The Graftons: A Novel

by Archibald Marshall

He did not usually allow her to speak at this length without interrupting her, but when you are brought to book about anything it is as well to know exactly what you have to meet. It may not after all be so difficult to meet it as you had anticipated.

It was with something like his customary tone that he said: "We have often discussed the Graftons together, and you know well enough that there are many things about them which I, as a priest of the Church, cannot approve of. If there has been any decline of intimacy between us it is for that reason and that reason alone. They are not what I thought they were when they first came here, and though in the position in which I stand towards them I must do my best to keep the peace for the good of the parish, I shall not surrender one jot or tittle of what I stand for here, for the sake of keeping in with the rich man of the parish."

It sounded very well to him, but she rather spoilt it by asking in a quiet voice: "What do you stand for here, Albert?"

Whether or not the necessity of explaining to her the whole gist and meaning of the Ordination Service withheld him from replying to her at once, she had time to go on before he spoke.

"I haven't been able to prevent myself asking that question lately," she said. "I was very much troubled by the way you behaved"—another phrase to which his ears were quite unaccustomed from her—"about the Coopers. When you thought that the Bishop had offered Surley to Mr. Leadbetter you didn't tell me anything about it, but you took me over there so that you might tell them, though you knew what disappointment it would bring them. Then when they told you that the living had been offered to Denis, you congratulated them, but you spoke in such a different way to me as we came home; and you did your best to stir up trouble about it before you knew that Denis had refused the offer. And even when that did come out, you couldn't give him any credit for what was a fine action on his part, as I think, but could only talk about the way his sisters were served right in doing what they had, and put it about what they had done, to discredit them."

The Vicar had in fact arrived at the conclusion that Rhoda and Ethel had opened the Bishop's letter addressed to their brother, which it is probable that no one else would have guessed at; and righteous indignation at such an action had been his chief contribution to the talk that had resulted from the Bishop's offer and its refusal. It was somewhat disturbing to find that his wife had not taken that indignation at its face value. He defended himself at some length against her charge of uncharity, but her silence and her downcast look warned him that he was not impressing her, and as the ground was not of the strongest he relinquished it.

"But we will have an end to all this," he said, catching at his authority, so unexpectedly being questioned. "I can quite see that my silence as to the Graftons may have been misunderstood by you. The fact is that for months I have been coming to see that my position here will become impossible unless the Graftons refrain from meddling in affairs which are my concern and not theirs. I went down to the Abbey yesterday to have it out with Grafton once and for all. Either I must be allowed my own way here in matters which appertain to my office, and that must be definitely understood, or else I must fight for it, and all pretence of intimacy and friendship must be abandoned between us. Matters have come to a crisis. I found Grafton quite irreconcileable. He takes his stand, as a rich man of that type always does, upon his money."

"Oh, Albert!" she exclaimed.

"I don't mean to say, of course, that he mentions his money, but it comes down to that. He has bought this place, and imagines that he has bought all the people who live in it body and soul. I told him very plainly that he had not bought me, and that I was not for sale, and I flatter myself that I have given him something to think about. I was at first very angry, as you no doubt saw when I came home, but I have been thinking long and earnestly too. If you had not come in just now with a series of accusations which are really quite unjustified and exceptionally painful in the midst of a crisis of this sort, I should have told you in a very short time where my deliberations had led me. They are serious enough, and as you are concerned in the matter as well as myself, I should have consulted you before making any actual decision. But I feel that I can no longer go on here under such conditions. The work I have spent some of the best years of my life over is made of no avail, and to go on with it would only be to invite further failure. Better face all the distress of a complete break, and the expense of a move, and get away from the place. I had almost made up my mind to do that, and if you give me your concurrence I shall take the step without further hesitation. You know that when Sherlock sent the photograph of that charming little house at Darthead, which he was prepared to put at the disposal of anybody who would go and help him there, you said you wished we were in a position to go ourselves. Well, let us go, I say. It will mean some sacrifice of means, and I shall not be the ultimate authority at Darthead, as I have been here. But there will be less to keep up, and with an older man than he had anticipated getting, Sherlock would only be too glad to give a free hand. In fact he said that if he could get somebody whom he could thoroughly trust, he should try to get away for a year at least, and leave his curate in complete charge. Are you ready to make this new departure with me, Gertrude, and support me loyally in my reasons for making it?"