Anthony Trollope: Barchester Towers

28. CHAPTER XXVIII: MRS BOLD IS ENTERTAINED BY DR AND MRS GRANTLY AT PLUMSTEAD (continued)

'You all want me to be illiberal as yourselves. That I shall never be. I see no harm in Mr Slope's acquaintance, and I shall not insult the man by telling him that I do. He has thought it necessary to write to me, and I do not want the archdeacon's advice about the letter. If I did I would ask it.'

'Then, Eleanor, it is my duty to tell you,' and now she spoke with a tremendous gravity, 'that the archdeacon thinks that such a correspondence is disgraceful, and that he cannot allow it to go on in this house.'

Eleanor's eyes flashed fire as she answered her sister, jumping up from her seat as she did so. 'You may tell the archdeacon that wherever I am I shall receive what letters I please and from whom I please. And as for the word disgraceful, if Dr Grantly has used it of me he has been unmanly and inhospitable,' and she walked off to the door. 'When papa comes from the dining-room I will thank you to ask him to step up to my bed-room. I will show him Mr Slope's letter, but I will show it to no one else.' And so saying she retreated to her baby.

She had no conception of the crime with which she was charged. The idea that she could be thought by her friends to regard Mr Slope as a lover, had never flashed upon her. She conceived that they were all prejudiced and illiberal in their persecution of him, and therefore she would not join in the persecution, even though she greatly disliked the man.

Eleanor was very angry as she seated herself in a low chair by her open window at the foot of her child's bed. 'To dare to say that I have disgraced myself,' she repeated to herself more than once. 'How papa can put up with that man's arrogance! I will certainly not sit down to dinner in this house again unless he begs my pardon for that word.' And then a thought struck her that Mr Arabin might perchance hear of her 'disgraceful' correspondence with Mr Slope, and she turned crimson with pure vexation. Oh, if she had known the truth! If she could have conceived that Mr Arabin had been informed as a fact that she was going to marry Mr Slope!