who had brought on him this ruin? But then had not Sowerby paid him? Had not that stall which he now held in Barchester been Sowerby’s gift? He was a poor man now—a distressed, poverty-stricken man; but nevertheless he wished with all his heart that he had never become a sharer in the good things of the Barchester chapter.
“I shall resign the stall,” he said to his wife that night. “I think I may say that I have made up my mind as to that.”
“But, Mark, will not people say that it is odd?”
“I cannot help it—they must say it. Fanny, I fear that we shall have to bear the saying of harder words than that.”
“Nobody can ever say that you have done anything that is unjust or dishonourable. If there are such men as Mr. Sowerby—”
“The blackness of his fault will not excuse mine.” And then again he sat silent, hiding his eyes, while his wife, sitting by him, held his hand.
“Don’t make yourself wretched, Mark. Matters will all come right yet. It cannot be that the loss of a few hundred pounds should ruin you.”
“It is not the money—it is not the money!”
“But you have done nothing wrong, Mark.”
“How am I to go into the church, and take my place before them all, when every one will know that bailiffs are in the house?” And then, dropping his head on to the table, he sobbed aloud.