Whatever Happened to Mary Bold Read online

  The room on the first floor which had once been the landlord's own sitting room became a private bar with comfortable chairs, a thick carpet and small tables where a gentleman might bring a business acquaintance for a brandy and water and a discussion in quiet comfort and out of the view (and the hearing) of the ladies in the Coffee Room. To serve here, Mr. Grant employed a discreet, not quite elderly man, with an air of being somewhat deaf. It reassured those wishing to discuss private matters to have the barman ask had he heard the order aright. Mr. Grant took a small house in the Old High Street not five minutes walk from the Dragon for his wife and family but he spent little time therein, saying in a coarse Scotch expression he had learned from his father, "The master's foot is the best dung... ". In fact, Mr. Grant knew his business, none better, and he prospered.

  At the time when our story begins, which is some fifteen years after the scandal of the cheque for twenty pounds, there were a number of people from Silverbridge assembled in the Coffee Room. Silverbridge was a small town only a few miles from Barchester. There had been a christening in the Cathedral that day and a gathering afterwards at the Deanery and now many of the guests were assembled waiting for the five-fifteen p.m. train back to Silverbridge. The child just baptised was the second baby to be born to Major Grantly of Crosby Lodge and his wife Grace (née Crawley) both of whom had many friends in Silverbridge. They had been slow to start their family but had now a son, four years old, named Theophilus, after his grandfather, the Archdeacon, though he was called Theo. In fact, when Major Grantly and his wife had told the Archdeacon that they wished to name the child for him he had protested,

  "No, no, my boy. I won't have it, upon my word, I won't. Poor boy, he won't thank you for it, either. I was named for my father's uncle. Expectations, d'you see. And the old man came through, indeed he did. But I was always Theo, never Theophilus. Kept it dark at school."

  "Then he shall be Theo too," Grace had said, much amused, "but he will be named for you. Henry is determined upon it."

  "Why not Josiah for your father, eh?"

  "Perhaps, if there is a brother for little Theo."

  And now there was a brother for Theo and he had been baptised Josiah, but already they were calling him Josh. No one acquainted with the baby's namesake, the Reverend Josiah Crawley, could imagine that reverend gentleman being called Josh, even as a baby. However, be that as it may, that day Baby Josh had been admitted into the fellowship of the Church with due ceremony and given the names of Josiah Henry.

  The Silverbridgians were scattered about the room, drinking tea and discussing the sad news of the death of the Duchess of Omnium, which had been announced in the newspapers that morning. Mr. Walker, the Silverbridge lawyer, who was the Duke's agent for all his property in the east part of the county, was applied to for details.

  "I know no more than do you," he protested. "I am told that she seemed a little under the weather when they came back from Baden last month."

  "On account of this senseless war, I daresay," said Dr. Thorne. "Omnium wouldn't want to expose his wife to any danger."

  "Pooh," said Mrs. Walker. "What danger? Very different if they had been in Paris."

  "She complained of a slight chill and feeling very tired after the journey," continued Mr. Walker. "When they got back to Gatherum she took to her bed. She said merely that she was tired by the journey and needed to rest, but after two days her condition deteriorated very quickly," Mr. Walker continued. "Their medical man was summoned from Town but he was too late. She died before he could arrive. They say Omnium is very much affected. Very much."

  "Bound to be, bound to be," said Doctor Thorne.

  Thorne was a hearty elderly man with a bluff manner. He was now nudging seventy years of age but seemed as hearty as ever. His wife, a handsome, stout lady some years younger than her husband, came up to the group and placed her hand in his arm.

  "Are we at the poor Duchess?" she asked. "What a sad business. She can't have been much more than forty. She was not yet twenty when they were married. I remember the wedding, such a grand affair. I felt a little sorry for her."

  "Why?" asked Mrs. Walker. "Surely Omnium... well, Palliser as he was then, surely he was the catch of the year?"

  "But such a stick," said Mrs. Thorne and laughed. "No one could imagine young Mr. Palliser kicking up larks, as they say, even when he was very young."

