Framley Parsonage (49 page)

Such, so great and so various,
was to be the intended gathering at Miss Dunstable’s house. She herself laughed, and quizzed herself – speaking of the affair to Mrs Harold Smith as though it were an excellent joke, and to Mrs Proudie as though she were simply
emulous of rivalling those world-famous assemblies in Gloucester Place; but the town at large knew that an effort was being made, and it was supposed that even Miss Dunstable
was somewhat nervous. In spite of her excellent joking it was presumed that she would be unhappy if she failed.

To Mrs Frank Gresham she did speak with some little seriousness. ‘But why on earth should you give yourself all this trouble?’ that lady had said, when Miss Dunstable owned that she was doubtful, and unhappy in her doubts, as to the coming of one of the great colleagues of Mr Supplehouse.
‘When such hundreds are coming, big wigs and little wigs of all shades, what can it matter whether Mr Towers be there or not?’

But Miss Dunstable had answered almost with a screech, –

‘My dear, it will be nothing without him. You don’t understand; but the fact is, that Tom Towers is everybody and everything at present.’

And then, by no means for the first time, Mrs Gresham began to lecture
her friend as to her vanity; in answer to which lecture Miss Dunstable mysteriously hinted, that if she were only allowed her full swing on this occasion, – if all the world would now indulge her, she would — She did not quite say what she would do, but the inference drawn by Mrs Gresham was this: that if the incense now offered on the altar of Fashion were accepted, Miss Dunstable would at once abandon
the pomps and vanities of this wicked world, and all the sinful lusts of the flesh.
⁴

‘But the doctor will stay, my dear? I hope I may look on that as fixed.’

Miss Dunstable, in making this demand on the doctor’s time, showed an energy quite equal to that with which she invoked the gods that Tom Towers might not be absent. Now, to tell the truth, Dr Thorne had at first thought it very unreasonable
that he should be asked to remain up in London in order that he might be present at an evening party, and had for a while pertinaciously refused; but when he learned that three or four prime ministers were expected, and that it was possible that even Tom Towers might be there in the flesh, his philosophy also had become weak, and he had written to Lady Arabella to say that his prolonged
absence
for two days further must be endured, and that the mild tonics, morning and evening, might be continued.

But why should Miss Dunstable be so anxious that Dr Thorne should be present on this grand occasion? Why, indeed, should she be so frequently inclined to summon him away from his country practice, his compounding board, and his useful ministrations to rural ailments? The doctor was connected
with her by no ties of blood. Their friendship, intimate as it was, had as yet been but of short date. She was a very rich woman, capable of purchasing all manner of advice and good counsel, whereas, he was so far from being rich, that any continued disturbance to his practice might be inconvenient to him. Nevertheless, Miss Dunstable seemed to have no more compunction in making calls upon his
time, than she might have felt had he been her brother. No ideas on this matter suggested themselves to the doctor himself. He was a simple-minded man, taking things as they came, and especially so taking things that came pleasantly. He liked Miss Dunstable, and was gratified by her friendship, and did not think of asking himself whether she had a right to put him to trouble and inconvenience. But
such ideas did occur to Mrs Gresham, the doctor’s niece. Had Miss Dunstable any object, and if so, what object? Was it simply veneration for the doctor, or was it caprice? Was it eccentricity – or could it possibly be love?

In speaking of the ages of these two friends it may be said in round terms that the lady was well past forty, and that the gentleman was well past fifty. Under such circumstances
could it be love? The lady, too, was one who had had offers almost by the dozen, – offers from men of rank, from men of fashion, and from men of power; from men endowed with personal attractions, with pleasant manners, with cultivated tastes, and with eloquent tongues. Not only had she loved none such, but by none such had she been cajoled into an idea that it was possible that she could love
them. That Dr Thorne’s tastes were cultivated, and his manners pleasant, might probably be admitted by three or four old friends in the country who valued him; but the world in London, that world to which Miss Dunstable was accustomed, and which was apparently becoming dearer to her day by day,
would not have regarded the doctor as a man likely to become the object of a lady’s passion.

