XII

In such wise, under the silent benediction of the lost loving dead,

the long-deserted old Manor received back the sole daughter of its

ancestry to that protection which we understand, or did understand

at one time in our history, as 'Home.' Home was once a safe and

sacred institution in England. There seemed no likelihood of its

ever being supplanted by the public restaurant. That it has, in a

great measure, been so supplanted, is no advantage to the country,

and that many women, young and old, prefer to be seen in gregarious

over-dressed hordes, taking their meals in Piccadilly eating-houses,

rather than essay the becoming grace of a simple and sincere

hospitality to their friends in their own homes, is no evidence of

their improved taste or good breeding. Abbot's Manor was in every

sense 'Home' in the old English sense of the word. Its ancient

walls, hallowed by long tradition, formed a peaceful and sweet

harbour of rest for a woman's life,--and the tranquil dignity of her

old-world surroundings with all the legends and memories they

awakened, soon had a beneficial effect on Maryllia's impressionable

temperament, which, under her aunt's 'social' influence, had been

more or less chafed and uneasy. She began to feel at peace with

herself and all the world,--while the relief she experienced at

having deliberately severed herself by both word and act from the

undesired attentions of a too-persistent and detested lover in the

person of Lord Roxmouth, future Duke of Ormistonne, was as keen and

pleasurable as that of a child who has run away from school. She was

almost confident that the fact of her having thrown off her aunt's

protection together with all hope of inheriting her aunt's wealth,

would be sufficient to keep him away from her for the future. "For

it is Aunt Emily's money he wants--not me;" she said to herself--"He

doesn't care a jot about me personally--any woman will do, provided

she has the millions. And when he knows I've given up the millions,

and don't intend ever to have the millions, he'll leave me alone.

And he'll go over to America in search of somebody else--some proud

daughter of oil or pork or steel!--and what a blessing that will

be!"

Meanwhile, such brief excitement as had been caused in St. Rest by

the return of 'th' owld Squire's gel' and by the almost simultaneous

dismissal of Oliver Leach, had well-nigh abated. A new agent had

been appointed, and though Leach had left the immediate vicinity,

having employment on Sir Morton Pippitt's lands, he had secured a

cottage for himself in the small outlying hamlet of Badsworth. He

also undertook some work for the Reverend 'Putty' Leveson in

assisting him to form an entomological collection for the private

museum at Badsworth Hall. Mr. Leveson had a singular fellow-feeling

for insects,--he studied their habits, and collected specimens of

various kinds in bottles, or 'pinned' them on cardboard trays,--he

was an interested observer of the sprightly manners practised by the

harvest-bug, and the sagacious customs of the ruminating spider,--as

well as the many surprising and agreeable talents developed by the

common flea. Leach's virulent hatred of Maryllia Vancourt was not

lessened by the apparently useful and scientific nature of the

employment he had newly taken up under the guidance of his reverend

instructor,--and whenever he caught a butterfly and ran his

murderous pin through its quivering body at Leveson's bland command,

he thought of her, and wished vindictively that she might perish as

swiftly and utterly as the winged lover of the flowers. Every small

bright thing in Nature's garden that he slew and brought home as

trophy, inspired him with the same secret fierce desire. The act of

killing a beautiful or harmless creature gave him pleasure, and he

did not disguise it from himself. The Reverend 'Putty' was delighted

with his aptitude, and with the many valuable additions he made to

the 'specimen' cards and bottles, and the two became constant

companions in their search for fresh victims among the blossoming

hedgerows and fields. St. Rest, as a village, was only too glad to

be rid of Leach's long detested presence to care anything at all as

to his further occupations or future career,--and only Bainton kept

as he said 'an eye on him.'

Bainton was a somewhat curious personage,--talkative as he showed

himself on most occasions, he was both shrewd and circumspect; no

stone was more uncommunicative than he when he chose. In his heart

he had set Maryllia Vancourt as second to none save his own master,

John Walden,--her beauty and grace, her firm action with regard to

the rescue of the 'Five Sisters,' and her quick dismissal of Oliver

Leach, had all inspired him with the most unbounded admiration and

respect, and he felt that he now had a double interest in life,--the

'Passon'--and the 'lady of the Manor.' But he found very little

opportunity to talk about his new and cherished theme of Miss

Vancourt and Miss Vancourt's many attractions to Walden,--for John

always 'shut him up' on the subject with quite a curt and peremptory

decision whenever be so much as mentioned her name. Which conduct on

the part of one who was generally so willing to hear and patient to

listen, somewhat surprised Bainton.

"For," he argued--"there ain't much doin' in the village,--we ain't

always 'on the go'--an' when a pretty face comes among us, surely

it's worth looking at an' pickin' to pieces as 'twere. But Passon's

that sharp on me when I sez any little thing wot might be

interestin' about the lady, that I'm thinkin' he's got out o' the

habit o' knowin' when a face is a male or a female one, which is wot

often happens to bacheldors when they gits fixed like old shrubs in

one pertikler spot o' ground. Now I should a' said he'd a' bin glad

to 'ear of somethin' new an' oncommon as 'twere,--he likes it in the

way o' flowers, an' why not in the way o' wimmin? But Passon ain't

like other folk--he don't git on with wimmin nohow--an' the prettier

they are the more he seems skeered off them."

But such opinions as Bainton entertained concerning his master, he

kept to himself, and having once grasped the fact that any mention

of Miss Vancourt's ways or Miss Vancourt's looks appeared to

displease rather than to entertain the Reverend John, he avoided the

subject altogether. This course of action on his part, if the truth

must be told, was equally annoying to Walden, who was in the curious

mental condition of wishing to know what he declined to hear.

