Читать книгу A Double Affair - Angela Margaret Thirkell - Страница 5

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The year waned and died amid the over-excitement of Christmas. To everyone’s joy the stopgap or locum went back to his own parish for a week and Mr. Choyce returned to his flock. During this time he was able to get estimates for the necessary repairs and painting and distempering for the vicarage and leave the rest in his affianced’s very capable hands. He also looked up a great many friends and acknowledged the many presents that had come to the vicarage in his absence. So full indeed were his days that he did not see as much of Miss Merriman as he would have wished, and had it not been for the thoughtfulness of Lady Graham in asking him to lunch or dinner when she and Sir Robert were out, they would never have had time to say all they had to say. Not quite all though and Miss Merriman looked forward with quiet happiness to their life in the vicarage when they would always be able to tell each other everything every day and never be tired of doing so.

But tempus, as a comedian now only remembered by the older among us said in a pantomime, does fuge. He lets the sands sift through his hour-glass with unfaltering hand and if the hours that have passed seem short or long to us, they are really all the same length. Though REALLY as Mrs. Morland said, emphasizing as usual the idea foremost in her fertile mind, they aren’t. She then tried to explain what she meant, but having rashly dragged in the word relativity was quite unable to do so.

The Thursday after Easter was chosen for the wedding, as both the consenting parties felt that Holy Week and Easter Day would be no bad preparation for the vows they were going to make. Also because it suited the Dean who was going to conduct the ceremony. As for Canon Bostock, who was to assist the Dean, he would willingly have given up any previous engagement for the pleasure of forwarding Lady Graham’s plans, having a great affection and admiration for her in an honourable way.

By the greatest good luck the stopgap vicar had liked nothing better than a bit of amateur painting and plastering and accepted with enthusiasm Miss Merriman’s tentative suggestion that he should keep an eye on the work done in the rooms which he was not using until such time as Mr. Choyce came back for good. Lady Graham wondered if this was wise and asked the builder’s foreman, rather privately, whether it upset his men or the work to have the Vicar always there.

“Bless you, my lady, not he,” said the foreman. “He likes it and we let him. The men like it too. The day he came down the ladder and put one leg into a pail of cream distemper, I’ll never forget it, my lady. The men they couldn’t keep from laughing, but the Reverend he just laughed too and he stood them beer all round when they’d cleared up the mess. The carpenter he took the trousers straight into Barchester on his bike and they came up lovely at the cleaners. Lucky it was his old grey trousers and not his Sunday ones. So then he stood us beer all round again and we had a bit of a sing-song,” which reporting of life at the vicarage was very well received in the village and raised its opinion of the stopgap.

Then, on Mr. Adams’s instructions, did men come and lay down a piece of felt on the study floor and on it put the very handsome carpet with contraptions fastened under its four corners which would keep them from rolling up as corners are too apt to do. Then was the furniture polished within an inch of its life, the curtains which had been cleaned put up again, the Arundel prints re-hung. And, most important of all, Mr. Choyce’s books, which Miss Merriman had caused to be removed to another room during the repainting, were one by one cleaned from the accumulated dust of a bachelor’s house. With the help of Mrs. Carter from the Old Manor House and one or two other friends each book was opened, slapped together again to drive out the dust, well dusted along its top and replaced on its shelf, which had also been well dusted. As Miss Merriman had piled them neatly in heaps, a shelf at a time, there was no difficulty in putting them back in their proper places. There was one moment of alarm when a volume of Gibbon was missing, but it turned up a few days later among the volumes of Gregorovius’ Rome in the Middle Ages. And as these had not yet been dusted, we can only suppose that Mr. Choyce had absent-mindedly put it there himself.

So when Mr. Choyce came home everything would be shiningly clean and tidy for him and nothing out of its place. His cat, who had kept aloof from the workmen, taking umbrage at finding the lower orders in Its house, came back like the Prodigal son, except that It had obviously fed very well while away, but whether in someone’s cottage, or several people’s cottages, or simply by poaching, was never discovered. Mr. Choyce’s one anxiety had been that his cat might not take easily to a mistress, having been so long accustomed to a bachelor life. But he had underestimated his cat’s fine selfishness. A cat likes to sit on people’s laps, particularly of course on women’s because of their skirts. Its one complaint, as its friends at the Tiles Club knew only too well, was that Mr. Choyce hadn’t a proper lap to sit on. Even if he had his cassock on there was apt to be a buckle, a thing no self-respecting cat could be expected to tolerate. But Miss Merriman had a nice comfortable lap and no objections to his occupying it, so he transferred his venal affections to her for good and boasted about it a good deal at his various night clubs, saying loudly that of course a woman’s name was sacred but he knew one woman who understood him and appreciated his finer nature and never troubled to sit up for him. For nothing, he said, was more annoying for a Tom than to come home tired in the early hours and find people bothering about him. Not that he was ever troubled in this way, for Mr. Choyce had constructed for him, down in the skirting board of the study, a Cat-Flap which he could push open from the outside and so enter the house without disturbing any one. But this he did not tell his friends, for to have a low fellow one had only met by chance at the club coming unasked into His house would be unbearable.

Miss Merriman’s last two or three weeks at Holdings might have become rather wearing, now that everything was prepared and her occupation gone. But the wedding presents were still coming in and the arrears of thank-you letters growing, so she set herself to answering them all as well as helping Lady Graham with her considerable correspondence, which at the moment still consisted largely of acceptances for the wedding. These had to be carefully gone through because it was doubtful whether the church would hold everyone. There was even a moment when Lady Graham, with a weakness quite unlike her, began to consider the cathedral, but the blood was strong, the heart was Leslie and Pomfret, so Hatch End it was. To her own quiet amusement Miss Merriman found that she was gradually arranging the whole of her wedding, just as she would have quietly arranged any other party that Lady Graham thought of giving. Whether Lady Graham noticed this, we cannot say.

The next stirring event was the final return of Mr. Choyce to his renovated vicarage a few days before the ceremony. Hardly had he unpacked his suitcase and begun to look at the improvements when a deputation from the village headed by Mr. Geo. Panter of the Mellings Arms appeared in front of the house, so he went to the front door and asked them to come in. This invitation caused those behind to cry Forward and those in front to cry Back, just as Lord Macaulay so well describes the Roman crowd doing in Horatius.

“If it’s all the same to you, sir,” said Mr. Panter, “we’ll come in the back way. The foreman he was having a glass with us at the Arms last night and he said see the Vicar we must, but not to go in by the front door because the hall floor was still a bit tacky like.”

Realizing that he was a mere puppet for the present, Mr. Choyce obligingly went round to the back door, where such a rubbing of boots on the door mat took place as considerably delayed the entrance of the party.

