Punctually at eleven Mr Chadwick came, wearing a very long face as he entered the palace door—­for he felt that he would in all probability be now compelled to quarrel with Mrs Proudie.  Much he could bear, but there was a limit to his endurance.  She had never absolutely sent for him before, though she had often interfered with him.  ’I shall have to tell her a bit of my mind,’ he said, as he stepped across the Close, habited in his best suit of black, with most exact white cravat, and yet looking not quite like a clergyman—­with some touch of the undertaker in his gait.  When he found that he was shown into the bishop’s room, and that the bishop was there—­the bishop only—­his mind was relieved.  It would have been better that the bishop should have written himself, or that the chaplain should have written in his lordship’s name; that, however, was a trifle.

But the bishop did not know what to say to him.  If he intended to direct an inquiry to be made by the rural dean, it would be by no means becoming that he should consult Mr Chadwick as to doing so.  It might be well, or if not well at any rate not improper, that he should make application to Dr Tempest through Mr Chadwick; but in that case he must give the order at once, and he still wished to avoid it if it were possible.  Since he had been in the diocese no case so grave as this had been pushed upon him.  The intervention of the rural dean in an ordinary way he had used—­had been made to use—­more than once, by his wife.  A vicar had been absent a little too long from one parish, and there had been rumours about brandy-and-water in another.  Once he had been very nearly in deep water because Mrs Proudie had taken it in dudgeon that a certain young rector, who had been left a widower, had a pretty governess for his children; and there had been that case, sadly notorious in the diocese at the time, of our excellent friend Mr Robarts of Framley, when the bailiffs were in the house because he couldn’t pay his debts—­or rather, the debts of his friend for whom he had signed bills.  But in all these cases some good fortune had intervened, and he had been saved from the terrible necessity of any ulterior process.  But now—­now he was being driven beyond himself, and all to no purpose.  If Mrs Proudie would only wait three months the civil law would do it all for him.  But here was Mr Chadwick in the room, and he knew that it would be useless for him to attempt to talk to Mr Chadwich about other matters, and so dismiss him.  The wife of his bosom would be down upon them before Chadwick could be out of the room.

‘H-m-ha.  How d’ye do, Mr Chadwick—­won’t you sit down?’ Mr Chadwick thanked his lordship, and sat down.  ’It’s very cold, isn’t it, Mr Chadwick?’

‘A hard frost, my lord, but a beautiful day.’

‘Won’t you come near the fire?’ The bishop knew that Mrs Proudie was on the road, and had an eye to the proper strategical position of his forces.  Mrs Proudie would certainly take up her position in a certain chair from whence the light enabled her to rake her husband thoroughly.  What advantage she might have from this he could not prevent;—­but he could so place Mr Chadwick, that the lawyer should be more than within reach of his eye than that of his wife.  So the bishop pointed to an arm-chair opposite to himself and near the fire, and Mr Chadwick seated himself accordingly.