On the receipt of this letter, Hugh proceeded to Nuncombe. At this time he was making about ten guineas a week, and thought that he saw his way to further work. No doubt the ten guineas were precarious;—that is, the “Daily Record” might discontinue his services tomorrow, if the “Daily Record” thought fit to do so. The greater part of his earnings came from the “D.R.,” and the editor had only to say that things did not suit any longer, and there would be an end of it. He was not as a lawyer or a doctor with many clients who could not all be supposed to withdraw their custom at once; but leading articles were things wanted with at least as much regularity as physic or law, and Hugh Stanbury, believing in himself, did not think it probable that an editor, who knew what he was about, would withdraw his patronage. He was proud of his weekly ten guineas, feeling sure that a weekly ten guineas would not as yet have been his had he stuck to the Bar as a profession. He had calculated, when Mrs. Trevelyan left the Clock House, that two hundred a year would enable his mother to continue to reside there, the rent of the place furnished, or half-furnished, being only eighty; and he thought that he could pay the two hundred easily. He thought so still, when he received Priscilla’s last letter; but he knew something of the stubbornness of his dear sister, and he, therefore, went down to Nuncombe Putney, in order that he might use the violence of his logic on his mother.
He had heard of Mr. Gibson from both Priscilla and from Dorothy, and was certainly desirous that “dear old Dolly,” as he called her, should be settled comfortably. But when dear old Dolly wrote to him declaring that it could not be so, that Mr. Gibson was a very nice gentleman, of whom she could not say that she was particularly fond—“though I really do think that he is an excellent man, and if it was any other girl in the world, I should recommend her to take him,”—and that she thought that she would rather not get married, he wrote to her the kindest brotherly letter in the world, telling her that she was “a brick,” and suggesting to her that there might come some day someone who would suit her taste better than Mr. Gibson. “I’m not very fond of parsons myself,” said Hugh, “but you must not tell that to Aunt Stanbury.” Then he suggested that as he was going down to Nuncombe, Dorothy should get leave of absence and come over and meet him at the Clock House. Dorothy demanded the leave of absence somewhat imperiously, and was at home at the Clock House when Hugh arrived.
“And so that little affair couldn’t come off?” said Hugh at their first family meeting.
“It was a pity,” said Mrs. Stanbury, plaintively. She had been very plaintive on the subject. What a thing it would have been for her, could she have seen Dorothy so well established!
“There’s no help for spilt milk, mother,” said Hugh. Mrs. Stanbury shook her head.
“Dorothy was quite right,” said Priscilla.
“Of course she was right,” said Hugh. “Who doubts her being right? Bless my soul! What’s any girl to do if she don’t like a man except to tell him so? I honour you, Dolly—not that I ever should have doubted you. You’re too much of a chip of the old block to say you liked a man when you didn’t.”
“He is a very excellent young man,” said Mrs. Stanbury.
“An excellent fiddlestick, mother. Loving and liking don’t go by excellence. Besides, I don’t know about his being any better than anybody else, just because he’s a clergyman.”
“A clergyman is more likely to be steady than other men,” said the mother.
“Steady, yes; and as selfish as you please.”
“Your father was a clergyman, Hugh.”
“I don’t mean to say that they are not as good as others; but I won’t have it that they are better. They are always dealing with the Bible, till they think themselves apostles. But when money comes up, or comfort, or, for the matter of that either, a pretty woman with a little money, then they are as human as the rest of us.”
If the truth had been told on that occasion, Hugh Stanbury would have had to own that he had written lately two or three rather stinging articles in the “Daily Record,” as “to the assumed merits and actual demerits of the clergy of the Church of England.” It is astonishing how fluent a man is on a subject when he has lately delivered himself respecting it in this fashion.
Nothing on that evening was said about the Clock House, or about Priscilla’s intentions. Priscilla was up early on the next morning, intending to discuss it in the garden with Hugh before breakfast; but Hugh was aware of her purpose and avoided her. It was his intention to speak first to his mother; and though his mother was, as he knew, very much in awe of her daughter, he thought that he might carry his point, at any rate for the next three months, by forcing an assent from the elder lady. So he managed to waylay Mrs. Stanbury before she descended to the parlour.
“We can’t afford it, my dear;—indeed we can’t,” said Mrs. Stanbury.
“That’s not the question, mother. The rent must be paid up to Christmas,