“The first thing,” said Mr. Choyce, when he had got them all into the kitchen passage, “is some beer. If you will wait in the kitchen I’ll get some. Come in and sit down.”

The deputation, looking extremely sheepish, filed into the kitchen where Geo. Panter, Vidler the Fish, and Caxton, the Hallidays’ estate carpenter, hitched their trousers at the knee and sat stiffly down on the three kitchen chairs, while the rest of the party leaned against the dresser and the chimney piece, for the kitchen fire had not yet been lighted. Mr. Choyce went to the little scullery and brought out six bottles of beer.

“It’s all I’ve got in the house today,” he said, “so let’s drink it.”

His guests all looked at one another.

“Well, sir, it’s this way,” said Geo. Panter with a kind of quiet desperation. “We’ve brought a present for you. What about bringing it in?” he added, addressing his followers.

Two men, recognized by the Vicar as the local poachers, slouched out of the room and came back with a fair-sized barrel. A third man followed them with what we can only describe as a barrel-stand, not knowing its technical name, on which they put the barrel. There was then an embarrassed silence which Mr. Choyce broke by saying what a nice solid barrel-stand that was and he wished he had one like it.

“Well, in a manner of speaking, sir, you have,” said Geo. Panter. “What I say is, what’s the good of a barrel without you’ve something to put it on. That’s right, boys, isn’t it?”

Murmurs from his friends, who had obviously been coached in their parts, arose, such as “That’s right,” and “Without you’ve got a barrel-stand where do you put the barrel?” and “If a man’s got a barrel it stands to reason he’ll need a barrel-stand,” with several other variants on the same theme.

“So Caxton here, he had a nice bit of wood in his shop and he made it,” said Geo. Panter, unable to contain himself and suddenly giving everything away.

“And nice bit of wood it is,” said Caxton, surveying it with something of the pleasant melancholy a father may have when giving his favourite daughter away. “A pleasure to work with, that wood was. You treat her well, sir, and she’ll see you into your grave and all your children too.”

“But I haven’t got any,” said Mr. Choyce.

“Lord bless you, sir, not yet of course,” said Vidler the Fish. “Another nine months, sir, and we’ll see,” which remark was followed by a kind of Noises Off while each visitor told the man next to him that he’d been a six months child himself and the doctor said his parents would never rear him but look at him now, or the doctor had said he’d never live weighing only three pounds the way he did and look at him now, and from Vidler the Fish that his father and mother had been married eighteen years and never a child till the old woman over Starveacres way sold them a charm for a bottle of gin and look at him now.

“Ar, but your father and mother are dead now,” said Geo. Panter. “My old mother’s alive and a gormed old nuisance she is.”

Much as Mr. Choyce would have liked to hear more of these simple village chronicles, he had work to do. His own small stock of beer was finished, so he dismissed his kind friends and went on with his unpacking. We need hardly say that before long Miss Merriman joined him, saying that she had driven over with Lady Graham who wanted to see Mrs. Carter at the Old Manor House, so she had come on to the vicarage and Lady Graham would pick her up. They had a delightful talk—perhaps a little dull to us—about further improvements to the kitchen and whether it would be worth while having a fridge—for as that horrible word has come to stay one might as well use it. Mr. Choyce boasted about the barrel of beer on its stand, rather proudly, though not because it was a fine upstanding affair so much as in affectionate gratitude to the friends who had subscribed for it and made the stand and filled the cask with beer.

“And I have something for you, Herbert—”

“I do like to hear you say Herbert,” said her betrothed.

“And I love saying it,” said Miss Merriman, “but what I wanted to tell you is that Mr. Adams, whom I saw at the Towers, asked me to give you this,” and she handed him an envelope carefully licked up by her.

“Shall I open it?” said Mr. Choyce.

“Oh, do. I am longing to know what it is,” said Miss Merriman, which was not exactly telling a lie, because even if she had already seen Mr. Adams’s munificent cheque it had been rather in the nature of eavesdropping and she wanted Mr. Choyce to be able to surprise her—or to think that he did.

“A cheque!” said Mr. Choyce. “How kind. How very kind. But I can hardly take it.”

Miss Merriman, who had rather expected some trouble of a Quixotic nature, asked why.

“I don’t really deserve it,” he said. “Mr. Adams hardly knows me. I do not see how I can accept it.”

“I don’t know what it is,” said Miss Merriman, telling a whopping lie, “but Mr. Adams said it was in trust for you to use for the church. Nothing personal, Herbert.”

“I do like it when you say Herbert,” said Mr. Choyce. “Of course if it is for the church I accept it gladly. How stupid I am. Of course Adams would not give money to me.”

Miss Merriman said she supposed that would be simony, which ignorance her betrothed thought the most charming remark he had ever heard. Then she asked how much it was and put on an excellent presentation of someone being extremely surprised, which entirely deceived Mr. Choyce. And we think she was right.

Then they went to the study where Mr. Choyce was quite overcome by the richness of the new carpet which Miss Merriman described, quite correctly, as a present to herself from Mr. Adams. The cat, who was dozing on the sunlight by the window, got up, stretched, and began to sharpen its claws on a chair leg. Mr. Choyce picked it up by the scruff of its neck and put it out of the room.

“I can’t have the furniture spoilt, even by Puss,” he said, and Miss Merriman, though she liked the cat, was glad to find that Mr. Choyce was not going to stand any nonsense from it in his renovated vicarage.

Then they walked across the garden, through the little gate into the churchyard, where Mr. Choyce stopped, looking upwards at the tower.

“You know, Dorothea,” he said, “this gift, this most kind gift of Mr. Adams’s, is a trust for me to use for the church. There are so many things I want. A new altar frontal, perhaps. The choir could do with new surplices—they are so darned and yellow. The stonework in the chancel does need cleaning badly and the stove is almost worn out. It is all most difficult. I almost wish that Mr. Adams in his kindness had specified his wishes as to its use—or even made it smaller. What do you think, my dear?”

Miss Merriman, who had really given considerable thought to this, said she had had one or two ideas if he would like to hear them. Luckily, she said, the altar did not need anything at present. The embroidered hangings were in good condition and the altar plate of good quality and quite enough for their wants. The vestry could certainly do with a good turn-out and repainting and the great iron stove that heated the church in winter had some ominous cracks in it. Of course a hundred pounds wouldn’t do everything, she said, which last piece of common sense impressed Mr. Choyce immensely.

“There is one thing, Herbert,” she went on, “but perhaps one oughtn’t to think about it.”

Mr. Choyce said that anything she thought must be right.

