Tommy Wilkins and the Black Smilies (The Elysium Trilogy Book 1)

They — the Walkers — lived in a great brick house in the middle of the town, gave dinners, to which the county gentlemen not unfrequently condescended to come, and in a mild way led the fashion in Silverbridge. You girls always seem to forget that clergymen are only men after all. This man has always been in debt. Of course a man likes to have his money.

He had written three times to the bishop, and he had sent a man over to Hogglestock to get his little bill settled six days running. You see he got it at last. Of course, a tradesman must look for his money. The whole affair is very painful, and as your father is engaged in the inquiry, I think that the less said about the matter in this house the better. I hate all that kind of clap-trap. Papa will be in directly. I never spoke to Mr Crawley in my life, and I do not think I ever saw her. Pity is no word for it, mamma.

My heart bleeds for them. And yet I do not believe for a moment that he stole the cheque. How can it be possible? For though he may have been in debt because they have been so very, very, poor, yet we all know that he has been an excellent clergyman. When the Robartses were dining here last, I heard Mrs Robarts say that for piety and devotion to his duties she had hardly ever seen anyone equal to him. And the Robartses know more of them than anybody. But Mrs Walker, like many other mothers, was apt to be more free in converse with her daughter than she was with her son.

While they were thus talking the father came in from his office, and then the subject was dropped. He was a man between fifty and sixty years of age, with grey hair, rather short, and somewhat corpulent, but still gifted with that amount of personal comeliness which comfortable position and the respect of others will generally seem to give. A man rarely carries himself meanly whom the world holds in high esteem. Come and sit down for a few minutes before you dress.

And then he whispered to his wife, as soon as Mary was out of hearing. I fear he is! I tried to make her understand that she should go to someone else. But it was of no use. She think him guilty! Nothing on earth — or from heaven either, as I take it, would make her suppose it to be possible.

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She came simply to tell me how good he was. But what is the good of loving her? The whole county was astir with this matter of this alleged guilt of the Reverend Mr Crawley — the whole county almost as keenly as the family of Mr Walker, of Silverbridge. The crime laid to his charge was the theft of a cheque for twenty pounds, which he was said to have stolen out of a pocket-book left or dropped in his house, and to have passed as money into the hands of one Fletcher, a butcher of Silverbridge, to whom he was indebted. Mr Crawley was in those days the perpetual curate of Hogglestock, a pariah in the northern extremity of East Barsetshire; a man known by all who knew anything of him to be very poor — an unhappy, moody, disappointed man, upon whom the troubles of the world always seemed to come with a double weight.

But he had ever been respected as a clergyman, since his old friend Mr Arabin, the dean of Barchester, had given him the small incumbency which he now held. Though moody, unhappy, and disappointed, he was a hard-working, conscientious pastor, among the poor people with whom his lot was cast; for in the parish of Hogglestock there resided only a few farmers higher in degree than field labourers, brickmakers, and such like. Mr Crawley had now passed some ten years of his life at Hogglestock; and during those years he had worked very hard to do his duty, struggling to teach the people around him perhaps too much of the mystery, but something of the comfort, of religion.

That he had became popular in his parish cannot be said of him. He was not a man to make himself popular in any position. I have said that he was moody and disappointed. He was even worse than this; he was morose, sometimes almost to insanity. There had been days in which even his wife had found it impossible to deal with him otherwise than as with an acknowledged lunatic. And this was known among the farmers, who talked about their clergyman among themselves as though he were a madman.

This was the man who was now accused of stealing a cheque for twenty pounds. It is declared that a good wife is a crown to her husband, but Mrs Crawley has been much more than a crown to him. As had regarded all the inner life of the man — all that portion of his life which had not been passed in the pulpit or in pastoral teaching — she had been crown, throne, and sceptre all in one. That she had endured with him and on his behalf the miseries of poverty, and the troubles of a life which had known no smiles, is perhaps not to be alleged as much to her honour. She had joined herself to him for better or worse, and it was her manifest duty to bear such things; wives always have to bear them, knowing when they marry that they must take their chance.

Mr Crawley might have been a bishop, and Mrs Crawley, when she married him, perhaps thought it probable that such would be his fortune. Instead of that he was now, just as he was approaching his fiftieth year, a perpetual curate, with an income of one hundred and thirty pounds per annum — and a family. But she had also done much more than this. She had striven hard to be contented, or, rather, to appear to be contented, when he had been most wretched and most moody. She had struggled to conceal from him her own conviction to his half-insanity, treating him at the same time with the respect due to an honoured father of a family, and with the careful measured indulgence fit for a sick and wayward child.

In all the terrible troubles of their life her courage had been higher than his. The metal of which she was made had been tempered to a steel which was very rare and fine, but the rareness and fineness of which he had failed to appreciate. He had often told her that she was without pride, because she was stooped to receive from others on his behalf and on behalf of their children, things which were needful, but which she could not buy. He had told her that she was a beggar, and that it was better to starve than to beg.

