Mr. Slope, however, had other plans. He saw from the first that he could not conciliate Dr. Grantly, and decided on open battle against the archdeacon and all his adherents. Only those came to call on Mr. Slope who, like Mr. Quiverful, the rector of Puddingdale, had large families and small incomes, and could not afford to neglect the loaves and fishes of the diocese, even if a Mr. Slope had charge of the baskets.

So Mr. Harding received a note begging him to call on Mr. Slope at the palace concerning the wardenship.

The result of this interview was so offensive to Mr. Harding that he said:

"You may tell the bishop, Mr. Slope, that as I altogether disagree with his views about the hospital, I shall decline the situation if I find that any such conditions are attached to it as those you have suggested." And so saying, he took his hat and went his way.

Mr. Slope was contented. He considered himself at liberty to accept Mr.

Harding's last speech as an absolute refusal of the appointment. At least, he so represented it to the bishop and to Mrs. Proudie.

"I really am sorry for it," said the bishop.

"I don't know that there is much cause for sorrow," said the lady. "Mr.

Quiverful is a much more deserving man."

"I suppose I had better see Quiverful," said the chaplain.

"I suppose you had," said the bishop.

But no sooner had Mr. Slope promised Quiverful the wardenship, Mrs.

Proudie writing at the same time to her protegee, Mrs. Quiverful, than he repented of the step he had taken.

Eleanor Bold, Mr. Harding's daughter, was a widow in prosperous circ.u.mstances, and when Mr. Slope had made her acquaintance, and learnt of her income, he decided that he would woo her. Mr. Harding at the hospital, and placed there by his means, would be more inclined to receive him as a son-in-law. Mr. Slope wanted a wife, and he wanted money, but he wanted power more than either. He had fully realised that sooner or later he must come to blows with Mrs. Proudie. He had no desire to remain in Barchester as her chaplain; he had higher views of his own destiny. Either he or Mrs. Proudie must go to the wall, and now had come the time when he would try which it should be.

To that end, he rode over to Puddingdale and persuaded Mr. Quiverful to give up all hope of the wardenship. Mrs. Quiverful, however, with fourteen children, refused to yield without a struggle, and went off there and then to Mrs. Proudie at the palace.

She told her tale, and Mrs. Proudie walked quickly into her husband's room, and found him seated at his office table, with Mr. Slope opposite to him.

"What is this, bishop, about Mr. Quiverful?" said she, coming to the end of the table and standing there.

"I have been out to Puddingdale this morning, ma'am," replied Mr. Slope, "and have seen Mr. Quiverful; and he has abandoned all claim to the hospital. Under these circ.u.mstances I have strongly advised his lordship to nominate Mr. Harding."

"Who desired you to go to Mr. Quiverful?" said Mrs. Proudie, now at the top of her wrath--for it was plain to her the chaplain was taking too much upon himself. "Did anyone send you, sir?"

There was a dead pause in the room. The bishop sat twiddling his thumbs.

How comfortable it would be, he thought, if they could fight it out between them; fight it out so that one should kill the other utterly, as far as diocesan life was concerned, so that he, the bishop, might know clearly by whom he ought to be led. If he had a wish as to which might prove victor, that wish was not antagonistic to Mr. Slope.

"Will you answer me, sir?" Mrs. Proudie repeated. "Who instructed you to call on Mr. Quiverful?"

"Mrs. Proudie," said Mr. Slope, "I am quite aware how much I owe to your kindness. But my duty in this matter is to his lordship. He has approved of what I have done, and having that approval, and my own, I want none other."

What horrid words were these which greeted the ear of Mrs. Proudie? Here was premeditated mutiny in the camp. The bishop had not yet been twelve months in the chair, and rebellion had already reared her hideous head in the palace.

"Mr. Slope," said Mrs. Proudie, with slow and dignified voice, "I will trouble you, if you please, to leave the apartment. I wish to speak to my lord alone."

Mr. Slope felt that everything depended on the present interview. Should the bishop now be repetticoated his thralldom would be complete and for ever. Now was the moment for victory or rout. It was now that Mr. Slope must make himself master of the diocese, or else resign his place and begin his search for fortune elsewhere.

