Mr Harding left the room almost together with the ladies, and the archdeacon opened his heart to Mr Arabin. He still harped upon the hospital. 'What did that fellow mean,' said he, 'by saying in his letter to Mrs Bold, that if Mr Harding would call on the bishop it would be all right? Of course I would not be guided by anything he might say; but still it may be well that Mr Harding should see the bishop. It would be foolish to let the thing slip through our fingers because Mrs Bold is determined to make a fool of herself.'
Mr Arabin hinted that he was not quite so sure that Mrs Bold would make a fool of herself. He said that he was not convinced that she did regard Mr Slope so warmly as she was supposed to do. The archdeacon questioned and cross-questioned him about this, but elicited nothing; and at least remained firm in his own conviction that he was destined, malgre lui, to be the brother-in-law of Mr Slope. Mr Arabin strongly advised that Mr Harding should take no step regarding the hospital in connexion with, or in consequence of, Mr Slope's letter. 'If the bishop really means to confer the appointment on Mr Harding,' argued Mr Arabin, 'he will take care to let him have some other intimation than a message conveyed through a letter to a lady. Were Mr Harding to present himself at the palace he might merely be playing Mr Slope's game;' and thus it was settled that nothing should be done till the great Dr Gwynne's arrival, or at any rate without that potentate's sanction.
It was droll how these men talked of Mr Harding as though he were a puppet, and planned their intrigues and small ecclesiastical manouvres without dreaming of taking him into their confidence.
There was a comfortable house and income in question, and it was very desirable, and certainly very just, that Mr Harding should have them; but that, at present, was not the main point; it was expedient to beat the bishop, and if possible to smash Mr Slope. Mr Slope had set up, or was supposed to have set up, a rival candidate. Of all things the most desirable would have been to have had Mr Quiverful's appointment published to the public, and then annulled by the clamour of an indignant world, loud in the defence of Mr Harding's rights. But of such an event the chance was small;a slight fraction only of the world would be indignant, and that fraction would be one not accustomed to loud speaking. And then the preferment had in a sort of way been offered to Mr Harding, and had in a sort of way been refused by him.
Mr Slope's wicked, cunning hand had been peculiarly conspicuous in the way in which this had been brought to pass, and it was the success of Mr Slope's cunning which was so painfully grating the feelings of the archdeacon. That which of all things he most dreaded was that he should be out-generalled by Mr Slope: and just at present it appeared probable that Mr Slope would turn his flank, steal a march on him, cut off his provisions, carry his strong town by a coup de main, and at last beat him thoroughly in a regular pitched battle. The archdeacon felt that his flank had been turned when desired to wait on Mr Slope instead of the bishop, that a march had been stolen when Mr Harding was induced to refuse the bishop's offer, that his provisions would be cut off when Mr Quiverful got the hospital, that Eleanor was the strong town doomed to be taken, and that Mr Slope, as Dean of Barchester, would be regarded by all the world as the conqueror in that final conflict.
Dr Gwyinne was the Deus ex machina who was to come down upon the Barchester stage, and bring about deliverance from these terrible evils. But how can melodramatic denouments be properly brought about, how can vice and Mr Slope be punished, and virtue and the archdeacon be rewarded, while the avenging god is laid up with the gout? In the mean time evil may be triumphant, and poor innocence, transfixed to the earth by an arrow from Dr Proudie's quiver, may be dead upon the ground, not to be resuscitated even by Dr Gwynne.
Two or three days after Eleanor's departure, Mr Arabin went to Oxford, and soon found himself closeted with the august head of his college. It was quite clear that Dr Gwynne was not very sanguine as to the effects of his journey to Barchester, and not over anxious to interfere with the bishop. He had had the gout but was very nearly convalescent, and Mr Arabin at once saw that had the mission been one of which the master thoroughly approved, he would before this have been at Plumstead.
As it was, Dr Gwynne was resolved to visiting his friend, and willingly promised to return to Barchester with Mr Arabin. He could not bring himself to believe that there was any probability that Mr Slope would be made Dean of Barchester. Rumour, he said, had reached even his ears not at all favourable to that gentleman's character, and he expressed himself strongly of the opinion that any such appointment was quite out of the question. At this stage of the proceedings, the master's right-hand man, Tom Staple, was called in to assist at the conference. Tom Staple was the Tutor of Lazarus, and moreover a great man at Oxford. Though universally known by a species of nomenclature as very undignified. Tom Staple was one who maintained a high dignity in the University. He was, as it were, the leader of the Oxford tutors, a body of men who consider themselves collectively as being by very little, if at all, second in importance to the heads themselves. It is not always the case that the master, or warden, or provost, or principal can hit it off exactly with his tutor. A tutor is by no means indisposed to have a will of his own. But at Lazarus they were great friends and firm allies at the time of which we are writing.
