Lady Standish was one of those clinging beings who seem morally and physically to be always seeking a prop. Before adversity she was prostrate, and when his lordship the Bishop of Bath and Wells was ushered into her sitting-room, half-an-hour after Sir Jasper's departure for Hammer's Fields, he found the poor lady stretched all her length upon the sofa, her head buried in the cushions.
"Dear me," said his lordship, and paused. He was a tall, portly, handsome gentleman with sleek countenance, full eye, and well-defined waistcoat. Could human weakness have touched him, he would have felt a pride in those legs which so roundly filled the silk stockings. But that human weakness could ever affect the Bishop of Bath and Wells was a thing that dignitary (and he gave his Maker thanks for it) felt to be utterly inconceivable.
"Lady Standish," said the Bishop; then he waved his hand to the curious servants. "Leave us, leave us, friends," said he.
Lady Standish reared herself with a sort of desperate heart-sickness into a sitting posture and turned her head to look dully upon her visitor.
"You come too late," she said; "my lord. Sir Jasper has gone to this most disastrous meeting."
"My dear Lady Standish," said Dr. Thurlow, "my dear child," he took a chair and drew it to the sofa, and then lifted her slight languid hand and held it between his two plump palms. "My dear Lady Standish," pursued he in a purring, soothing tone. If he did not know how to deal with an afflicted soul (especially if that afflicted soul happened to belong to the aristocracy and in preference inhabited a young female body), who did? "I came upon the very moment I received your letter. I might perhaps have instantly done something to help in this matter, had you been more explicit, but there was a slight incoherence ... very natural!" Here he patted her hand gently. "A slight incoherence which required explanations. Now tell me—I gather that your worthy husband has set forth upon an affair of honour, eh? Shall we say a duel?"
Lady Standish gave a moaning assent.
"Some trifling quarrel. Hot-headed young men! It is very reprehensible, but we must not be too hard on young blood. Young blood is hot! Well, well, trust in a merciful Providence, my dear Lady Standish. You know, not a sparrow falls, not a hair of our heads, that is not counted. Was the, ah—quarrel about cards, or some such social trifle?"
"It was about me," said the afflicted wife in a strangled voice.
"About you, my dear lady!" The clasp of the plump hand grew, if possible, a trifle closer, almost tender. Lady Standish was cold and miserable, this warm touch conveyed somehow a vague feeling of strength and comfort.
"About me," she repeated, and her lip trembled.
"Ah, is it so? And with whom does Sir Jasper fight?"
"With Colonel Villiers," said she, and shot a glance of full misery into the benign large-featured face bending over her.
"Colonel Villiers," repeated the Bishop in tones of the blankest astonishment. "Not—eh, not—er, old Colonel Villiers?"
"Oh, my lord," cried Lady Standish, "I am the most miserable and the most innocent of women!"
"My dear madam," cried the Bishop, "I never for an instant doubted the latter." His hold upon her hand relaxed, and she withdrew it to push away the tears that now began to gather thick and fast on her eyelashes. The Bishop wondered how it was he had never noticed before what a very pretty woman Lady Standish was, what charming eyes she had, and what quite unusually long eyelashes. It was something of a revelation to him too, to see so fair and fine a skin in these days of rouge and powder.
"And yet," sobbed Lady Standish, "'tis my fault too, for I have been very wrong, very foolish! Oh, my lord, if my husband is hurt, I cannot deny 'tis I shall bear the guilt of it."
"Come, tell me all about it," said the Bishop, and edged from his chair to her side on the sofa, and re-possessed himself of her hand. She let it lie in his; she was very confiding. "We are all foolish," said Dr. Thurlow, "we are all, alas, prone to sin." He spoke in the plural to give her confidence, not that such a remark could apply to any Bishop of Bath and Wells.
"Oh, I have been very foolish," repeated the lady. "I thought, my lord, I fancied that my husband's affection for me was waning."
"Impossible!" cried his lordship. But he felt slightly bewildered.