“Well, it’s the cushions or squabs or whatever you like to call them, in the pews,” said Miss Merriman. “You couldn’t know about them, Herbert, because you never sit in a pew. I can assure you that any stuffing there ever was has turned into lumps and knobs and places where there isn’t any stuffing at all. Lots of people bring a cushion, or even better an air-cushion, only then you have to blow it up outside the church, otherwise it would make the children laugh.”

She then looked at Mr. Choyce and was much distressed to see anguish written on his face.

“What is it, Herbert?” she said, wondering if her strictures on the cushions had somehow touched him on the raw—though this seemed unreasonable.

“I cannot bear it,” said Mr. Choyce vehemently. “To think that you—that you of all people—should have had to suffer discomfort in the church where I minister. I have failed in my duties,” and so distraught did he appear that Miss Merriman, with hazy recollections of historic novels, half expected him to beat his breast and say Mea maxima culpa.

“If Lady Graham can stand it, I can,” said Miss Merriman stoutly. “She did once say something about having the cushions picked over, but nothing came of it.”

“Most certainly the remaking of the cushions shall be a first charge upon Mr. Adams’s gift,” said Mr. Choyce. “For you, dearest.”

“Then,” said Miss Merriman, rather cleverly we think, though not illogically, “you must have six new surplices to do justice to the new cushions.”

Mr. Choyce said surely two would be enough, but his betrothed was adamant, pointing out that if three were at the wash and one had a little tear in it, he would only have two left. And if there were only two, something was bound to happen to one of them, like the time when the laundry had starched them almost as stiff as a board and they had to be unwashed by Mrs. Panter and re-ironed.

“You think of everything, dearest,” said Mr. Choyce.

Miss Merriman said Why not ask Sir Robert Graham, as he was a churchwarden, and luckily Lady Graham drove up at that moment and finding Mr. Choyce there asked him to come back to Holdings and stay to lunch, an invitation which he accepted with pleasure, for he had always admired Lady Graham and though Miss Merriman must now take first place in his allegiance, Lady Graham would still have a throne of her own.

“Only just ourselves,” said Lady Graham. “Robert said he would be back to lunch and he does so want to see you. I do not quite know why, but it will be very nice,” which foolish words seemed to Mr. Choyce the very essence of kindness, as indeed they were intended to be. Then they were at Holdings and went indoors. Lady Graham said they would have some sherry and rang the bell; an act of glad confident courage which deeply impressed her guest. Odeena appeared.

“Sherry in the drawing-room, Odeena,” said Lady Graham, “and tell Cook we shan’t be ready for lunch for a quarter of an hour. Is Sir Robert in?”

“I’m sure I couldn’t say, my lady,” said Odeena, apparently imagining that Lady Graham suspected her of having secreted him in a cupboard. “Shall I ask Cook?”

“No,” said Lady Graham, quite kindly. “Go and look in Sir Robert’s study and if he isn’t there, ring the outside bell.” For an old bell with a long wrought-iron handle was fixed to an outer wall, with a little wooden penthouse over it, and was used to warn the family of meals when they were in the garden or the stables or the piggery or even—if the wind were in the right direction—on the river.

“Yes, my lady,” said Odeena and went away.

“I have never heard her say My Lady before,” said Mr. Choyce, considerably impressed.

“I don’t think anyone had,” said Lady Graham. “It was Mrs. Carter who thought of it. You know, that nice Mrs. Carter at the Old Manor House. She has had the same trouble with her foreign servants about speaking properly to people. So she very kindly took Odeena to the Barchester Odeon to a film about a sort of Scarlet Pimpernel hero where everyone said Sir or Madam and danced minuets on the slightest provocation. Of course Odeena came back perfectly enraptured and we have had nothing but Sirs and Madams ever since.”

Miss Merriman, nearly always practical, asked if Lady Graham thought it would last.

“Now that it has begun, it is going to last,” said Lady Graham firmly.

Then Sir Robert, summoned by the bell, came in and shook hands warmly with his vicar, saying how glad they all were to see him back, and they went in to lunch.

It was a very comfortable party of four who temporarily had a strong common interest, namely the approaching marriage and how nice it was of the Dean to marry them and how nice it was that Mr. Gresham would be best man, and the wedding was discussed all through lunch in an impartial way, each speaker trying to see it from someone else’s point of view. Miss Merriman waited to get round to the question of how best to spend Mr. Adams’s gift, but every time a change or a gap in the conversation seemed to make this possible someone was sure to sidetrack it. But while Odeena was out of the room fetching the pudding, Mr. Choyce, summoning up his courage and remembering that though he was not the Vicar of God on earth he was Vicar of Hatch End (which seemed to him the higher point of honour), told Sir Robert about Mr. Adams’s cheque.

“Adams, eh?” said Sir Robert. “Never could abide the man, but he’s a very good citizen and a remarkable character. Selfmade of course and it does him credit. Glad one of my daughters didn’t marry him, all the same.”

“But Robert, they couldn’t,” said Lady Graham.

“Of course they couldn’t,” said Robert. “No one asked them to, my dear. Well, Vicar, what are your ideas?”

“Dorothea—I mean Miss Merriman—” said Mr. Choyce—

“Never knew your Christian name, Merry,” said Sir Robert. “Never thought about it. A charming name. Much better than Dodo.”

This introduction of an unknown quantity struck the party almost dumb.

“Do you mean Rose’s mother?” said Lady Graham. “She is dead, you know.”

“Of course she’s dead,” said Sir Robert. “Didn’t I go to her funeral and have to stand half an hour in the rain with my hat off. Can’t think what made me think of her. She was Dorothy,” he added, turning courteously to Miss Merriman, “and you, I learn, are Dorothea.”

Miss Merriman admitted it, with a smile to her betrothed, who said, rather nervously, that the heroine of George Eliot’s Middlemarch was Dorothea and called Dodo.

“Eliot? I thought he wrote about religious things,” said Sir Robert. “Murder of Becket and all that. More in your line, Choyce, eh?”

Mr. Choyce, flattered by being drawn into this discussion, and how surprised he was in reading a recent life of Becket to find that he was nearly seven feet high, which, he said, seemed to him impossible.

“Ah well, Choyce, you know we are told that to God all things are possible,” said Sir Robert. “What the dickens were we talking about, my dear?” he added, turning to his wife.

“How best to spend Mr. Adams’s generous gift to the church,” said Lady Graham. “The money he gave to Mr. Choyce for it.”

“Then,” said Sir Robert, looking accusingly at the company, “we’d better discuss it. Miss Merriman, will you tell us what your feelings are,” he added, very courteously.