For the rest, the village generally grew speedily accustomed to the

presence of the mistress of the Manor. She had fulfilled her promise

of paying a visit to Josey Letherbarrow, and had sat with the old

man in his cottage, talking to him for the better part of two hours.

Rumour asserted that she had even put the kettle on the fire for

him, and had made his tea. Josey himself was reticent,--and beyond

the fact that he held up his head with more dignity, and showed a

touch of more conscious superiority in his demeanour, he did not

give himself away by condescending to narrate any word of the

lengthy interview that had taken place between himself and 'th' owld

Squire's little gel.' One remarkable thing was noticed by the

villagers and commented upon,--Miss Vancourt had now passed two

Sundays in their midst, and had never once attended church. Her

servants were always there at morning service, but she herself was

absent. This occasioned much whispering and head-shaking in the

little community, and one evening the subject was openly discussed

in the bar-room of the 'Mother Huff' by a group of rustic worthies

whose knowledge of matters theological and political was, by

themselves, considered profound. Mrs. Buggins had started the

conversation, and Mrs. Buggins was well known to be a lady both

pious and depressing. She presided over her husband's 'public' with

an air of meek resignation, not unmixed with sorrowful protest,--she

occasionally tasted the finer cordials in the bar-room, and was

often moved to gentle tears at the excellence of their flavour,--she

had a chronic 'stitch in the side,' and a long smooth pale yellow

countenance from which the thin grey hair was combed well back from

the temples in the frankly unbecoming fashion affected by the

provincial British matron. She begun her remarks by plaintively

opining that "it was a very strange thing not to see Miss Vancourt

at church, on either of the Sundays that had passed since her

return--very strange! Perhaps she was 'High'? Perhaps she had driven

into Riversford to attend the 'processional' service of the Reverend

Francis Anthony?"

"Perhaps she ain't done nothing of the sort!"--growled a thick-set

burly farmer, who with a capacious mug of ale before him was sucking

at his pipe with as much zeal as a baby at its bottle--"Ef you cares

for my 'pinion, which, m'appen you doan't, she's neither Low nor

'Igh. She's no Seck. If she h'longed to a Seck, she wouldn't be

readin' on a book under the Five Sisters last Sunday marnin' when

the bells was a-ringin' for church time. I goes past 'er, an' I sez

'Marnin,' mum!' an' she looks up smilin'-like, an' sez she: 'Good-

marnin!' Nice day, isn't it?' 'Splendid day, mum,' sez I, an' she

went on readin', an' I went on a walkin'. I sez then, and I sez now,

she ain't no Seck!"

"Example," sighed Mrs. Buggins, "is better than precept. It would be

more decent if the lady showed herself in church as a lesson to

others,--if she did so more lost sheep might follow!"

"Hor-hor-hor!" chuckled Bainton, from a corner of the room--"Don't

you worrit yourself, Missis Buggins, 'bout no lost sheep! Sheep

allus goes where there's somethin' to graze upon,--leastways that's

my 'speriemce, an' if there ain't no grazin' there ain't no sheep!

An' them as grazes on Passon Walden, gittin' out of 'im all they can

to 'elp 'em along, wouldn't go to church, no more than Miss Vancourt

do, if they didn't know wot a man 'e is to be relied on in times o'

trouble, an' a reg'lar 'usband to the parish in sickness an' in

'elth, for richer, for poorer, for better, for worse, till death do

'im part. Miss Vancourt don't want nothin' out of 'im as all we

doos, an' she kin show 'er independence ef she likes to by stayin'

away from church when she fancies, an' readin' books instead of

'earin' sermons,--there ain't no harm in that."

"I'm not so sure that I agree with you, Mr. Bainton,"--said a stout,

oily-looking personage, named Netlips, the grocer and 'general

store' dealer of the village, a man who was renowned in the district

for the profundity and point of his observations at electoral

meetings, and for the entirely original manner in which he 'used'

the English language; "Public worship is a necessary evil. It is a

factor in vulgar civilisations. Without it, the system of religious

politics would fall into cohesion,--absolute cohesion!" And he

rapped his fist on the table with a smartness that made his hearers

jump. "At the last meeting I addressed in this division, I said we

must support the props. The aristocracy must bear them on their

shoulders. If your Squire stays away from church, he may be called a

heathen with propriety, though a Liberal. And why? Because he makes

public exposure of himself as a heathen negative! He is bound to

keep up the church factor in the community. Otherwise he runs

straight aground on Cohesion."

This oratorical outburst on the part of Mr. Netlips was listened to

with respectful awe and admiration.

"Ay, ay!" said Roger Buggins, who as 'mine host' stood in his shirt

sleeves at the entrance of his bar, surveying his customers and

mentally counting up their reckonings--"Cohesion would never do--

cohesion government would send the country to pieces. You're right,

Mr. Netlips,--you're right! Props must be kep' up!"

"I don't see no props in goin' to church,"--said Dan Ridley, the

little working tailor of the village--"I goes because I likes Mr.

Walden, but if there was a man in the pulpit I didn't like, I'd stop

away. There's a deal too many wolves in sheep's clothing getting

ordained in the service o' the Lord, an' I don't blame Miss Vancourt

if so be she takes time to find out the sort o' man Mr. Walden is

before settin' under him as 'twere. She can say prayers an' read 'em

too in her own room, an' study the Bible all right without goin' to

church. Many folks as goes to church reg'lar are downright mean

lyin' raskills--and don't never read their Bibles at all. Mebbe they

does as much harm as what Mr. Netlips calls Cohesion, though I don't

myself purfess to understand Government language, it bein' too deep

for me."

Mr. Netlips smiled condescendingly, and nodded as one who should

say--'You do well, my poor fellow, to be humble in my presence!'--

and buried his nose in his tankard of ale.

