米德尔马契 英文版 Middlemarch
乔治.艾略特 George Eliot
CHAPTER LXXI. Page 2
Mrs. Dollop looked round with the air of a landlady accustomedto dominate her company. There was a chorus of adhesion from themore courageous; but Mr. Limp, after taking a draught, placed hisflat hands together and pressed them hard between his knees,looking down at them with blear-eyed contemplation, as if the scorchingpower of Mrs. Dollop's speech had quite dried up and nullifiedhis wits until they could be brought round again by further moisture.
"Why shouldn't they dig the man up and have the Crowner?"said the dyer. "It's been done many and many's the time.If there's been foul play they might find it out."
"Not they, Mr. Jonas!" said Mrs Dollop, emphatically. "I knowwhat doctors are. They're a deal too cunning to be found out.And this Doctor Lydgate that's been for cutting up everybody beforethe breath was well out o' their body--it's plain enough what usehe wanted to make o' looking into respectable people's insides.He knows drugs, you may be sure, as you can neither smell nor see,neither before they're swallowed nor after. Why, I've seen dropsmyself ordered by Doctor Gambit, as is our club doctor and agood charikter, and has brought more live children into the world norever another i' Middlemarch--I say I've seen drops myself as madeno difference whether they was in the glass or out, and yet havegriped you the next day. So I'll leave your own sense to judge.Don't tell me! All I say is, it's a mercy they didn't take this DoctorLydgate on to our club. There's many a mother's child might ha'rued it."
The heads of this discussion at "Dollop's" had been the commontheme among all classes in the town, had been carried to LowickParsonage on one side and to Tipton Grange on the other, had comefully to the ears of the Vincy family, and had been discussed withsad reference to "poor Harriet" by all Mrs. Bulstrode's friends,before Lydgate knew distinctly why people were looking strangely at him,and before Bulstrode himself suspected the betrayal of his secrets.He had not been accustomed to very cordial relations with his neighbors,and hence he could not miss the signs of cordiality; moreover, he hadbeen taking journeys on business of various kinds, having now madeup his mind that he need not quit Middlemarch, and feeling ableconsequently to determine on matters which he had before left in suspense.
"We will make a journey to Cheltenham in the course of a month or two,"he had said to his wife. "There are great spiritual advantagesto be had in that town along with the air and the waters, and sixweeks there will be eminently refreshing to us."
He really believed in the spiritual advantages, and meant that hislife henceforth should be the more devoted because of those later sinswhich he represented to himself as hypothetic, praying hypotheticallyfor their pardon:--"if I have herein transgressed."
As to the Hospital, he avoided saying anything further to Lydgate,fearing to manifest a too sudden change of plans immediately on thedeath of Raffles. In his secret soul he believed that Lydgate suspectedhis orders to have been intentionally disobeyed, and suspecting this hemust also suspect a motive. But nothing had been betrayed to him as tothe history of Raffles, and Bulstrode was anxious not to do anythingwhich would give emphasis to his undefined suspicions. As to anycertainty that a particular method of treatment would either save orkill, Lydgate himself was constantly arguing against such dogmatism; hehad no right to speak, and he had every motive for being silent. HenceBulstrode felt himself providentially secured. The only incident he hadstrongly winced under had been an occasional encounter with Caleb Garth,who, however, had raised his hat with mild gravity.
Meanwhile, on the part of the principal townsmen a strongdetermination was growing against him.
A meeting was to be held in the Town-Hall on a sanitary questionwhich had risen into pressing importance by the occurrence of a choleracase in the town. Since the Act of Parliament, which had beenhurriedly passed, authorizing assessments for sanitary measures,there had been a Board for the superintendence of such measuresappointed in Middlemarch, and much cleansing and preparationhad been concurred in by Whigs and Tories. The question now was,whether a piece of ground outside the town should be secured as aburial-ground by means of assessment or by private subscription.The meeting was to be open, and almost everybody of importancein the town was expected to be there.
Mr. Bulstrode was a member of the Board, and just before twelveo'clock he started from the Bank with the intention of urging the planof private subscription. Under the hesitation of his projects,he had for some time kept himself in the background, and he feltthat he should this morning resume his old position as a man of actionand influence in the public affairs of the town where he expected toend his days. Among the various persons going in the same direction,he saw Lydgate; they joined, talked over the object of the meeting,and entered it together.
It seemed that everybody of mark had been earlier than they.But there were still spaces left near the head of the largecentral table, and they made their way thither. Mr. Farebrothersat opposite, not far from Mr. Hawley; all the medical men were there;Mr. Thesiger was in the chair, and Mr. Brooke of Tipton was on hisright hand.
Lydgate noticed a peculiar interchange of glances when heand Bulstrode took their seats.
