The Vicar of Bullhampton

at him, and accused him of base purposes in coming after such a one. She stood with arms akimbo in the passage, and said she would raise the neighbourhood on him. She was drunk, and dirty, as foul a thing as the eye could look upon; every other word was an oath, and no phrase used by the lowest of men in their lowest moments was too hot or too bad for her woman’s tongue; and yet there was the indignation of outraged virtue in her demeanour and in her language, because this stranger had come to her door asking after a girl who had been led astray. Our Vicar cared nothing for the neighbourhood, and, indeed, cared very little for the woman at all⁠—except in so far as she disgusted him; but he did care much at finding that he could obtain no clue to her whom he was seeking. The woman would not even tell him when the girl had left her house, or give him any assistance towards finding her. He had at first endeavoured to mollify the virago by offering to pay the amount of any expenses which might have been left unsettled; but even on this score he could obtain no consideration. She continued to revile him, and he was obliged to leave her⁠—which he did, at last, with a hurried step to avoid a quart pot which the woman had taken up to hurl at his head, upon some comparison which he most indiscreetly made between herself and poor Carry Brattle.

What should he do now? The only chance of finding the girl was, as he thought, to go to the police-office. He was still in the lane, making his way back to the street which would take him into the city, when he was accosted by a little child. “You be the parson,” said the child. Mr. Fenwick owned that he was a parson. “Parson from Bull’umpton?” said the child, inquiringly. Mr. Fenwick acknowledged the fact. “Then you be to come with me.” Whereupon Mr. Fenwick followed the child, and was led into a miserable little court in which population was squalid, thick, and juvenile. “She be here, at Mrs. Stiggs’s,” said the child. Then the Vicar understood that he had been watched, and that he was being taken to the place where she whom he was seeking had found shelter.

XL

Trotter’s Buildings

In the back room upstairs of Mr. Stiggs’s house in Trotter’s Buildings the Vicar did find Carry Brattle, and he found also that since her coming thither on the preceding evening⁠—for only on the preceding evening had she been turned away from the Three Honest Men⁠—one of Mrs. Stiggs’s children had been on the lookout in the lane.

“I thought that you would come to me, sir,” said Carry Brattle.

“Of course I should come. Did I not promise that I would come? And where is your brother?”

But Sam had left her as soon as he had placed her in Mrs. Stiggs’s house, and Carry could not say whither he had gone. He had brought her to Salisbury, and had remained with her two days at the Three Honest Men, during which time the remainder of their four pounds had been spent; and then there had been a row. Some visitors to the house recognised poor Carry, or knew something of her tale, and evil words were spoken. There had been a fight and Sam had thrashed some man⁠—or some half-dozen men, if all that Carry said was true. She had fled from the house in sad tears, and after a while her brother had joined her⁠—bloody, with his lip cut and a black eye. It seemed that he had had some previous knowledge of this woman who lived in Trotter’s Buildings⁠—had known her or her husband⁠—and there he had found shelter for his sister, having explained that a clergyman would call for her and pay for her modest wants, and then take her away. She supposed that Sam had gone back to London; but he had been so bruised and mauled in the fight that he had determined that Mr. Fenwick should not see him. This was the story as Carry told it; and Mr. Fenwick did not for a moment doubt its truth.

“And now, Carry,” said he, “what is it that you would do?”

She looked up into his face, and yet not wholly into his face⁠—as though she were afraid to raise her eyes so high⁠—and was silent. His were intently fixed upon her, as he stood over her, and he thought that he had never seen a sight more sad to look at. And yet she was very pretty⁠—prettier, perhaps, than she had been in the days when she would come up the aisle of his church, to take her place among the singers, with red cheeks and bright flowing clusters of hair. She was pale now, and he could see that her cheeks were rough⁠—from paint, perhaps, and late hours, and an ill-life; but the girl had become a woman, and the lines of her countenance were fixed, and were very lovely, and there was a pleading eloquence about her mouth for which there had been no need in her happy days at Bullhampton. He had asked her what she would do! But had she not come there, at her brother’s instigation, that he might tell her what she should do? Had he not promised that he would find her a home if she would leave her evil ways? How was it possible that she should have a plan for her future life? She answered him not a word; but tried to look into his face and failed.

Nor had he any formed plan. That idea, indeed, of going to Startup had come across his brain⁠—of going to Startup, and of asking assistance from the prosperous elder brother. But so diffident was he of success that he hardly dared to mention it to the poor