John Eames was seated between
his own sister and the parson, and did not at all enjoy his position.
He had a full view of the doctor's felicity, as the happy pair sat
opposite to him, and conceived himself to be hardly treated by Lily's
absence. The party was certainly very dull, as were all such dinners
at Guestwick Manor. There are houses, which, in their everyday
course, are not conducted by any means in a sad or unsatisfactory
manner,--in which life, as a rule, runs along merrily enough; but
which cannot give a dinner-party; or, I might rather say, should
never allow themselves to be allured into the attempt. The owners of
such houses are generally themselves quite aware of the fact, and
dread the dinner which they resolved to give quite as much as it
is dreaded by their friends. They know that they prepare for their
guests an evening of misery, and for themselves certain long hours of
purgatory which are hardly to be endured. But they will do it. Why
that long table, and all those supernumerary glasses and knives and
forks, if they are never to be used? That argument produces all this
misery; that and others cognate to it. On the present occasion, no
doubt, there were excuses to be made. The squire and his niece had
been invited on special cause, and their presence would have been
well enough. The doctor added in would have done no harm. It was
good-natured, too, that invitation given to Mrs Eames and her
daughter. The error lay in the parson and his wife. There was no
necessity for their being there, nor had they any ground on which
to stand, except the party-giving ground. Mr and Mrs Boyce made the
dinner-party, and destroyed the social circle. Lady Julia knew that
she had been wrong as soon as she had sent out the note.

Nothing was said on that evening which has any bearing on our story.
Nothing, indeed, was said which had any bearing on anything. The
earl's professed object had been to bring the squire and young Eames
together; but people are never brought together on such melancholy
occasions. Though they sip their port in close contiguity, they are
poles asunder in their minds and feelings. When the Guestwick fly
came for Mrs Eames, and the parson's pony-phaeton came for him and
Mrs Boyce, a great relief was felt; but the misery of those who were
left had gone too far to allow of any reaction on that evening. The
squire yawned, and the earl yawned, and then there was an end of it
for that night.

CH