第132章

'Arrogant!' said Mrs Proudie; 'it is the most impudent piece of pretension I ever heard in my life. Mr Slope dean of Barchester, indeed! And what did you do in the matter, bishop?'

'Why, my dear, I did speak to the archbishop.'

'You don't mean to tell me,' said Mrs Proudie, 'that you are going to make yourself ridiculous by lending your name to such preposterous attempts as this? Mr Slope dean of Barchester indeed!'

And she tossed her head, and put her arms a-kimbo, with an air of confident defiance that made her husband quite sure that Mr Slope never would be Dean of Barchester. In truth, Mrs Proudie was all but invincible; had she married Petruchio, it may be doubted whether that arch wife-tamer would have been able to keep her legs out of those garments which are presumed by men to be peculiarly unfitted for feminine use.

'It is preposterous, my dear.'

'Then why have you endeavoured to assist him?'

'Why,--my dear, I haven't assisted him--much.'

'But why have you done it at all? Why have you mixed your name up in any thing so ridiculous? What was it you did say to the archbishop?'

'Why, I did just mention it; I just did say that--that in the event of the poor dean's death, Mr Slope would--would--'

'Would what?'

'I forget how I put it,--would take it if he could get it;something of that sort. I didn't say much more than that.'

'You shouldn't have said anything at all. And what did the archbishop say?'

'He didn't say anything; he just bowed and rubbed his hands.

Somebody else came up at the moment, and as we were discussing the new parochial universal school committee, the matter of the new dean dropped; after that I didn't think it was wise to renew it.'

'Renew it! I am very sorry you ever mentioned it. What will the archbishop think of that?'

'You may be sure, my dear, that the archbishop thought very little about it.'

'But why did you think about it, bishop? How could you think of making such a creature as that Dean of Barchester?--Dean of Barchester! I suppose he'll be looking for bishoprics some of these days--a man that hardly knows who his father was; a man that Ifound without bread to his mouth, or a coat to his back. Dean of Barchester indeed! I'll dean him.'

Mrs Proudie considered herself to be in politics a pure Whig; all her family belonged to the Whig party. Now among all ranks of Englishmen and Englishwomen (Mrs Proudie should, I think, be ranked among the former, on the score of her great strength of mind), no one is so hostile to lowly born pretenders to high station as the pure Whig.

The bishop thought it necessary to exculpate himself. 'Why, my dear,' said he, 'it appeared to me that you and Mr Slope did not get on quite as well as you used to do.'

'Get on!' said Mrs Proudie, moving her foot uneasily on the hearth-rug, and compressing her lips in a manner that betokened such danger to the subject of their discourse.

'I began to find that he was objectionable to you,'--Mrs Proudie's foot worked on the hearth-rug with great rapidity,--'and that you would be more comfortable if he was out of the palace,' Mrs Proudie smiled, as a hyena may probably smile before he begins his laugh,--'and therefore I thought that if he got this place, and so ceased to be my chaplain, you might be pleased at such an arrangement.'

And then the hyena laughed loud. Pleased at such an arrangement!

pleased at having her enemy converted into a dean with twelve hundred a year! Medea, when she describes the customs of her native country (I am quoting from Robson's edition), assures her astonished auditor that in her land captives, when taken, are eaten. 'You pardon them!' says Medea. 'We do indeed,' says the mild Grecian. 'We eat them!' says she of Colchis, with terrible energy.

Mrs Proudie was the Medea of Barchester; she had no idea of not eating Mr Slope. Pardon him! merely get rid of him! make a dean of him! It was not so they did with their captives in her country, among people of her sort! Mr Slope had no such mercy to expect; she would pick him to the very last bone.

'Oh, yes, my dear, of course he'll cease to be your chaplain,' said she. 'After what has passed, that must be a matter of course. Icouldn't for a moment think of living in the same house with such a man. Besides, he has shown himself quite unfit for such a situation; making broils and quarrels among the clergy, getting you, my dear, into scrapes, and taking upon himself as though he was as good as bishop himself. Of course he'll go. But because he leaves the palace, that is no reason why he should get into the deanery.'

'Oh, of course not!' said the bishop; 'but to save appearances you know, my dear--'

'I don't want to save appearances; I want Mr Slope to appear just what he is--a false, designing, mean, intriguing man. I have my eye on him; he little knows what I see. He is misconducting himself in the most disgraceful way with that lame Italian woman. That family is a disgrace to Barchester, and Mr Slope is a disgrace to Barchester! If he doesn't look well to it, he'll have his gown stripped off his back instead of having a dean's hat on his head.

Dean, indeed! The man has gone mad with arrogance.

The bishop said nothing further to excuse either himself or his chaplain, and having shown himself passive and docile was again taken into favour. They soon went to dinner, and he spent the pleasantest evening he had had in his own house for a long time.

His daughter played and sang to him as he sipped his coffee and read his newspaper, and Mrs Proudie asked good-natured little questions about the archbishop; and then he went happily to bed, and slept as quietly as though Mrs Proudie had been Griselda herself. While shaving himself in the morning and preparing for the festivities of Ullathorne, he fully resolved to run no more tilts against a warrior so fully armed at all points as was Mrs Proudie.