“It’s very good of you to make me such an offer, and I need not say I am grateful for the honour, but--if I may put it frankly--I don’t think I feel inclined to go to such a dead and alive town as Barchester. I have a passion for work, and I can’t live without plenty to do. If I leave London at all it must be for a place that offers ample scope for a man of energy, a place where there’s a vigorous civic life, and where you may feel yourself, as it were, at the centre of this busy modern world of ours. Advance and progress are my watchwords.”
Conversation with Lord Stonehenge was difficult, for he seldom opened his mouth. When you had said what you wanted, he merely waited for you to begin again; and unless possessed of much effrontery, you were utterly disconcerted. In the present case, however, there was but one word he needed to utter, and that word was Sheffield. It remained unspoken. Canon Spratte, content to let things take their time, got up.
“But it’s too bad of me to take up the only moment in the day you have for recreation. I shall be seeing Durant again after dinner.”
With a nod and a smile he left the Prime Minister to his own reflections.
Theodore’s day had been somewhat exhausting. It is given to few, however eagerly they pursue the art of life, within twelve hours to win a wife and to refuse a bishopric. He had thoroughly earned the bath he took before dinner. He wondered how many people knew that he, Theodore Spratte, then pleasantly wallowing in cold water, mother naked, held as in a balance the destinies of the British Empire. Sir John Durant would do as he suggested, and the next few hours might see determined the fall of an administration. He rubbed himself joyously with rough towels.
“When the Clergy and the Licensed Victualers stand shoulder to shoulder, not all the powers of Satan can avail against them,” he cried.
He dressed with unusual care and shaved a second time; he brushed his hair with feminine nicety. He put two rings on his little finger, and with a sigh of complete satisfaction, looked at himself in the glass. He felt very well and young and happy. His appetite was good and he was prepared to enjoy an excellent dinner.
When he reached the drawing-room he found that Lord Spratte was already arrived. Winnie, whom he had not seen since her return, came up to kiss him.