He Knew He Was Right by Anthony Trollope (ebook reader with internet browser txt) 📖

the courage to jilt her! She felt sure

that he had not heart enough to do a deed of such audacity. And her

sister, too, was weak and a coward, and would lack the power to stand

on her legs and declare herself to be the perpetrator of such villany.

Her mother, as she knew well, would always have preferred that her

elder daughter should be the bride; but her mother was not the woman to

have the hardihood, now, in the eleventh hour, to favour such an

intrigue. Let her wish be what it might, she would not be strong enough

to carry through the accomplishment of it. They would all know that

that threat of hers of setting Exeter on fire would be carried out

after some fashion that would not be inadequate to the occasion. A

sister, a mother, a promised lover, all false—all so damnably, cruelly

false! It was impossible. No history, no novel of most sensational

interest, no wonderful villany that had ever been wrought into prose or

poetry, would have been equal to this. It was impossible. She told

herself so a score of times a day. And yet the circumstances were so

terribly suspicious! Mr Gibson’s conduct as a lover was simply

disgraceful to him as a man and a clergyman. He was full of excuses,

which she knew to be false. He would never come near her if he could

help it. When he was with her, he was as cold as an archbishop both in

word and in action. Nothing would tempt him to any outward

manifestation of affection. He would talk of nothing but the poor women

of St. Peter-cum-Pumpkin in the city, and the fraudulent idleness of a

certain colleague in the cathedral services, who was always shirking

his work. He made her no presents. He never walked with her. He was

always gloomy, and he had indeed so behaved himself in public that

people were beginning to talk of ‘poor Mr Gibson.’ And yet he could

meet Arabella on the sly in the lanes, and send notes to her by the

greengrocer’s boy! Poor Mr Gibson indeed! Let her once get him well

over the 29th of April, and the people of Exeter might talk about poor

Mr Gibson if they pleased. And Bella’s conduct was more wonderful

almost than that of Mr Gibson. With all her cowardice, she still held

up her head, held it perhaps a little higher than was usual with her.

And when that grievous accusation was made against her—made and

repeated—an accusation the very thought and sound of which would almost

have annihilated her had there been a decent feeling in her bosom, she

would simply shrug her shoulders and walk away. ‘Camilla,’ she had once

said, ‘you will drive that man mad before you have done.’ ‘What is it

to you how I drive him?’ Camilla had answered in her fury. Then

Arabella had again shrugged her shoulders and walked away. Between

Camilla and her mother, too, there had come to be an almost internecine

quarrel on a collateral point. Camilla was still carrying on a vast

arrangement which she called the preparation of her trousseau, but

which both Mrs French and Bella regarded as a spoliation of the

domestic nest, for the proud purposes of one of the younger birds. And

this had grown so fearfully that in two different places Mrs French had

found herself compelled to request that no further articles might be

supplied to Miss Camilla. The bride elect had rebelled, alleging that

as no fortune was to be provided for her, she had a right to take with

her such things as she could carry away in her trunks and boxes. Money

could be had at the bank, she said; and, after all, what were fifty

pounds more or less on such an occasion as this? And then she went into

a calculation to prove that her mother and sister would be made so much

richer by her absence, and that she was doing so much for them by her

marriage, that nothing could be more mean in them than that they should

hesitate to supply her with such things as she desired to make her

entrance into Mr Gibson’s house respectable. But Mrs French was

obdurate, and Mr Gibson was desired to speak to her. Mr Gibson, in fear

and trembling, told her that she ought to repress her spirit of

extravagance, and Camilla at once foresaw that he would avail himself

of this plea against her should he find it possible at any time to

avail himself of any plea. She became ferocious, and, turning upon him,

told him to mind his own business. Was it not all for him that she was

doing it? ‘She was not,’ she said, ‘disposed to submit to any control in

such matters from him till he had assumed his legal right to it by

standing with her before the altar.’ It came, however, to be known all

over Exeter that Miss Camilla’s expenditure had been checked, and that,

in spite of the joys naturally incidental to a wedding, things were not

going well with the ladies at Heavitree.

 

At last the blow came. Camilla was aware that on a certain morning her

mother had been to Mr Gibson’s house, and had held a long conference

with him. She could learn nothing of what took place there, for at that

moment she had taken upon herself to place herself on non-speaking

terms with her mother in consequence of those disgraceful orders which

had been given to the tradesmen. But Bella had not been at Mr Gibson’s

house at the time, and Camilla, though she presumed that her own

conduct had been discussed in a manner very injurious to herself, did

not believe that any step was being then arranged which would be

positively antagonistic to her own views. The day fixed was now so

very near that there could, she felt, be no escape for the victim.