She had borne the rebuke without a word in reply, and had then begged again for him, and had endured the starvation herself. Nothing in their poverty had, for years past, been a shame to her; but every accident of their poverty was still, and ever had been, a living disgrace to him. They had had many children, and three were still alive. Of the eldest, Grace Crawley, we shall hear much in the coming story. She was at this time nineteen years old, and there were those who said, that in spite of her poverty, her shabby outward apparel, and a certain thin, unfledged, unrounded form of person, a want of fulness in the lines of her figure, she was the prettiest girl in that part of the world.

In this also the world saw a stroke of good luck. But then nothing was lucky to Mr Crawley. Bob, indeed, who had done well at school, might do well at Cambridge — might achieve great things there. But Mr Crawley would almost have preferred that the boy should work in the fields, than that he should be educated in a manner so manifestly eleemosynary.

And then his clothes! How was he to be provided with clothes fit either for school or for college? But the dean and Mrs Crawley between them managed this, leaving Mr Crawley very much in the dark, as Mrs Crawley was in the habit of leaving him. And now there had come upon them all this terribly crushing disaster. That poor Mr Crawley had gradually got himself into a mess of debt at Silverbridge, from which he had been quite unable to extricate himself, was generally known by all the world both of Silverbridge and Hogglestock.

To a great many it was known that Dean Arabin had paid money for him, very much contrary to his own consent, and that he had quarrelled, or attempted to quarrel, with the dean in consequence — had so attempted, although the money had in part passed through his own hands. There had been one creditor, Fletcher, the butcher at Silverbridge, who had of late been specially hard upon poor Crawley. And thus a rumour had grown up.

And then the butcher had written repeated letters to the bishop — to bishop Proudie of Barchester, who had first caused his chaplain to answer them, and had told Mr Crawley somewhat roundly what was his opinion of a clergyman who ate meat and did not pay for it. But nothing that bishop could say or do enabled Mr Crawley to pay the butcher. It was very grievous to such a man as Mr Crawley to receive these letters from such a man as Bishop Proudie; but the letters came, and made festering wounds, but then there was an end of them.

All who heard of this in Silverbridge were very angry with Mr Fletcher, for no one there had ever known a tradesman to take such a step before; but Fletcher swore that he would persevere, and defended himself by showing that six or seven months since, in the spring of the year, Mr Crawley had been paying money in Silverbridge, but had paid none to him — to him who had been not only his earliest, but his most enduring creditor. If he had even shown himself, I would not have so much about it. So far Fletcher the butcher had been successful. He was in the habit of paying a rentcharge to Mr Crawley on behalf of Lord Lufton, amounting to twenty pounds four shillings, every half-year.

Lord Lufton held the large tithes of Hogglestock, and paid annually a sum of forty pounds eight shillings to the incumbent. This amount was, as a rule, remitted punctually by Mr Soames through the post. On the occasion now spoken of, he had had some reason to visit Hogglestock, and had paid the money personally to Mr Crawley. Of so much there is no doubt. But he had paid it by a cheque drawn by himself on his own bankers at Barchester, and that cheque had been cashed in the ordinary way on the next morning. On returning to his own house in Barchester he had missed his pocket-book, and had written to Mr Crawley to make inquiry.

There had been no money in it, beyond the cheque drawn by Lord Lufton for twenty pounds. Mr Crawley had answered this letter by another, saying that no pocket-book had been found in his house. All this had happened in March. A brickmaker of Hoggle End, much favoured by Mr Crawley, had asked for change over the counter of this Barchester bank — not, as will be understood, the bank on which the cheque was drawn — and had received it. When inquiry was made, Mr Crawley stated that the cheque had been paid to him by Mr Soames, on behalf of the rentcharge due to him by Lord Lufton.

But the error of this statement was at once made manifest. There was the cheque, signed by Mr Soames himself, for the exact amount — twenty pounds four shillings. As he himself declared, he had never in his life paid money on behalf of Lord Lufton by a cheque drawn on his lordship. The cheque given by Lord Lufton, and which had been lost, had been a private matter between them. His lordship had simply wanted change in his pocket, and his agent had given it to him. Mr Crawley was speedily shown to be altogether wrong in the statement made to account for the possession of the cheque.

Then he became very moody and would say nothing further. But his wife, who had known nothing of his first statement when made, came forward and declared that she believed the cheque for twenty pounds to be part of a present given by Dean Arabin to her husband in April last.

There had been, she said, great heart-burnings about this gift, and she hardly dared to speak to her husband on the subject. An execution had been threatened in the house by Grobury, the baker, of which the dean had heard. Then there had been some scenes at the deanery between her husband and the dean and Mrs Arabin, as to which she had subsequently heard much from Mrs Arabin. Mrs Arabin had told her that money had been given — and at last taken.

Indeed, so much had been very apparent, as bills had been paid to the amount of at least fifty pounds. All this was the story told by Mrs Crawley to Mr Walker, the lawyer, when he was pushing his inquiries. She, poor woman, at any rate told all she knew. She had done so, and had felt no doubt that the money so forthcoming had been given by the dean.

That was the story told by Mrs Crawley. All this passed between Mr Walker and Mrs Crawley, and the lawyer was very gentle with her. In the first stages of the inquiry he had simply desired to learn the truth, and place the clergyman above suspicion. No one knows him but I. It is hard to have to tell you all of our troubles. When he declared that the money had been paid to him by Mr Soames, most certainly he thought so. There are times when in his misery he knows not what he says — when he forgets everything. Up to this period Mr Walker had not suspected Mr Crawley of anything dishonest, nor did he suspect him as yet.