"And so, acting upon inconsiderate advice, I—I pretended—only pretended indeed, my lord—that I cared for someone else, and Sir Jasper got jealous and so he has been calling everybody out thinking that he has a rival."
"Nevertheless," said the Bishop, "he has no rival. Do I understand you correctly, my dear child? These suspicions of his are unfounded? Colonel Villiers?"
"Colonel Villiers," cried she, "that old stupid red-nosed wretch! No, my lord, indeed, there is no one. My husband has my whole heart!" She caught her breath and looked up at him with candid eyes swimming in the most attractive tears. "Colonel Villiers!" cried she. "Oh, how can you think such a thing of me? But my husband will not believe me; indeed, indeed, indeed I am innocent! He was jealous of Lord Verney too, and last night fought Mr. O'Hara."
The Bishop smiled to himself with the most benign indulgence. His was a soul overflowing with charity, but it was chiefly when dealing with the foibles of a pretty woman that he appreciated to the full what a truly inspired ordinance that of charity is.
"My dear child, if I may call you so, knowing your worthy mother so well, you must not grieve like this. Let me feel that you look upon me as a friend. Let me wipe away these tears. Why, you are trembling! Shall we not have more trust in the ruling of a merciful Heaven? Now I am confident that Sir Jasper will be restored to you uninjured or with but a trifling injury. And if I may so advise, do not seek, my dear Lady Standish, in the future to provoke his jealousy in this manner; do not openly do anything which will arouse those evil passions of anger and vengeance in him!"
"Oh, indeed, indeed," she cried, and placed her other little hand timidly upon the comforting clasp of the Bishop's, "indeed I never will again!"
"And remember that in me you have a true friend, my dear Lady Standish. Allow me to call myself your friend."
Here there came a sound of flying wheels and frantic hoofs without, and the door-bell was pealed and the knocker plied so that the summons echoed and re-echoed through the house.
"Oh, God!" screamed Lady Standish springing to her feet, "they have returned! Oh, heavens, what has happened? If he is hurt I cannot bear it, I cannot—I cannot!" She clasped her head wildly and swayed as if she would have fallen. What could a Christian do, a gentleman and a shepherd of souls, but catch her lest she fall? Half mad with terror she turned and clung to him as she would have clung to the nearest support.
"Have courage," he purred into the little ear; "I am with you, dear child, have courage."
So they stood, she clasping the Bishop and the Bishop clasping her, patting her shoulder, whispering in her ear, when Sir Jasper burst in upon them.
It was his voice that drove them apart, yet it was neither loud nor fierce, it was only blightingly sarcastic.
"So!" said he.
What was it Stafford had said: "There's the Bishop of Bath and Wells. He's red, as red as a lobster, from top to toe! They have a way, these divines." Oh, Stafford knew doubtless: all Bath knew! Sir Jasper cursed horribly in his heart, but aloud only said: "So!"
Lady Standish flew half across the room to him with a joyful cry, but was arrested midway by his attitude, his look. The Bishop said "Ahem," and "ahem" again, and then said he:
"I rejoice, I rejoice, Sir Jasper, to see you return unscathed. Lady Standish has been greatly distressed."
"And you," said Sir Jasper, drily, "have been consoling her."
"To the best of my poor power," said the Bishop, and felt, he knew not why (if indeed it were possible for him to feel that way!) a shade uncomfortable.
Sir Jasper closed the door and bowed.
"I think," said he, "I ought to crave pardon for this intrusion."
"Oh Jasper!" cried my lady.
Her husband turned towards her for a second. She wilted beneath his eye and sank into a chair.
"Oh, Sir Jasper," said she, floundering. "The Bishop has been very kind. I have been so unhappy about you."
"I see," said Sir Jasper, "that his lordship has been very kind. His lordship, as I said, has been administering consolation."
Here all at once his stoniness gave way. He walked towards the Bishop and bent a ghastly face close to the florid uneasily smiling countenance.