Miss Merriman, always mistress of herself, said quietly that she had suggested some new cushions for the pews, or at any rate that they should be renovated, as they were so very lumpy.

“Excellent idea,” said Sir Robert. “Only one thing against it. We had that bed on the top floor made over—the one your mother’s maid Conque had—” he added, turning to his wife, “and in a year or so it was just as bad.”

“If I might make a suggestion,” said Mr. Choyce, “would it not perhaps be better to have new cushions made of that stuff like rubber sponges? They had some in the church where I was taking my friend’s duties for a time lately and I thought them excellent. Very comfortable and do not collect fluff and dust as ours do. They have covers of some kind of plastic or rubber that only need to be sponged, or even wiped with a damp cloth, so there is never any dust or fluff flying about. When the League of Church Helpers beat our cushions once a year they have to tie handkerchiefs over their mouths and noses. I believe the rubber ones are expensive but they will last more or less for ever. Latex? I believe that is the name. Or if not, it is something like it,” he added cautiously.

“Now who was it who used to say he always liked to hear persons talk because you were bound to get a surprise somewhere?” said Sir Robert. “Extraordinary how one forgets things. I believe it was Adams. That man crops up wherever you go. Well, it’s your cheque, Vicar, and what you say goes. Does everyone agree on this?” and he looked round the table, as he had looked round so many tables at so many meetings.

“Then the Ayes have it,” said Sir Robert, who was celebrated for managing to ignore the No faction on any measure which had his approval, yet somehow without giving offence. “There’s a man on one of my boards who has a large interest in whatever that stuff is. I’ll get him to send a man and give us an estimate, Vicar. Trade price, of course.”

“If,” said Mr. Choyce, with unusual diffidence, “there were some money left over, would it perhaps be possible to put a small stone, or a brass plate, above the Holdings pew, to mark where Lady Emily Leslie used to sit while she was living here? I think the village would like it. I would.”

“Oh, Mr. Choyce, how very kind of you,” said Lady Graham, gently dabbing her eyes. “Darling Mamma. She did so love your services.”

“And I loved and honoured her presence at them,” said Mr. Choyce. “But one never knew what she would do next,” which words broke the slight sentiment and everyone laughed—though most lovingly—remembering Lady Emily’s various intromissions and her habit of winding herself in scarves only to unwind herself again and her sometimes too audible comments on the service; though only upon the words that were being read or sung, never upon the officiant.

So it was decided that Mr. Adams’s gift should be put to these two uses and the money left over—if there were any—to be used for the general upkeep of graves, which all led to a very interesting conversation about cemeteries and their charm, Miss Merriman being adjudged the winner by her description of Brompton Cemetery when as a little girl she was staying with cousins near by, and on the west side you could walk on a long terrace overlooking a deep railway cutting, or run along the great curved corridors of the central building, and there was a tomb somewhere with the terrifying inscription “I am hiding in thee” so that the little girl Miss Merriman had been had nightmares about it.

It was a warm day for so early in April and Lady Graham said they might go and sit in the parlour, which faced the afternoon sun. So they went there and it was quite pleasant, even with one of the glass doors onto the terrace open. A noise, beginning far away, began to increase and become almost alarming.

“If it’s one of Pilward’s big lorries I’ll speak to him about it,” said Sir Robert. “I often see him at the Club,” for by now the County Club, a very old and once select Barchester institution with a handsome early nineteenth-century house in the middle of the city, had been forced to open its doors to many members who would never have been considered, nor indeed considered themselves, as eligible for election.

“It’s not a lorry,” said Mr. Choyce, who knew a good deal about motors though he could only afford a modest car. “It sounds to me more like a Hobgoblin. The new model. They’ve got the finest engines going and their body-work is first rate. It’s coming up the drive, I think,” and indeed the loud purring noise had increased and then died down with a comfortable hum to silence. Voices were heard and round the corner of the house Edith Graham came, almost running in her excitement, and hurled herself on her father and mother.

“Oh, mother, it’s marvellous,” she said. “Uncle David and Aunt Rose said we must come over to Merry’s wedding, so we flew over and Uncle David had ordered a new car in England so he cabled that he’d take delivery at the airport, so we came straight to you. Here they are.”

And there were Mr. and Mrs. David Leslie, much as we remember then when we last met, except that David was a little balder and perhaps a little stouter. His wife appeared to have come straight out of a beauty-parlour-cum-hairdresser-cum-dressmaker-cum-modiste and her silken legs were as unexceptionable as ever. There was a tremendous kissing and hugging and handshaking among the family and Miss Merriman wondered if she had better remove herself and her affianced till things were quieter, but the affectionate greetings of the newcomers put her mind quite at rest.

“Merry, my adored one, you look years, years younger,” said David.

Miss Merriman said, very quietly, that it was happiness.

“When you say that, my precious Merry, I am dancing with tears in my eyes,” said David, quoting a rather out-of-date song of nostalgic attractiveness.

“There is no need to,” said Miss Merriman.

“Bless your heart, Merry, it is like old times to be snubbed by you,” said David cheerfully. “Now tell me all.”

“You know quite well that you don’t want to hear,” said Miss Merriman quietly. “Mr. Choyce and I have known one another for a long time and are both very happy. And I am so glad you and your wife and Edith have come. I know Lady Emily would have liked it.”

David was silent for a moment, looking away towards the river.

“You know, Merry,” he said, “when we were coming up the drive I somehow wondered if I could see darling Mamma. I didn’t know I would go on missing her like this.”

“One does,” said Miss Merriman. “Even I do.”

“Don’t say ‘even’ like that,” said David indignantly. “You were nearer to her than anyone. Oh, she loved us more of course, because we were her children. But you were the rock among us all. Choyce, you are a lucky man,” to which Mr. Choyce, though much affected by David’s words, answered quietly that his luck and his happiness were more than he had ever imagined. Then he was drawn into the general conversation and there was a great noise of everyone speaking at once. Lady Graham wanted news of Rose Leslie’s children: Dorothy (after Rose’s redoubtable mother, Lady Dorothy Bingham, now no more), known in the family as Dodo, and Henry (after David’s father). Both were very well, said David, but it didn’t seem worth bringing them for so short a visit, especially as they both went to a day school now and would be having a wonderful holiday in a Children’s Camp, near a river. Lady Graham said wouldn’t they be homesick, or get drowned.

“Bless your soft heart, Agnes,” said David. “After all, they are ten years old or as near as makes no odds and citizens of the New World. Not the Brave New World which I cannot abide and long for four-wheelers and fogs and really poor people in rags and gin at twopence a go, but the New World, U.S.A. I must say that the joy of getting one’s darling children into holiday camps almost makes up for everything. And don’t say ‘Wicked One’ to me, Agnes, for I couldn’t bear it. It would remind me of Rushwater and Mamma” he added, looking away.

