visit to Florence. "I should have come
back at once," he said to his wife, "when they wrote to ask me
whether Crawley had taken the cheque from me, had anybody then told
me that he was in actual trouble; but I had no idea then that they
were charging him with theft."

"As far as I can learn, they never really suspected him until after
your answer had come. They had been quite sure that your answer would
be in the affirmative."

"What he must have endured it is impossible to conceive. I shall go
out to him to-morrow."

"Would he not come to us?" said Mrs. Arabin.

"I doubt it. I will ask him, of course. I will ask them all here.
This about Henry and the girl may make a difference. He has resigned
the living, and some of the palace people are doing the duty."

"But he can have it again?"

"Oh, yes; he can have it again. For the matter of that, I need simply
give him back his letter. Only he is so odd,--so unlike other people!
And he has tried to live there, and has failed; and is now in debt. I
wonder whether Grantly would give him St Ewold's?"

"I wish he would. But you must ask him. I should not dare."

As to the matter of the cheque, the dean acknowledged to his wife at
last that he had some recollection of her having told him that she
had made the sum of money up to seventy pounds. "I don't feel certain
of it now; but I think you may have done so." "I am quite sure I
could not have done it without telling you," she replied. "At any
rate you said nothing of the cheque," pleaded the dean. "I don't
suppose I did," said Mrs. Arabin. "I thought that cheques were like
any other money; but I shall know better for the future."

On the following morning the dean rode over to Hogglestock, and as he
drew near to the house of his old friend, his spirits flagged,--for
to tell the truth, he dreaded the meeting. Since the day on which he
had brought Mr. Crawley from a curacy in Cornwall into the diocese of
Barchester, his friend had been a trouble to him rather than a joy.
The trouble had been a trouble of spirit altogether,--not at all of
pocket. He would willingly have picked the Crawleys out from the
pecuniary mud into which they were ever falling, time after time,
had it been possible. For, though the dean was hardly to be called
a rich man, his lines had fallen to him not only in pleasant places,
but in easy circumstances;--and Mr. Crawley's embarrassments, though
overwhelming to him, were not so great as to have bee