<h3>CHAPTER III.</h3>
<h4>CHALDICOTES.<br/> </h4>
<p>Chaldicotes is a house of much more pretension than Framley Court.
Indeed, if one looks at the ancient marks about it, rather than at
those of the present day, it is a place of very considerable
pretension. There is an old forest, not altogether belonging to the
property, but attached to it, called the Chace of Chaldicotes. A
portion of this forest comes up close behind the mansion, and of
itself gives a character and celebrity to the place. The Chace of
Chaldicotes—the greater part of it, at least—is, as all the world
knows, Crown property, and now, in these utilitarian days, is to be
disforested. In former times it was a great forest, stretching half
across the country, almost as far as Silverbridge; and there are bits
of it, here and there, still to be seen at intervals throughout the
whole distance; but the larger remaining portion, consisting of aged
hollow oaks, centuries old, and wide-spreading withered beeches,
stands in the two parishes of Chaldicotes and Uffley. People still
come from afar to see the oaks of Chaldicotes, and to hear their feet
rustle among the thick autumn leaves. But they will soon come no
longer. The giants of past ages are to give way to wheat and turnips;
a ruthless Chancellor of the Exchequer, disregarding old associations
and rural beauty, requires money returns from the lands; and the
Chace of Chaldicotes is to vanish from the earth's surface.</p>
<p>Some part of it, however, is the private property of Mr. Sowerby, who
hitherto, through all his pecuniary distresses, has managed to save
from the axe and the auction-mart that portion of his paternal
heritage. The house of Chaldicotes is a large stone building,
probably of the time of Charles the Second. It is approached on both
fronts by a heavy double flight of stone steps. In the front of the
house a long, solemn, straight avenue through a double row of
lime-trees, leads away to lodge-gates, which stand in the centre of
the village of Chaldicotes; but to the rear the windows open upon
four different vistas, which run down through the forest: four open
green rides, which all converge together at a large iron gateway, the
barrier which divides the private grounds from the Chace. The
Sowerbys, for many generations, have been rangers of the Chace of
Chaldicotes, thus having almost as wide an authority over the Crown
forest as over their own. But now all this is to cease, for the
forest will be disforested.</p>
<p>It was nearly dark as Mark Robarts drove up through the avenue of
lime-trees to the hall-door; but it was easy to see that the house,
which was dead and silent as the grave through nine months of the
year, was now alive in all its parts. There were lights in many of
the windows, and a noise of voices came from the stables, and
servants were moving about, and dogs barked, and the dark gravel
before the front steps was cut up with many a coach-wheel.</p>
<p>"Oh, be that you, sir, Mr. Robarts?" said a groom, taking the
parson's horse by the head, and touching his own hat. "I hope I see
your reverence well?"</p>
<p>"Quite well, Bob, thank you. All well at Chaldicotes?"</p>
<p>"Pretty bobbish, Mr. Robarts. Deal of life going on here now, sir.
The bishop and his lady came this morning."</p>
<p>"Oh—ah—yes! I understood they were to be here. Any of the young
ladies?"</p>
<p>"One young lady. Miss Olivia, I think they call her, your reverence."</p>
<p>"And how's Mr. Sowerby?"</p>
<p>"Very well, your reverence. He, and Mr. Harold Smith, and Mr.