“Darling Mamma,” said Agnes. “One still misses her. David, tell me about Edith. We have missed her.”

“We shall miss her, too, when we go back,” said David. “Unless you want her to go back with us. We love having her,” but his sister said very firmly that Edith really must settle down at home now and find something to do.

“I expect you are right,” said David. “But you won’t find it easy to make her stick to anything. All our friends adored her and she had beaux—such a delicious expression—by the dozen. But she is unsatisfied. I don’t mean dissatisfied, I mean un. What the dickens the girl really wants, I don’t know. Rose thinks she ought to be married.”

“Rose has a very good head,” said Lady Graham. “So has Hermione. You remember her sister Hermione, David, when we had Martin’s seventeenth birthday dance at Rushwater. She married Lord Tadpole and lives almost entirely at their place near Tadcaster.”

“I am enchanted to hear it again,” said David. “But that isn’t exactly what I’m talking about. Aren’t there any beaux for Edith here?”

“Several,” said Lady Graham. “And likely to be more. Really a daughter can be very trying. Emmy and Clarissa married so sensibly when they were about her age, or perhaps a little older, and they are so happy. Edith is an anxiety to me. There are at least three young men who are fond of her—though how deep it goes I couldn’t say.”

David enquired with real interest, who they were.

“Well, that nice George Halliday for one,” said Lady Graham. “His father died, you know, and he is running the farm and being a good landlord. It’s a lonely life for him. His mother goes away a good deal to relations, but I think he feels less lonely when he is alone.”

“Therefore post hoc and ergo propter hoc,” said David, “he ought to marry Edith.”

“And if you really want to hear about the others,” said Lady Graham, ignoring his last words, “there is that nice young Crosse, Lord Crosse’s son over at Crosse Hall. He is in a bank and has prospects. I like him.”

“That is rather a help,” said David.

“Oh, but I like poor George Halliday too. Very much,” said Lady Graham with decision.

“Well, we’ll leave it at that,” said David, who was beginning to feel a little bored already, as indeed he had always been too quickly and easily bored if decisions had to be made; but never by his Rose. “And who is the tertium quid?”

“But can’t you see?” said Lady Graham. “And they are quite distant cousins.”

“Not that boy of the Duke of Towers?” said David, “though when I say boy he isn’t all that young. I hated him at dancing class when we were small. Thank God we didn’t go to the same public school.”

“Of course not,” said Agnes with some dignity. She looked round, and seeing that the rest of the party were busily talking, she said, “Ludo, of course.”

“If there were a garden path here, I would sit down on it,” said David. “Agnes, you don’t really mean it?”

“I shouldn’t have said it if I didn’t,” said Agnes, without rancour, merely as one stating an ineluctable fact. “I don’t think either of them know it. I can’t tell you what Sandhurst has done for Ludo and he will be passing into the Brigade soon.”

“And very nice too, darling,” said David. “There is still a faint aroma of Ouida about the Brigade.”

“Robert says—” Agnes began.

“Bless your heart, I was wondering how soon you would say that,” said David. “Rose never says David says to any one. She says I told David—”

“Which I am sure is very good for you,” said his sister.

“Leaving that aside for the moment,” said David, “what does Merry think?”

“Now, I will not have Merry bothered,” said Lady Graham. “She is just going to be married and has quite enough to think of without our private worries. Ludo is a darling and he will, we hope, be in the Foot Guards. But Robert will arrange all that. And they are both very young. Edith is nearly nineteen. Mellings a little older,” and she looked away into some far distance.

“Well, if it prove a girl, the boy Will have plenty, so let it be,” said David. “And that, darling Agnes, is Lord Tennyson. Don’t meddle too much.”

“I never meddle,” said Lady Graham with great dignity. “And as for money, if that is what you mean, I should think Ludo will have to work pretty hard. Death duties are killing England. Of course Robert has been insuring against them and doing everything legal he can to make it easier. I daresay Gillie has too, but if you make all the best arrangements about your property and make it over to your heir, then he dies first—or is killed in the next war in Ludo’s case—and there you are without a son and all the death duties to pay.”

To this David could not at once make any answer. Never before had he seen his beloved elder sister so moved, and to be moved was not part of his scheme for himself.

“And now we must talk about Merry’s wedding,” said Lady Graham, getting up and joining the rest of the party. “How are the arrangements going, Mr. Choyce?”

“Excellently as far as I know,” said the vicar. “I can’t tell you, Lady Graham, how kind people have been. You and the Pomfrets and Mr. Adams whom I hardly know, and so many other friends. And Panter at the Mellings Arms has given me a delightful present. A fur foot-muff for the winter, when I am trying to compose my sermon—for I made it a rule quite soon after taking Holy Orders to prepare my sermon on paper but to speak it extempore. It is made of quite beautiful skins. I cannot tell you how touched I was. I fear it may have cost a good deal.”

“Good old Panter,” said David aside to Sir Robert. “I don’t know a man in West Barsetshire that can trap rabbits—and hares—as he does—and cure them too,” to which Sir Robert only answered by a smile; but to anyone who knew him that smile would have meant as much as Lord Burleigh’s nod.

At this moment Odeena appeared with a parcel.

“Please, my lady,” she said, “the post’s just come and there’s a parcel for Miss Merriman so I thought I’d better bring it at once.”

“Tell Cook,” said Lady Graham, “that we are three more for tea. Here is your parcel, Merry.”

“I don’t know the writing,” said Miss Merriman, trying as one so often does to guess who one’s correspondent is with absolutely nothing to go upon.

Sir Robert very sensibly suggested that if she opened it she would probably find the sender’s name inside.

“Besides, we are all panting to know who has given you what, Merry,” said David.

Encouraged by these remarks Miss Merriman undid the parcel and took out a book rather badly wrapped in a piece of tissue paper which had obviously seen use before.

“To use a very démodé phrase, I can’t wait to see what it is,” said David, to which his niece Edith replied that she wished Merry wouldn’t open it so that she could see what would happen to David. Probably there would have been a sparring match between David and his impertinent young niece, but all was forgotten when Miss Merriman uttered the words, “The Palace.”

“What do you mean, Miss Merriman?” said Rose. “Has the Queen sent you a present?”

“Oh, I don’t mean a real palace,” said Miss Merriman, “I mean the Close.”

There was a brief and pregnant silence.

“Do you mean the Bishop?” said Mr. Choyce.

“Well, it says on a card from them both, but I expect his secretary did it up,” said Edith, who had been looking at it over Miss Merriman’s shoulder. “It’s that book he wrote about their cruise to Madeira.”

