"I think she's going," said the Rector's wife. "She was very red in
the face when we left dinner. I was obliged to unlace her."
"She drank seven glasses of champagne," said the reverend gentleman, in
a low voice; "and filthy champagne it is, too, that my brother poisons
us with--but you women never know what's what."
"We know nothing," said Mrs. Bute Crawley.
"She drank cherry-brandy after dinner," continued his Reverence, "and
took curacao with her coffee. I wouldn't take a glass for a five-pound
note: it kills me with heartburn. She can't stand it, Mrs.
Crawley--she must go--flesh and blood won't bear it! and I lay five to
two, Matilda drops in a year."
Indulging in these solemn speculations, and thinking about his debts,
and his son Jim at College, and Frank at Woolwich, and the four girls,
who were no beauties, poor things, and would not have a penny but what
they got from the aunt's expected legacy, the Rector and his lady
walked on for a while.
"Pitt can't be such an infernal villain as to sell the reversion of the
living. And that Methodist milksop of an eldest son looks to
Parliament," continued Mr. Crawley, after a pause.
"Sir Pitt Crawley will do anything," said the Rector's wife. "We must
get Miss Crawley to make him promise it to James."
"Pitt will promise anything," replied the brother. "He promised he'd
pay my college bills, when my father died; he promised he'd build the
new wing to the Rectory; he promised he'd let me have Jibb's field and
the Six-acre Meadow--and much he executed his promises! And it's to
this man's son--this scoundrel, gambler, swindler, murderer of a Rawdon
Crawley, that Matilda leaves the bulk of her money. I say it's
un-Christian. By Jove, it is. The infamous dog has got every vice
except hypocrisy, and that belongs to his brother."
"Hush, my dearest love! we're in Sir Pitt's grounds," interposed his
wife.
"I say he has got every vice, Mrs. Crawley. Don't Ma'am, bully me.
Didn't he shoot Captain Marker? Didn't he rob young Lord Dovedale at
the Cocoa-Tree? Didn't he cross the fight between Bill Soames and the
Cheshire Trump, by which I lost forty pound? You know he did; and as
for the women, why, you heard that before me, in my own magistrate's
room."
"For heaven's sake, Mr. Crawley," said the lady, "spare me the details."
"And you ask this villain into your house!" continued the exasperated
Rector. "You, the mother of a young family--the wife of a clergyman of
the Church of England. By Jove!"
"Bute Crawley, you are a fool," said the Rector's wife scornfully.
"Well, Ma'am, fool or not--and I don't say, Martha, I'm so clever as
you are, I never did. But I won't meet Rawdon Crawley, that's flat.
I'll go over to Huddleston, that I will, and see his black greyhound,
Mrs. Crawley; and I'll run Lancelot against him for fifty. By Jove, I
will; or against any dog in England. But I won't meet that beast
Rawdon Crawley."