Fothergill—that's the duke's man of business, you know—is getting
off their horses now in the stable-yard there."</p>
<p>"Home from hunting—eh, Bob?"</p>
<p>"Yes, sir, just home, this minute." And then Mr. Robarts walked into
the house, his portmanteau following on a footboy's shoulder.</p>
<p>It will be seen that our young vicar was very intimate at
Chaldicotes; so much so that the groom knew him, and talked to him
about the people in the house. Yes; he was intimate there: much more
than he had given the Framley people to understand. Not that he had
wilfully and overtly deceived any one; not that he had ever spoken a
false word about Chaldicotes. But he had never boasted at home that
he and Sowerby were near allies. Neither had he told them there how
often Mr. Sowerby and Lord Lufton were together in London. Why
trouble women with such matters? Why annoy so excellent a woman as
Lady Lufton?</p>
<p>And then Mr. Sowerby was one whose intimacy few young men would wish
to reject. He was fifty, and had lived, perhaps, not the most
salutary life; but he dressed young, and usually looked well. He was
bald, with a good forehead, and sparkling moist eyes. He was a clever
man, and a pleasant companion, and always good-humoured when it so
suited him. He was a gentleman, too, of high breeding and good birth,
whose ancestors had been known in that county—longer, the farmers
around would boast, than those of any other landowner in it, unless
it be the Thornes of Ullathorne, or perhaps the Greshams of
Greshamsbury—much longer than the De Courcys at Courcy Castle. As
for the Duke of Omnium, he, comparatively speaking, was a new man.</p>
<p>And then he was a member of Parliament, a friend of some men in
power, and of others who might be there; a man who could talk about
the world as one knowing the matter of which he talked. And moreover,
whatever might be his ways of life at other times, when in the
presence of a clergyman he rarely made himself offensive to clerical
tastes. He neither swore, nor brought his vices on the carpet, nor
sneered at the faith of the Church. If he was no churchman himself,
he at least knew how to live with those who were.</p>
<p>How was it possible that such a one as our vicar should not relish
the intimacy of Mr. Sowerby? It might be very well, he would say to
himself, for a woman like Lady Lufton to turn up her nose at him—for
Lady Lufton, who spent ten months of the year at Framley Court, and
who during those ten months, and for the matter of that, during the
two months also which she spent in London, saw no one out of her own
set. Women did not understand such things, the vicar said to himself;
even his own wife—good, and nice, and sensible, and intelligent as
she was—even she did not understand that a man in the world must
meet all sorts of men; and that in these days it did not do for a
clergyman to be a hermit.</p>
<p>'Twas thus that Mark Robarts argued when he found himself called upon
to defend himself before the bar of his own conscience for going to
Chaldicotes and increasing his intimacy with Mr. Sowerby. He did know
that Mr. Sowerby was a dangerous man; he was aware that he was over
head and ears in debt, and that he had already entangled young Lord
Lufton in some pecuniary embarrassment; his conscience did tell him
that it would be well for him, as one of Christ's soldiers, to look
out for companions of a different stamp. But nevertheless he went to
Chaldicotes, not satisfied with himself indeed, but repeating to
himself a great many arguments why he should be so satisfied.</p>
<p>He was shown into the drawing-room at once, and there he found Mrs.
Harold Smith, with Mrs. and Miss Proudie, and a lady whom he had
never before seen, and whose name he did not at first hear mentioned.</p>
<p>"Is that Mr. Robarts?" said Mrs. Harold Smith, getting up to greet
him, and screening her pretended ignorance under the veil of the
darkness. "And have you really driven over four-and-twenty miles of
Barsetshire roads on such a day as this to assist us in our little
difficulties? Well, we can promise you gratitude at any rate."</p>
<p>And then the vicar shook hands with Mrs. Proudie, in that deferential
manner which is due from a vicar to his bishop's wife; and Mrs.
Proudie returned the greeting with all that smiling condescension
which a bishop's wife should show to a vicar. Miss Proudie was not
quite so civil. Had Mr. Robarts been still unmarried, she also could
have smiled sweetly; but she had been exercising smiles on clergymen
too long to waste them now on a married parish parson.</p>
<p>"And what are the difficulties, Mrs. Smith, in which I am to assist
you?"</p>
<p>"We have six or seven gentlemen here, Mr. Robarts, and they always go
out hunting before breakfast, and they never come back—I was going
to say—till after dinner. I wish it were so, for then we should not
have to wait for them."</p>
<p>"Excepting Mr. Supplehouse, you know," said the unknown lady, in a
loud voice.</p>
<p>"And he is generally shut up in the library, writing articles."</p>
<p>"He'd be better employed if he were trying to break his neck like the
others," said the unknown lady.</p>
<p>"Only he would never succeed," said Mrs. Harold Smith. "But perhaps,
Mr. Robarts, you are as bad as the rest; perhaps you, too, will be
hunting to-morrow."</p>
<p>"My dear Mrs. Smith!" said Mrs. Proudie, in a tone denoting slight
reproach, and modified horror.</p>
<p>"Oh! I forgot. No, of course, you won't be hunting, Mr. Robarts;
you'll only be wishing that you could."</p>
<p>"Why can't he?" said the lady with the loud voice.</p>
<p>"My dear Miss Dunstable! a clergyman hunt, while he is staying in the
same house with the bishop? Think of the proprieties!"</p>
<p>"Oh—ah! The bishop wouldn't like it—wouldn't he? Now, do tell me,
sir, what would the bishop do to you if you did hunt?"</p>
<p>"It would depend upon his mood at the time, madam," said Mr. Robarts.
