Roger Carbury

Roger Carbury

Chapter XIV
Letter from Lady Carbury to Roger requesting they might come to Carbury Manor:

“My Dear Roger,

“We know how kind you are and how sincere, and that if what I am going to propose doesn’t suit you’ll say so at once. I have been working very hard, -- too hard indeed, and I feel that nothing will do me so much real good as getting into the country for a day or two. Would you takes us for a part of Whitsun week? We would come down on the 20th May and stay over the Sunday if you would keep us. Felix says he would run down though he would not trouble you for so long a time as we talk of staying.

“I’m sure you must have been glad to hear of his being put upon that Great American Railway Board as a Director. It opens upon a new sphere of life to him, and will enable him to prove that he can make himself useful. I think it was a great confidence to place in one so young.

“Of course you will say so at once if my little proposal interferes with any of your plans, but you have been so very very kind to us that I have no scruple in making it.

“Henrietta joins with me in kind love” (113) #Letters

“He [ Roger ] wrote his two letters at once. That to Lady Carbury was very short. He would be delighted to see her and Henrietta at the time named, -- and would be very glad should it suit Felix to come also. He did not say a word about the Board, or the young man’s probable usefulness in his new sphere of life. To Montague his letter was long. ‘It is always best to be open and true,’ he said. ‘Since you were kind enough to say that you would come to me, Lady Carbury has proposed to visit me just at the same time and to bring her daughter. After what has passed between us I need hardly say that I could not make you both welcome here together. It is not pleasant to me to have to ask you to postpone your visit, but I think you will not accuse me of a want of hospitality toward you.’ Paul wrote back to say that he was sure that there was no want of hospitality, and that he would remain in town” (115). #Letters #Sincerity

Chapter XV
Roger 's thoughts, via the narrator: “But if there were one among all others to whom the house should be a house of refuge from care, not an abode of trouble, on whose behalf were it possible, he would make the very air softer, and the flowers sweeter than their wont, to whom he would declare, were such words possible to his tongue, that of him and of his house, and of all things there, she [ Hetta Carbury ] was the mistress, whether she would condescend to love him or no” (126-127). #Facility with Language

Roger Carbury reflecting after criticizing Felix to Lady Carbury : “He [ Roger ] had said very hard words. It was true that he could not have expressed his meaning without hard words, nor have repressed his meaning without self-reproach” (126). #Sincerity

“In the course of the evening there came a note, -- or rather a bundle of notes, -- from Caversham. That addressed to Roger was in the form of a letter. Lady Pomona was sorry to say that the Longestaffe party were prevented from having the pleasure of dining at Carbury Hall by the fact that they had a house full of guests. Lady Pomona hoped that Mr. Carbury and his relatives, who, Lady Pomona heard, were with him at the Hall, would do the Longestaffes the pleasure of dining at Caversham either on the Monday or Tuesday following, as might best suit the Carbury plans. That was the purport of Lady Pomona ’s letter to Roger Carbury. Then there were cards of invitation for Lady Carbury and her daughter, and also for Sir Felix. Roger, as he read his own note, handed the others over to Lady Carbury , and then asked her what she would wish to have done” (127). #Letters #Proximity

Roger to Lady Carbury about the invitation to dine with the Longestaffes at Caversham: “You must answer at once, because their servant is waiting.”. . . . “I suppose I had better say that I [ Lady Carbury ], and Hetta, -- and Felix will accept their invitation” (128). #Premeditation

“A quarter of an hour later the Caversham servant was on his way home with two letters, -- the one from Roger expressing his regret that he could not accept Lady Pomona ’s invitation, and the other from Lady Carbury declaring that she and her son and daughter would have great pleasure in dining at Caversham on the Monday” (128). #Proximity #Dishonesty