  "Not so much of a stick that he didn't have a little...whirl, shall we say, with Lady Dumbello, as she was then," observed Mr. Walker dryly.

  "No!" exclaimed Mrs. Thorne, "not our nose-in-the-air Lady Hartletop? She behaved today as if she were compromising her dignity attending such a paltry affair."

  "She was only Grizelda Grantly, when all's said," said Dr. Thorne. "She did uncommonly well for herself, did Grizelda. The Archdeacon was pleased about the match, I recall."

  "I doubt if Mrs. Grantly approved her daughter's behaviour today," said Mr. Walker. "I thought she looked a trifle tight-lipped once or twice."

  "I heard," said Mrs. Walker, "that Lady Hartletop had offered to be godmother but that her brother refused her offer."

  "Goodness!" cried Mrs. Thorne. "Why?"

  "If that is true," said Mr. Walker with an admonitory look at his wife, "it was probably because at the time of the affair of the cheque Lady Hartletop disapproved very much of his marrying Crawley's daughter and did her best to bring the Archdeacon to her way of thinking."

  "And why has she swung round to it now?" asked Mrs. Thorne. "For one must suppose she has done so, to grace this christening, godmama or no."

  "I can only suppose," said Mr. Walker, "it is on account of Mr. Crawley's book. It has become required reading these days for any person interested in relieving the poor. I understand it has gone into three editions and the publishers are now considering a fourth."

  "And Hartletop," added Doctor Thorne, "is chairing the Commission on Poverty and Crime, though what he knows about either might be written on a postage stamp. Crawley is now a desirable connection."

  "How odd that seems," said one of the ladies beside the fire, "when not so very long ago ago we were all wondering whether he might not have to go to jail for theft."

  "That was a damnable affair," said Doctor Thorne. "And I was very glad when he was cleared, very glad. As if a gentleman like Crawley would have behaved so?"

  "And now he has written a book," exclaimed Mrs. Thorne. "And it has taken. I was never more surprised in my life."

  "I have read the book," said Doctor Thorne, "and this I must say, Crawley has some very strong opinions and voices them fearlessly but he has also some very sensible ideas. When he is engaged in a subject he writes very strongly and clearly. He is a man of sense."

  The company stared at him.

  "I would not have said that anyone could describe him as a man of sense where his own affairs are concerned," said Mr. Walker. "The reverse, indeed."

  "Nevertheless," said Doctor Thorne, "he knows the causes of poverty and the effects of poverty and the suggestions he makes for the relief of that condition are wise and sensible."

  There was a short silence. No one was prepared to say that Dr. Thorne must be mistaken because only he of all the company had read the book. However, there were few there prepared to accept that Mr. Crawley was a man of sense.

  "I have to say," said Mrs. Thorne, well aware of their dilemma and much amused by it, "that I was rather astonished by the choice of godparents. Were you not, Mrs. Walker?"

  "Indeed I was," said that lady. "My goodness, they seemed hardly more than babes themselves."

  "Come now," said Doctor Thorne, "young Johnny Bold is almost twenty and means to be a doctor. He told me he was entered at St Thomas's and will be going there in a week or two. He seems a good-natured steady young man. He reminds me of his grandfather, old Doctor Bold."

  "St. Thomas's," exclaimed Mrs. Walker. "The last I heard was that he was going to Vienna to study music."

  "No, no," said Dr. Thorne. "His mother wished
for that but Johnny has a decided bent for medicine. I had a word with him this afternoon. Music will always be an interest and pleasure for him, so he told me, but he wishes to be a doctor."

  "And what about little Posy Arabin?" asked Mrs. Thorne. "She cannot be more than seventeen. I thought it quite ridiculous."

  "Posy Arabin is the eldest of six," said Dr. Thorne. "And she is a girl. They are older at that age than young men. And being the eldest, poor girl, she knows something of responsibility. In my trade, you see that. I have seen girls of twelve take on their mother's duties to the manner born when their mothers were sick... or dead. It is hard on the child, but responsibility will mature them fast."

