Dr. Wortles School | Page 4

meet on a
summer's day. She had good health, easy temper, pleasant friends,
abundant means, and no ambition. She went nowhere without the
Doctor, and whenever he went she enjoyed her share of the respect
which was always shown to him. She had little or nothing to do with
the school, the Doctor having many years ago resolved that though it

became him as a man to work for his bread, his wife should not be a
slave. When the battles had been going on,--those between the Doctor
and the bishops, and the Doctor and Mrs. Stantiloup, and the Doctor
and the newspapers,--she had for a while been unhappy. It had grieved
her to have it insinuated that her husband was an atheist, and asserted
that her husband was a cormorant; but his courage had sustained her,
and his continual victories had taught her to believe at last that he was
indomitable.
They had one child, a daughter, Mary, of whom it was said in Bowick
that she alone knew the length of the Doctor's foot. It certainly was so
that, if Mrs. Wortle wished to have anything done which was a trifle
beyond her own influence, she employed Mary. And if the boys
collectively wanted to carry a point, they would "collectively" obtain
Miss Wortle's aid. But all this the Doctor probably knew very well; and
though he was often pleased to grant favours thus asked, he did so
because he liked the granting of favours when they had been asked with
a proper degree of care and attention. She was at the present time of the
age in which fathers are apt to look upon their children as still children,
while other men regard them as being grown-up young ladies. It was
now June, and in the approaching August she would be eighteen. It was
said of her that of the girls all round she was the prettiest; and indeed it
would be hard to find a sweeter-favoured girl than Mary Wortle. Her
father had been all his life a man noted for the manhood of his face. He
had a broad forehead, with bright grey eyes,--eyes that had always a
smile passing round them, though the smile would sometimes show
that touch of irony which a smile may contain rather than the
good-humour which it is ordinarily supposed to indicate. His nose was
aquiline, not hooky like a true bird's-beak, but with that bend which
seems to give to the human face the clearest indication of individual
will. His mouth, for a man, was perhaps a little too small, but was
admirably formed, as had been the chin with a deep dimple on it, which
had now by the slow progress of many dinners become doubled in its
folds. His hair had been chestnut, but dark in its hue. It had now
become grey, but still with the shade of the chestnut through it here and
there. He stood five feet ten in height, with small hands and feet. He
was now perhaps somewhat stout, but was still as upright on his horse

as ever, and as well able to ride to hounds for a few fields when by
chance the hunt came in the way of Bowick. Such was the Doctor. Mrs.
Wortle was a pretty little woman, now over forty years of age, of whom
it was said that in her day she had been the beauty of Windsor and
those parts. Mary Wortle took mostly after her father, being tall and
comely, having especially her father's eyes; but still they who had
known Mrs. Wortle as a girl declared that Mary had inherited also her
mother's peculiar softness and complexion.
For many years past none of the pupils had been received within the
parsonage,--unless when received there as guests, which was of
frequent occurrence. All belonging to the school was built outside the
glebe land, as a quite separate establishment, with a door opening from
the parsonage garden to the school-yard. Of this door the rule was that
the Doctor and the gardener should have the only two keys; but the rule
may be said to have become quite obsolete, as the door was never
locked. Sometimes the bigger boys would come through
unasked,--perhaps in search of a game of lawn-tennis with Miss Wortle,
perhaps to ask some favour of Mrs. Wortle, who always was delighted
to welcome them, perhaps even to seek the Doctor himself, who never
on such occasions would ask how it came to pass that they were on that
side of the wall. Sometimes Mrs. Wortle would send her housekeeper
through for some of the little boys. It would then be a good time for the
little boys. But this would generally be during the Doctor's absence.
Here, on the school side