There was complete silent for a moment.

“Let me see it for a moment, Edith,” said David. “I must say the Palace has surpassed itself. Second-hand copy. I can distinctly see the words two and sixpence which have been written in pencil on the back page and rubbed out rather carelessly by some one,” and he handed it back to her.

“Canon Joram’s butler Simnet always speaks of the bishop’s wife as the old cat,” said Lady Graham, addressing apparently the circumambient air, but looking gratified when people began to laugh.

“Even a cat wouldn’t do that,” said David indignantly. “I mean if it could it wouldn’t.”

A fascinating discussion then took place as to how such a present should be acknowledged and several suggestions were made.

“I shall write to the Bishopess and thank her so much for the kind thought,” said Miss Merriman firmly. “But I shall tell everyone, of course,” which statement was loudly applauded.

“And then,” she continued, “I shall give it to the next sale in aid of something. As she hasn’t written my name in it, I think I shall be justified.”

Her hearers agreed that this would be a good course to pursue and though they were sorry that Miss Merriman was going to be polite, they felt she was living up to her own standards and respected her. Then they all went in to tea and Miss Merriman, smiling at Mr. Choyce across the table, thought how delightful it would be when they were alone together at their meals in their own house.

After tea Rose and David Leslie bade an affectionate farewell to everyone and said Edith must come to America again soon, which she promised to do. They then drove off to The Towers and apparently thence to the whole of West Barsetshire, before going back to London for a play and supper at the newest night club. Lady Graham was sorry they had to go, but they promised to come for Miss Merriman’s wedding, and so drove away.

After the excitement of Edith’s homecoming and the lunch party, Lady Graham, having sent Miss Merriman upstairs to rest, felt that a short rest for herself would not be disagreeable, but first asked Edith what she would like to do.

“I know exactly what,” said Edith. “I’ll just hang up my new dresses that Rose gave me and then I’d frightfully like to go round the farm. Could we, father?”

Nothing could have been more pleasant, more flattering to Sir Robert. He also gave his daughter a good mark for hanging up her dresses instead of letting them lie about. Sir Robert had never, as we know through our long acquaintance with him, been a father who showed great outward affection for his children, but he thought much about them, none the less. That his boys were following or preparing to follow his own profession gave him much quiet satisfaction. Of his daughters the eldest, Emmy, had married Tom Grantly, son of the Rector of Edgewood, and they farmed at Rushwater with Martin Leslie, Agnes’s nephew. His second daughter, brilliant, charming, unsure of herself, had been won and tamed by Charles Belton of a family as good as any in Barsetshire, now a master at Harefield School. Now there was this youngest, naturally the spoilt one of the family, who had so far never stuck to anything. She was very young and her parents thought a visit to her Leslie cousins in America would help to civilize her. Well, in a way it had. She seemed to be her old affectionate self, with some experience and poise added, which was so far all to the good, and for these last Lady Graham felt the Pomfrets were largely responsible.

“But what are we going to do with Edith now, Robert?” said Lady Graham, when Edith had gone upstairs to unpack. “She went to stay at the Towers so that she could go into Barchester every day to learn estate management and just as we thought she was settling down to it, David and Rose asked her to go to America. And what she wants to do now I cannot imagine.”

“We shall just have to wait,” said Sir Robert. “I shan’t mind having a daughter at home for a bit. The last we’ve got, you know,” to which his wife replied that she wouldn’t mind having a daughter at home either, but Edith would have to do something, or she would never see any young people of her own age. Which seems now to be sadly true. “Are you ready, Edith?” he called up the stairs and in a moment down came Edith in her comfortable shabby English coat and skirt and her sensible brown shoes.

“You look very nice,” said her father approvingly. “Come on,” and off they went towards the farm where Sir Robert’s bailiff, Goble, was delighted to see Miss Edith safely back and to show her the latest additions to the pig-world, who were sixteen in number and all trying to have their tea at once while the beneficent donor of the tea lay flatly upon her huge side and looked malevolently at her owner and her daughter through her small eyes.

“I say, Goble, it’s lovely to smell pig again,” said Edith. “Rose and David have lots of friends in America with gardens but none of them had pigs like ours. How is Holdings Goliath?” to which Goble replied that handsome was as handsome did and if Miss Edith would come along she would see something. Accordingly they went to the far end of the pig-sties and there was the great boar, Holdings Goliath, lying on his side waiting to be scratched.

“Can I have your stick, father?” said Edith.

“You take mine, miss,” said Goble. “Sir Robert, he’ll be wanting to scratch old Goliath himself,” so father and daughter poked and scratched and tickled the great monster, who grunted his pleasure and from time to time turned his great bulk to indicate a fresh spot that required treatment.

Edith asked if Goble was entering any of the pigs for the Barsetshire Agricultural Show in the summer.

“Old Goliath he’s going up again,” said Goble, “and I’ve got a nice young boar I might send and I’m hoping for a nice lot of piglings. Her ladyship here,” he went on, pausing before a sty a little further along, “has done us proud” and he stood aside to let Edith see an immense matron, reposing on her side, surrounded and overrun by piglings. On seeing Goble all the piglings began to shriek for help, saying that they had had nothing to eat or drink since last Tuesday, which very untrue statement left Goble unmoved. Their mother, probably annoyed at being disturbed in her afternoon nap, ponderously rolled herself over and engulfed her brood, who however almost immediately reappeared on the far side of her bulk and re-arranged themselves for another meal.

“They are lovely, Goble,” said Edith, “I didn’t see anything in the least like them in America,” which in its literal sense was perfectly true, for if any of David’s friends had pigs, she had not seen them.

“No, nor you won’t, miss,” said Goble, “unless it was some of young Mr. Halliday’s pigs over at Hatch House. He’s got a tidy lot of little ’uns.”

“Thank you, Goble,” said a voice, and there was George Halliday. “Welcome home, Edith. I met Choyce in the village and he told me you were back. You are looking very nice. I thought you might come back looking like the American Vogue.”

Edith, who privately thought she did, was almost annoyed, but her real pleasure at seeing George got the upper hand and she welcomed him warmly.

“You’re the first friend I’ve met,” she said. “I only got back after lunch. Of course I don’t count Miss Merriman and Mr. Choyce.”

“I do,” said George stoutly. “But I’m very glad to see you. My mother always asks after you. She is still at Rushwater with Sylvia.”

Edith said she hoped she would go to Rushwater soon and see Mrs. Halliday. There was a pause. George Halliday had not expected to see Edith (as why should he when she had so lately arrived) and was trying to find his bearings. The pretty, pert, rather spoilt Edith had been replaced somehow by a better groomed and dressed Edith; one with poise (if one must use that word) rather than a slight cockiness. But where he stood he did not quite know.

