"Queens hereafter might be glad to live

Upon the alms of her superfluous praise."

But this result was questionable. And what else could he do for

Dorothea? What was his devotion worth to her? It was impossible to

tell. He would not go out of her reach. He saw no creature among her

friends to whom he could believe that she spoke with the same simple

confidence as to him. She had once said that she would like him to

stay; and stay he would, whatever fire-breathing dragons might hiss

around her.

This had always been the conclusion of Will's hesitations. But he was

not without contradictoriness and rebellion even towards his own

resolve. He had often got irritated, as he was on this particular

night, by some outside demonstration that his public exertions with Mr.

Brooke as a chief could not seem as heroic as he would like them to be,

and this was always associated with the other ground of

irritation--that notwithstanding his sacrifice of dignity for

Dorothea's sake, he could hardly ever see her. Whereupon, not being

able to contradict these unpleasant facts, he contradicted his own

strongest bias and said, "I am a fool."

Nevertheless, since the inward debate necessarily turned on Dorothea,

he ended, as he had done before, only by getting a livelier sense of

what her presence would be to him; and suddenly reflecting that the

morrow would be Sunday, he determined to go to Lowick Church and see

her. He slept upon that idea, but when he was dressing in the rational

morning light, Objection said--

"That will be a virtual defiance of Mr. Casaubon's prohibition to visit

Lowick, and Dorothea will be displeased."

"Nonsense!" argued Inclination, "it would be too monstrous for him to

hinder me from going out to a pretty country church on a spring

morning. And Dorothea will be glad."

"It will be clear to Mr. Casaubon that you have come either to annoy

him or to see Dorothea."

"It is not true that I go to annoy him, and why should I not go to see

Dorothea? Is he to have everything to himself and be always

comfortable? Let him smart a little, as other people are obliged to

do. I have always liked the quaintness of the church and congregation;

besides, I know the Tuckers: I shall go into their pew."

Having silenced Objection by force of unreason, Will walked to Lowick

as if he had been on the way to Paradise, crossing Halsell Common and

skirting the wood, where the sunlight fell broadly under the budding

boughs, bringing out the beauties of moss and lichen, and fresh green

growths piercing the brown. Everything seemed to know that it was

Sunday, and to approve of his going to Lowick Church. Will easily felt

happy when nothing crossed his humor, and by this time the thought of

vexing Mr. Casaubon had become rather amusing to him, making his face

break into its merry smile, pleasant to see as the breaking of sunshine

on the water--though the occasion was not exemplary. But most of us

are apt to settle within ourselves that the man who blocks our way is

odious, and not to mind causing him a little of the disgust which his

personality excites in ourselves. Will went along with a small book

under his arm and a hand in each side-pocket, never reading, but

chanting a little, as he made scenes of what would happen in church and

coming out. He was experimenting in tunes to suit some words of his

own, sometimes trying a ready-made melody, sometimes improvising. The

words were not exactly a hymn, but they certainly fitted his Sunday

experience:--




readonlinefreebook.com Copyright 2016 - 2024