"If that were very stern, he might perhaps have me beheaded before
the palace gates."</p>
<p>Mrs. Proudie drew herself up in her chair, showing that she did not
like the tone of the conversation; and Miss Proudie fixed her eyes
vehemently on her book, showing that Miss Dunstable and her
conversation were both beneath her notice.</p>
<p>"If these gentlemen do not mean to break their necks to-night," said
Mrs. Harold Smith, "I wish they'd let us know it. It's half-past six
already."</p>
<p>And then Mr. Robarts gave them to understand that no such catastrophe
could be looked for that day, as Mr. Sowerby and the other sportsmen
were within the stable-yard when he entered the door.</p>
<p>"Then, ladies, we may as well dress," said Mrs. Harold Smith. But as
she moved towards the door, it opened, and a short gentleman, with a
slow, quiet step, entered the room; but was not yet to be
distinguished through the dusk by the eyes of Mr. Robarts. "Oh!
bishop, is that you?" said Mrs. Smith. "Here is one of the luminaries
of your diocese." And then the bishop, feeling through the dark, made
his way up to the vicar and shook him cordially by the hand. "He was
delighted to meet Mr. Robarts at Chaldicotes," he said—"quite
delighted. Was he not going to preach on behalf of the Papuan Mission
next Sunday? Ah! so he, the bishop, had heard. It was a good work, an
excellent work." And then Dr. Proudie expressed himself as much
grieved that he could not remain at Chaldicotes, and hear the sermon.
It was plain that his bishop thought no ill of him on account of his
intimacy with Mr. Sowerby. But then he felt in his own heart that he
did not much regard his bishop's opinion.</p>
<p>"Ah, Robarts, I'm delighted to see you," said Mr. Sowerby, when they
met on the drawing-room rug before dinner. "You know Harold Smith?
Yes, of course you do. Well, who else is there? Oh! Supplehouse. Mr.
Supplehouse, allow me to introduce to you my friend Mr. Robarts. It
is he who will extract the five-pound note out of your pocket next
Sunday for these poor Papuans whom we are going to Christianize. That
is, if Harold Smith does not finish the work out of hand at his
Saturday lecture. And, Robarts, you have seen the bishop, of course:"
this he said in a whisper. "A fine thing to be a bishop, isn't it? I
wish I had half your chance. But, my dear fellow, I've made such a
mistake; I haven't got a bachelor parson for Miss Proudie. You must
help me out, and take her in to dinner." And then the great gong
sounded, and off they went in pairs.</p>
<p>At dinner Mark found himself seated between Miss Proudie and the lady
whom he had heard named as Miss Dunstable. Of the former he was not
very fond, and, in spite of his host's petition, was not inclined to
play bachelor parson for her benefit. With the other lady he would
willingly have chatted during the dinner, only that everybody else at
table seemed to be intent on doing the same thing. She was neither
young, nor beautiful, nor peculiarly ladylike; yet she seemed to
enjoy a popularity which must have excited the envy of Mr.
Supplehouse, and which certainly was not altogether to the taste of
Mrs. Proudie—who, however, fêted her as much as did the others. So
that our clergyman found himself unable to obtain more than an
inconsiderable share of the lady's attention.</p>
<p>"Bishop," said she, speaking across the table, "we have missed you so
all day! we have had no one on earth to say a word to us."</p>
<p>"My dear Miss Dunstable, had I known that— But I really was engaged
on business of some importance."</p>
<p>"I don't believe in business of importance; do you, Mrs. Smith?"</p>
<p>"Do I not?" said Mrs. Smith. "If you were married to Mr. Harold Smith
for one week, you'd believe in it."</p>
<p>"Should I, now? What a pity that I can't have that chance of
improving my faith! But you are a man of business, also, Mr.
