"Everybody" that day did not include Mr. Bulstrode, whose health could

not well endure crowds and draughts. But Mrs. Bulstrode had

particularly wished to have a certain picture--a "Supper at Emmaus,"

attributed in the catalogue to Guido; and at the last moment before the

day of the sale Mr. Bulstrode had called at the office of the

"Pioneer," of which he was now one of the proprietors, to beg of Mr.

Ladislaw as a great favor that he would obligingly use his remarkable

knowledge of pictures on behalf of Mrs. Bulstrode, and judge of the

value of this particular painting--"if," added the scrupulously polite

banker, "attendance at the sale would not interfere with the

arrangements for your departure, which I know is imminent."

This proviso might have sounded rather satirically in Will's ear if he

had been in a mood to care about such satire. It referred to an

understanding entered into many weeks before with the proprietors of

the paper, that he should be at liberty any day he pleased to hand over

the management to the subeditor whom he had been training; since he

wished finally to quit Middlemarch. But indefinite visions of ambition

are weak against the ease of doing what is habitual or beguilingly

agreeable; and we all know the difficulty of carrying out a resolve

when we secretly long that it may turn out to be unnecessary. In such

states of mind the most incredulous person has a private leaning

towards miracle: impossible to conceive how our wish could be

fulfilled, still--very wonderful things have happened! Will did not

confess this weakness to himself, but he lingered. What was the use of

going to London at that time of the year? The Rugby men who would

remember him were not there; and so far as political writing was

concerned, he would rather for a few weeks go on with the "Pioneer."

At the present moment, however, when Mr. Bulstrode was speaking to him,

he had both a strengthened resolve to go and an equally strong resolve

not to go till he had once more seen Dorothea. Hence he replied that

he had reasons for deferring his departure a little, and would be happy

to go to the sale.

Will was in a defiant mood, his consciousness being deeply stung with

the thought that the people who looked at him probably knew a fact

tantamount to an accusation against him as a fellow with low designs

which were to be frustrated by a disposal of property. Like most

people who assert their freedom with regard to conventional

distinction, he was prepared to be sudden and quick at quarrel with any

one who might hint that he had personal reasons for that assertion--that

there was anything in his blood, his bearing, or his character to

which he gave the mask of an opinion. When he was under an irritating

impression of this kind he would go about for days with a defiant look,

the color changing in his transparent skin as if he were on the qui

vive, watching for something which he had to dart upon.




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