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Page 55
"No, I think not," said he. "I think I shall start before the
archdeacon could be ready;--I shall go early to-morrow morning."
"That will be best, papa," said Eleanor, showing that her father's
ruse was appreciated.
"Why yes, my love. The fact is, I wish to do all this before the
archdeacon can--can interfere. There is a great deal of truth in
all he says;--he argues very well, and I can't always answer him;
but there is an old saying, Nelly: 'Everyone knows where his own
shoe pinches!' He'll say that I want moral courage, and strength of
character, and power of endurance, and it's all true; but I'm sure I
ought not to remain here, if I have nothing better to put forward than
a quibble: so, Nelly, we shall have to leave this pretty place."
Eleanor's face brightened up, as she assured her father how cordially
she agreed with him.
"True, my love," said he, now again quite happy and at ease in his
manner. "What good to us is this place or all the money, if we are to
be ill-spoken of?"
"Oh, papa, I am so glad!"
"My darling child! It did cost me a pang at first, Nelly, to think
that you should lose your pretty drawing-room, and your ponies, and
your garden: the garden will be the worst of all;--but there is a
garden at Crabtree, a very pretty garden."
Crabtree Parva was the name of the small living which Mr Harding had
held as a minor canon, and which still belonged to him. It was only
worth some eighty pounds a year, and a small house and glebe, all
of which were now handed over to Mr Harding's curate; but it was to
Crabtree glebe that Mr Harding thought of retiring. This parish must
not be mistaken for that other living, Crabtree Canonicorum, as it is
called. Crabtree Canonicorum is a very nice thing; there are only two
hundred parishioners; there are four hundred acres of glebe; and the
great and small tithes, which both go to the rector, are worth four
hundred pounds a year more. Crabtree Canonicorum is in the gift of
the dean and chapter, and is at this time possessed by the Honourable
and Reverend Dr Vesey Stanhope, who also fills the prebendal stall
of Goosegorge in Barchester Chapter, and holds the united rectory of
Eiderdown and Stogpingum, or Stoke Pinquium, as it should be written.
This is the same Dr Vesey Stanhope whose hospitable villa on the Lake
of Como is so well known to the _�lite_ of English travellers, and
whose collection of Lombard butterflies is supposed to be unique.
"Yes," said the warden, musing, "there is a very pretty garden at
Crabtree;--but I shall be sorry to disturb poor Smith." Smith was the
curate of Crabtree, a gentleman who was maintaining a wife and half a
dozen children on the income arising from his profession.
Eleanor assured her father that, as far as she was concerned, she
could leave her house and her ponies without a single regret. She was
only so happy that he was going--going where he would escape all this
dreadful turmoil.
"But we will take the music, my dear."
And so they went on planning their future happiness, and plotting how
they would arrange it all without the interposition of the archdeacon,
and at last they again became confidential, and then the warden did
thank her for what she had done, and Eleanor, lying on her father's
shoulder, did find an opportunity to tell her secret: and the father
gave his blessing to his child, and said that the man whom she
loved was honest, good, and kind-hearted, and right-thinking in the
main,--one who wanted only a good wife to put him quite upright,--"a
man, my love," he ended by saying, "to whom I firmly believe that I
can trust my treasure with safety."
"But what will Dr Grantly say?"
"Well, my dear, it can't be helped;--we shall be out at Crabtree
then."
And Eleanor ran upstairs to prepare her father's clothes for his
journey; and the warden returned to his garden to make his last adieux
to every tree, and shrub, and shady nook that he knew so well.
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