But she was wrong.

 

Mr Gibson had been found by Mrs French in a very excited state on that

occasion. He had wept, and pulled his hair, and torn open his

waistcoat, had spoken of himself as a wretch, pleading, however, at the

same time, that he was more sinned against than sinning, had paced

about the room with his hands dashing against his brows, and at last

had flung himself prostrate on the ground. The meaning of it all was

that he had tried very hard, and had found at last that ‘he couldn’t do

it.’ ‘I am ready to submit,’ said he, ‘to any verdict that you may

pronounce against me, but I should deceive you and deceive her if I

didn’t say at once that I can’t do it.’ He went on to explain that

since he had unfortunately entered into his present engagement with

Camilla, of whose position he spoke in quite a touching manner, and since

he had found what was the condition of his own heart and feelings, he

had consulted a friend who, if any merely human being was capable of

advising, might be implicitly trusted for advice in such a matter, and

that this friend had told him that he was bound to give up the marriage,

let the consequences to himself or to others be what they might.

‘Although the skies should fall on me, I cannot stand at the hymeneal

altar with a lie in my mouth,’ said Mr Gibson immediately upon his

rising from his prostrate condition on the floor. In such a position as

this a mother’s fury would surely be very great! But Mrs French was

hardly furious. She cried, and begged him to think better of it, and

assured him that Camilla, when she should be calmed down by matrimony,

would not be so bad as she seemed, but she was not furious. ‘The truth

is, Mr Gibson,’ she said through her tears, ‘that, after all, you like

Bella best.’ Mr Gibson owned that he did like Bella best, and although

no bargain was made between them then and there—and such making of a

bargain then and there would hardly have been practicable—it was

understood that Mrs French would not proceed to extremities if Mr

Gibson would still make himself forthcoming as a husband for the

advantage of one of the daughters of the family.

 

So far Mr Gibson had progressed towards a partial liberation from his

thraldom with a considerable amount of courage; but he was well aware

that the great act of daring still remained to be done. He had

suggested to Mrs French that she should settle the matter with Camilla,

but this Mrs French had altogether declined to do. It must, she said,

come from himself. If she were to do it, she must sympathise with her

child; and such sympathy would be obstructive of the future

arrangements which were still to be made. ‘She always knew that I liked

Bella best,’ said Mr Gibson still sobbing, still tearing his hair,

still pacing the room with his waistcoat torn open. ‘I would not advise

you to tell her that,’ said Mrs French. Then Mrs French went home, and

early on the following morning it was thought good by Arabella that she

also should pay a visit at Ottery St. Mary’s. ‘Goodbye, Cammy,’ said

Arabella as she went. ‘Bella,’ said Camilla, ‘I wonder whether you are

a serpent. I do not think you can be so base a serpent as that.’ ‘I

declare, Cammy, you do say such odd things that no one can understand

what you mean.’ And so she went.

 

On that morning Mr Gibson was walking at an early hour along the road

from Exeter to Cowley, contemplating his position and striving to

arrange his plans. What was he to do, and how was he to do it? He was

prepared to throw up his living, to abandon the cathedral, to leave the

diocese, to make any sacrifice rather than take Camilla to his bosom.

Within the last six weeks he had learned to regard her with almost a

holy horror. He could not understand by what miracle of self-neglect he

had fallen into so perilous an abyss. He had long known Camilla’s

temper. But in those days in which he had been beaten like a

shuttlecock between the Stanburys and the Frenches, he had lost his

head and had done he knew not what. ‘Those whom the God chooses to

destroy, he first maddens,’ said Mr Gibson to himself of himself,

throwing himself back upon early erudition and pagan philosophy. Then

he looked across to the river Exe, and thought that there was hardly

water enough there to cover the multiplicity of his sorrows.

 

But something must be done. He had proceeded so far in forming a

resolution, as he reached St. David’s Church on his return homewards.

His sagacious friend had told him that as soon as he had altered his

mind, he was bound to let the lady know of it without delay. ‘You must

remember,’ said the sagacious friend, ‘that you will owe her much very

much.’ Mr Gibson was perplexed in his mind when he reflected how much

he might possibly be made to owe her if she should decide on appealing

to a jury of her countrymen for justice. But anything would be better

than his home at St. Peter’s-cum-Pumpkin with Camilla sitting opposite

to him as his wife. Were there not distant lands in which a clergyman,

unfortunate but still energetic, might find work to do? Was there not

all America? And were there not Australia, New Zealand, Natal, all open

to him? Would not a missionary career among the Chinese be better for

him than St. Peter’s-cum-Pumpkin with Camilla French for his wife? By

the time he had reached home his mind was made up. He would write a