After the business had been fully opened by the chairman,who pointed out the advantages of purchasing by subscription a pieceof ground large enough to be ultimately used as a general cemetery,Mr. Bulstrode, whose rather high-pitched but subdued and fluentvoice the town was used to at meetings of this sort, rose and askedleave to deliver his opinion. Lydgate could see again the peculiarinterchange of glances before Mr. Hawley started up, and saidin his firm resonant voice, "Mr. Chairman, I request that beforeany one delivers his opinion on this point I may be permittedto speak on a question of public feeling, which not only by myself,but by many gentlemen present, is regarded as preliminary."
Mr. Hawley's mode of speech, even when public decorum repressed his"awful language," was formidable in its curtness and self-possession.Mr. Thesiger sanctioned the request, Mr. Bulstrode sat down,and Mr. Hawley continued.
"In what I have to say, Mr. Chairman, I am not speaking simplyon my own behalf: I am speaking with the concurrence and atthe express request of no fewer than eight of my fellow-townsmen,who are immediately around us. It is our united sentiment thatMr. Bulstrode should be called upon--and I do now call upon him--to resign public positions which he holds not simply as a tax-payer,but as a gentleman among gentlemen. There are practices and thereare acts which, owing to circumstances, the law cannot visit,though they may be worse than many things which are legally punishable.Honest men and gentlemen, if they don't want the company of people whoperpetrate such acts, have got to defend themselves as they best can,and that is what I and the friends whom I may call my clients in thisaffair are determined to do. I don't say that Mr. Bulstrode hasbeen guilty of shameful acts, but I call upon him either publiclyto deny and confute the scandalous statements made against him by aman now dead, and who died in his house--the statement that he wasfor many years engaged in nefarious practices, and that he won hisfortune by dishonest procedures--or else to withdraw from positionswhich could only have been allowed him as a gentleman among gentlemen."
All eyes in the room were turned on Mr. Bulstrode, who, since the firstmention of his name, had been going through a crisis of feeling almosttoo violent for his delicate frame to support. Lydgate, who himselfwas undergoing a shock as from the terrible practical interpretationof some faint augury, felt, nevertheless, that his own movementof resentful hatred was checked by that instinct of the Healerwhich thinks first of bringing rescue or relief to the sufferer,when he looked at the shrunken misery of Bulstrode's livid face.
The quick vision that his life was after all a failure, that he wasa dishonored man, and must quail before the glance of those towardswhom he had habitually assumed the attitude of a reprover--that Godhad disowned him before men and left him unscreened to the triumphantscorn of those who were glad to have their hatred justified--the senseof utter futility in that equivocation with his conscience in dealingwith the life of his accomplice, an equivocation which now turnedvenomously upon him with the full-grown fang of a discovered lie:--all this rushed through him like the agony of terror which fails to kill,and leaves the ears still open to the returning wave of execration.The sudden sense of exposure after the re-established sense ofsafety came--not to the coarse organization of a criminal but to--the susceptible nerve of a man whose intensest being lay in suchmastery and predominance as the conditions of his life had shapedfor him.
But in that intense being lay the strength of reaction. Through allhis bodily infirmity there ran a tenacious nerve of ambitiousself-preserving will, which had continually leaped out like a flame,scattering all doctrinal fears, and which, even while he satan object of compassion for the merciful, was beginning to stirand glow under his ashy paleness. Before the last words wereout of Mr. Hawley's mouth, Bulstrode felt that he should answer,and that his answer would be a retort. He dared not get up and say,"I am not guilty, the whole story is false"--even if he haddared this, it would have seemed to him, under his present keen senseof betrayal, as vain as to pull, for covering to his nakedness,a frail rag which would rend at every little strain.
For a few moments there was total silence, while every manin the room was looking at Bulstrode. He sat perfectly still,leaning hard against the back of his chair; he could not ventureto rise, and when he began to speak he pressed his hands uponthe seat on each side of him. But his voice was perfectly audible,though hoarser than usual, and his words were distinctly pronounced,though he paused between sentence as if short of breath. He said,turning first toward Mr. Thesiger, and then looking at Mr. Hawley--
"I protest before you, sir, as a Christian minister, against the sanctionof proceedings towards me which are dictated by virulent hatred.Those who are hostile to me are glad to believe any libel utteredby a loose tongue against me. And their consciences become strictagainst me. Say that the evil-speaking of which I am to be madethe victim accuses me of malpractices--" here Bulstrode's voicerose and took on a more biting accent, till it seemed a low cry--"who shall be my accuser? Not men whose own lives are unchristian,nay, scandalous--not men who themselves use low instruments tocarry out their ends--whose profession is a tissue of chicanery--who have been spending their income on their own sensual enjoyments,while I have been devoting mine to advance the best objects withregard to this life and the next."