Supplehouse; so they tell me." And she turned to her neighbour on her
right hand.</p>
<p>"I cannot compare myself to Harold Smith," said he. "But perhaps I
may equal the bishop."</p>
<p>"What does a man do, now, when he sits himself down to business? How
does he set about it? What are his tools? A quire of blotting paper,
I suppose, to begin with?"</p>
<p>"That depends, I should say, on his trade. A shoemaker begins by
waxing his thread."</p>
<p>"And Mr. Harold Smith—?"</p>
<p>"By counting up his yesterday's figures, generally, I should say; or
else by unrolling a ball of red tape. Well-docketed papers and
statistical facts are his forte."</p>
<p>"And what does a bishop do? Can you tell me that?"</p>
<p>"He sends forth to his clergy either blessings or blowings-up,
according to the state of his digestive organs. But Mrs. Proudie can
explain all that to you with the greatest accuracy."</p>
<p>"Can she, now? I understand what you mean, but I don't believe a word
of it. The bishop manages his own affairs himself, quite as much as
you do, or Mr. Harold Smith."</p>
<p>"I, Miss Dunstable?"</p>
<p>"Yes, you."</p>
<p>"But I, unluckily, have not a wife to manage them for me."</p>
<p>"Then you should not laugh at those who have, for you don't know what
you may come to yourself, when you're married."</p>
<p>Mr. Supplehouse began to make a pretty speech, saying that he would
be delighted to incur any danger in that respect to which he might be
subjected by the companionship of Miss Dunstable. But before he was
half through it, she had turned her back upon him, and begun a
conversation with Mark Robarts.</p>
<p>"Have you much work in your parish, Mr. Robarts?" she asked. Now,
Mark was not aware that she knew his name, or the fact of his having
a parish, and was rather surprised by the question. And he had not
quite liked the tone in which she had seemed to speak of the bishop
and his work. His desire for her further acquaintance was therefore
somewhat moderated, and he was not prepared to answer her question
with much zeal.</p>
<p>"All parish clergymen have plenty of work, if they choose to do it."</p>
<p>"Ah, that is it; is it not, Mr. Robarts? If they choose to do it? A
great many do—many that I know, do; and see what a result they have.
But many neglect it—and see what a result <i>they</i> have. I think it
ought to be the happiest life that a man can lead, that of a parish
clergyman, with a wife and family, and a sufficient income."</p>
<p>"I think it is," said Mark Robarts, asking himself whether the
contentment accruing to him from such blessings had made him
satisfied at all points. He had all these things of which Miss
Dunstable spoke, and yet he had told his wife, the other day, that he
could not afford to neglect the acquaintance of a rising politician
like Harold Smith.</p>
<p>"What I find fault with is this," continued Miss Dunstable, "that we
expect clergymen to do their duty, and don't give them a sufficient
income—give them hardly any income at all. Is it not a scandal, that
an educated gentleman with a family should be made to work half his
life, and perhaps the whole, for a pittance of seventy pounds a
year?"</p>
<p>Mark said that it was a scandal, and thought of Mr. Evan Jones and
his daughter;—and thought also of his own worth, and his own house,
and his own nine hundred a year.</p>
<p>"And yet you clergymen are so proud—aristocratic would be the
genteel word, I know—that you won't take the money of common,
ordinary poor people. You must be paid from land and endowments, from
tithe and church property. You can't bring yourself to work for what
you earn, as lawyers and doctors do. It is better that curates should
starve than undergo such ignominy as that."</p>
<p>"It is a long subject, Miss Dunstable."</p>
<p>"A very long one; and that means that I am not to say any more about
it."</p>
<p>"I did not mean that exactly."</p>
<p>"Oh! but you did though, Mr. Robarts. And I can take a hint of that
kind when I get it. You clergymen like to keep those long subjects
for your sermons, when no one can answer you. Now if I have a longing
heart's desire for anything at all in this world, it is to be able to
get up into a pulpit, and preach a sermon."</p>
<p>"You can't conceive how soon that appetite would pall upon you, after
its first indulgence."</p>
<p>"That would depend upon whether I could get people to listen to me.