"Mebbe Cohesion's got hold o' my red cow"--said the burly farmer who

had spoken before--"For she's as ailin' as ever she was, an' if I

lose her, I loses a bit o' my livin.' An' that's what I sez an'

'olds by, no church-goin' seems to 'elp us in a bit o' trouble, an'

it ain't decent or Christian like, so it 'pears, to pray to the

Almighty for the savin' of a cow. I asked Passon Walden if 'twould

be right, for the cow's as valuable to me as ever my wife was when

she was alive, if not more, an' he sez quite pleasant-like--'Well

no, Mister Thorpe, I think it best not to make any sort of special

prayer for the poor beast, but just do all you can for it, and leave

the rest to Providence. A cow is worldly goods, you see--and we're

not quite justified in praying to be allowed to keep our worldly

goods.' 'Ain't we!' I sez--'Is that a fact? He smiled and said it

was. So I thanked him and comed away. But I've been thinkin' it over

since, an' I sez to myself--ef we ain't to pray for keepin' an'

'avin' our worldly goods, wot 'ave we got to pray for?"

"Oh Mr. Thorpe!" ejaculated Mrs. Buggins, almost tearfully--"It is

not this world but the next, that we must think of! We must pray for

our souls!"

"Well, marm, I ain't got a 'soul' wot I knows on--an' as for the

next world, if there ain't no cattle farmin' there, I reckon I'll be

out o' work. Do you count on keepin' a bar in the 'eavenly country?"

A loud guffaw went the round of the room, and Mrs. Buggins gasped

with horror.

"Oh, Roger!" she murmured, addressing her portly spouse, who at once

took up the argument.

"You goes too fur--you goes too fur, Mister Thorpe!" he said

severely--"There ain't no keepin' bars nor farmin' carried on in the

next world, nor marrying nor givin' in marriage. We be all as the

angels there."

"A nice angel you'll make too, Mr. Buggins!" said Farmer Thorpe, as

he sent his tankard to be refilled,--"Lord! We won't know you!"

Again the laugh went round, and Mrs. Buggins precipitately retired

to her 'inner parlour' there to recover from the shock occasioned to

her religious feelings by the irreverent remarks of her too matter-

of-fact customer. Meanwhile Dan Ridley, the tailor, had again

reverted to the subject of Miss Vancourt.

"There's one thing about her comin' to church,"--he said; "If so be

as she did come it 'ud do us all good, for she's real pleasant to

look at. I've seen her a many times in the village."

"Ah, so have I!" chorussed two or three more men.

"She's been in to see Adam Frost's children an' she gave Baby

Hippolyta a bag o' sweeties,"--said Bainton. "An' she's called at

the schoolhouse, but Miss Eden, she worn't in an' Susie Prescott saw

her, an' Susie was that struck that she 'adn't a wurrd to say, so

she tells us, an' Miss Vancourt she went to old Josey Letherbarrow's

straight away an' there she stayed iver so long. She ain't called at

our house yet."

"Which 'ouse might you be a-meanin', Tummas?" queried Farmer Thorpe,

with a slow grin--"Your own or your measter's?"

"When we speaks in the plural we means not one, but two,"--rejoined

Bainton with dignity. "An' when I sez 'our' I means myself an'

Passon, which Miss Vancourt ain't as yet left her card on Passon. He

went up in a great 'urry one afternoon when he knowed she was out,--

he knowed it, 'cos I told 'im as 'ow I'd seen her gallopin' by on

that mare of hers which, they calls Cleopatra-an' away 'e run like a

March 'are, an' he ups to the Manor and down again, an' sez he,

laughin' like: 'I've done my dooty by the lady' sez he--'I've left

my card!' That was three days ago, an' there ain't been no return o'

the perliteness up to the present--"

Here he broke off and began to drink his ale, as a small dapper man

entered the bar-room with a brisk step and called for 'a glass of

home-brewed,' looking round on those assembled with a condescending

smile. All of them knew him as Jim Bennett, Miss Vancourt's groom.

"Well, mates!" he said with a sprightly air of familiarity--"All

well and hearty?"

"As yourself, Mr. Bennett,"--replied Roger Buggins, acting as

spokesman for the rest, and personally serving him with the foaming

draught he had ordered. "Which, we likewise trusts your lady is

well?"

"My lady enjoys the hest of health, thank you!" said Bennett, with

polite gravity. And tossing off the contents of his glass, he

signified by an eloquent gesture and accompanying wink, that he was

'good for another.'

"We was just a-sayin' as you come in, Mr. Bennett," observed Dan

Ridley, "that we'd none of us seen your lady at church yet on

Sundays, Mebbe she ain't of our 'persuasion' as they sez, or mehbe

she goes into Riversford, preferrin' 'Igh services---"

Bennett smiled a superior smile, and leaning easily against the bar,

crossed his legs and surveyed the company generally with a

compassionate air.

"I suppose it's quite a business down here,--goin' to church, eh?"

he queried--"Sort of excitement like--only bit of fun you've got--

helps to keep you all alive! That's the country way, but Lord bless

you!--in town we're not taking any!"

Bainton looked up,--and Mr. Netlips loosened his collar and lifted

his head, as though preparing himself for another flow of 'cohesion'

eloquence. Farmer Thorpe turned his bull-neck slowly round, and

brought his eyes to bear on the speaker.

"How d'ye make that out, Mr. Bennett?" he demanded. "Doan't ye sarve

the A'mighty same in town as in country?"