But nevertheless
the idea did occur to Mrs Gresham. She had been brought up at the elbow of this country practitioner; she had lived with him as though she had been his daughter; she had been for years the ministering angel of his household; and, till her heart had opened to the natural love of womanhood, all her closest sympathies had been with him. In her eyes the doctor was all but perfect; and it did
not seem to her to be out of the question that Miss Dunstable should have fallen in love with her uncle.

Miss Dunstable once said to Mrs Harold Smith that it was possible that she might marry, the only condition then expressed being this, that the man elected should be one who was quite indifferent as to money. Mrs Harold Smith, who, by her friends, was presumed to know the world with tolerable
accuracy, had replied that such a man Miss Dunstable would never find in this world. All this had passed in that half comic vein of banter which Miss Dunstable so commonly used when conversing with such friends as Mrs Harold Smith; but she had spoken words of the same import more than once to Mrs Gresham; and Mrs Gresham, putting two and two together as women do, had made four of the little sum;
and, as the final result of the calculation, determined that Miss Dunstable would marry Dr Thorne if Dr Thorne would ask her.

And then Mrs Gresham began to bethink herself of two other questions. Would it be well that her uncle should marry Miss Dunstable? and if so, would it be possible to induce him to make such a proposition? After the consideration of many pros and cons, and the balancing
of very various arguments, Mrs Gresham thought that the arrangement on the whole might not be a bad one. For Miss Dunstable she herself had a sincere affection, which was shared by her husband. She had often grieved at the sacrifices Miss Dunstable made to the world, thinking that her friend was falling into vanity, indifference, and an ill mode of life; but such a marriage as this would probably
cure all that. And then as to Dr Thorne himself, to whose benefit were of course applied Mrs Gresham’s most earnest thoughts in this matter, she could
not but think that he would be happier married than he was single. In point of temper, no woman could stand higher than Miss Dunstable; no one had ever heard of her being in an ill humour; and then though Mrs Gresham was gifted with a mind which
was far removed from being mercenary, it was impossible not to feel that some benefit must accrue from the bride’s wealth. Mary Thorne, the present Mrs Frank Gresham, had herself been a great heiress. Circumstances had weighted her hand with enormous possessions, and hitherto she had not realized the truth of that lesson which would teach us to believe that happiness and riches are incompatible.
Therefore she resolved that it might be well if the doctor and Miss Dunstable were brought together.

But could the doctor be induced to make such an offer? Mrs Gresham acknowledged a terrible difficulty in looking at the matter from that point of view. Her uncle was fond of Miss Dunstable; but she was sure that an idea of such a marriage had never entered his head; that it would be very difficult
– almost impossible – to create such an idea; and that if the idea were there, the doctor could hardly be instigated to make the proposition. Looking at the matter as a whole, she feared that the match was not practicable.

On the day of Miss Dunstable’s party, Mrs Gresham and her uncle dined together alone in Portman Square. Mr Gresham was not yet in Parliament, but an almost immediate vacancy
was expected in his division of the county, and it was known that no one could stand against him with any chance of success. This threw him much among the politicians of his party, those giants, namely, whom it would be his business to support, and on this account he was a good deal away from his own house at the present moment.

‘Politics make a terrible demand on a man’s time,’ he said to his
wife; and then went down to dine at his club in Pall Mall with sundry other young philogeants. On men of that class politics do make a great demand – at the hour of dinner and thereabouts.

‘What do you think of Miss Dunstable?’ said Mrs Gresham to her uncle, as they sat together over their coffee. She added nothing to the question, but asked it in all its baldness.

‘Think about her!’ said the
doctor. ‘Well, Mary; what do you think about her? I daresay we think the same.’

‘But that’s not the question. What do you think about her? Do you think she’s honest?’

‘Honest? Oh, yes, certainly – very honest, I should say.’

‘And good-tempered?’

‘Uncommonly good-tempered.’

‘And affectionate?’

‘Well; yes, – and affectionate. I should certainly say that she is affectionate.’

‘I’m sure she’s
clever.’

‘Yes, I think she’s clever.’