After the word chicanery there was a growing noise, half of murmursand half of hisses, while four persons started up at once--Mr. Hawley,Mr. Toller, Mr. Chichely, and Mr. Hackbutt; but Mr. Hawley'soutburst was instantaneous, and left the others behind in silence.
"If you mean me, sir, I call you and every one else to the inspectionof my professional life. As to Christian or unchristian, I repudiateyour canting palavering Christianity; and as to the way in which Ispend my income, it is not my principle to maintain thieves and cheatoffspring of their due inheritance in order to support religionand set myself up as a saintly Killjoy. I affect no nicenessof conscience--I have not found any nice standards necessary yetto measure your actions by, sir. And I again call upon you to enterinto satisfactory explanations concerning the scandals against you,or else to withdraw from posts in which we at any rate decline youas a colleague. I say, sir, we decline to co-operate with a manwhose character is not cleared from infamous lights cast upon it,not only by reports but by recent actions."
"Allow me, Mr. Hawley," said the chairman; and Mr. Hawley,still fuming, bowed half impatiently, and sat down with his handsthrust deep in his pockets.
"Mr. Bulstrode, it is not desirable, I think, to prolong thepresent discussion," said Mr. Thesiger, turning to the pallidtrembling man; "I must so far concur with what has fallen fromMr. Hawley in expression of a general feeling, as to think itdue to your Christian profession that you should clear yourself,if possible, from unhappy aspersions. I for my part should bewilling to give you full opportunity and hearing. But I must saythat your present attitude is painfully inconsistent with thoseprinciples which you have sought to identify yourself with, and forthe honor of which I am bound to care. I recommend you at present,as your clergyman, and one who hopes for your reinstatementin respect, to quit the room, and avoid further hindrance to business."
Bulstrode, after a moment's hesitation, took his hat from thefloor and slowly rose, but he grasped the corner of the chairso totteringly that Lydgate felt sure there was not strengthenough in him to walk away without support. What could he do?He could not see a man sink close to him for want of help.He rose and gave his arm to Bulstrode, and in that way led him outof the room; yet this act, which might have been one of gentle dutyand pure compassion, was at this moment unspeakably bitter to him.It seemed as if he were putting his sign-manual to that associationof himself with Bulstrode, of which he now saw the full meaningas it must have presented itself to other minds. He now felt theconviction that this man who was leaning tremblingly on his arm,had given him the thousand pounds as a bribe, and that somehow thetreatment of Raffles had been tampered with from an evil motive.The inferences were closely linked enough; the town knew of the loan,believed it to be a bribe, and believed that he took it as a bribe.
Poor Lydgate, his mind struggling under the terrible clutchof this revelation, was all the while morally forced to takeMr. Bulstrode to the Bank, send a man off for his carriage,and wait to accompany him home.
Meanwhile the business of the meeting was despatched, and fringedoff into eager discussion among various groups concerning thisaffair of Bulstrode--and Lydgate.
Mr. Brooke, who had before heard only imperfect hints of it,and was very uneasy that he had "gone a little too far"in countenancing Bulstrode, now got himself fully informed,and felt some benevolent sadness in talking to Mr. Farebrotherabout the ugly light in which Lydgate had come to be regarded.Mr. Farebrother was going to walk back to Lowick.
"Step into my carriage," said Mr. Brooke. "I am going round to seeMrs. Casaubon. She was to come back from Yorkshire last night.She will like to see me, you know."
So they drove along, Mr. Brooke chatting with good-natured hopethat there had not really been anything black in Lydgate's behavior--a young fellow whom he had seen to be quite above the common mark,when he brought a letter from his uncle Sir Godwin. Mr. Farebrothersaid little: he was deeply mournful: with a keen perception ofhuman weakness, he could not be confident that under the pressureof humiliating needs Lydgate had not fallen below himself.
When the carriage drove up to the gate of the Manor, Dorothea wasout on the gravel, and came to greet them.
"Well, my dear," said Mr. Brooke, "we have just come from a meeting--a sanitary meeting, you know."
"Was Mr. Lydgate there?" said Dorothea, who looked full of healthand animation, and stood with her head bare under the gleamingApril lights. "I want to see him and have a great consultationwith him about the Hospital. I have engaged with Mr. Bulstrodeto do so."
"Oh, my dear," said Mr. Brooke, "we have been hearing bad news--bad news, you know."
They walked through the garden towards the churchyard gate,Mr. Farebrother wanting to go on to the parsonage; and Dorotheaheard the whole sad story.
She listened with deep interest, and begged to hear twice over thefacts and impressions concerning Lydgate. After a short silence,pausing at the churchyard gate, and addressing Mr. Farebrother,she said energetically--
"You don't believe that Mr. Lydgate is guilty of anything base?I will not believe it. Let us find out the truth and clear him!"