第 六十七 章 · Chapter LXVII

Now is there civil war within the soul:

Resolve is thrust from off the sacred throne

By clamorous Needs, and Pride the grand-vizier

Makes humble compact, plays the supple part

Of envoy and deft-tongued apologist

For hungry rebels.

Happily Lydgate had ended by losing in the billiard-room, and brought

away no encouragement to make a raid on luck. On the contrary, he felt

unmixed disgust with himself the next day when he had to pay four or

five pounds over and above his gains, and he carried about with him a

most unpleasant vision of the figure he had made, not only rubbing

elbows with the men at the Green Dragon but behaving just as they did.

A philosopher fallen to betting is hardly distinguishable from a

Philistine under the same circumstances: the difference will chiefly be

found in his subsequent reflections, and Lydgate chewed a very

disagreeable cud in that way. His reason told him how the affair might

have been magnified into ruin by a slight change of scenery—if it had

been a gambling-house that he had turned into, where chance could be

clutched with both hands instead of being picked up with thumb and

fore-finger. Nevertheless, though reason strangled the desire to

gamble, there remained the feeling that, with an assurance of luck to

the needful amount, he would have liked to gamble, rather than take the

alternative which was beginning to urge itself as inevitable.

That alternative was to apply to Mr. Bulstrode. Lydgate had so many

times boasted both to himself and others that he was totally

independent of Bulstrode, to whose plans he had lent himself solely

because they enabled him to carry out his own ideas of professional

work and public benefit—he had so constantly in their personal

intercourse had his pride sustained by the sense that he was making a

good social use of this predominating banker, whose opinions he thought

contemptible and whose motives often seemed to him an absurd mixture of

contradictory impressions—that he had been creating for himself strong

ideal obstacles to the proffering of any considerable request to him on

his own account.

Still, early in March his affairs were at that pass in which men begin

to say that their oaths were delivered in ignorance, and to perceive

that the act which they had called impossible to them is becoming

manifestly possible. With Dover’s ugly security soon to be put in

force, with the proceeds of his practice immediately absorbed in paying

back debts, and with the chance, if the worst were known, of daily

supplies being refused on credit, above all with the vision of

Rosamond’s hopeless discontent continually haunting him, Lydgate had

begun to see that he should inevitably bend himself to ask help from

somebody or other. At first he had considered whether he should write

to Mr. Vincy; but on questioning Rosamond he found that, as he had

suspected, she had already applied twice to her father, the last time

being since the disappointment from Sir Godwin; and papa had said that

Lydgate must look out for himself. “Papa said he had come, with one bad

year after another, to trade more and more on borrowed capital, and had

had to give up many indulgences; he could not spare a single hundred

from the charges of his family. He said, let Lydgate ask Bulstrode:

they have always been hand and glove.”

Indeed, Lydgate himself had come to the conclusion that if he must end

by asking for a free loan, his relations with Bulstrode, more at least

than with any other man, might take the shape of a claim which was not

purely personal. Bulstrode had indirectly helped to cause the failure

of his practice, and had also been highly gratified by getting a

medical partner in his plans:—but who among us ever reduced himself to

the sort of dependence in which Lydgate now stood, without trying to

believe that he had claims which diminished the humiliation of asking?

It was true that of late there had seemed to be a new languor of

interest in Bulstrode about the Hospital; but his health had got worse,

and showed signs of a deep-seated nervous affection. In other respects

he did not appear to be changed: he had always been highly polite, but

Lydgate had observed in him from the first a marked coldness about his

marriage and other private circumstances, a coldness which he had

hitherto preferred to any warmth of familiarity between them. He

deferred the intention from day to day, his habit of acting on his

conclusions being made infirm by his repugnance to every possible

conclusion and its consequent act. He saw Mr. Bulstrode often, but he

did not try to use any occasion for his private purpose. At one moment

he thought, “I will write a letter: I prefer that to any circuitous

talk;” at another he thought, “No; if I were talking to him, I could

make a retreat before any signs of disinclination.”

Still the days passed and no letter was written, no special interview

sought. In his shrinking from the humiliation of a dependent attitude

towards Bulstrode, he began to familiarize his imagination with another

step even more unlike his remembered self. He began spontaneously to

consider whether it would be possible to carry out that puerile notion

of Rosamond’s which had often made him angry, namely, that they should

quit Middlemarch without seeing anything beyond that preface. The

question came—“Would any man buy the practice of me even now, for as

little as it is worth? Then the sale might happen as a necessary

preparation for going away.”