‘And, and – and womanly in her feelings.’ Mrs Gresham felt that she could not quite say ladylike, though she would fain have done so had she dared.

‘Oh, certainly,’ said the doctor. ‘But, Mary, why are you dissecting Miss Dunstable’s character with so much ingenuity?’

‘Well, uncle, I will tell you why; because –’ and Mrs Gresham, while she was speaking,
got up from her chair, and going round the table to her uncle’s side, put her arm round his neck till her face was close to his, and then continued speaking as she stood behind him out of his sight – ‘because – I think that Miss Dunstable is – is very fond of you; and that it would make her happy if you would – ask her to be your wife.’

‘Mary!’ said the doctor, turning round with an endeavour
to look his niece in the face.

‘I am quite in earnest, uncle – quite in earnest. From little things that she has said, and little things that I have seen, I do believe what I now tell you.’

‘And you want me to –’

‘Dear uncle; my own one darling uncle, I want you only to do that which will make you – make you happy. What is Miss Dunstable to me compared to you?’ And then she stooped down and
kissed him.

The doctor was apparently too much astounded by the intimation given him to make any further immediate reply. His niece, seeing this, left him that she might go and dress; and when they met again in the drawing-room Frank Gresham was with them.

M
ISS
D
UNSTABLE
did not look like a love-lorn maiden, as she stood in a small ante-chamber at the top of her drawing-room stairs receiving her guests. Her house was one of those abnormal mansions, which are to be seen here and there in London, built in compliance rather with the rules of rural architecture, than with those which usually govern the erection of city
streets and town terraces. It stood back from its brethren, and alone, so that its owner could walk round it. It was approached by a short carriageway; the chief door was in the back of the building; and the front of the house looked on to one of the parks. Miss Dunstable in procuring it had had her usual luck. It had been built by an eccentric millionaire at an enormous cost; and the eccentric
millionaire, after living in it for twelve months, had declared that it did not possess a single comfort, and that it was deficient in most of those details which, in point of house accommodation, are necessary to the very existence of man. Consequently the mansion was sold, and Miss Dunstable was the purchaser. Cran-bourn House it had been named, and its present owner had made no change in this
respect; but the world at large very generally called it Ointment Hall, and Miss Dunstable herself as frequently used that name for it as any other. It was impossible to quiz Miss Dunstable with any success, because she always joined in the joke herself.

Not a word further had passed between Mrs Gresham and Dr Thorne on the subject of their last conversation; but the doctor as he entered the
lady’s portals amongst a tribe of servants and in a glare of light, and saw the crowd before him and the crowd behind him, felt that it was quite impossible that he should ever be at home there. It might be all right that a Miss Dunstable should live in this way, but it could not be right that the wife of Dr Thorne should so live. But all this was a matter of the merest speculation, for he was well
aware – as he said to himself a dozen times –
that his niece had blundered strangely in her reading of Miss Dunstable’s character.

When the Gresham party entered the ante-room into which the staircase opened, they found Miss Dunstable standing there surrounded by a few of her most intimate allies. Mrs Harold Smith was sitting quite close to her; Dr Easyman was reclining on a sofa against the
wall, and the lady who habitually lived with Miss Dunstable was by his side. One or two others were there also, so that a little running conversation was kept up, in order to relieve Miss Dunstable of the tedium which might otherwise be engendered by the work she had in hand. As Mrs Gresham, leaning on her husband’s arm, entered the room, she saw the back of Mrs Proudie, as that lady made her way
through the opposite door leaning on the arm of the bishop.

Mrs Harold Smith had apparently recovered from the annoyance which she must no doubt have felt when Miss Dunstable so utterly rejected her suit on behalf of her brother. If any feeling had existed, even for a day, calculated to put a stop to the intimacy between the two ladies, that feeling had altogether died away, for Mrs Harold Smith
was conversing with her friend, quite in the old way. She made some remark on each of the guests as they passed by, and apparently did so in a manner satisfactory to the owner of the house, for Miss Dunstable answered with her kindest smiles, and in that genial, happy tone of voice which gave its peculiar character to her good humour: