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<h3>CHAPTER XLVIII</h3>
<h3>Miss Thorne Shows Her Talent at Match-Making<br/> </h3>
<p>On Mr. Harding's return to Barchester from Plumstead, which was
effected by him in due course in company with the archdeacon, more
tidings of a surprising nature met him. He was, during the journey,
subjected to such a weight of unanswerable argument, all of which
went to prove that it was his bounden duty not to interfere with the
paternal Government that was so anxious to make him a dean, that when
he arrived at the chemist's door in High Street, he hardly knew which
way to turn himself in the matter. But, perplexed as he was, he was
doomed to further perplexity. He found a note there from his
daughter begging him most urgently to come to her immediately. But
we must again go back a little in our story.</p>
<p>Miss Thorne had not been slow to hear the rumours respecting Mr.
Arabin which had so much disturbed the happiness of Mrs. Grantly.
And she, also, was unhappy to think that her parish clergyman should
be accused of worshipping a strange goddess. She, also, was of
opinion that rectors and vicars should all be married, and with that
good-natured energy which was characteristic of her, she put her wits
to work to find a fitting match for Mr. Arabin. Mrs. Grantly, in
this difficulty, could think of no better remedy than a lecture from
the archdeacon. Miss Thorne thought that a young lady, marriageable
and with a dowry, might be of more efficacy. In looking through the
catalogue of her unmarried friends who might possibly be in want of a
husband, and might also be fit for such promotion as a country
parsonage affords, she could think of no one more eligible than Mrs.
Bold; consequently, losing no time, she went into Barchester on the
day of Mr. Slope's discomfiture, the same day that her brother had
had his interesting interview with the last of the Neros, and invited
Mrs. Bold to bring her nurse and baby to Ullathorne and make them a
protracted visit.</p>
<p>Miss Thorne suggested a month or two, intending to use her influence
afterwards in prolonging it so as to last out the winter, in order
that Mr. Arabin might have an opportunity of becoming fairly intimate
with his intended bride. "We'll have Mr. Arabin, too," said Miss
Thorne to herself; "and before the spring they'll know each other;
and in twelve or eighteen months' time, if all goes well, Mrs. Bold
will be domiciled at St. Ewold's;" and then the kind-hearted lady
gave herself some not undeserved praise for her match-making genius.</p>
<p>Eleanor was taken a little by surprise, but the matter ended in her
promising to go to Ullathorne for at any rate a week or two; on the
day previous to that on which her father drove out to Plumstead, she
had had herself driven out to Ullathorne.</p>
<p>Miss Thorne would not perplex her with her embryo lord on that same
evening, thinking that she would allow her a few hours to make
herself at home; but on the following morning Mr. Arabin arrived.
"And now," said Miss Thorne to herself, "I must contrive to throw
them in each other's way." That same day, after dinner, Eleanor, with
an assumed air of dignity which she could not maintain, with tears
which she could not suppress, with a flutter which she could not
conquer, and a joy which she could not hide, told Miss Thorne that
she was engaged to marry Mr. Arabin and that it behoved her to get
back home to Barchester as quick as she could.</p>
<p>To say simply that Miss Thorne was rejoiced at the success of the
scheme would give a very faint idea of her feelings on the occasion.
My readers may probably have dreamt before now that they have had
before them some terribly long walk to accomplish, some journey of
twenty or thirty miles, an amount of labour frightful to anticipate,
and that immediately on starting they have ingeniously found some
accommodating short cut which has brought them without fatigue to
their work's end in five minutes. Miss Thorne's waking feelings were
somewhat of the same nature. My readers may perhaps have had to do
with children, and may on some occasion have promised to their young
charges some great gratification intended to come off, perhaps at the
end of the winter, or at the beginning of summer. The impatient
juveniles, however, will not wait, and clamorously demand their treat
before they go to bed. Miss Thorne had a sort of feeling that her
children were equally unreasonable. She was like an inexperienced
gunner, who has ill-calculated the length of the train that he has
laid. The gun-powder exploded much too soon, and poor Miss Thorne
felt that she was blown up by the strength of her own petard.</p>
<p>Miss Thorne had had lovers of her own, but they had been gentlemen
of old-fashioned and deliberate habits. Miss Thorne's heart also had
not always been hard, though she was still a virgin spinster; but it
had never yielded in this way at the first assault. She had intended to
bring together a middle-aged, studious clergyman and a discreet matron
who might possibly be induced to marry again, and in doing so she had
thrown fire among tinder. Well, it was all as it should be, but she did
feel perhaps a little put out by the precipitancy of her own success,
and perhaps a little vexed at the readiness of Mrs. Bold to be wooed.</p>
<p>She said, however, nothing about it to anyone, and ascribed it all
to the altered manners of the new age. Their mothers and grandmothers
were perhaps a little more deliberate, but it was admitted on all sides
that things were conducted very differently now than in former times.
For aught Miss Thorne knew of the matter, a couple of hours might be
quite sufficient under the new régime to complete that for which
she in her ignorance had allotted twelve months.</p>
<p>But we must not pass over the wooing so cavalierly. It has been
told, with perhaps tedious accuracy, how Eleanor disposed of two of
her lovers at Ullathorne; and it must also be told with equal
accuracy, and if possible with less tedium, how she encountered Mr.
Arabin.</p>
<p>It cannot be denied that when Eleanor accepted Miss Thorne's
invitation she remembered that Ullathorne was in the parish of St.
Ewold's. Since her interview with the signora she had done little
else than think about Mr. Arabin and the appeal that had been made to
her. She could not bring herself to believe, or try to bring herself
to believe, that what she had been told was untrue. Think of it how
she would, she could not but accept it as a fact that Mr. Arabin was
fond of her; and then when she went further and asked herself the
question, she could not but accept it as a fact also that she was
fond of him. If it were destined for her to be the partner of his
hopes and sorrows, to whom could she look for friendship so properly
as to Miss Thorne? This invitation was like an ordained step towards
the fulfilment of her destiny, and when she also heard that Mr.
Arabin was expected to be at Ullathorne on the following day, it
seemed as though all the world were conspiring in her favour. Well,
did she not deserve it? In that affair of Mr. Slope had not all the
world conspired against her?</p>
<p>She could not, however, make herself easy and at home. When, in the
evening after dinner, Miss Thorne expatiated on the excellence of Mr.
Arabin's qualities, and hinted that any little rumour which might be
ill-naturedly spread abroad concerning him really meant nothing, Mrs.
Bold found herself unable to answer. When Miss Thorne went a little
further and declared that she did not know a prettier vicarage-house
in the county than St. Ewold's, Mrs. Bold, remembering the projected
bow-window and the projected priestess, still held her tongue, though
her ears tingled with the conviction that all the world knew that she
was in love with Mr. Arabin. Well, what would that matter if they
could only meet and tell each other what each now longed to tell?</p>
<p>And they did meet. Mr. Arabin came early in the day and found the
two ladies together at work in the drawing-room. Miss Thorne, who,
had she known all the truth, would have vanished into air at once, had
no conception that her immediate absence would be a blessing, and
remained chatting with them till luncheon-time. Mr. Arabin could
talk about nothing but the Signora Neroni's beauty, would discuss no
people but the Stanhopes. This was very distressing to Eleanor and
not very satisfactory to Miss Thorne. But yet there was evidence of
innocence in his open avowal of admiration.</p>
<p>And then they had lunch, and then Mr. Arabin went out on parish
duty, and Eleanor and Miss Thorne were left to take a walk together.</p>
<p>"Do you think the Signora Neroni is so lovely as people say?"
Eleanor asked as they were coming home.</p>
<p>"She is very beautiful, certainly, very beautiful," Miss Thorne
answered; "but I do not know that anyone considers her lovely. She
is a woman all men would like to look at, but few, I imagine, would
be glad to take her to their hearths, even were she unmarried and not
afflicted as she is."</p>
<p>There was some little comfort in this. Eleanor made the most of it
till she got back to the house. She was then left alone in the
drawing-room, and just as it was getting dark Mr. Arabin came in.</p>
<p>It was a beautiful afternoon in the beginning of October, and
Eleanor was sitting in the window to get the advantage of the last
daylight for her novel. There was a fire in the comfortable room, but
the weather was not cold enough to make it attractive; and as she could
see the sun set from where she sat, she was not very attentive to her
book.</p>
<p>Mr. Arabin, when he entered, stood awhile with his back to the fire
in his usual way, merely uttering a few commonplace remarks about the
beauty of the weather, while he plucked up courage for more
interesting converse. It cannot probably be said that he had
resolved then and there to make an offer to Eleanor. Men, we
believe, seldom make such resolves. Mr. Slope and Mr. Stanhope had
done so, it is true, but gentlemen generally propose without any
absolutely defined determination as to their doing so. Such was now
the case with Mr. Arabin.</p>
<p>"It is a lovely sunset," said Eleanor, answering him on the
dreadfully trite subject which he had chosen.</p>
<p>Mr. Arabin could not see the sunset from the hearth-rug, so he had
to go close to her.</p>
<p>"Very lovely," said he, standing modestly so far away from her as to
avoid touching the flounces of her dress. Then it appeared that he
had nothing further to say; so, after gazing for a moment in silence
at the brightness of the setting sun, he returned to the fire.</p>
<p>Eleanor found that it was quite impossible for herself to commence a
conversation. In the first place she could find nothing to say;
words, which were generally plenty enough with her, would not come to
her relief. And moreover, do what she would, she could hardly
prevent herself from crying.</p>
<p>"Do you like Ullathorne?" said Mr. Arabin, speaking from the safely
distant position which he had assumed on the hearth-rug.</p>
<p>"Yes, indeed, very much!"</p>
<p>"I don't mean Mr. and Miss Thorne—I know you like
them—but the style of the house. There is something about
old-fashioned mansions, built as this is, and old-fashioned gardens,
that to me is especially delightful."</p>
<p>"I like everything old-fashioned," said Eleanor; "old-fashioned
things are so much the honestest."</p>
<p>"I don't know about that," said Mr. Arabin, gently laughing. "That
is an opinion on which very much may be said on either side. It is
strange how widely the world is divided on a subject which so nearly
concerns us all, and which is so close beneath our eyes. Some think
that we are quickly progressing towards perfection, while others
imagine that virtue is disappearing from the earth."</p>
<p>"And you, Mr. Arabin, what do you think?" said Eleanor. She felt
somewhat surprised at the tone which his conversation was taking, and
yet she was relieved at his saying something which enabled herself to
speak without showing her own emotion.</p>
<p>"What do I think, Mrs. Bold?" and then he rumbled his money with his
hands in his trousers pockets, and looked and spoke very little like a
thriving lover. "It is the bane of my life that on important
subjects I acquire no fixed opinion. I think, and think, and go on
thinking, and yet my thoughts are running ever in different
directions. I hardly know whether or no we do lean more confidently
than our fathers did on those high hopes to which we profess to
aspire."</p>
<p>"I think the world grows more worldly every day," said Eleanor.</p>
<p>"That is because you see more of it than when you were younger. But
we should hardly judge by what we see—we see so very, very
little." There was then a pause for awhile, during which Mr. Arabin
continued to turn over his shillings and half-crowns. "If we believe in
Scripture, we can hardly think that mankind in general will now be
allowed to retrograde."</p>
<p>Eleanor, whose mind was certainly engaged otherwise than on the
general state of mankind, made no answer to this. She felt
thoroughly dissatisfied with herself. She could not force her
thoughts away from the topic on which the signora had spoken to her
in so strange a way, and yet she knew that she could not converse
with Mr. Arabin in an unrestrained, natural tone till she did so.
