Middlemarch

Auction of the Steel Fender

After Will’s entrance, a “second fender” said to have been forgotten in its proper place is brought forward. Mr. Trumbull, alive to his own humor, praises it as a piece of polished steel with lancet-shaped open-work whose antique style will one day be the only one in vogue. Mrs. Mawmsey protests that no child could survive its knife-like edge, but Trumbull counters that it would conveniently sever a hanging man. Bidding climbs from half-a-crown to six shillings, where Mr. Clintup, a diffident nurseryman, secures it, pleased to have bought a fender that always prompts the joke.

Auction of the Riddle Trinket Lot

Joseph next brings a tray of drawing-room trifles, including an ingenious heart-shaped box that unfolds into a flower of riddle-cards containing five hundred riddles printed in red. Trumbull commends riddles as promoters of innocent mirth and virtue, recites a sample about spelling “honey” to catch lady-birds, and works the bidding upward. Mr. Bowyer bids to hinder rivals, Mr. Horrock is drawn in despite his neutral expression, and Mr. Bambridge denounces the lot as blasted stuff fit only for haberdashers in perdition. The collection finally goes to Mr. Spilkins, a young Slender, for a guinea, though Mr. Toller grumbles that an old maid’s rubbish has been foisted on the sale and demands the prints.

Sale of Prints and Paintings

Trumbull presents Lot 235, a proof-before-the-letter engraving of the Duke of Wellington on the field of Waterloo, whose anonymous painter Mr. Powderell admires enough to bid a pound, which no one challenges. Two Dutch prints Mr. Toller has been eager for are then knocked down to him, after which other prints and paintings pass to leading Middlemarchers who had come specifically for them, the audience ebbing and flowing between the room and the marquee on the lawn where refreshments are served. Mr. Bambridge covets the marquee itself and lingers inside it. The “Supper at Emmaus” is then brought forward, and Trumbull, in mounting fervor, extols it as a Guydo suitable for any lady’s refectory or a corporation benefactor, turning the frame toward Will as the one connoisseur present.

Mysterious Stranger Raffles Approaches Will

All eyes turn to Will, who coolly bids five pounds, prompting Trumbull’s remonstrance that the frame alone is worth that and that Middlemarch must not let a gem slip by. The bidding rises briskly as Will, remembering Mrs. Bulstrode’s wish, tries to stretch the price toward twelve pounds; he finally secures it at ten guineas and pushes out through the bow-window. He chooses the empty marquee to get a glass of water, but before the attendant can fetch it he is annoyed to see the florid stranger who had stared at him entering. Will, wary of political hangers-on seeking a shilling, half-seated on a garden-chair, turns his eyes away, but Mr. Raffles, undeterred by such rebuffs, steps in front of him and asks, with full-mouthed haste, whether Will’s mother’s name was Sarah Dunkirk.

CHAPTER LX.

In this chapter, Will Ladislaw first encounters the disreputable Raffles at an auction, reacting with sharp defensiveness and a fierce challenge when Raffles pries into his parentage, remarking on Will’s strong resemblance to his father and claiming he knew Will’s mother in her youth. Raffles initially holds back from provoking Will further, but catches up to him later that evening, acting with forced joviality to reveal that Will’s mother ran away from her wealthy, hypocritical family who operated a high-end receiving house for stolen goods, a detail that aligns with Will’s long-held suspicion that his mother refused to disclose the real reason she cut ties with her relatives. After turning down Raffles’ offer to join him for a drink at the Blue Bull, Will flees through the streets and walks for hours along the dark Lowick road, reeling from the shame of the revelation and worrying that if Dorothea’s social circle, including the Chettam family, learned of his mother’s disgraced background, they would use it to dismiss him as an unsuitable match for Dorothea, even as he reassures himself that his own character is free of the moral taint of his extended family.