It does not pall upon Mr. Spurgeon, I suppose." Then her attention
was called away by some question from Mr. Sowerby, and Mark Robarts
found himself bound to address his conversation to Miss Proudie. Miss
Proudie, however, was not thankful, and gave him little but
monosyllables for his pains.</p>
<p>"Of course you know Harold Smith is going to give us a lecture about
these islanders," Mr. Sowerby said to him, as they sat round the fire
over their wine after dinner. Mark said that he had been so informed,
and should be delighted to be one of the listeners.</p>
<p>"You are bound to do that, as he is going to listen to you the day
afterwards—or, at any rate, to pretend to do so, which is as much as
you will do for him. It'll be a terrible bore—the lecture, I mean,
not the sermon." And he spoke very low into his friend's ear. "Fancy
having to drive ten miles after dusk, and ten miles back, to hear
Harold Smith talk for two hours about Borneo! One must do it, you
know."</p>
<p>"I daresay it will be very interesting."</p>
<p>"My dear fellow, you haven't undergone so many of these things as I
have. But he's right to do it. It's his line of life; and when a man
begins a thing he ought to go on with it. Where's Lufton all this
time?"</p>
<p>"In Scotland, when I last heard from him; but he's probably at Melton
now."</p>
<p>"It's deuced shabby of him, not hunting here in his own county. He
escapes all the bore of going to lectures, and giving feeds to the
neighbours; that's why he treats us so. He has no idea of his duty,
has he?"</p>
<p>"Lady Lufton does all that, you know."</p>
<p>"I wish I'd a Mrs. Sowerby <i>mère</i> to do it for me. But then Lufton
has no constituents to look after—lucky dog! By-the-by, has he
spoken to you about selling that outlying bit of land of his in
Oxfordshire? It belongs to the Lufton property, and yet it doesn't.
In my mind it gives more trouble than it's worth."</p>
<p>Lord Lufton had spoken to Mark about this sale, and had explained to
him that such a sacrifice was absolutely necessary, in consequence of
certain pecuniary transactions between him, Lord Lufton, and Mr.
Sowerby. But it was found impracticable to complete the business
without Lady Lufton's knowledge, and her son had commissioned Mr.
Robarts not only to inform her ladyship, but to talk her over, and to
appease her wrath. This commission he had not yet attempted to
execute, and it was probable that this visit to Chaldicotes would not
do much to facilitate the business.</p>
<p>"They are the most magnificent islands under the sun," said Harold
Smith to the bishop.</p>
<p>"Are they, indeed!" said the bishop, opening his eyes wide, and
assuming a look of intense interest.</p>
<p>"And the most intelligent people."</p>
<p>"Dear me!" said the bishop.</p>
<p>"All they want is guidance, encouragement,
<span class="nowrap">instruction—"</span></p>
<p>"And Christianity," suggested the bishop.</p>
<p>"And Christianity, of course," said Mr. Smith, remembering that he
was speaking to a dignitary of the Church. It was well to humour such
people, Mr. Smith thought. But the Christianity was to be done in the
Sunday sermon, and was not part of his work.</p>
<p>"And how do you intend to begin with them?" asked Mr. Supplehouse,
the business of whose life it had been to suggest difficulties.</p>
<p>"Begin with them—oh—why—it's very easy to begin with them. The
difficulty is to go on with them, after the money is all spent. We'll
begin by explaining to them the benefits of civilization."</p>
<p>"Capital plan!" said Mr. Supplehouse. "But how do you set about it,
Smith?"</p>
<p>"How do we set about it? How did we set about it with Australia and
America? It is very easy to criticize; but in such matters the great
thing is to put one's shoulder to the wheel."</p>
<p>"We sent our felons to Australia," said Supplehouse, "and they began
the work for us. And as to America, we exterminated the people
instead of civilizing them."</p>
<p>"We did not exterminate the inhabitants of India," said Harold Smith,
angrily.</p>
<p>"Nor have we attempted to Christianize them, as the bishop so
properly wishes to do with your islanders."</p>
<p>"Supplehouse, you are not fair," said Mr. Sowerby, "neither to Harold
Smith nor to us;—you are making him rehearse his lecture, which is
bad for him; and making us hear the rehearsal, which is bad for us."</p>
<p>"Supplehouse belongs to a clique which monopolizes the wisdom of
England," said Harold Smith; "or, at any rate, thinks that it does.
But the worst of them is that they are given to talk leading
articles."</p>
<p>"Better that, than talk articles which are not leading," said Mr.