She was most anxious not to show to him any special emotion, and yet
she felt that if he looked at her, he would at once see that she was
not at ease.</p>
<p>But he did not look at her. Instead of doing so, he left the
fire-place and began walking up and down the room. Eleanor took up her
book resolutely, but she could not read, for there was a tear in her
eye, and do what she would, it fell on her cheek. When Mr. Arabin's
back was turned to her, she wiped it away; but another was soon
coursing down her face in its place. They would come—not a
deluge of tears that would have betrayed her at once, but one by one,
single monitors. Mr. Arabin did not observe her closely, and they
passed unseen.</p>
<p>Mr. Arabin, thus pacing up and down the room, took four or five
turns before he spoke another word, and Eleanor sat equally silent with
her face bent over her book. She was afraid that her tears would get
the better of her, and was preparing for an escape from the room, when
Mr. Arabin in his walk stood opposite to her. He did not come close up
but stood exactly on the spot to which his course brought him, and
then, with his hands under his coat-tails, thus made his confession.</p>
<p>"Mrs. Bold," said he, "I owe you retribution for a great offence of
which I have been guilty towards you." Eleanor's heart beat so that
she could not trust herself to say that he had never been guilty of
any offence. So Mr. Arabin thus went on.</p>
<p>"I have thought much of it since, and I am now aware that I was
wholly unwarranted in putting to you a question which I once asked
you. It was indelicate on my part, and perhaps unmanly. No intimacy
which may exist between myself and your connexion, Dr. Grantly, could
justify it. Nor could the acquaintance which existed between
ourselves." This word acquaintance struck cold on Eleanor's heart.
Was this to be her doom after all? "I therefore think it right to
beg your pardon in a humble spirit, and I now do so."</p>
<p>What was Eleanor to say to him? She could not say much because she
was crying, and yet she must say something. She was most anxious to
say that something graciously, kindly, and yet not in such a manner
as to betray herself. She had never felt herself so much at a loss
for words.</p>
<p>"Indeed, I took no offence, Mr. Arabin."</p>
<p>"Oh, but you did! And had you not done so, you would not have been
yourself. You were as right to be offended as I was wrong so to
offend you. I have not forgiven myself, but I hope to hear that you
forgive me."</p>
<p>She was now past speaking calmly, though she still continued to hide
her tears; and Mr. Arabin, after pausing a moment in vain for her
reply, was walking off towards the door. She felt that she could not
allow him to go unanswered without grievously sinning against all
charity; so, rising from her seat, she gently touched his arm and
said, "Oh, Mr. Arabin, do not go till I speak to you! I do forgive
you. You know that I forgive you."</p>
<p>He took the hand that had so gently touched his arm and then gazed
into her face as if he would peruse there, as though written in a
book, the whole future destiny of his life; as he did so, there was a
sober, sad seriousness in his own countenance which Eleanor found
herself unable to sustain. She could only look down upon the carpet,
let her tears trickle as they would, and leave her hand within his.</p>
<p>It was but for a minute that they stood so, but the duration of that
minute was sufficient to make it ever memorable to them both.
Eleanor was sure now that she was loved. No words, be their
eloquence what it might, could be more impressive than that eager,
melancholy gaze.</p>
<p>Why did he look so into her eyes? Why did he not speak to her?
Could it be that he looked for her to make the first sign?</p>
<p>And he, though he knew but little of women, even he knew that he was
loved. He had only to ask, and it would be all his own, that
inexpressible loveliness, those ever-speaking but yet now mute eyes,
that feminine brightness and eager, loving spirit which had so
attracted him since first he had encountered it at St. Ewold's. It
might, must, all be his own now. On no other supposition was it
possible that she should allow her hand to remain thus clasped within
his own. He had only to ask. Ah, but that was the difficulty. Did
a minute suffice for all this? Nay, perhaps it might be more than a
minute.</p>
<p>"Mrs. Bold—" at last he said and then stopped himself.</p>
<p>If he could not speak, how was she to do so? He had called her by
her name, the same name that any merest stranger would have used!
