'Then, my lord, if I may be allowed to express a wish, I would prefer that no discussion on the subject should take place between us in the presence of a third party.'
'Don't alarm yourself, Mr Slope,' said Mrs Proudie, 'no discussion is at all necessary. The bishop merely intends to express his own wishes.'
'I merely intend, Mr Slope, to express my own wishes--no discussion will be at all necessary,' said the bishop, reiterating his wife's words.
'That is more, my lord, than we any of us can be sure of,' said Mr Slope; 'I cannot, however, force Mrs Proudie to leave the room; nor can I refuse to remain here, if it be your lordship's wish that Ishould do so.'
'It is certainly his lordship's wish,'said Mrs Proudie.
'Mr Slope,' began the bishop, in a solemn, serious voice, 'it grieves me to have to find fault. It grieves me much to find fault with a clergyman; but especially so with a clergyman in your position.'
'Why, what have I done amiss, my lord?' demanded Mr Slope, loudly.
'What have you done amiss, Mr Slope?' said Mrs Proudie, standing erect before the culprit, and raising that terrible forefinger. 'Do you dare to ask the bishop what you have done amiss? does not your conscience--'
'Mrs Proudie, pray let it be understood, once for all, that I will have no words with you.'
'Ah, sire, but you will have words,' said she; 'you must have words. Why have you had so may words with that Signora Neroni? Why have you disgraced yourself, you a clergyman, by constantly consorting with such a woman as that--with a married woman--with one altogether unfit for a clergyman's society?'
'At any rate, I was introduced to her in your drawing-room,'
returned Mr Slope.
'And shamefully you behave there,' said Mrs Proudie, 'most shamefully. I was wrong to allow you to remain in the house a day after what I then saw. I should have insisted on your instant dismissal.'
'I have yet to learn, Mrs Proudie, that you have the power to insist either on my going from hence or on my staying here.'
'What!' said the lady; 'I am not to have the privilege of saying who shall and who shall not frequent my own drawing-room! I am not to save my servants and dependents from having their morals corrupted by improper conduct! I am not to save my own daughters from impurity! I will let you see, Mr Slope, whether I have the power or whether I have not. You will have the goodness to understand that you no longer fill any situation about the bishop;and as your room will be immediately wanted in the palace for another chaplain, I must ask you to provide yourself with apartments as soon as may be convenient to you.'
'My lord,' said Mr Slope, appealing to the bishop, and so turning his back completely on the lady, 'will you permit me to ask that Imay have from your own lips and decision that you may have come to on this matter?'
'Certainly, Mr Slope, certainly,' said the bishop; 'that is but reasonable. Well, my decision is that you had better look for some other preferment. For the situation which you have lately held I do not think you are well suited.'
'And what, my lord, has been my fault?'
'That Signora Neroni is one fault,' said Mrs Proudie; 'and a very abominable fault she is; very abominable, and very disgraceful.
Fie, Mr Slope, fie! You an evangelical clergyman indeed!'
'My lord, I desire to know for what fault I am turned out of your lordship's house.'
'You hear what Mrs Proudie says,' said the bishop.
'When I publish the history of this transaction, my lord, as Idecidedly shall do in my own vindication, I presume you will not wish me to state that you have discarded me at your wife's bidding --because she has objected to my being acquainted with another lady, the daughter of one of the prebendaries of the chapter?'