But against his taking this step, which he still felt to be a

contemptible relinquishment of present work, a guilty turning aside

from what was a real and might be a widening channel for worthy

activity, to start again without any justified destination, there was

this obstacle, that the purchaser, if procurable at all, might not be

quickly forthcoming. And afterwards? Rosamond in a poor lodging, though

in the largest city or most distant town, would not find the life that

could save her from gloom, and save him from the reproach of having

plunged her into it. For when a man is at the foot of the hill in his

fortunes, he may stay a long while there in spite of professional

accomplishment. In the British climate there is no incompatibility

between scientific insight and furnished lodgings: the incompatibility

is chiefly between scientific ambition and a wife who objects to that

kind of residence.

But in the midst of his hesitation, opportunity came to decide him. A

note from Mr. Bulstrode requested Lydgate to call on him at the Bank. A

hypochondriacal tendency had shown itself in the banker’s constitution

of late; and a lack of sleep, which was really only a slight

exaggeration of an habitual dyspeptic symptom, had been dwelt on by him

as a sign of threatening insanity. He wanted to consult Lydgate without

delay on that particular morning, although he had nothing to tell

beyond what he had told before. He listened eagerly to what Lydgate had

to say in dissipation of his fears, though this too was only

repetition; and this moment in which Bulstrode was receiving a medical

opinion with a sense of comfort, seemed to make the communication of a

personal need to him easier than it had been in Lydgate’s contemplation

beforehand. He had been insisting that it would be well for Mr.

Bulstrode to relax his attention to business.

“One sees how any mental strain, however slight, may affect a delicate

frame,” said Lydgate at that stage of the consultation when the remarks

tend to pass from the personal to the general, “by the deep stamp which

anxiety will make for a time even on the young and vigorous. I am

naturally very strong; yet I have been thoroughly shaken lately by an

accumulation of trouble.”

“I presume that a constitution in the susceptible state in which mine

at present is, would be especially liable to fall a victim to cholera,

if it visited our district. And since its appearance near London, we

may well besiege the Mercy-seat for our protection,” said Mr.

Bulstrode, not intending to evade Lydgate’s allusion, but really

preoccupied with alarms about himself.

“You have at all events taken your share in using good practical

precautions for the town, and that is the best mode of asking for

protection,” said Lydgate, with a strong distaste for the broken

metaphor and bad logic of the banker’s religion, somewhat increased by

the apparent deafness of his sympathy. But his mind had taken up its

long-prepared movement towards getting help, and was not yet arrested.

He added, “The town has done well in the way of cleansing, and finding

appliances; and I think that if the cholera should come, even our

enemies will admit that the arrangements in the Hospital are a public

good.”

“Truly,” said Mr. Bulstrode, with some coldness. “With regard to what

you say, Mr. Lydgate, about the relaxation of my mental labor, I have

for some time been entertaining a purpose to that effect—a purpose of a

very decided character. I contemplate at least a temporary withdrawal

from the management of much business, whether benevolent or commercial.

Also I think of changing my residence for a time: probably I shall

close or let ‘The Shrubs,’ and take some place near the coast—under

advice of course as to salubrity. That would be a measure which you

would recommend?”

“Oh yes,” said Lydgate, falling backward in his chair, with

ill-repressed impatience under the banker’s pale earnest eyes and

intense preoccupation with himself.

“I have for some time felt that I should open this subject with you in

relation to our Hospital,” continued Bulstrode. “Under the

circumstances I have indicated, of course I must cease to have any

personal share in the management, and it is contrary to my views of

responsibility to continue a large application of means to an

institution which I cannot watch over and to some extent regulate. I

shall therefore, in case of my ultimate decision to leave Middlemarch,

consider that I withdraw other support to the New Hospital than that

which will subsist in the fact that I chiefly supplied the expenses of

building it, and have contributed further large sums to its successful

working.”

Lydgate’s thought, when Bulstrode paused according to his wont, was,

“He has perhaps been losing a good deal of money.” This was the most

plausible explanation of a speech which had caused rather a startling

change in his expectations. He said in reply—

“The loss to the Hospital can hardly be made up, I fear.”

“Hardly,” returned Bulstrode, in the same deliberate, silvery tone;

“except by some changes of plan. The only person who may be certainly

counted on as willing to increase her contributions is Mrs. Casaubon. I

have had an interview with her on the subject, and I have pointed out

to her, as I am about to do to you, that it will be desirable to win a

more general support to the New Hospital by a change of system.”

Another pause, but Lydgate did not speak.

“The change I mean is an amalgamation with the Infirmary, so that the

New Hospital shall be regarded as a special addition to the elder

institution, having the same directing board. It will be necessary,

also, that the medical management of the two shall be combined. In this

way any difficulty as to the adequate maintenance of our new

establishment will be removed; the benevolent interests of the town

will cease to be divided.”

Mr. Bulstrode had lowered his eyes from Lydgate’s face to the buttons

of his coat as he again paused.