The poor man had probably received the money from the dean, and had told the lie about it, not choosing to own that he had taken the money from his rich friend, and thinking that there would be no further inquiry.

He had been very foolish, and that would be the end of it. Mr Soames was by no means so good-natured in his belief. Mr Walker wrote a letter to the dean, who at that moment was in Florence, on his way to Rome, from whence he was going on to the Holy Land. There came back a letter from Mr Arabin, saying that on the 17th March he had given to Mr Crawley a sum of fifty pounds and that the payment had been made in five Bank of England notes of ten pounds each, which had been handed to his friend in the library at the deanery. The letter was very short, and, may, perhaps, be described as having been almost curt.

The dean in answer simply stated the fact as it had been given above; but he wrote to Mr Crawley begging to know what was in truth this new difficulty, and offering any assistance in his power. He explained all the circumstances of the money, as he remembered them. The sum advanced had certainly consisted of fifty pounds, and there had certainly been five Bank of England notes. He went on to say that Mrs Arabin would have written, but she was in Paris with her son. Mrs Arabin was to remain in Paris during his absence in the Holy Land, and meet him in Italy on his return.

As she was so much nearer at hand, the dean expressed a hope that Mrs Crawley would apply to her if there was any trouble. Then whence had he received it? The poor wife was left by the lawyer to obtain further information from her husband. Ah, who can tell how terrible were the scenes between that poor pair of wretches, as the wife endeavoured to learn the truth from her miserable, half-maddened husband! That her husband had been honest throughout, she had not any shadow of doubt. She did not doubt that to her at least he endeavoured to tell the truth, as far as his poor racked imperfect memory would allow him to remember what was true and what was not true.

The upshot of it all was that the husband declared that he still believed that the money had come to him from the dean. He had kept it by him, not wishing to use it if he could help it.

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He had forgotten it — so he said at times — having understood from Arabin that he was to have fifty pounds, and having received more. If it had not come to him from the dean, then it had been sent to him by the Prince of Evil for his utter undoing; and there were times in which he seemed to think that such had been the manner in which the fatal cheque had reached him. It need hardly be said that his poor wife in these days had a burden on her shoulders that was more than enough to crush any woman.

She at last acknowledged to Mr Walker that she could not account for the twenty pounds. She herself would write again to the dean about it, but she hardly hoped for any further assistance there. I must ask the reader to make acquaintance with Major Grantly of Cosby Lodge, before he is introduced to the family of Mr Crawley, at their parsonage at Hogglestock. It has been said that Major Grantly had thrown a favourable eye on Grace Crawley — by which report occasion was given to all men and women in those parts to hint that the Crawleys, with all their piety and humility, were very cunning, and that one of the Grantlys was — to say the least of it — very soft, admitted as it was throughout the county of Barsetshire, that there was no family therein more widely awake to the affairs generally of this world and the next combined, than the family of which Archdeacon Grantly was the respected head and patriarch.

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Mrs Walker, the most good-natured woman in Silverbridge, had acknowledged to her daughter that she could not understand it — that she could not see anything at all in Grace Crawley. Others, who were ill-natured, had declared that Grace Crawley was little better than a beggar, and that she could not possibly have acquired the manners of a gentlewoman. Such and such like had been the expressions of the opinions of men and women in Silverbridge.

To those who have not as yet learned the fact from the public character and well-appreciated reputation of the man, let it be known that Archdeacon Grantly was at this time, as he had been for many years previously, Archdeacon of Barchester and Rector of Plumstead Episcopi. A rich and prosperous man he had even been — though he also had had his sore troubles, as we all have — his having arisen chiefly from want of that higher ecclesiastical promotion which his soul had coveted, and for which the whole tenor of his life had especially fitted him.

Now, in his green old age, he had ceased to covet, but had not ceased to repine. He had ceased to covet aught for himself, but still coveted much for his children; and for him such a marriage as this which was now suggested for his son, was encompassed almost with the bitterness of death.

A daughter of the archdeacon had made a splendid matrimonial alliance — so splendid that its history was at the time known to all the aristocracy of the county, and had not been altogether forgotten by any of those who keep themselves well instructed in the details of the peerage. Griselda Grantly had married Lord Dumbello, the eldest don of the Marquis of Hartletop — than whom no English nobleman was more puissant, if broad acres, many castles, high title, and stars and ribbons are any sign of puissance — and she was now, herself, Marchioness of Hartletop, with a little Lord Dumbello of her own.

A Marchioness of Hartletop has special duties which will hardly permit her to devote herself frequently to the humdrum society of a clerical mother and father. That it would be so, father and mother had understood when they sent the fortunate girl forth to a higher world. But, now and again, since her august marriage, she had laid her coroneted head upon one of the old rectory pillows for a night or so, and, on such occasions all the Plumsteadians had been loud in praise of her condescension. Mrs Grantly had ever loved her daughter dearly, and had been very proud of that great success in life which Griselda had achieved; but in late years, the child had become, as a woman, separate from the mother, and there had arisen not unnaturally, a break of that close confidence which in early years had existed between them.

Griselda, Marchioness of Hartletop, was more than ever the daughter of the archdeacon, even though he might never see her. Nothing could rob him of the honour of such a progeny — nothing, even though there had been an actual estrangement between them. But it was not so with Mrs Grantly. Griselda had done very well, and Mrs Grantly had rejoiced; but she had lost her child. Now Mrs Grantly was by no means willing to throw her influence into the hands of her titled daughter.

But the titled daughter was consulted and gave her advice. On the occasion of the present visit to Plumstead she had consented to lay her head for two nights on the parsonage pillows, and on the second evening her brother the major was to come over from Cosby Lodge to meet her. Before his coming the affair of Grace Crawley was discussed. There is no knowing. They told me today in Barchester that Soames is pressing a case against him. The poor girl has no advantages. I always though Arabin was very wrong to place such a man in such a parish as Hogglestock.

Of course the family could not live there. The dean and archdeacon had married sisters, and there was much intimacy between the families. You know how headstrong Henry is. Lady Hartletop said nothing, but still sat, with impassive face, and eyes fixed upon the fire. They were all silent, and sat looking at the fire. He was also allowed to go upstairs to dress before anything was said to him about his great offence. I never knew a young woman with more sense than Griselda. As a father I would do anything to prevent such a marriage as that. The idea of having Grace Crawley as a daughter at the Plumstead Rectory was too much for the archdeacon, and he resented it by additional vehemence to the tone of his voice, and a nearer personal approach to the wife of his bosom.

All unaccoutred as he was, he stood in the doorway between the two rooms, and thence fulminated at his wife his assurances that he would never allow himself to be immersed in such a depth of humility as that she had suggested. I will never receive her here. You can do as you please. Think of what her bringing up has been. Think what it would be to have all the Crawleys in our house for ever, and all their debts, and all their disgrace! The whole county has heard of the affair of this twenty pounds. Look at that dear girl upstairs, who has been such a comfort to us. Do you think it would be fit that she and her husband should meet such a one as Grace Crawley at our table?

But nobody was so glad as you when he proposed to Eleanor. He has about six thousand a year of his own, and if he chooses to throw himself away, he had better go and live in the south of France, or in Canada, or where he pleases. On hearing this the archdeacon slammed the door, and retired to his own washing apparatus. At the present moment he was very angry with his wife, but then he was so accustomed to such anger, and was so well aware that it in truth meant nothing, that it did not make him unhappy. The archdeacon and Mrs Grantly had now been man and wife for more than quarter of a century and had never in truth quarrelled.

He had the most profound respect for her judgment, and the most implicit reliance on her conduct. She had never yet offended him, or caused him to repent the hour in which he had made her Mrs Grantly. On the present occasion he was the more annoyed because he felt that she might be right. And yet as he said it, he knew that he would not have the strength of character to carry him through a prolonged quarrel with his son. He had served in India as a very young man, and had been decorated with the Victoria Cross. Then he had married a lady with some money, and had left the active service of the army, with the concurring advice of his own family and that of his wife.

Nevertheless he had gone to reside there, hunting a good deal and farming a little, making himself popular in the district, and keeping up the good name of Grantly in a successful way, till — alas! His wife had now been dead just two years, and he was still under thirty, no one could deny it would be right that he should marry again. No one did deny it. As for dear little Edith, being a girl, she is almost no impediment. Do you know those two girls at Chaldicotes? Emily Dunstable is very handsome; — and as for money —! Now for him to think of Grace Crawley after that — of Grace Crawley who had no money, and no particular birth, and not even beauty herself — so at least Mrs Grantly said — who had not even enjoyed the ordinary education of a lady, was too bad.

The disappointment of the mother would be the more sore because she had gone to work upon her little scheme with reference to Miss Emily Dunstable, and had at first, as she thought, seen her way to success — to success in spite of the disparaging words her son had spoken to her. No one saw so much company as the Thornes, or spent so much money in so pleasant a way.

The great county families, the Pallisers and the De Courcys, the Luftons and the Greshams, were no doubt grander, and some of them were perhaps richer than the Chaldicote Thornes — as they were called to distinguish them from the Thornes of Ullathorne; but none of these people were so pleasant in their ways, so free in their hospitality, or so easy in their modes of living, as the doctor and his wife. When first Chaldicotes, a very old country seat, had by the chances of war fallen into their hands and been newly furnished, and newly decorated, and newly gardened, and newly greenhoused and hot-watered by them, many of the county people had turned up their noses at them.

And the Grantlys had stood aloof, partly influenced, no doubt, by their dear and intimate old friend Miss Monica Thorne of Ullathorne, a lady of the very old school, who, though good as gold and kind as charity, could not endure that an interloping Mrs Thorne, who never had a grandfather, should come to honour and glory in the county, simply because of her riches. And the major had been once there with her, and had made himself very pleasant, and there certainly had been some little passage of incipient love between him and Miss Dunstable, as to which Mrs Thorne, who managed everything, seemed to be well pleased.