“Was it fun in America?” said George.

“It was lovely,” said Edith. “Rose and David were angels to me.”

“And did you have heaps of beaux?” said George, having gathered from American literature that it was the right equivalent of admirers, or prétendants.

“Of course,” said Edith. “Rose wouldn’t have allowed me not to. I liked them all awfully, but I found them a bit young.”

“Young yourself,” said George cheerfully. “Wait a minute. I want to ask Goble about a tractor,” and at once he was deep in technical talk with the bailiff, Sir Robert standing by to see fair play.

To Edith, accustomed lately to homage, to gifts of flowers and what she still thought of as candies (soon to turn into sweets now that she was home again), this was almost the equivalent of a snub. The three men were having a pig-talk and no one was paying any attention to her. She turned away rather pettishly, didn’t look where she was going, and almost ran into a tall young man with a pleasing though rather melancholy face.

“Hi! hold up!” said her cousin Ludovic, otherwise Viscount Mellings.

“Ludo!” Edith shrieked, standing on tip-toe to kiss her tall cousin. “You’ve been growing again while I was away.”

“Wrong again,” said Lord Mellings. “It’s only because I stand up straight. You can’t slouch at the Shop. I’m only six foot two really, but there’s a fellow who’s six feet four and a half and he thinks he’s still growing.”

“Do you have to be tall in the Brigade?” said Edith. “When I see them marching it’s always the privates who are so tall and the officers are often quite un-tall,” over which last word she had hesitated, thinking “small” to be perhaps rather tactless.

“Oh, they take us as we come,” said Lord Mellings loftily. “Mother sent her love to everyone. I’m really here on business, a kind of ambassador. Uncle Roddy wants to know if Holdings Goliath will oblige, but he won’t hear of it unless your father will take a proper stud fee. It’s always better to do things on a business basis.”

At these very sensible and practical words, Edith almost burst. Here was she, just back from America and beaux and bouquets and in general a high old time, but when her cousin Ludo met her, fresh from her triumphs, all he wanted to talk about was a stud boar.

“Well, he’s over by Goliath’s sty, talking to George Halliday and Goble,” said Edith, rather sulkily.

“Good. I’ll go along and see what I can do,” said Lord Mellings and went off to the sty.

If Edith had been an amateur of melodrama, she might have said “Foiled Again.” But being a nice, rather spoilt young woman, she only kicked a stone into the side of the lane. This did her good, so she kicked it again.

“Hi, Edith! Look where you’re kicking,” said a cheerful voice, and there was Mr. Crosse, a pleasant friend to the Grahams for some years now and son of the widower Lord Crosse over at Crosse Hall.

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to kick you, John-Arthur,” said Edith, for somehow by this hyphened name young Mr. Crosse was known to most of his friends.

“Whom did you mean to kick, then?” said Mr. Crosse, not unreasonably.

“Oh, I don’t know—anybody,” said Edith, and suddenly she saw how silly it all was and began to laugh.

“That’s better,” said Mr. Crosse. “Come to the sties with me. Father wants me to ask Goble about some young pigs.”

So back to the sties they went, where George Halliday was talking to Goble about the tractor, while Lord Mellings waited his turn to enquire about getting Holdings Goliath in his capacity as future father to a large progeny whom he would probably never see and certainly would not recognize if he did. Mr. Crosse took his place in the queue to ask Goble about some young pigs. Sir Robert, intelligently interested in all these subjects, stood by as a kind of arbiter in case of need.

It was all too much. Edith would have liked to drown or stab herself on the spot just to show them what she thought of their behaviour and was only deterred by being at some distance from the river and not having a sword or knife. So she went away rather loftily, looking round from time to time to see if anyone had missed her. Busy talk with laughter from time to time reached her ears. A horrid prickling behind her eyes meant that she was going to cry, so she hurried back to the house, rushed upstairs to her bedroom, shut her door (though, we are glad to say on her behalf, not with a bang) and delivered herself to Misery. This was her welcome home! If people liked to talk about pigs, let them! If tractors were more important than politeness, that was that. If Holdings Goliath wanted to be the father of lots of piglets, well let him. She hated piglets and she hated Goliath and John-Arthur and Ludo and George Halliday. It then occurred to her that she also hated herself for being so silly, which made her laugh. It was rather a poor kind of laugh, but it helped, so she unpacked the rest of her luggage, laid or hung everything in its right place with her usual precise neatness, collected the presents she had brought from America for her family and the villagers, and then looked at her face in the glass.

“Idiot!” she said to it, and it looked as if it were saying Idiot back to her and they both laughed.

“Well, I’m sorry,” said Edith to her reflection, “but John-Arthur and Ludo and George were rather trying. Sherman Concord and Lee Sumpter wouldn’t have been so rude. I wish I was back in America,” she added defiantly. But somehow these words, instead of lashing her to further fury as she had meant them to do, made her laugh even more. And when she had laughed enough she went downstairs again, at peace with the world. It was nearly teatime now. She found her mother with Miss Merriman. Her own troubles and the slights put upon her were all forgotten in a moment and she asked how soon she could see the vicarage.

“At any time you like,” said Miss Merriman.

“Could we go after tea then?” said Edith. “Oh, and mother this is for you,” and she gave her mother a parcel wrapped and tied with a skilful prettiness that we have almost forgotten. In it was a soft silky scarf, warm, yet delicate enough to draw through a wedding ring. Lady Graham was delighted with the present and kissed the giver.

“Oh, and I’ve brought you a wedding present, Merry,” she said. “I do hope you will like it,” and she offered her a package wrapped in enchanting flowered paper and tied with the gayest of tinsel ribbons.

Miss Merriman undid the ribbon, smoothed it, rolled it neatly and put it aside. Then she unwrapped the parcel, smoothed and folded the pretty paper, undid the inner wrapping of tissue paper, and took out a grey silk bag, piped with silver, with three different silvery zip fasteners for three pockets containing a little of everything that a bride could want in the way of discreet made-up, powder, lotions, tissues and in fact all the things we want and never seem to have when we need them, including a special damp-proof compartment for the soft sponge and pretty face-cloths that were nestling there.

We regret to have to write it again, but facts are facts, and Miss Merriman did begin to cry. But she stopped almost at once and thanked Edith with a warmth that was perfectly truthful.

“I remember when I was engaged,” said Lady Graham, “someone sent me a lovely little crystal heart on a chain.”

“Who was it?” said Edith.