"Not a bit of it!" replied Bennett airily--"You're a long way behind

the times, Mr. Thorpe!--you are indeed, beggin' your pardon for

sayin' so! The 'best' people have given up the Almighty altogether,

owing to recent scientific discoveries. They've taken to the

Almighty Dollar instead which no science can do away with. And

Sundays aren't used any more for church-going, except among the

middle-class population,--they're just Bridge days with OUR set--

Bridge lunches, Bridge suppers,--every Sunday's chock full of

engagements to 'Bridge,' right through the 'season.'"

"That's cards, ain't it?" enquired Dan Ridley.

"Just so! Harmless cards!" rejoined Bennett--"Only you can chuck

away a few thousands or so on 'em if you like!"

Mr. Netlips here pushed aside his emptied ale-glass and raised his

fat head unctuously out of his stiff shirt-collar.

"Are we to understand," he began ponderously, "that Miss Vancourt is

addicted to this fashion of procrastinating the Lord's Day?"

Bennett straightened his dapper figure suddenly.

"Now don't you put yourself out, Mr. Netlips, don't, that's a good

feller!" he said in sarcastically soothing tones--"There's no

elections going on just at present--when there is you can bring your

best leg foremost, and rant away for all you're worth! My lady don't

gamble, if that's what you mean,--though she's always with the

swagger set, and likely so to remain. But you keep up your spirits!-

-your groceries 'ull be paid for all right!--she don't run up no

bills--so don't you fear, cards or no cards! And as for

procrastinating the Lord's Day, whatever that may be, I could name

to you the folks what does worse than play Bridge on Sundays. And

who are they? Why the clergymen theirselves! And how does they do

worse? Why by tellin' lies as fast as they can stick! They says

we're all going to heaven if we're good,--and they don't know

nothing about it,--and we're all going to hell if we're bad, and

they don't know nothing about that neither! I tell you, as I told

you at first, in town we've got beyond all that stuff--we're just

not taking any!"

He paused, and there was a deep silence, while he drank off his

second glass of ale. The thoughts of every man present were

apparently too deep for words.

"You're a smart chap!" said Bainton at last, breaking the mystic

spell and rising to take his leave--"An' I don't want to argify with

ye, for I'spect you're about right in what you sez about Sunday ways

in town--but I tell ye what, young feller!--you've got to 'ave a

deal o' patience an' a deal o' pity for they poor starveling sinners

wot gits boxed up in cities an' never ain't got no room to look at

the sky, or see the wide fields with all the daisies blowin' open to

the sun. No wonder they're so took up wi' their scinetific muddlins

over worms an' microbes an' sich-like, as to 'ave forgot what the

Almighty is doin' in the workin' o' the Universe,--but it's onny

jest like poor prisiners in a cell wot walks up an' down, up an'

down, countin' the stones in the wall with scinetific

multiplication-like, an' 'splainin' to their poor lonely selves as

how many stones makes a square foot, an' so many square feet makes a

square yard, an' on they goes a-walkin' their mis'able little round

an' countin' their mis'able little sums, an' all the time just

outside the prison the flowers is all bloomin' wild an' the birds

singin', an' the blue sky over it all with God smilin' behind it.

That's 'ow 'tis, Mr. Bennett!" and Bainton looked into the lining of

his cap as was his wont before he put it on his head--"I believe all

you say right enough, an' it don't put me out nohow--I've seen too

much o' natur to be shook off my 'old on the Almighty--for there's

no worm wot ain't sure of a rose or some kind o' flower an' fruit

somewhere, though m'appen the poor blind thing don't know where to

find it. It's case o' leadin' on, an' guidin' beyond our knowledge,

Mr. Bennett,--an' that's wot Passon Walden tells us. HE don't bother

us wi' no 'hows' nor 'whys' nor 'wherefores'--he says we can FEEL

God with us in our daily work, an' so we can, if we've a mind to!

Daily work and common things shows Him to us,--why look there!"--

here he pulled from his pocket a small paper-bag, and opening it,

showed some dry loose seed--"There ain't nothin' commoner than that!

That's pansy seed--a special stock too,--well now, if you didn't

know how common it is, wouldn't it seem a miracle as wonderful as

any in the Testymen, that out o' that handful o' dust like, the

finest flowers of purple an' yellow will come?--ay! some o' them two

to three inches across, an' every petal like velvet an' silk! If so

be you don't b'lieve in a God, Mr. Bennett, owin' to town opinions,

you try the gardenin' business! That'll make a man of ye! I allus

sez if Adam had stuck to the gardenin' business an' left the

tailorin' trade alone we'd have all been in Eden now!"

His eyes twinkled, as glancing round the company, he saw that his

words had made an impression and awakened a responsive smile--"Good-

night t'ye!" And touching Bennett on the shoulder in passing, he

added: "You come an' see me, my lad, when you feels like goin' a bit

in the scinetific line! Mebbe I can tell ye a few pints wot the

learned gentlemen in London don't know. Anyway, a little church-

goin' under Passon Walden won't do you no 'arm, nor your lady

neither, if she's what I takes her for, which is believin' her to be

all good as wimmin goes. An' when Passon warms to his work an' tells

ye plain as 'ow everything's ordained for the best, an' as 'ow every

flower's a miracle of the Lord, an' every bird's song a bit o' the

Lord's own special music, it 'eartens ye up an' makes ye more

'opeful o' your own poor mis'able self--it do reely now!"

With another friendly pat on the groom's shoulder, and a cheery

smile, Bainton passed out, and left the rest of the company in the

'Mother Huff' tap-room solemnly gazing upon one another.

"He speaks straight, he do," said Farmer Thorpe, "An' he ain't no

canter,--he's just plain Tummas, an' wot he sez he means."