  "Is Johnny Bold really nineteen?" asked Mrs. Walker. "Why it seems only a little while since we heard that the widow Bold was to have a posthumous child."

  "That was the year before Bishop Proudie came to Barchester," said her husband.

  "And Mrs. Proudie," said Mrs. Thorne. "One must never forget her."

  "As if one could," said Dr. Thorne. "Dreadful, disagreeable woman."

  A newcomer joined the group and immediately they made room for her. Lady Lufton was now the only Lady Lufton, for her mother-in-law had died the year before and she was still wearing black ribbons for her.

  "My dearest Mama-in-law detested her," said Lady Lufton, "I was so reminded of the creature today when we were in the Cathedral and I saw that memorial. Well I hope she is resting in peace but if ever she got to heaven I'll lay she is leading the angels a life of it!"

  There was a ripple of laughter. Someone, it might have been Dr. Thorne, observed that if she were in the other place doubtless she would be usurping the powers of Old Nick himself.

  "If that personage," said Mr. Walker with feeling, "had a particle of sense he would have left her to heaven...if heaven would have her."

  "Did you not think, Lady Lufton, that the godparents were lamentably young?" asked Mrs. Walker hastily.

  "Not at all" said her ladyship. "When little Josiah is old enough to need godparents they will be just the right age, young enough to enter into his feelings and old enough to give him good advice."

  "That is one way of looking at it," said Mrs. Walker.

  "I remember when Mrs Arabin and the Dean were married," said Lady Lufton. "I was invited you know. I hadn't been long married myself and remembered my own wedding but something happened that I have never forgotten. Little Johnny Bold, he must have been almost two years old and he was at the service. His Aunt was looking after him... you remember her? Mary Bold? She had him on the pew beside her but near the door in case he made a noise and had to be taken out because he was a lively child and full of energy. However, he was good as gold and never made a sound until he saw his Mama coming back down the aisle on Dean Arabin's arm. Then he shouted out 'Mama! Mama!' and scrambled down and ran up to them holding up his arms. The Dean just laughed and picked him up, kissed him and set him on his arm and then he took Eleanor's arm again and they walked out all three together. It was the prettiest thing."

  "The Dean has treated that young man like his own," agreed Dr. Thorne. "And Johnny certainly looks on him as a father."

  "He behaves to him better than many born sons," said Mr. Walker with a sigh for, in his business, he was all too familiar with family disputes and his own younger son was behaving in a far from satisfactory style.

  "True," agreed Lady Lufton. "Mary Bold? That would be John Bold's elder sister, would it not? She was a very fine girl. She stayed with Eleanor after John died. Such a tragedy that was for they were barely a year married."

  "I think she was always with them. I know she was a great help to Bold in his practice," said Doctor Thorne. "She kept the records and she could dispense many of the medicines and when he was absent she saw patients and could tell him what was wrong as often as not."

  "Mark, my brother," said Lady Lufton, "admired her very much and said it was a pity she could not be the doctor because Bold himself was really more interested in other things. You won't have forgotten the dust he kicked up over Hiram's Hospital in the Jupiter. I recall what it did to Mrs. Arabin's father, poor Mr. Harding. He resigned the Wardenship over the matter. And what is more it stayed vacant until the Bishopess put Quiverful into it. I wonder Bold ever got Eleanor to marry him."

  "You might well wonder," said Mrs. Thorne, "but I understand he was a fine fellow."

  "But a poor doctor," said Dr. Thorne. "His sister was worth a dozen of him. I wonder what became of her?"

  He looked round the assembly but no one seemed to know; heads were shaken and shoulders shrugged.

  "I have an idea she went abroad," said Mr. Walker. "I seem to recall her man of business, Simpson in the High Street here told me once that she was gone to the Antipodes. Old Doctor Bold's uncle went to New Zealand very early, very soon after it was declared open for settlement and I believe he married one of his fellow passengers and there were children, or so Bold gave me to understand. She may have visited there. But I heard from Mrs. Arabin some little time ago that she had returned to Europe and was in Kaiserswerth or some such place, but she meant to go to Paris and the Arabins were to visit her there."

