The squire did not ask again. He had no warrant for supposing that Lady Arabella would receive Dr Thorne if he did come; and he saw that it was useless to attempt to overcome the rancour of the man so pig-headed as the little Galen now before him. Other propositions were then broached, and it was at last decided that assistance should be sought for from London, in the person of the great Sir Omicron Pie.
Sir Omicron came, and Drs Fillgrave and Century were there to meet him. When they all assembled in Lady Arabella's room, the poor woman's heart almost sand within her,--as well it might, at such a sight. If she could only reconcile it with her honour, her consistency, with her high De Courcy principles, to send once more for Dr Thorne. Oh, Frank! Frank! to what misery your disobedience brought your mother!
Sir Omicron and the lesser provincial lights had their consultation, and the lesser lights went their way to Barchester and Silverbridge, leaving Sir Omicron to enjoy the hospitality of Greshamsbury.
'You should have Thorne back here, Mr Gresham,' said Sir Omicron, almost in a whisper, when they were quite alone. 'Doctor Fillgrave is a very good man, and so is Dr Century; very good, I'm sure. But Thorne has known her ladyship so long.' And then, on the following morning, Sir Omicron also went his way.
And then there was a scene between the squire and her ladyship. Lady Arabella had given herself credit for great good generalship when she found that the squire had been induced to take that pill. We have all heard of the little end of the wedge, and we have most of us an idea that the little end is the difficulty. That pill had been the little end of Lady Arabella's wedge. Up to that period she had been struggling in vain to make a severance between her husband and her enemy. That pill should do the business. She well knew how to make the most of it; to have it published in Greshamsbury that the squire had put his gouty toe into Dr Fillgrave's hands; how to let it be known--especially at that humble house in the corner of the street--that Fillgrave's prescriptions now ran current through the whole establishment. Dr Thorne did hear of it, and did suffer. He had been a true friend to the squire, and he thought the squire should have stood to him more staunchly.
'After all,' said he himself, 'perhaps it's as well--perhaps it will be best that I should leave this place altogether.' And then he thought of Sir Roger and his will, and of Mary and her lover. And then of Mary's birth, and of his own theoretical doctrines as to pure blood.
And so his troubles multiplied, and he saw no present daylight through them.
Such had been the way in which Lady Arabella had got in the little end of the wedge. And she would have triumphed joyfully had not her increased doubts and fears as to herself then come in to check her triumph and destroy her joy. She had not yet confessed to any one her secret regret for the friend she had driven away. She hardly yet acknowledged to herself that she did regret him; but she was uneasy, frightened, and in low spirits.
'My dear,' said the squire, sitting down by her bedside, 'I want to tell you what Sir Omicron said as he went away.'
'Well?' said her ladyship, sitting up and looking frightened.
'I don't know how you may take it, Bell; but I think it very good news:' the squire never called his wife Bell, except when he wanted her to be on particularly good terms with him.
'Well?' she said again. She was not over-anxious to be gracious, and did not reciprocate his familiarity.
'Sir Omicron says that you should have Thorne back again, and upon my honour, I cannot but agree with him. Now, Thorne is a clever man, a very clever man; nobody denies that; and then, you know--'
'Why did not Sir Omicron say that to me?' said her ladyship, sharply, all her disposition in Dr Thorne's favour becoming wonderfully damped by her husband's advocacy.
'I suppose he thought it better to say it to me,' said the squire.
'He should have spoken to myself,' said Lady Arabella, who, though she did not absolutely doubt her husband's word, gave him credit for having induced and led on Sir Omicron to the uttering of the opinion. 'Doctor Thorne has behaved to me in so gross, so indecent a manner! And then, as I understand, he is absolutely encouraging that girl--'
'Now, Bell, you are quite wrong--'
'Of course I am; I always am quite wrong.'
'Quite wrong in mixing up two things; Doctor Thorne as an acquaintance, and Dr Thorne as a doctor.'
'It is dreadful to have him here, even standing in the room with me.
How can one talk to one's doctor openly and confidentially when one looks upon him as one's worst enemy?' And Lady Arabella, softening, almost melted with tears.
'My dear, you cannot wonder that I should be anxious for you.'
Lady Arabella gave a little snuffle, which might be taken as a not very eloquent expression of thanks for the squire's solicitude, or as an ironical jeer at his want of sincerity.
'And, therefore, I have not lost a moment in telling you what Sir Omicron said. "You should have Thorne back here;" those were his very words. You can think it over, my dear. And remember this, Bell; if he is to do any good no time is to be lost.'
And then the squire left the room, and Lady Arabella remained alone, perplexed by many doubts.