"Here's to his 'elth,--a game old boy!" said Bennett good-

humouredly, ordering another glass of ale; "It's quite a treat to

meet a man like him, and I shan't be above owning that he's got a

deal of right on his side. But what he says ain't Orthodox Church

teaching."

"Mebbe not," said Dan Kidley, "but it's Passon Walden's teachin',

an' if you ain't 'eard Passon yet, Mister Bennett, I'd advise ye to

go next Sunday. An' if your lady 'ud make up her mind to go too just

for once---"

Bennett gave an expressive gesture.

"She won't go--you may depend on that!" he said; "She's had too much

of parsons as it is. Why Mrs. Fred--that's her American aunt--was

regular pestered with 'em coming beggin' of her for their churches

and their windows and their schools and their infants and their

poor, lame, blind, sick of all sorts, as well as for theirselves.

D'rectly they knew she was a millionaire lady' they 'adn't got but

one thought--how to get some of the millions out of her. There was

three secretaries kept when we was in London, and they'd hardly time

for bite nor sup with all the work they 'ad, refusin' scores of

churches and religious folks all together. Miss Maryllia's got a

complete scare o' parsons. Whenever she see a shovel-hat coming she

just flew! When she was in Paris it was the Catholics as wanted

money--nuns, sisters of the poor, priests as 'ad been turned out by

the Government,--and what not,--and out in America it was the

Christian Scientists all the time with such a lot of tickets for

lectures and fal-lals as you never saw,--then came the

Spiritooalists with their seeances; and altogether the Vancourt

family got to look on all sorts of religions merely as so many kinds

of beggin' boxes which if you dropped money into, you went straight

to the Holy-holies, and if you didn't you dropped down into the

great big D's. No!--I don't think anyone need expect to see my lady

at church--it's the last place she'd ever think of going to!"

This piece of information was received by his hearers with profound

gravity. No one spoke, and during the uncomfortable pause Bennett

gave a careless 'Good-night!'--and took his departure.

"Things is come to a pretty pass in this 'ere country," then said

Mr. Netlips grandiosely, "when the woman who is merely the elevation

of the man, exhibits in public a conviction to which her status is

unfitted. If the lady who now possesses the Manor were under the

submission of a husband, he would naturally assume the control which

is govemmentally retaliative and so compel her to include the

religious considerations of the minority in her communicative

system!"

Farmer Thorpe looked impressed, but slightly puzzled.

"You sez fine, Mr. Netlips,--you sez fine," he observed

respectfully. "Not that I altogether understands ye, but that's onny

my want of book-larnin' and not spellin' through the dictionary as I

oughter when I was a youngster. Howsomever I makes bold to guess wot

you're drivin' at and I dessay you may be right. But I'm fair bound

to own that if it worn't for Mr. Walden, I shouldn't be found in

church o' Sundays neither, but lyin' flat on my back in a field wi'

my face turned up to the sun, a-thinkin' of the goodness o' God, and

hopin' He'd put a hand out to 'elp make the crops grow as they

should do. Onny Passon he be a rare good man, and he do speak to the

'art of ye so wise-like and quiet, and that's why I goes to hear him

and sez the prayers wot's writ for me to say and doos as he asks me

to do. But if I'd been unfort'nit enough to live in the parish of

Badsworth under that old liar Leveson, I'd a put my fist in his

jelly face 'fore I'd a listened to a word he had to say! Them's my

sentiments, mates!--and you can read 'em how you like, Mr. Netlips.

God's in heaven we know,--but there's onny churches on earth, an' we

'as to make sure whether there's men or devils inside of 'em 'fore

we goes kneelin' and grubbin' in front of 'uman idols--Good-night

t'ye!"

With these somewhat disjointed remarks Farmer Thorpe strode out of

the tap-room, whistling loudly to his dog as he reached the door.

The heavy tramp of his departing feet echoed along the outside lane

and died away, and Roger Buggins, glancing at the sheep-faced clock

in the bar, opined that it was 'near closin' hour.' All the company

rose and began to take their leave.

"Church or no church, Miss Vancourt's a real lady!" declared Dan

Bidley emphatically--"She may have her reasons, an' good ones too,

for not attending service, but she ain't no heathen, I'm sartin'

sure o' that."

"You cannot argumentarially be sure of what you do not know," said

Mr. Netlips, with a tight smile, buttoning on his overcoat--"A

heathen is a proscription of the law, and cannot enjoy the rights of

the commons."

Dan stared.

"There ain't no proscription of the law in stayin' away from

church," he said--"Nobody's bound to go. Lords nor commons can't

compel us."

Mr. Netlips shook his head and frowned darkly, with the air of one

who could unveil a great mystery if he chose.

"Compulsion is a legal community," he said--"And while powerless to

bring affluence to the Christian conscience, it culminates in the

citizenship of the heathen. Miss Vancourt, as her father's daughter,

should be represented by the baptized spirit, and not by the

afflatus of the ungenerate! Good-night!"

Still puckering his brow into lines of mysterious suggestiveness,

the learned Netlips went his way, Roger Buggins gazing after him

admiringly.

"That man's reg'lar lost down 'ere,"--he observed--"He oughter ha'

been in Parliament."

"Ah, so he ought!" agreed Dan Ridley--"Where's there's fog he'd a

made it foggier, and where's there's no understandin' he'd a made it

less understandable. I daresay he'd a bin Prime Minister in no time-

-he's just the sort. They likes a good old muddler for that work--

someone as has the knack o' addlin' the people's brains an' makin'

them see a straight line as though'twere crooked. It keeps things

quiet an' yet worrity-like--first up, then down--this way, then that

way, an' never nothin' certain, but plenty o' big words rantin'

round. That's Netlips all over,--it's in the shape of his 'ed,--he

was born like it. I don't like his style myself,--but he'd make a

grand cab-nit minister!"