  "Well, I hope that she is not in Paris now!" exclaimed Mrs. Walker. "The newspapers say that the Prussians are all around and no one can get in or out."

  "I dare say she will have left before the Prussians arrived," said Dr. Thorne, and pulled out his watch. "And if we are to catch that train, my friends, it is time we left also."

  The party settled their bills, retrieved their cloaks and umbrellas and set out for the Station.

  The little train which went to Silverbridge and from thence meandered to the far west of Barset was waiting at its obscure platform and as our party embarked there was a great hissing and puffing and the Down Train from London arrived with suitable pomp of flags and whistles and top-hatted officials at the platform opposite. With five minutes before their own train pulled out the Silverbridge party was able to observe those who descended. From a First Class carriage there alighted a handsome woman who might have been in her forties clad in a plain brown velvet cloak and a close bonnet. With her was a younger woman, tall and red haired, dressed in a very similar fashion, who hailed a porter and had him retrieve two large cloak bags from the compartment; both new, both alike. The porter loaded them on to his trolley and made for the gate. The two women followed, sorting out the paraphernalia of any railway journey, umbrellas and newspapers and periodicals and a small basket, which might have contained fruit or sandwiches. The tall red-haired girl carried a small battered black leather case. As they passed the carriage in which the Silverbridge party were seated Dr. Thorne made an exclamation, got to his feet and peered out of the window. When the two women had been lost to sight among the other passengers waiting to surrender their tickets at the gate, he turned back to look at his companions and he was smiling,

  "Speak of angels," he began but was unable to finish because the train gave a preliminary jerk and he fell into his wife's lap and thence to the floor of the carriage which occasioned some dismay for he was not a young man. When he was seated again and the train huffing its way out of the Station, he said,

  "So very odd that we should have been speaking of Mary Bold just now, for if that lady in the brown velvet cloak was not she, you may call me a Dutchman."

  The porter bearing the cloakbags hailed a cab, bestowed the bags in it and stood to help them in and receive his sixpence.

  "Where to, ma'am?" he enquired.

  "The Deanery," said the woman in the brown velvet cloak who was indeed that Miss Mary Bold of whom Dr. Thorne had been speaking. The porter accepted his sixpenny piece, the cabdriver nodded at the address and the cab left the forecourt of the station and headed up the hill to the Close. Mary Bold peered out of the window at the buildings still visible in the soft October dusk. The gas lamps were starting to come on as the lamplighters went from lamp to lamp with their long poles.

  "Now that is new," said Mary Bold.
"No street lamps when I lived here. No gas, indeed. There were link-men, Katie, and they would walk before you with a lantern, which might have been under their jacket for all the light it shed. But ladies did not walk out at night, of course,"

  "No, Mem," said Katie.

  "I wonder will they have gas lamps in the Close?" Mary speculated and when the cab turned out of the steep road which climbed up from the New High Street to the Close she laughed aloud.

  "I might have known. No gas lamps here. I dare say there will be a lantern lit over the Deanery gate."

  The horse trotted briskly past the row of ancient dwellings and drew up in front of the Deanery, which was indeed lit by a lamp in the wrought iron holder above the gate. The driver instructed his beast to 'Stand!' and ran up the steps to use the knocker before coming back to assist his passengers to the pavement and set their bags beside them. Mary was paying him when the front door opened wide and a young man hurtled down the steps, sweeping her into a bear's hug.

  "Aunt Mary!" he cried and almost lifted her off her feet. "You're really here! We thought that old Moltke might have snaffled you after all."

  "No, Johnny, he didn't," said his Aunt and set her bonnet straight, "but it was a very near thing, was it not, Katie?"

  "Ay, mem," said Katie.

  "You are Katie?" asked the young man and shook her vigorously by the hand. "I have heard so much about you, Katie, I feel I should know you. You take very good care of my Aunt, do you not, Katie?"

  "I try," said Katie. "But it's a fell task and no mistake."