The dinner-party at the rectory comprised none but the Grantly family. The marchioness had written to say that she preferred to have it so. But Lady Hartletop had preferred to see her dear mother and father in privacy. Mr Harding, a clergyman of Barchester, who was now stricken in years. Of course we cannot have everything. I am told the child does her duty in her sphere of life, and I suppose we ought to be contented. Nothing was said to the major on the unpleasant subject of the Crawleys before dinner.

He met his sister in the drawing-room, and was allowed to kiss her noble cheek. Any adulation which Griselda received of that kind came from her father, and therefore, unconsciously she had learned to think that her father was more better bred than the other members of her family, and more fitted by nature to move in that sacred circle to which she herself had been exalted. We need not dwell upon the dinner, which was but a dull affair. Mrs Grantly strove to carry on the family party exactly as it would have been carried on had her daughter married the son of some neighbouring squire; but she herself was conscious of the struggle, and the fact of there being a struggle produced failure.

Even the archdeacon, who enjoyed something in that which was so disagreeable to his wife, felt a relief when he was left alone after dinner with his son. He felt relieved as his son got up to open the door for his mother and sister, but was aware at the same time that he had before him a most difficult and possibly a most disastrous task. His dear son Henry was not a man to be talked smoothly out of, or into, any propriety. He had a will of his own, and having hitherto been a successful man, who in youth had fallen into few youthful troubles — who had never justified his father in using stern parental authority — was not now inclined to bend his neck.

Shall I send for another bottle? But you young fellows have become so desperately temperate. They say that there is a young woman living in Silverbridge to whom you are becoming attached. They seemed to tell him, firstly, that the rumour about Grace Crawley was true; and, secondly, that the major was resolved not to be talked out of his folly. The son did not at first make any answer, and then the father repeated the question. Had I become so, I should have taken the first opportunity of telling you or my mother. Now, my dear boy, I can speak out more plainly.

The young woman whose name I have heard is daughter to that Mr Crawley who is perpetual curate at Hogglestock. I knew that there could be nothing in it. When you express yourself as thankful that there is nothing in the rumour, I am forced to stop you, as otherwise it is possible that hereafter you may say that I have deceived you.

You advised me to give up my profession. Miss Crawley is a lady. Her father is a clergyman, as is mine. There is nothing on earth against her except her poverty. You can treat me in this way, if you please, but it will not have any effect on my conduct. You can stop my allowance tomorrow, if you like it. I had not yet made up my mind to make an offer to Miss Crawley, but I shall do so tomorrow morning. This was very bad indeed, and the archdeacon was extremely unhappy. He was by no means at heart a cruel man.

He loved his children dearly. If this disagreeable marriage were to take place, he would doubtless do exactly as his wife had predicted. He was a generous man in money matters — having a dislike for poverty which was not generous — and for his own sake could not have endured to see a son of his in want. But he was terribly anxious to exercise the power which the use of the threat might give him. My anxiety has always been for the welfare of my children.

Do you think that Miss Crawley would be a fitting sister-in-law for that dear girl upstairs?

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You are not committed as yet. Pray think of us while there is time. I would rather double your income, if I saw you marry anyone that we could name here. Perhaps it might be better that he should say nothing further at the moment. The major, however, was indiscreet, and pushed the question. That evening at the rectory was gloomy. The archdeacon now and again said a word or two to his daughter, and his daughter answered him in monosyllables.

The major sat apart moodily, and spoke to no one. Mrs Grantly, understanding well what had passed, knew that nothing could be done at the present moment to restore family comfort; so she sat by the fire and knitted. Exactly at ten they all went to bed. Then he went out and put on his wrapper, and got into his dog-cart, and drove himself to Silverbridge. He had not spoken to his father since they were in the dining-room on the previous evening. When he started, the marchioness had not yet come downstairs; but at eleven she breakfasted, and at twelve she also was taken away.

The tidings which she brought home with her to her husband were very grievous. The magistrates would sit on the next Thursday — it was then Friday — and Mr Crawley had better appear before them to answer the charge made by Mr Soames. He would be served with a summons, which he would obey of his own accord. There had been many points very closely discussed between Walker and Mrs Crawley, as to which there had been great difficulty in the choice of words which should be tender enough to convey to her the very facts as they stood.

Would Mr Crawley come, or must a policeman be sent to fetch him? The magistrate had already issued a warrant for his apprehension. Could Mrs Crawley undertake to say that he would appear? Mrs Crawley did undertake either that her husband should appear on the Thursday, or else that she would send over in the early part of the week and declare her inability to ensure his appearance. In that case it was understood the policeman must come. Then Mr Walker had suggested that Mr Crawley had better employ a lawyer.

He was of course obliged to explain that he was already employed on the other side. Mr Soames had secured his services, and though he was willing to do all in his power to mitigate the sufferings of the family, he could not abandon the duty he had undertaken. Mrs Crawley would not allow herself to be driven up to the garden gate before her own house, but had left the carriage some three hundred yards off down the road and from thence she walked home. It was now quite dark. It was nearly six in the evening on a wet December night, and although cloaks and shawls had been supplied to her, she was wet and cold when she reached her home.