"Ay, so he would!" acquiesced Buggins, as he drew the little red

curtains across the windows of the tap-room and extinguished the

hanging lamp--"Easy rest ye, Dan!"

"Same to you, Mr. Buggins!" responded the tailor cheerfully, as he

turned out into the cool sweet dimness of the hawthorn-hedged lane

in which the 'Mother Huff' stood--"I make bold to say that church or

no church, Miss Vancourt's bein' at her own 'ouse 'ull be a gain an'

a blessing to the village."

"Mebbe so," returned Buggins laconically,--and closing his door he

barred it across for the night, while Dan Ridley, full of the half-

poetic, half philosophic thoughts which the subjects of religion and

religious worship frequently excite in a more or less untutored

rustic mind, trudged slowly homeward.

During these days, Maryllia herself, unconscious of the remarks

passed upon her as the lady of the Manor by her village neighbours,

had not been idle, nor had she suffered much from depression of

spirits, though, socially speaking, she was having what she

privately considered in her own mind 'rather a dull time.' To begin

with, everybody in the neighbourhood that was anybody in the

neighbourhood, had called upon her,--and the antique oaken table in

the great hall was littered with a snowy array of variously shaped

bits of pasteboard, bearing names small and great,--names of old

county families,--names of new mushroom gentry,--names of clergymen

and their wives in profusion, and one or two modest cards with the

plain 'Mr.' of the only young bachelors anywhere near for fifteen

miles round. Nearly every man had a wife--"Such a pity!" commented

Maryllia, when noting the fact--"One can never ask any of them to

dinner without their dragons!"

Most of the callers had paid their 'duty visits' at a time of the

afternoon when she was always out,--roaming over her own woods and

fields, and 'taking stock' as she said, of her own possessions,--but

on one or two occasions she had been caught 'in,' and this was the

case when Sir Morton Pippitt, accompanied by his daughter Tabitha,

Mr. Julian Adderley, and Mr. Marius Longford were announced just at

the apt and fitting hour of 'five-o'clock tea.' Rising from the

chair where she had negligently thrown herself to read for a quiet

half hour, she set aside her book, and received those important

personages with the careless ease and amiable indifference which was

a 'manner familiar' to her, and which invariably succeeded in making

less graceful persons than she was, feel wretchedly awkward and

unhappy about the management of their hands and feet. With a smiling

upward and downward glance, she mastered Sir Morton Pippitt's

'striking and jovial personality,'--his stiffly-carried upright

form, large lower chest, close-shaven red face, and pleasantly clean

white hair,--"The very picture of a Bone-Melter"--she thought--"He

looks as if he had been boiled all over himself--quite a nice well-

washed old man,"--her observant eyes flashed over the attenuated

form of Julian Adderley with a sparkle of humour,--she noticed the

careful carelessness of his attire, the artistic 'set' of his ruddy

locks, the eccentric cut of his trousers, and the, to himself,

peculiar knot of his tie.

"The poor thing wants to be something out of the common and can't

quite manage it," she mentally decided, while she viewed with

extreme disfavour the feline elegance affected by Mr. Marius

Longford, and the sleek smile, practised by him 'for women only,'

with which he blandly admitted her existence. To Miss Tabitha Pippit

she offered a chair of capacious dimensions, amply provided with

large down cushons, inviting her to sit down in it with a gentleness

which implied kindly consideration for her years and for the fatigue

she might possibly experience as a result of the drive over from

Badsworth Hall,--whereat the severe spinster's chronically red nose

reddened more visibly, and between her thin lips she sharply

enunciated her preference for 'a higher seat,--no cushions, thank

you!' Thereupon she selected the 'higher seat' for herself, in the

shape of an old-fashioned music-stool, without back or arm-rest, and

sat stiffly upon it like a draper's clothed dummy put up in a window

for public inspection. Maryllia smiled,--she knew that kind of woman

well;--and paying only the most casual attention to her for the rest

of the time, returned to her own place by the open windows and began

to dispense the tea, while Sir Morton Pippitt opened conversation by

feigning to recall having met her some two or three years back. He

was not altogether in the best of humours, the sight of his recently

dismissed butler, Primmins, having upset his nerves. He knew how

servants 'talked.' Who could tell what Primmins might not say in his

new situation at Abbot's Manor, of his former experiences at

Badsworth Hall? And so it was with a somewhat heated countenance

that Sir Morton endeavoured to allude to a former acquaintance with

his hostess at a Foreign Office function.

"Oh no, I don't think so," said Maryllia, lazily dropping lumps of

sugar into the tea-cups--"Do you take sugar? I ought to ask, I

know,--such a number of men have the gout nowadays, and they take

saccharine. I haven't any saccharine,--so sorry! You do like sugar,

Mr. Adderley? How nice of you!" And she smiled. "None for you, Mr.

Longford? I thought not. You, Miss Pippitt? No! Everybody else, yes?

That's all right! The Foreign Office? I think not, Sir Morton,--I

gave up going there long ago when I was quite young. My aunt, Mrs.

Fred Vancourt, always went--you must have met her and taken her for

me, I always hated a Foreign Office 'crush.' Such big receptions

bore one terribly--you never see anybody you really want to know,

and the Prime Minister always looks tired to death. His face is a

study in several agonies. Two or three years ago? Oh no,--I don't

think I was in London at that time. And you were there, were you?

Really!"

She handed a cup of tea with a bewitching smile and a 'Will you

kindly pass it?' to Julian Adderley, who so impetuously accepted the

task she imposed upon him of acting as general waiter to the

company, that in hastening towards her he caught his foot in the

trailing laces of her gown and nearly fell over the tea-tray.