"My Lord," said Sir Jasper, "your cloth will not protect you."
"Sir!" ejaculated the divine.
"Your cloth will not protect you!" repeated Sir Jasper in that voice of strenuous composure that seems to tremble on a shriek. "Oh, shepherd, you!"
"Sir!" cried the Bishop, "do you mean to insinuate——"
"I insinuate nothing," cried the other and sneered. "So madam," he turned again to his wife, "this is your choice, eh? You were always a pious woman, were you not? You would like to have the approval of the Church upon your acts, would you not?" Indescribable was the sarcasm upon his lip.
"Really," said the Bishop, "I am seriously annoyed." He looked reproachfully at Lady Standish. "Madam," said he, "I came to you, as you know, in pure charity, in unsuspecting friendship. I was not prepared for this."
"Ha, ha," said Sir Jasper with a hideous laugh. "No, sir, I have no doubt you were not prepared for this. Pure, ha—unsuspecting—this is pleasant! Be silent, madam, these groans, these crocodile tears have no effect upon me. Come, my Lord Bishop, your sanctimonious airs cannot take me in. Have I not read your letter? Oh, you have got a very fine head of hair, but I know ... there is a curl missing! Ha, Julia, you should take better care of your love-tokens."
"I vow," said Dr. Thurlow, majestically, "that your behaviour, your words are quite beyond my poor comprehension.—Madam, I pity you from my heart!—Sir Jasper, sir," folding his arms fiercely, "your servant. I wish you good-morning." He strode to the door, his fine legs quivering with indignation beneath their purple silk meshes.
"No!" said Sir Jasper, and seized him roughly by the skirts. "No, you do not escape me thus!"
"How now!" cried the Bishop, the veins on his forehead swelling, and the nostrils of his handsome Roman nose dilating. "Would you lay hands upon the Lord's anointed? Let go my coat, Sir Jasper!"
He struck at Sir Jasper's retaining hand with his own plump fist clenched in a fashion suggestive of pulpit eloquence.
"Ha! you would, would you?" exclaimed Sir Jasper, and leaped at the Episcopal throat.
The next instant, to his intense astonishment, Sir Jasper found himself in an iron grip; lifted into the air with an ease against which all his resistance was as that of a puppet; shaken till his teeth rattled, and deposited on the flat of his back upon the floor.
"Oh, help, help, help!" screamed Lady Standish.
"Really," said the Bishop, "I don't know when I have been so insulted in my life. 'Tis the whole Church, sir, the Church of England, the State itself, that you have assaulted in my person!"
He stood glaring down on the prostrate foe, breathing heavy rebuke through his high dignified nose.
"You have committed blasphemy, simony, sacrilege, rank sacrilege," thundered Dr. Thurlow.
Sir Jasper gathered himself together like a panther, and sprang to his feet; like a panther, too, he took two or three stealthy steps and, half crouching, measured the muscular Bishop with bloodshot eyes, selecting the most vulnerable portion of anatomy. He panted and foamed. The air was thick with flying powder.
Lady Standish flung herself between them.
"In mercy, my lord," she cried, "leave us—leave us!"
Here the door opened and butler and delighted footmen burst into the room.
The Bishop turned slowly. The grace of his vocation prevailed over the mere man.
"May heaven pardon you," he said. "May Heaven pardon you, sir, and help you to chasten this gross violence of temper. And you, madam," said he, turning witheringly upon the unfortunate and long-suffering lady, "may you learn womanly decorum and circumspection!"
"You shall hear from me again," growled Sir Jasper, murderously—"Toombs," cried he to the butler with a snarl, "show the Bishop the door!"
The Bishop smiled. He wheeled upon them all a stately back, and with short deliberate steps withdrew, taking his cane from the footman with a glassy look that petrified Thomas, and refusing Mr. Toombs' proffered ministrations as he might have waved aside a cup of poison. "Vade retro Satanas," he seemed to say; and so departed, leaving his pastoral curse voicelessly behind him.