“No doubt that is a good device as to ways and means,” said Lydgate,

with an edge of irony in his tone. “But I can’t be expected to rejoice

in it at once, since one of the first results will be that the other

medical men will upset or interrupt my methods, if it were only because

they are mine.”

“I myself, as you know, Mr. Lydgate, highly valued the opportunity of

new and independent procedure which you have diligently employed: the

original plan, I confess, was one which I had much at heart, under

submission to the Divine Will. But since providential indications

demand a renunciation from me, I renounce.”

Bulstrode showed a rather exasperating ability in this conversation.

The broken metaphor and bad logic of motive which had stirred his

hearer’s contempt were quite consistent with a mode of putting the

facts which made it difficult for Lydgate to vent his own indignation

and disappointment. After some rapid reflection, he only asked—

“What did Mrs. Casaubon say?”

“That was the further statement which I wished to make to you,” said

Bulstrode, who had thoroughly prepared his ministerial explanation.

“She is, you are aware, a woman of most munificent disposition, and

happily in possession—not I presume of great wealth, but of funds which

she can well spare. She has informed me that though she has destined

the chief part of those funds to another purpose, she is willing to

consider whether she cannot fully take my place in relation to the

Hospital. But she wishes for ample time to mature her thoughts on the

subject, and I have told her that there is no need for haste—that, in

fact, my own plans are not yet absolute.”

Lydgate was ready to say, “If Mrs. Casaubon would take your place,

there would be gain, instead of loss.” But there was still a weight on

his mind which arrested this cheerful candor. He replied, “I suppose,

then, that I may enter into the subject with Mrs. Casaubon.”

“Precisely; that is what she expressly desires. Her decision, she says,

will much depend on what you can tell her. But not at present: she is,

I believe, just setting out on a journey. I have her letter here,” said

Mr. Bulstrode, drawing it out, and reading from it. “‘I am immediately

otherwise engaged,’ she says. ‘I am going into Yorkshire with Sir James

and Lady Chettam; and the conclusions I come to about some land which I

am to see there may affect my power of contributing to the Hospital.’

Thus, Mr. Lydgate, there is no haste necessary in this matter; but I

wished to apprise you beforehand of what may possibly occur.”

Mr. Bulstrode returned the letter to his side-pocket, and changed his

attitude as if his business were closed. Lydgate, whose renewed hope

about the Hospital only made him more conscious of the facts which

poisoned his hope, felt that his effort after help, if made at all,

must be made now and vigorously.

“I am much obliged to you for giving me full notice,” he said, with a

firm intention in his tone, yet with an interruptedness in his delivery

which showed that he spoke unwillingly. “The highest object to me is my

profession, and I had identified the Hospital with the best use I can

at present make of my profession. But the best use is not always the

same with monetary success. Everything which has made the Hospital

unpopular has helped with other causes—I think they are all connected

with my professional zeal—to make me unpopular as a practitioner. I get

chiefly patients who can’t pay me. I should like them best, if I had

nobody to pay on my own side.” Lydgate waited a little, but Bulstrode

only bowed, looking at him fixedly, and he went on with the same

interrupted enunciation—as if he were biting an objectional leek.

“I have slipped into money difficulties which I can see no way out of,

unless some one who trusts me and my future will advance me a sum

without other security. I had very little fortune left when I came

here. I have no prospects of money from my own family. My expenses, in

consequence of my marriage, have been very much greater than I had

expected. The result at this moment is that it would take a thousand

pounds to clear me. I mean, to free me from the risk of having all my

goods sold in security of my largest debt—as well as to pay my other

debts—and leave anything to keep us a little beforehand with our small

income. I find that it is out of the question that my wife’s father

should make such an advance. That is why I mention my position to—to

the only other man who may be held to have some personal connection

with my prosperity or ruin.”

Lydgate hated to hear himself. But he had spoken now, and had spoken

with unmistakable directness. Mr. Bulstrode replied without haste, but

also without hesitation.

“I am grieved, though, I confess, not surprised by this information,

Mr. Lydgate. For my own part, I regretted your alliance with my

brother-in-law’s family, which has always been of prodigal habits, and

which has already been much indebted to me for sustainment in its

present position. My advice to you, Mr. Lydgate, would be, that instead

of involving yourself in further obligations, and continuing a doubtful

struggle, you should simply become a bankrupt.”

“That would not improve my prospect,” said Lydgate, rising and speaking

bitterly, “even if it were a more agreeable thing in itself.”

“It is always a trial,” said Mr. Bulstrode; “but trial, my dear sir, is

our portion here, and is a needed corrective. I recommend you to weigh

the advice I have given.”

“Thank you,” said Lydgate, not quite knowing what he said. “I have

occupied you too long. Good-day.”