"A thousand pardons!" he murmured, righting himself with an effort--

"So clumsy of me!"

"Don't mention it!" said Maryllia, placidly--"Will you hand bread-

and-butter to Miss Pippitt, Do you take hot cake, Sir Morton?"

Sir Morton's face had become considerably redder during this

interval, and, as he spread his handkerchief out on one knee to

receive the possible dribblings of tea from the cup he had begun to

sip at somewhat noisily, he looked as he certainly felt, rather at a

loss what next to say. He was not long in this state of indecision,

however, for a bright idea occurred to him, causing a smile to

spread among his loose cheek-wrinkles.

"I'm sorry my friend the Duke of Lumpton has left me," he said with

unctuous pomp. "He would have been delighted--er--delighted to call

with me to-day--"

"Who is he?" enquired Maryllia, languidly.

Again Sir Morton reddened, but managed to conceal his discomfiture

in a fat laugh.

"Well, my dear lady, he is Lumpton!--that is enough for him, and for

most people--"

"Really?--Oh--well--of course!--I suppose so!" interrupted Maryllia,

with an expressive smile, which caused Miss Tabitha's angular form,

perched as it was on the high music-stool, to quiver with spite, and

moved Miss Tabitha's neatly gloved fingers to clench like a cat's

claws in their kid sheaths with an insane desire to scratch the fair

face on which that smile was reflected.

"He is a charming fellow, the Duke-charming-charming!" went on Sir

Morton, unconscious of the complex workings of thought in his

elderly daughter's acidulated brain! "And his great 'chum,' Lord

Mawdenham, has also been staying with us--but they left Badsworth

yesterday, I'm sorry to say. They travelled up to London with Lady

Elizabeth Messing, who paid us a visit of two or three days--"

"Lady Elizabeth Messing!" echoed Maryllia, with a sudden ripple of

laughter--"Dear me! Did you have her staying with you? How very nice

of you! She is such a terror!"

Mr. Marius Longford stroked one of his pussy-cat whiskers

thoughtfully, and put in his word.

"Lady Elizabeth spoke of you, Miss Vancourt, several times," he

said. "In fact"--and he smiled--"she had a good deal to say! She

remembers meeting you in Paris, and--if I mistake not--also at

Homburg on one occasion. She was surprised to hear you were coming

to live in this dull country place--she said it would never suit you

at all--you were altogether too brilliant--er--" he bowed--" and er-

-charming!" This complimentary phrase was spoken with the air of a

beneficent paterfamilias giving a child a bon-bon.

Maryllia's glance swept over him carelessly.

"Much obliged to her, I'm sure!" she said--"I can quite imagine the

anxiety she felt concerning me! So good of her! Is she a great

friend of yours?"

Mr. Longford looked slightly disconcerted.

"Well, no," he replied--"I have only during these last few days--

through Sir Morton--had the pleasure of her acquaintance--"

"Mr. Longford is not a 'society' man!" said Sir Morton, with a

chuckle--"He lives on the heights of Parnassus--and looks down with

scorn on the browsing sheep in the valleys below! He is a great

author!"

"Indeed!" and Maryllia raised her delicately arched eyebrows with a

faint movement of polite surprise--"But all authors are great

nowadays, aren't they? There are no little ones left."

"Oh, yes, indeed, and alas, there are!" exclaimed Julian Adderley,

flourishing his emptied tea-cup in the air before setting it back in

its saucer and depositing the whole on a table before him; "I am one

of them, Miss Vancourt! Pray be merciful to me!"

The absurd attitude of appeal he assumed moved Maryllia to a laugh.

"Well, when you look like that I guess I will!" she said playfully,

not without a sense of liking for the quaint human creature who so

willingly made himself ridiculous without being conscious of it--

"What is your line in the small way?"

"Verse!" he replied, with tragic emphasis--"Verse which nobody

reads--verse which nobody wants--verse which whenever it struggles

into publication, my erudite friend here, Mr. Longford, batters into

pulp with a sledge-hammer review of half-a-dozen lines in the

heavier magazines. Verse, my dear Miss Vancourt!--verse written to

please myself, though its results do not feed myself. But what

matter! I am happy! This village of St. Rest, for example, has

exercised a spell of enchantment over me. It has soothed my soul! So

much so, that I have taken a cottage in a wood--how melodious that

sounds!--at the modest rent of a pound a week. That much I can

afford,--that much I will risk--and on the air, the water, the nuts,

the berries, the fruits, the flowers, I will live like a primaeval

man, and let the baser world go by!" He ran his fingers through his

long hair. "It will be an experience! So new--so fresh!"

Miss Tabitha sniffed sarcastically, and gave a short, hard laugh.

"I hope you'll enjoy yourself!" she said tartly--"But you'll soon

tire. I told you at once when you said you had decided to spend the

summer in this neighbourhood that you'd regret it. You'll find it

very dull."

"Oh, I don't think he will!" murmured Maryllia graciously; "He will

be writing poetry all the time, you see! Besides, with you and Sir

Morton as neighbours, how CAN he feel dull? Won't you have some more

tea?"

"No, thank you!" and Miss Pippitt rose,--"Father, we must be going.

You have not yet explained to Miss Vancourt the object of our

visit."

