A Country Gentleman and His Family · Chapter
XXXIX explained
Dick Cavendish, left behind in London after Chatty's departure, finds himself listless and preoccupied with thoughts of her and their quiet evenings.
What happens
Dick Cavendish, left behind in London after Chatty's departure, finds himself listless and preoccupied with thoughts of her and their quiet evenings. He receives an invitation from Mrs. Warrender to visit for the partridges, which intensifies his inner turmoil. Seeking counsel, he visits an old lawyer friend and, under the guise of a friend's case, reveals his own dilemma: he is already married to a woman in America who has long been absent, and he contemplates whether he can marry Chatty without revealing this past, knowing it would be a form of bigamy.
Themes in this chapter
Secrecy and the Past
Dick's hidden marriage in America and his fear of exposure drive the chapter's tension.
Love and Marriage
Dick's love for Chatty conflicts with the legal and moral bonds of his existing marriage.
Duty vs. Individual Desire
Dick wrestles with his desire to marry Chatty against his duty to honor his prior vows.
Characters to notice
- Dick Cavendish
Struggles with his feelings for Chatty and the moral weight of his secret marriage.
- Minnie Chatty Warrender
Absent from London but constantly in Dick's thoughts; her departure has left him restless.
- Mrs. Wilberforce
Mentioned as part of the little group in Half Moon Street that made the lodging-house feel like home.
- Mr. Warrender
Mentioned as the sender of a formal invitation to Dick for a shooting visit.
- Tom Wyld
Used by Dick as a pseudonym for himself in the story he tells the old lawyer about a secret marriage.
- Old Black
The retired lawyer whom Dick consults; described as sharp and knowledgeable.
Key passages
“When the ladies left London, Dick Cavendish had felt himself something like a wreck upon the shore.”
After Chatty and her mother left London, Dick felt abandoned and aimless.
Sets the emotional tone of the chapter.
“He was so far gone that he scrawled patterns for that muslin work over his blotting books, arrangements of little holes, in squares, in rounds, in diagonal formations, in the shape of primitive leaf and berry, at which he would laugh all by himself and blush, and fling them into the fire.”
Dick was so lovesick that he doodled patterns for Chatty's embroidery, then laughed and burned them in embarrassment.
Illustrates Dick's deep infatuation with Chatty.
“He was going to do—nothing, unless life and feeling should be too much for him and he should be driven into doing what would be a villainy—yes a villainy, though probably no harm would ever come of it; most probably, almost certainly, no harm would come of it—and yet it would be a villainy.”
Dick contemplates marrying Chatty while still legally married, knowing it is wrong but hoping it will never be discovered.
Reveals Dick's internal moral conflict.
“Do you mean to say, sir, that you contemplate betraying a woman by a fictitious marriage, making her children illegitimate and herself a—I can't suppose that you have any real intention of that.”
The old lawyer accuses Dick of planning a bigamous marriage that would make Chatty's children illegitimate.
Highlights the legal and moral stakes of Dick's dilemma.
