It was not to be expected that the matter should be kept out of the county newspaper, or even from those in the metropolis. There was too much of romance in the story, too good a tale to be told, for any such hope. The man’s former life and the woman’s, the disappearance of her husband and his reappearance after his reported death, the departure of the couple from St Louis and the coming of Lefroy to Bowick formed together a most attractive subject. But it could not be told without reference to Dr Wortle’s school, to Dr Wortle’s position as clergyman of the parish — and also to the fact which was considered by his enemies to be of all the facts the most damning, that Mr Peacocke had for a time been allowed to preach in the parish church. The “Broughton Gazette,” a newspaper which was supposed to be altogether devoted to the interest of the diocese, was very eloquent on this subject. “We do not desire”, said the “Broughton Gazette, to make any remarks as to the management of Dr Wortle’s school. We leave all that between him and the parents of the boys who are educated there. We are perfectly aware that Dr Wortle himself is a scholar, and that his school has been deservedly successful. It is advisable, no doubt, that in such an establishment none should be employed whose lives are openly immoral — but as we have said before, it is not our purpose to insist upon this. Parents, if they feel themselves to be aggrieved, can remedy the evil by withdrawing their sons. But when we consider the great power which is placed in the hands of an incumbent of a parish, that he is endowed as it were with the freehold of his pulpit, that he may put up whom he will to preach the gospel to his parishioners, even in a certain degree in opposition to his bishop, we think that we do no more than our duty in calling attention to such a case as this.” Then the whole story was told at great length, so as to give the “we” of the Broughton Gazette a happy opportunity of making its leading article not only much longer, but much more amusing, than usual. “We must say”, continued the writer, as he concluded his narrative, “that this man should not have been allowed to preach in the Bowick pulpit. He is no doubt a clergyman of the Church of England, and Dr Wortle was within his rights in asking for his assistance; but the incumbent of a parish is responsible for those he employs, and that responsibility now rests on Dr Wortle.”
There was a great deal in this that made the Doctor very angry — so angry that he did not know how to restrain himself. The matter had been argued as though he had employed the clergyman in his church after he had known the history. “For aught I know,” he said to Mrs Wortle, “any curate coming to me might have three wives, all alive.”
“That would be most improbable,” said Mrs Wortle.
“So was all this improbable — just as improbable. Nothing could be more improbable. Do we not all feel overcome with pity for the poor woman because she encountered trouble that was so improbable? How much more improbable was it that I should come across a clergyman who had encountered such improbabilities.” In answer to this Mrs Wortle could only shake her head, not at all understanding the purport of her husband’s argument.
But what was said about his school hurt him more than what was said about his church. In regard to his church he was impregnable. Not even the Bishop could touch him — or even annoy him much. But this “penny-a-liner,” as the Doctor indignantly called him, had attacked him in his tenderest point. After declaring that he did not intend to meddle with the school, he had gone on to point out that an immoral person had been employed there, and had then invited all parents to take away their sons. “He doesn’t know what moral and immoral means,” said the Doctor, again pleading his own case to his own wife. “As far as I know, it would be hard to find a man of a higher moral feeling than Mr Peacocke, or a woman than his wife.”
“I suppose they ought to have separated when it was found out,” said Mrs Wortle.
“No, no,” he shouted; I hold that they were right. He was right to cling to her, and she was bound to obey him. Such a fellow as that,’ — and he crushed the paper up in his hand in his wrath, as though he were crushing the editor himself — “such a fellow as that knows nothing of morality, nothing of honour, nothing of tenderness. What he did I would have done, and I’ll stick to him through it all in spite of the Bishop, in spite of the newspapers, and in spite of all the rancour of all my enemies.” Then he got up and walked about the room in such a fury that his wife did not dare to speak to him. Should he or should he not answer the newspaper? That was a question which for the first two days after he had read the article greatly perplexed him. He would have been very ready to advise any other man what to do in such a case. “Never notice what may be written about you in a newspaper,” he would have said. Such is the advice which a man always gives to his friend. But when the case comes to himself he finds it sometimes almost impossible to follow it. “What’s the use? Who cares what the “Broughton Gazette” says? let it pass, and it will be forgotten in three days. If you stir the mud yourself, it will hang about you for months. It is just what they want you to do. They cannot go on by themselves, and so the subject dies away from them; but if you write rejoinders they have a contributor working for them for nothing, and one whose writing will be much more acceptable to their readers than any that comes from their own anonymous scribes. It is very disagreeable to be worried like a rat by a dog; but why should you go into the kennel and unnecessarily put yourself in the way of it?” The Doctor had said this more than once to clerical friends who were burning with indignation at something that had been written about them. But now he was burning himself, and could hardly keep his fingers from pen and ink.
In this emergency he went to Mr Puddicombe, not, as he said to himself, for advice, but in order that he might hear what Mr Puddicombe would have to say about it. He did not like Mr Puddicombe, but he believed in him — which was more than he quite did with the Bishop. Mr Puddicombe would tell him his true thoughts. Mr Puddicombe would be unpleasant very likely; but he would be sincere and friendly. So he went to Mr Puddicombe. “It seems to me,” he said, “almost necessary that I should answer such allegations as these for the sake of truth.”
“You are not responsible for the truth of the “Broughton Gazette,”” said Mr Puddicombe.
“But I am responsible to a certain degree that false reports shall not be spread abroad as to what is done in my church.”
“You can contradict nothing that the newspaper has said.”
“It is implied,” said the Doctor, that I allowed Mr Peacocke to preach in my church after I knew his marriage was informal.”
“There is no such statement in the paragraph,” said Mr Puddicombe, after attentive reperusal of the article. “The writer has written in a hurry, as such writers generally do, but has made no statement such as you presume. Were you to answer him, you could only do so by an elaborate statement of the exact facts of the case. It can hardly be worth your while, in defending yourself against the “Broughton Gazette,” to tell the whole story in public of Mr Peacocke’s life and fortunes.”
“You would pass it over altogether?”
“Certainly I would.”
“And so acknowledge the truth of all that the newspaper says.”
“I do not know that the paper says anything untrue,” said Mr Puddicombe, not looking the Doctor in the face, with his eyes turned to the ground, but evidently with the determination to say what he thought, however unpleasant it might be. “The fact is that you have fallen into a — misfortune.”
“I don’t acknowledge it at all,” said the Doctor.
“All your friends at any rate will think so, let the story be told as it may. It was a misfortune, that this lady whom you had taken into your establishment should have proved not to be the gentleman’s wife. When I am taking a walk through the fields and get one of my feet deeper than usual into the mud, I always endeavour to bear it as well as I may before the eyes of those who meet me rather than make futile efforts to get rid of the dirt and look as though nothing had happened. The dirt, when it is rubbed and smudged and scraped, is more palpably dirt than the honest mud.”
“I will not admit that I am dirty at all,” said the Doctor.
“Nor do I, in the case which I describe. I admit nothing; but I let those who see me form their own opinion. If anyone asks me about my boot I tell him that it is a matter of no consequence. I advise you to do the same. You will only make the smudges more palpable if you write to the “Broughton Gazette.””
“Would you say nothing to the boys’ parents?” asked the Doctor.
“There, perhaps, I am not a judge, as I never kept a school — but I think not. If any father writes to you, then tell him the truth.”
If the matter had gone no farther than this, the Doctor might probably have left Mr Puddicombe’s house with a sense of thankfulness for the kindness rendered to him; but he did go farther, and endeavoured to extract from his friend some sense of the injustice shown by the Bishop, the Stantiloups, the newspaper, and his enemies in general t............