"His lordship has summoned me on most important diocesan business," said Mr. Slope, glancing with uneasy eye at Dr. Proudie; "my leaving him at the present moment is, I fear, impossible."

"Do you bandy words with me, you ungrateful man?" said the lady. "My lord, is Mr. Slope to leave this room, or am I?"

His lordship twiddled his thumbs, and then proclaimed himself a Slopeite.

"Why, my dear," said he, "Mr. Slope and I are very busy."

That was all. There was nothing more necessary. Mr. Slope saw at once the full amount of his gain, and turned on the vanquished lady a look of triumph which she never forgot and never forgave.

Mrs. Proudie without further parley left the room; and then followed a close conference between the new allies. The chaplain told the bishop that the world gave him credit for being under the governance of his wife, and the bishop pledged himself with Mr. Slope's a.s.sistance to change his courses.

_IV.--Mr. Slope Bids Farewell_

As it proved, however, Mr. Slope had not a chance against Mrs. Proudie.

Not only could she stun the poor bishop by her midnight anger when the two were alone, but she could a.s.suage him, if she so willed, by daily indulgences.

On the death of Dr. Trefoil, the dean of Barchester, Mr. Slope had not shrunk from urging the bishop to recommend his chaplain for the post.

"How could you think of making such a creature as that dean of Barchester?" said Mrs. Proudie to her now submissive husband.

"Why, my dear," said he, "it appeared to me that you and Mr. Slope did not get on as well as you used to do, and therefore I thought that if he got this place, and so ceased to be my chaplain, you might be pleased at such an arrangement."

Mrs. Proudie laughed aloud.

"Oh yes, my dear, of course he'll cease to be your chaplain," said she.

"After what has pa.s.sed, that must be a matter of course. I couldn't for a moment think of living in the same house with such a man. Dean, indeed! The man has gone mad with arrogance."

The bishop said nothing further to excuse either himself or his family, and having shown himself pa.s.sive and docile was again taken into favour, and spent the pleasantest evening he had had in his own house for a long time.

Mr. Slope did not get the deanery, though for a week he was decidedly the favourite--owing to the backing he received from the _Jupiter_. And Mr. Quiverful was after all appointed to the hospital, with the complete acquiescence of Mr. Harding.

Mr. Harding might have had the deanery, but he declined the office on the ground of his age and his inability to fit himself into new duties.

In vain the archdeacon threatened, and in vain he coaxed; his father-in-law could not be made to accept it.

To Mr. Harding's infinite relief, Mrs. Bold regarded Mr. Slope's proposal with horror, and refused him with indignation. She had never thought of him as a possible suitor, and when he addressed her as "beautiful woman," and as "dearest Eleanor," and as "sweetest angel,"

and even contrived to pa.s.s his arm round her waist, it was more than she could bear. Mrs. Bold raised her little hand and just dealt him a box on the ear with such good will that it sounded among the trees--he had followed her into the garden--like a miniature thunderclap.

The news that the deanery was not for him ended Mr. Slope's prospects in Barchester. He was aware that as regarded the diocese Mrs. Proudie had checkmated him. He had, for a moment, run her hard, but it was only for a moment, and Mrs. Proudie had come forth victorious in the struggle.

Having received a formal command to wait upon the bishop, he went into Dr. Proudie's study. There, as he had antic.i.p.ated, he found Mrs. Proudie together with her husband.

"Mr. Slope," began the bishop, "I think you had better look for some other preferment. I do not think you are well suited for the situation you have lately held. I will enclose you a cheque for any balance that may be due to you; and under the present circ.u.mstances it will, of course, be better for all parties that you should leave the palace at the earliest possible moment."

"If, however, you wish to remain in the neighbourhood," said Mrs.

Proudie, "the bishop will mention your name to Mr. Quiverful, who now wants a curate at Puddingdale, and the stipend is 50 a year, sufficient for your requirements."

"May G.o.d forgive you, madam, for the manner in which you have treated me," said Mr. Slope; "and remember this, madam, that you yourself may still have a fall. As to the bishop, I pity him!"

Thus ended the intimacy of the bishop of Barchester with his first confidential chaplain.