Supplehouse. "Some first-class official men do that."</p>
<p>"Shall I meet you at the duke's next week, Mr. Robarts?" said the
bishop to him, soon after they had gone into the drawing-room.</p>
<p>Meet him at the duke's!—the established enemy of Barsetshire
mankind, as Lady Lufton regarded his grace! No idea of going to the
duke's had ever entered our hero's mind; nor had he been aware that
the duke was about to entertain any one.</p>
<p>"No, my lord; I think not. Indeed, I have no acquaintance with his
grace."</p>
<p>"Oh—ah! I did not know. Because Mr. Sowerby is going; and so are the
Harold Smiths, and, I think, Mr. Supplehouse. An excellent man is the
duke;—that is, as regards all the county interests," added the
bishop, remembering that the moral character of his bachelor grace
was not the very best in the world.</p>
<p>And then his lordship began to ask some questions about the church
affairs of Framley, in which a little interest as to Framley Court
was also mixed up, when he was interrupted by a rather sharp voice,
to which he instantly attended.</p>
<p>"Bishop," said the rather sharp voice; and the bishop trotted across
the room to the back of the sofa, on which his wife was sitting.
"Miss Dunstable thinks that she will be able to come to us for a
couple of days, after we leave the duke's."</p>
<p>"I shall be delighted above all things," said the bishop, bowing low
to the dominant lady of the day. For be it known to all men, that
Miss Dunstable was the great heiress of that name.</p>
<p>"Mrs. Proudie is so very kind as to say that she will take me in,
with my poodle, parrot, and pet old woman."</p>
<p>"I tell Miss Dunstable that we shall have quite room for any of her
suite," said Mrs. Proudie. "And that it will give us no trouble."</p>
<p>"'The labour we delight in physics pain,'" said the gallant bishop,
bowing low, and putting his hand upon his heart.</p>
<p>In the meantime, Mr. Fothergill had got hold of Mark Robarts. Mr.
Fothergill was a gentleman, and a magistrate of the county, but he
occupied the position of managing man on the Duke of Omnium's
estates. He was not exactly his agent; that is to say, he did not
receive his rents; but he "managed" for him, saw people, went about
the county, wrote letters, supported the electioneering interest, did
popularity when it was too much trouble for the duke to do it
himself, and was, in fact, invaluable. People in West Barsetshire
would often say that they did not know what <i>on earth</i> the duke would
do, if it were not for Mr. Fothergill. Indeed, Mr. Fothergill was
useful to the duke.</p>
<p>"Mr. Robarts," he said, "I am very happy to have the pleasure of
meeting you—very happy, indeed. I have often heard of you from our
friend Sowerby."</p>
<p>Mark bowed, and said that he was delighted to have the honour of
making Mr. Fothergill's acquaintance.</p>
<p>"I am commissioned by the Duke of Omnium," continued Mr. Fothergill,
"to say how glad he will be if you will join his grace's party at
Gatherum Castle, next week. The bishop will be there, and indeed
nearly the whole set who are here now. The duke would have written
when he heard that you were to be at Chaldicotes; but things were
hardly quite arranged then, so his grace has left it for me to tell
you how happy he will be to make your acquaintance in his own house.
I have spoken to Sowerby," continued Mr. Fothergill, "and he very
much hopes that you will be able to join us."</p>
<p>Mark felt that his face became red when this proposition was made to
him. The party in the county to which he properly belonged—he and
his wife, and all that made him happy and respectable—looked upon
the Duke of Omnium with horror and amazement; and now he had
absolutely received an invitation to the duke's house! A proposition
was made to him that he should be numbered among the duke's friends!</p>
<p>And though in one sense he was sorry that the proposition was made to
him, yet in another he was proud of it. It is not every young man,
let his profession be what it may, who can receive overtures of
friendship from dukes without some elation. Mark, too, had risen in
the world, as far as he had yet risen, by knowing great people; and
he certainly had an ambition to rise higher. I will not degrade him
by calling him a tuft-hunter; but he undoubtedly had a feeling that
the paths most pleasant for a clergyman's feet were those which were
trodden by the great ones of the earth.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, at the moment he declined the duke's invitation. He was
very much flattered, he said, but the duties of his parish would
require him to return direct from Chaldicotes to Framley.</p>
<p>"You need not give me an answer to-night, you know," said Mr.
Fothergill. "Before the week is past, we will talk it over with
Sowerby and the bishop. It will be a thousand pities, Mr. Robarts, if
you will allow me to say so, that you should neglect such an
opportunity of knowing his grace."</p>
<p>When Mark went to bed, his mind was still set against going to the
duke's; but, nevertheless, he did feel that it was a pity that he
should not do so. After all, was it necessary that he should obey
Lady Lufton in all things?</p>
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