"True, true!" and Sir Morton got out of his chair with some

difficulty--"Time flies fast in such fascinating company!" and he

smiled beamingly--"We came, my dear lady, to ask you to dine with us

on Thursday next at Badsworth Hall." No words could convey the

pomposity which Sir Morton managed to infuse into this simple

sentence. To dine at Badsworth was, or ought to be, according to his

idea, the utmost height of human bliss and ambition. "We will invite

some of our most distinguished neighbours to meet you,--there are a

few of the old stock left--" this as if he were of the 'old stock'

himself;--"I knew your father--poor fellow!--and of course I

remember seeing you as a child, though you don't remember me--ha-

ha!--but I shall be delighted to welcome you under my roof--"

"Thanks so much!" said Maryllia, demurely--"But please let it be for

another time, will you? I haven't a single evening disengaged

between this and the end of June! So sorry! I'll come over to tea

some day, with pleasure! I know Badsworth. Dear old place!--quite

famous too, once in the bygone days--almost as famous as Abbot's

Manor itself. Let me see!" and she looked up at the ceiling

musingly--"There was a Badsworth who fought against the

Commonwealth,--and there was another who was Prime Minister or

something of that kind,--then there was a Sir Thomas Badsworth who

wrote books--and another who did some wonderful service for King

James the First--yes, and there were some lovely women in the

family, too--I suppose their portraits are all there? Yes--I thought

so!"--this as Sir Morton nodded a blandly possessive affirmative--

"How things change, don't they? Poor old Badsworth! So funny to

think you live there! Oh, yes! I'll come over--certainly I'll come

over,--some day!"

Thus murmuring polite platitudes, Maryllia bade her visitors adieu.

Sir Morton conquered an inclination to gasp for breath and say

'Damn!' at the young lady's careless refusal of his invitation to

dinner,--Miss Tabitha secretly rejoiced.

"I'm sure I don't want her at Badsworth," she said within herself,

viciously--"Nasty little insolent conceited thing! I believe her

hair is dyed, and her complexion put on! A regular play-actress!"

Unconscious of the spinster's amiable thoughts, Maryllia was holding

out a hand to her.

"Good-bye!" she said--"So kind of you to come and see me! I'm sure

you think I must be lonely here. But I'm not, really! I don't think

I ever shall be,--because as soon as I have got the house quite in

order, I am going to ask a great many friends to stay with me in

turn. They will enjoy seeing the old place, and country air is such

a boon to London people! Good-bye!"--and here she turned to Marius

Longford--"I'm afraid I haven't read any of your books!--anyway I

expect they would be too deep for me. Wouldn't they?"

"Lord Roxmouth has been good enough to express his liking for my

poor efforts," he replied, with a slight covert smile--"I believe

you know him?"

"Oh, quite well--quite too well!" said Maryllia, without any

discomposure--"But what he likes, I always detest. Unfortunate,

isn't it! So I mustn't even try to read your works! You, Mr.

Adderley"--and she laughingly looked up at that gentleman, who, hat

in hand, was pensively drooping in a farewell attitude before her,--

"you are going to stop here all summer, aren't you? And in a

cottage! How delightful! Anywhere near the Manor?"

"I am not so happy as to have found a domicile on this side Eden!"

murmured Adderley, with a languishing look--"My humble hut is set

some distance apart,--about a mile beyond the rectory."

"Then your best neighbour will be the parson," said Maryllia, gaily-

-"So improving to your morals!"

"Possibly--possibly! "assented Adderley--" Mr. Walden is not exactly

like other parsons,--there is something wonderfully attractive about

him--"

"Something wonderfully conceited and unbearable, you mean!" snapped

out Sir Morton--"Come, come!--we must be off! The horses are at the

door,--can't keep them standing! Miss Vancourt doesn't want to hear

anything about the parson. She'll find him out soon enough for

herself. He's an upstart, my dear lady--take my word for it!--a

pretentious University prig and upstart! You'll never meet HIM at

Badsworth!--ha-ha-ha! Never! Sorry you can't dine on Thursday! Never

mind, never mind! Another time! Good-bye!"

"Good-bye!" and with a slight further exchange of salutations

Maryllia found herself relieved of her visitors. Of all the four,

Adderley alone looked back with a half-appealing smile, and received

an encouraging little nod for his pains--a nod which said 'Yes--you

can come again if you like!' The wheels of the Pippitt equipage

crunched heavily down the drive, and as the grating sound died away,

clear on the quiet air came the soft slow chime of the church-bells

ringing. It was near sunset,--and Walden sometimes held a short

simple service of evening prayer at that hour. Leaning against the

open window Maryllia listened.

"How pretty it is!" she said--"It must be the nearness of the river

that makes the tone of the bells so soft and mellow! Oh, what an

insufferable old snob that Pippitt is! And what a precious crew of

'friends' he boasts of! Lumpton, who, when he was a few years

younger, danced the skirt-dance in women's clothes for forty pounds

a night at a New York restaurant!--Mawdenham, who pawned all his

mother's jewels to pay his losses at Bridge--and Lady Elizabeth

Messing, who is such an abandoned old creature that her own married

daughters won't know her! Oh, dear! And I believe the Knighted Bone-

Boiler thinks they are quite good style! That literary man,

Longford, was a most unprepossessing looking object,--a friend of

Roxmouth's too, which makes him all the more unpleasant. And of

course he will at once write off and say he has seen me. And then--

and then-dear me! I wonder where Sir Morton picks these people up!

He doesn't like the parson here evidently--'a pretentious University

prig and upstart'--what a strong way of putting it!--very strong for

such a clean-looking old man! 'A pretentious University prig and

upstart' are you, Mr. Walden!" Here, smiling to herself, she moved

out into the garden and called her dog to her side--"Do you hear

that, Plato? Our next-door neighbour is a prig as well as a parson!-

-isn't it dreadful!" Plato looked up at her with great loving brown

eyes and wagged his plumy tail. "I believe he is,--and yet--yet all

the same, I think--yes!--I think, as soon as a convenient

opportunity presents itself, I'll ask him to dinner."