"The position, you know, is not one of great wealth."
"It is to me, who have barely hitherto had the means of support. Will you tell your husband from me that I will accept, and endeavour not to betray the double trust he proposes to confer on me. It is much that he should give to me his daughter. She shall be to me bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh. If God will give me his grace thereto, I will watch over her, so that no harm shall come nigh her. I love her as the apple of my eye; and I am thankful,—very thankful that the rich gift should be made to me."
"I am sure that you love her, Mr. Saul."
"But," continued he, not marking her interruption, "that other trust is one still greater, and requiring a more tender care and even a closer sympathy. I shall feel that the souls of these people will be, as it were, in my hand, and that I shall be called upon to give an account of their welfare. I will strive,—I will strive. And she, also, will be with me, to help me."
When Mrs. Clavering described this scene to her husband, he shook his head; and there came over his face a smile, in which there was much of melancholy, as he said, "Ah, yes,—that is all very well now. He will settle down as other men do, I suppose, when he has four or five children around him." Such were the ideas which the experience of the outgoing and elder clergyman taught him to entertain as to the ecstatic piety of his younger brother.
It was Mrs. Clavering who suggested to Mr. Saul that perhaps he would like to see Fanny. This she did when her story had been told, and he was preparing to leave her. "Certainly, if she will come to me."
"I will make no promise," said Mrs. Clavering, "but I will see." Then she went upstairs to the room where the girls were sitting, and the sacrificial lamb was sent down into the drawing-room. "I suppose if you say so, mamma—"
"I think, my dear, that you had better see him. You will meet then more comfortably afterwards." So Fanny went into the drawing-room, and Mr. Saul was sent to her there. What passed between them all readers of these pages will understand. Few young ladies, I fear, will envy Fanny Clavering her lover; but they will remember that Love will still be lord of all; and they will acknowledge that he had done much to deserve the success in life which had come in his way.
It was long before the old rector could reconcile himself either to the new rector or his new son-in-law. Mrs. Clavering had now so warmly taken up Fanny's part, and had so completely assumed a mother's interest in her coming marriage, that Mr. Clavering, or Sir Henry, as we may now call him, had found himself obliged to abstain from repeating to her the wonder with which he still regarded his daughter's choice. But to Harry he could still be eloquent on the subject. "Of course it's all right now," he said. "He's a very good young man, and nobody would work harder in the parish. I always thought I was very lucky to have such an assistant. But upon my word I cannot understand Fanny; I cannot indeed."
"She has been taken by the religious side of her character," said Harry.