But at such a moment, anxious as she was to prevent the additional evil which would come to them from illness to herself she could not pass through to her room till she had spoken to her husband. He was sitting in the one sitting-room on the left side of the passage as the house was entered, and with him was their daughter Jane, a girl now nearly sixteen years of age. There was no light in the room, and hardly more than a spark of fire showed in the grate.

The father was sitting on one side of the hearth, in an old arm-chair, and there he had sat for the last hour without speaking. His daughter had been in and out of the room, and had endeavoured to gain his attention now and again by a word, but he had never answered her, and had not even noticed her presence.

She had tried to get her hand into his, but he had either been unaware of the attempt, or rejected it. Get a light out of the kitchen, Jane, and I will go upstairs in two minutes. Mr Walker is the attorney, I believe. Josiah, let us do the best we can in this trouble.

We have had others as heavy before. Well; what am I to do? Am I to go to prison — tonight? It was a wretched, poverty-stricken room. By degrees the carpet had disappeared, which had been laid down some nine or ten years since, when they had first come to Hogglestock, and which even then had not been new. Now nothing but a poor fragment of it remained in front of the fire-place.

In the middle of the room there was a table which had once been large; but one flap of it was gone altogether, and the other flap sloped grievously towards the floor, the weakness of old age having fallen into its legs. There were two or three smaller tables about, but they stood propped against walls, thence obtaining a security which their own strength would not give them. The man who had made it, some time in the last century, had intended it to be a locked guardian for domestic documents, and the receptacle for all that was most private in the house of some paterfamilias.

There were there two odd volumes of Euripides, a Greek Testament, an Odyssey, a duodecimo Pindar, and a miniature Anacreon. There was half a Horace — the two first books of the Odes at the beginning and the De Arte Poetica at the end having disappeared. All these were piled upon the secretary, with many others — odd volumes of sermons and the like; but the Greek and Latin lay at the top, and showed signs of frequent use.

There was one arm-chair in the room — a Windsor chair, as such used to be called, made soft by an old cushion in the back, in which Mr Crawley sat when both he and his wife were in the room, and Mrs Crawley when he was absent. And there was an old horsehair sofa — now almost denuded of its horsehair — but that, like the tables required the assistance of a friendly wall. Then there was a half a dozen of other chairs — all of different sorts — and they completed the furniture of the room.

It was not such a room as one would wish to see inhabited by an beneficed clergyman of the Church of England; but they who know what money will do and what it will not, will understand how easily a man with a family, and with a hundred and thirty pounds a year, may be brought to the need of inhabiting such a chamber.

When it is remembered that three pounds of meat a day, at ninepence a pound, will cost over forty pounds a year, there need be no difficulty in understanding that it may be so. Bread for such a family must cost at least twenty-five pounds. Clothes for five persons of whom one must at any rate wear the raiment of a gentleman, can hardly be found for less than ten pounds a year a head.

Then there remains fifteen pounds for tea, sugar, beer, wages, education, amusements and the like. In such circumstances a gentleman can hardly pay much for the renewal of furniture! I will be there in two minutes, when I have had a word with your papa.

You will do that? Only you must promise that you will be there. I have promised for you. You will go; will you not? Mr Walker has promised that he will send over his phaeton. He sent me home in it today. If I go I will walk. If it were ten times the distance, and though I had not a shoe left to my feet I would walk. If I go there at all, of my own accord, I will walk there. What matters who sees me now? I cannot be degraded as worse than I am.

I see it in their eyes. The children know of it, and I hear whispers in the school. If I am wanted let them take me as they would another. I shall be here for them — unless I am dead. At this moment Jane appeared, pressing her mother to take off her wet clothes, and Mrs Crawley went with her daughter to the kitchen. The one red-armed young girl who was their only servant was sent away, and then the mother and the child discussed how best they might prevail on the head of the family.

He has made great mistakes, it is hard to make people understand that he has not intentionally spoken untruths. He is ever thinking of other things, about the school, and his sermons, and he does not remember. He said that he had got this money from Mr Soames, and of course he thought it was so. I should have said that I had seen every shilling that came into the house; but I know nothing of this cheque — whence it came.

The dean told me he would give him fifty pounds, and the fifty pounds came. I had them in my own hands. And he was written to say that it was so. To this Mrs Crawley made no reply. Mr Soames was confident that he had dropped the pocket-book at the parsonage. Mrs Crawley had always disliked Mr Soames, thinking him to be hard, cruel and vulgar.

But she could not do so. She was driven to make excuses for him which, valid as they might be with herself, could not be valid with others. He had said that Soames had paid the cheque to him. That was clearly a mistake. He had said that the cheque had been given to him by the dean. That was clearly another mistake. She knew, or thought she knew, that he, being such as he was, might make blunders such as these, and yet be true. But having such a conviction she was driven to believe also that almost anything might be possible.

Soames may have been right, or he might have dropped, not the book, but the cheque. She had no difficulty in presuming Soames to be wrong in any detail, if by so supposing she could make the exculpation of her husband easier to herself. If villainy on the part of Soames was needful to her theory, Soames would become to her a villain at once — of the blackest die. And if it were so, would it be possible to make others so believe? It seemed to her that she would be compelled to have him proved to be either a thief or a madman. And yet she knew that he was neither.