She withdrew her hand from his and moved as though to return to her
seat. "Eleanor!" he then said in his softest tone, as though the
courage of a lover were as yet but half-assumed, as though he were
still afraid of giving offence by the freedom which he took. She
looked slowly, gently, almost piteously up into his face. There was
at any rate no anger there to deter him.</p>
<p>"Eleanor!" he again exclaimed, and in a moment he had her clasped to
his bosom. How this was done, whether the doing was with him or her,
whether she had flown thither conquered by the tenderness of his
voice, or he with a violence not likely to give offence had drawn her
to his breast, neither of them knew; nor can I declare. There was
now that sympathy between them which hardly admitted of individual
motion. They were one and the same—one flesh—one
spirit—one life.</p>
<p>"Eleanor, my own Eleanor, my own, my wife!" She ventured to look up
at him through her tears, and he, bowing his face down over hers,
pressed his lips upon her brow—his virgin lips, which, since
a beard first grew upon his chin, had never yet tasted the luxury of a
woman's cheek.</p>
<p>She had been told that her yea must be yea, or her nay, nay, but she
was called on for neither the one nor the other. She told Miss
Thorne that she was engaged to Mr. Arabin, but no such words had
passed between them, no promises had been asked or given.</p>
<p>"Oh, let me go," said she, "let me go now. I am too happy to
remain—let me go, that I may be alone." He did not try to
hinder her; he did not repeat the kiss; he did not press another on her
lips. He might have done so, had he been so minded. She was now all his
own. He took his arm from round her waist, his arm that was trembling
with a new delight, and let her go. She fled like a roe to her own
chamber, and then, having turned the bolt, she enjoyed the full luxury
of her love. She idolised, almost worshipped this man who had so meekly
begged her pardon. And he was now her own. Oh, how she wept and cried
and laughed as the hopes and fears and miseries of the last few weeks
passed in remembrance through her mind.</p>
<p>Mr. Slope! That anyone should have dared to think that she who had
been chosen by him could possibly have mated herself with Mr. Slope!
That they should have dared to tell him, also, and subject her bright
happiness to such needless risk! And then she smiled with joy as she
thought of all the comforts that she could give him—not that
he cared for comforts, but that it would be so delicious for her to
give.</p>
<p>She got up and rang for her maid that she might tell her little boy
of his new father, and in her own way she did tell him. She desired
her maid to leave her, in order that she might be alone with her
child; and then, while he lay sprawling on the bed, she poured forth
the praises, all unmeaning to him, of the man she had selected to
guard his infancy.</p>
<p>She could not be happy, however, till she had made Mr. Arabin take
the child to himself and thus, as it were, adopt him as his own. The
moment the idea struck her she took the baby up in her arms and,
opening her door, ran quickly down to the drawing-room. She at once
found, by his step still pacing on the floor, that he was there, and
a glance within the room told her that he was alone. She hesitated a
moment and then hurried in with her precious charge.</p>
<p>Mr. Arabin met her in the middle of the room. "There," said she,
breathless with her haste; "there, take him—take him, and
love him."</p>
<p>Mr. Arabin took the little fellow from her and, kissing him again
and again, prayed God to bless him. "He shall be all as my
own—all as my own," said he. Eleanor, as she stooped to
take back her child, kissed the hand that held him and then rushed back
with her treasure to her chamber.</p>
<p>It was thus that Mr. Harding's younger daughter was won for the
second time. At dinner neither she nor Mr. Arabin were very bright,
but their silence occasioned no remark. In the drawing-room, as we
have before said, she told Miss Thorne what had occurred. The next
morning she returned to Barchester, and Mr. Arabin went over with his
budget of news to the archdeacon. As Doctor Grantly was not there,
he could only satisfy himself by telling Mrs. Grantly how that he
intended himself the honour of becoming her brother-in-law. In the
ecstasy of her joy at hearing such tidings Mrs. Grantly vouchsafed
him a warmer welcome than any he had yet received from Eleanor.</p>
<p>"Good heavens!" she exclaimed—it was the general
exclamation of the rectory. "Poor Eleanor! Dear Eleanor! What a
monstrous injustice has been done her! Well, it shall all be made up
now." And then she thought of the signora. "What lies people tell," she
said to herself.</p>
<p>But people in this matter had told no lies at all.</p>
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