“I never really knew,” said Lady Graham. “There was no name in it, only a poem.”

Edith and Miss Merriman begged for the poem.

“It was quite silly,” said Lady Graham. “It said:

“ ‘Two little feet, unconscious they,

Trod on the heart of a man one day,

Two little feet ran gaily on,

But the heart of the man was for ever gone.’ ”

“Oh, mother!” said Edith, deeply surprised that anyone as old as her mother should have had so romantic an experience—for there is something about our beloved parents that sets them to us, quite apart from romance; just as we appear now to our children and so it will always go on. “Who was it?” but Lady Graham laughed and said it was all very old history now and might have been any one of several men with whom she had danced and who had come to her mother’s parties. Edith teased her mother for a little, but Lady Graham, though not resenting the teasing, would not tell. And if our reader thinks we are being unfair, we can only say that we have not had time to invent this prétendant to the lovely Agnes Leslie’s hand. If he existed we fear he must have been a Detrimental—delightful expression now no longer in use.

Miss Merriman then said that she must go to the vicarage and Edith asked if she might come too and see the improvements, which pleased Miss Merriman very much. So they walked down to the village, making a kind of royal progress as one old friend after another stopped Edith to ask if she had had a nice time, and whether she had seen their Jack who was in a lumber camp in Oregon, or their Doris whose husband was a builder in Houston, splendidly ignoring the improbability of Edith, whose visit had been limited to New York City and the surrounding country (a fairly large radius, given good roads and mammoth cars and two hundred miles as a pleasant afternoon’s run), having ever visited any of these places. But as none of her questioners had the faintest idea where in the United States these places were, no bones were broken.

Mrs. Panter at 6, Clarence Cottages, wife of George Halliday’s carter, who as usual was doing her ironing at the front door, partly because the light was better, partly to talk with any passing friends, was the next to see Edith, so she put her iron back on the stove and came out to shake hands.

“So you’re back, Miss Edith,” she said. “Nice to see you again.”

“It’s nice to see you too, Mrs. Panter,” said Edith and asked after the children.

“Still at school,” said Mrs. Panter, “and high time they wasn’t. If I’d been at school till I was their age, mother she’d have told the teacher what she thought of her. Trouble is they keep them at school too long, learning them things they don’t want to know,” with much of which Miss Merriman privately agreed, but felt it better not to say so.

“I brought some presents for you and the children, Mrs. Panter,” said Edith, offering her a parcel.

“Well, Miss Edith, that is a treat,” said Mrs. Panter. “It isn’t often I get presents. Can I open it?”

Without waiting for permission she carefully untied it, rolled up the pretty tinsel ribbon, and folded the pretty flowered wrapping paper. Not till this was done did she look at the contents.

“Oh, miss, they are lovely,” she said. And indeed very pretty they were. Printed scarves of gay colours for the girls, trappers’ caps made of sham fur for the boys, and for Mrs. Panter a long plastic clothes-line with plastic attachments for hanging the washing on.

“Oh, it’s lovely, miss,” said Mrs. Panter, deeply moved. “I’ll keep it wrapped up careful and only use it for the best wash. You know I do some of Mrs. Carter’s things at the Old Manor House. Her smalls are beautiful and real handsewn,” and then she picked up her iron and her visitors went on their way.

As they had to pass the church, Edith said she would like to go in and there was Mr. Choyce talking with the verger and delighted to see them.

“We were discussing flowers for the wedding,” he said. “I am not any good at that kind of thing.”

“Nor am I,” said Miss Merriman, “and I would rather marry you without flowers than have flowers and not marry you.”

“Lovely flowers there were when Miss Clarissa used to do them,” said the verger. “Lady Emily Leslie too, she always mentioned the flowers. And a rare time we had sometimes when her ladyship wanted to do the flowers a bit different. It was a happy time, miss, when her ladyship was living at Holdings.”

“It was,” said Miss Merriman. There was a silence, broken by Miss Merriman who said, “Herbert!”

“What, my dear?” said Mr. Choyce.

“What have we been thinking about?” said Miss Merriman. “Of course Mrs. Charles Belton—Clarissa that is—is coming to our wedding. Why shouldn’t we ask Lady Graham if Clarissa could come to Holdings for the night before the wedding and do the flowers for the church? There is nothing that she can’t turn to favour and to prettiness.”

“My dear, you are always right,” said Mr. Choyce, which words came so often from his mouth that his less reverent young friends made rather a joke of it, comparing his attitude to Miss Merriman (though in the most loving way) to Miss Betsy Trotwood’s attitude to Mr. Dick.

“Then I will ring her up from Holdings if Lady Graham agrees,” said Miss Merriman, though she had very little doubt of Lady Graham’s acquiescence in anything that could help to make the wedding glorious without and within.

Edith, who had been wandering about the church, came back to them and said she had been sitting in some of the pews and the cushions were far, far worse even than the cushions in the Holdings pew. This appeared to depress Mr. Choyce, who said he had been a careless shepherd in that he had allowed his flock to be in conditions of discomfort.

“Lord bless you, sir,” said the verger, “that’s nothing. Gives them something to think about. Makes them too comfortable and they’ll go to sleep.”

Miss Merriman said she believed people often did go to sleep in those old square pews, some of which had a fireplace in them, but it must have been very pleasant in winter. Then they told the verger about Mr. Adams’s generosity which was going to enable them to get new hygienic cushions for the pews. It was but natural that the verger should at once disapprove of so drastic a change, but when he saw how pleased Mr. Choyce and Miss Merriman were, he allowed his better self to get the upper hand and said anyway it would mean less dust as what with them cushions and the coal dust from the stove in winter a man was fair choked.

“Do you think, Herbert,” said Miss Merriman, “that Mr. Adams’s kind gift might run to a new stove as well?” Mr. Choyce was doubtful, but Miss Merriman determined to find out what could be done. Not at once of course, but quietly, as time went on.

Then Mr. Choyce went into the vicarage and Miss Merriman with Edith walked back to Holdings, sometimes talking comfortably, sometimes in a comfortable silence. The evening passed quietly. When they were going to bed Lady Graham came up to see if all was comfortable in Edith’s room and admired the lovely heavy jersey-nylon nightgowns that Rose and David had given her.

“Good-night, darling,” she said. “It is lovely to have you back.”

“For me too,” said Edith. “I adored America and all Uncle David’s and Aunt Rose’s friends, but Holdings is best, and however often I go to America it will be lovely to have Holdings to come back to.”

Lady Graham felt that life was not so permanent as that. Holdings must some day change. Edith’s life would very probably some day change. But no need to think of these things yet, so she kissed her daughter and went away, glad at heart that Edith loved her home.