That he was not a thief was as clear to her as the sun at noonday. The whole mind of the man was, as she told herself, within her grasp. He might have taken the twenty pounds; he might have taken it and spent it, though it was not his own; but yet he was no thief. Nor was he a madman.

No man more sane in preaching the gospel of his Lord, in making intelligible to the ignorant the promises of his Saviour, ever got into a parish pulpit, or taught in a parish school.

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The intellect of the man was as clear as running water in all things not appertaining to his daily life, and its difficulties. He could be logical with a vengeance — so logical as to cause infinite trouble to his wife, who, with all her good sense, was not logical. And even to this day he would sometimes recite to them English poetry, lines after lines, stanzas upon stanzas, in a sweet low melancholy voice, on long winter evenings when occasionally the burden of his troubles would be lighter to him than was usual. Books in Latin and in French he read with as much ease as in English, and took delight in such as came to him, when he would condescend to accept such loans from the deanery.

And there was at times a lightness of heart about the man. In the course of the last winter he had translated into Greek irregular verse the very noble ballad of Lord Bateman, maintaining the rhythm and the rhyme, and had repeated it with uncouth glee till his daughter knew it all by heart. His wife knew well that he was not mad; but yet she knew that there were dark moments with him, in which his mind was so much astray that he could not justly be called to account as to what he might remember and what he might forget. How would it be possible to explain all this to a judge and jury, so that they might neither say that he was dishonest, nor yet that he was mad?

Perhaps it was so, but she might not as yet admit as much even to her child. Of one thing we at least may be sure; that your papa has not wilfully done anything wrong. Mrs Crawley had many troubles during the next four or five days, of which the worst, perhaps, had reference to the services of the Sunday which intervened between the day of her visit to Silverbridge and the sitting of the magistrates. On the Saturday it was necessary that he should prepare his sermons, of which he preached two every Sunday, though his congregation consisted only of farmers, brickmakers, and agricultural labourers, who would willingly have dispensed with the second.

Mrs Crawley proposed to send over to Mr Robarts, a neighbouring clergyman, for the loan of a curate. Mr Robarts was a warm friend to the Crawleys, and in such an emergency would probably have come himself; but Mr Crawley would not hear of it. And on the Sunday morning he went into his school before the hour of the church service, as had been his wont, and taught there as though everything with him was as usual.

The poor bairns came creeping in, for he was a man who by his manners had been able to secure their obedience in spite of his poverty.

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And he preached to the people of his parish on that Sunday, as he had always preached; eagerly, clearly, and with an eloquence fitted for the hearts of such an audience. No one would have guessed from his tones and gestures and appearance on that occasion, that there was aught wrong with him — unless there had been some observer keen enough to perceive that the greater care which he used, and the special eagerness of his words, denoted a special frame of mind.

After that, after those church services were over, he sank again and never roused himself till the dreaded day had come. Opinion at Silverbridge, at Barchester, and throughout the county, was very much divided as to the guilt or innocence of Mr Crawley. To give Mr Soames his due he had be no means been anxious to press the matter against the clergyman; but he had been forced to go on with it.

While the first cheque was missing, Lord Lufton had sent him a second cheque for the money, and the loss had thus fallen upon his lordship. When that gentleman declared that he had received it from Mr Soames, Mr Soames had been forced to contradict and to resent such assertion. He had done so with as much silence as the nature of the work admitted. All Hogglestock believed their parson to be innocent; but then all Hogglestock believed him to be mad.

At Silverbridge the tradesmen with whom he had dealt, and to whom he had owed, and still owed, money, all declared him to be innocent. They knew something of the man personally, and could not believe him to be a thief. All the ladies at Silverbridge, too, were sure of his innocence. It was to them impossible that such a man should have stolen twenty pounds. Therefore you should not trouble yourself. But the gentlemen in Silverbridge were made of sterner stuff, and believed the man to be guilty, clergyman and gentleman though he was. Had Mr Walker believed him to be innocent, his tongue would have been ready enough.

People did not think much of Mr Winthrop, excepting certain unmarried ladies; for Mr Winthrop was a bachelor, and had plenty of money. People did not think much of Mr Winthrop; but still on this subject he might know something, and when he shook his head he manifestly intended to indicate guilt. And Dr Tempest, the rector of Silverbridge, did not hesitate to declare his belief in the guilt of the incumbent of Hogglestock. No man reverences a clergyman, as a clergyman, so slightly as a brother clergyman. To Dr Tempest it appeared to be neither very strange nor very terrible that Mr Crawley should have stolen twenty pounds.

He should not have married on such a preferment as that. The elder lady had lived much among clergymen, and could hardly, I think, by any means have been brought to believe in the guilt of any man who had taken upon himself the orders of the Church of England. She had also known Mr Crawley personally for some years, and was one of those who could not admit to herself that anyone was vile who had been near to herself. She believed intensely in the wickedness of the outside world, of the world which was far away from herself, and of which she never saw anything; but they who were near to her, and who had even become dear to her, or who even had been respected by her, were made, as it were, saints in her imagination.

They were brought into the inner circle, and could hardly be expelled. She did know Mr Soames also; and thus there was a mystery for the unravelling of which she was very anxious. And the young Lady Lufton was equally sure, and perhaps with better reason for such certainty. She had, in truth, known more of Mr Crawley personally, than anyone in the county, unless it was the dean. No evidence would make me believe it. This took place in the morning, but in the evening the affair was again discussed at Framley Hall.

Indeed, for some days, there was hardly any other subject held to be worthy of discussion in the county. Mr Robarts, the clergyman of the parish and the brother of the younger Lady Lufton, was dining at the hall with his wife, and the three ladies had together expressed their perfect conviction of the falseness of the accusation. But when Lord Lufton and Mr Robarts were together after the ladies had left them, there was much less certainty of this expressed. I wish with all my heart that Soames had said nothing about it, and that the cheque had passed without remark.

We send him to prison for making the mistake. It is one of those cases in which everyone concerned would wish to drop it if it were only possible. But it is not possible. On the evidence, as one sees it at present, one is bound to say that it is a case for the jury. You do, I think? At that time the waters had nearly closed over his head and Mr Crawley had given him some assistance.

When the gentlemen had again found the ladies, they kept their own doubts to themselves; for at Framley Hall, as at present tenanted, female voices and female influences predominated over those which came from the other sex. At Barchester, the cathedral city of the county in which the Crawleys lived, opinion was violently against Mr Crawley. She hated old Lady Lufton with all her heart, and old Lady Lufton hated her as warmly. Mrs Proudie would say frequently that Lady Lufton was a conceited old idiot, and Lady Lufton would declare as frequently that Mrs Proudie was a vulgar virago.

It was known at the palace in Barchester that kindness had been shown to the Crawleys by the family at Framley Hall, and this alone would have been sufficient to make Mrs Proudie believe that Mr Crawley could be guilty of any crime. And as Mrs Proudie believed, so did the bishop believe. And you must be firm. Is it not true that he has been disgracefully involved in debt ever since he has been there; that you have been pestered by letters from unfortunate tradesmen who cannot get their money from him?

He cannot come to the palace as all clergymen should do, because he has got no clothes to come in. I saw him once about the lanes, and I never set my eyes on such an object in all my life! I would not believe that the man was a clergyman till John told me. He is a disgrace to the diocese, and he must be got rid of. I feel sure of his guilt, and I hope he will be convicted. One is bound to hope that a guilty man should be convicted.

But if he escapes conviction, you must sequestrate the living because of the debts. The income is enough to get an excellent curate. It would just do for Thumble. He knew that he could not do exactly what his wife required of him; but if it should so turn out that poor Crawley was found to be guilty, then the matter would be comparatively easy. We have already heard what was said on the subject at the house of Archdeacon Grantly. Dr Grantly had been a very successful man in the world, and on all ordinary occasions had been able to show that bold front with which success endows a man.

But he still had his moments of weakness, and feared greatly lest anything of misfortune should touch him and mar the comely roundness of his prosperity. He was very wealthy. The wife of his bosom had been to him all that a wife should be. His reputation in the clerical world stood very high. His two sons had hitherto done well in the world, not only as regarded their happiness, but as to marriage also, and as to social standing. But how great would be the fall if his son should at last marry the daughter of a convicted thief! How would the Proudies rejoice over him — the Proudies who had been crushed to the ground by the success of the Hartletop alliance; and how would the low-church curates, who swarmed in Barsetshire, gather together and scream in delight over his dismay!

He had told his father that he had made an offer of marriage to Grace Crawley, and he had told the truth. Increasingly Tommy sees how he and his family figure in the story. Queen Lilith invades Candyland and takes over. Tommy learns that he is in fact a member of a family that has a long history of defending Candyland. He learns that it was the forces of evil—Queen Lilith and her ilk— who killed his Grandfather and kidnapped his mother. Tommy also learns that Queen Lilith is not content with simply invading Candyland.

She hates children and plots to poison all of the children on earth. Her scheme can only be stopped with the anti-evil elixir, Elysium.

Product description

Ampoules of Elysium have been secretly lodged on Earth. All but one have been found and destroyed by the Shadowlanders. However, grey-suited Shadowlanders are on to them, trying to get the Ampoule and kill Tommy. An extended chase sequence takes place. Our heroes must survive: All this builds to the climax in the Museum where our heroes must ward off their pursuers while trying to establish a cosmic alignment that will activate the Elysium. We see the start of the global giveaway of the poisoned sweets. Children and adults begin to turn grey and flop to the ground.

Just in time, our heroes manage to complete their task. An energy ray of sorts spreads all over the world and restores the fallen back to life. Tommy wakes up in hospital, after having spent three days unconscious. Nobody knows just how much he has been through. And nobody knows just how important Tommy is in the cosmic scheme of things. Tommy himself is only beginning to see his true role as that of Candyland Defender. Read more Read less.

Product description Product Description The story follows the struggles of twelve-year-old Tommy Wilkins as the fabric of his existence slowly unravels to reveal another reality underneath. Kindle Edition File Size: Stanley Eales; 1 edition 17 June Sold by: Share your thoughts with other customers. Write a product review. Get to Know Us.