For his own sake he saw no advantage in this increasingcongregation. It was a difficult matter of late to find seatingaccommodation for the people. But the vicar liked it, of course; aswell as adding to his prestige, it swelled the offertory. And whatvicar does not enjoy a full collection plate?
Robert looked at the vicar and fidgeted. He wanted to lock up; but thevicar showed no haste to depart. When a man is looking forward to hissupper he does not care to waste time, and Hannah, when he was late, wasinclined to grumble. Robert, like his vicar, was married, and, unlikehis vicar, he regretted his married state. When a man takes untohimself a partner he swears away his liberty at the altar as surely asany criminal who pleads guilty from the dock.
"I reckon Mr Musgrave will be supping with you to-night," he observedabruptly.
The vicar looked down into the quaint, bearded face, so many incheslower than his own, and smiled pleasantly.
"Supper?" he said. "I was forgetting, Robert. Yes, you can lock up."
Then he took his soft hat from its peg, and wishing his sextongood-evening stepped forth into the night.
Robert looked after him thoughtfully before turning the key in the lock.
"Seems to 'ave somethin' on 'is mind," he mused. "Reckon 'is missis isas aggravating as most."
With which he turned the key in the rusty lock viciously, andextinguished the lights and left.
The Rev Walter Errol on entering the vicarage drawing-room found JohnMusgrave already there, talking with his wife. Mrs Errol, a pretty,delicate looking woman, who, while she made an excellent wife andmother, was none the less a dead failure in the parish, according to theopinion of the local helpers, looked round brightly as her husbandentered the room, and remarked:
"Mr Musgrave has just been telling me that some friends of his--"
"Acquaintances," John Musgrave interposed gravely.
"Some people he knows," Mrs Errol substituted, "have taken the Hall.I'm so glad. It is such a pity to have a place like that standingempty."
The vicar looked pleased.
"Who are they, John?" he asked.
Mr Musgrave gazed thoughtfully into the fire. From the concentrationof his look it would seem as though he found there the record of thefamily under discussion.
"The man," he said slowly, "is a connection of Charlie Sommers. Bellewrote to me that they had taken the Hall. She wants me to be civil tothem. The expression is hers. His name is Chadwick. I met him atCharlie's place last year. He made his money in Ceylon, I understand,in rubber, or cocoa, or something of that sort. His wife is--modern."He pursed his lips, and looked up suddenly. "That expression alsoemanates from Belle. I don't think I like it very much. There are nochildren."
"The result of her modernity, possibly," observed the vicar.
John Musgrave's air was faintly disapproving. He did not appreciate thelevity of some of Walter Errol's remarks.
"I am not much of a judge of women," he added seriously, "but from thelittle I saw of her I think she will be--a misfit in Moresby."
Mrs Errol laughed.
"I believe I am going to like her," she said. "I'm a misfit in Moresbymyself."
John Musgrave turned to regard her with a protracted, contemplativelook. She met his serious eyes, and smiled mockingly. Though she likedthis old friend of her husband very well, his pedantry often worriedher; it was, however, she realised, a part of the man's nature, and notan affectation, which would have made it offensive.
"You are not a misfit in the sense in which she will be," he repliedquietly.
"You are rousing my curiosity to a tremendous pitch," she returned."How is it no one here has seen these people? They didn't take the Hallwithout viewing it, I suppose?"
"They took it on Charlie's recommendation, I believe," he answered."They will use it merely as a country house."
"Oh!" Mrs Errol's tone was slightly disappointed. "That means, Isuppose, that they will live mostly in town?"
"And abroad," he answered. "They travel a lot."
"Well," observed Mrs Errol brightly, "they will probably do somethingwhen they are here to liven the parish a little. We want a few modernideas; our ideas in Moresby are covered with lichen. Lichen ispicturesque, but it's a form of decay, after all."
John Musgrave appeared surprised. Here was another person who hungeredfor change; it was possibly, he decided, a feminine characteristic.
"Moresby compares, I believe, very favourably with other small places,"he said.
"I daresay it does." She laughed abruptly. "If it didn't it might bemore gay."
The vicar smiled at her indulgently.
"I've a rebel, you see, John, in my own household. Mary only requires akindred spirit to break into open revolt. The coming of Mrs Chadwickmay create an upheaval."
"I doubt whether the advent of Mrs Chadwick will work any greatchange," John Musgrave returned in his heavy, serious fashion. "We aretoo settled to have the current of our ideas disturbed by a fresharrival. She will adapt herself, possibly, to our ways."
Mrs Errol rose with a little shrug of the shoulders, and left the room.Had John Musgrave, she wondered, ever treated any subject other thanseriously? In anyone else this habit of bringing the weight of the mindto bear on every trivial matter would have seemed priggish; but it saton John Musgrave so naturally that, beyond experiencing a passingirritation at times, she could not feel severe towards him. He wouldhave made, in her opinion, an admirable bishop.
The vicar followed her exit with his glance, and then dropped leisurelyinto a chair and stretched his feet towards the fire.
"When is Mrs Sommers coming this way again?" he asked, not so muchconversationally as because he liked John Musgrave's sister, and wasalways glad when she returned to her childhood's home, which she did atfitful and infrequent intervals.
The man whom he addressed leaned back in his chair and staredthoughtfully into the flickering flames. The question recalled his ownlonely fireside, the solitariness of which always struck him moreforcibly while seated beside the cheery vicarage hearth. He missedBelle more as the years passed.
"She did not say," he answered. "She has many claims upon her timesince Charlie entered Parliament. I wish it were otherwise. I missBelle."
"That's only natural," the other answered. "She is so bright."
"Yes." John Musgrave looked directly at the speaker. "She is bright.She's companionable. I expect that's what Charlie thought."
Walter Errol laughed.
"No doubt," he agreed.
"Yes, she's bright," John Musgrave repeated, as though the realisationof this fact, striking him for the first time, accounted for what he hadbeen at a loss to comprehend before. "I expect that's why Charliemarried her."
"My dear fellow," the other said, with a hardly repressed smile, "did itnever occur to you that Charlie might have had a better reason?"
"A better reason?" John Musgrave echoed.
"Yes. Don't you think it possible that he married her for love?"
John Musgrave flushed deeply.
"For love!" he said.
The vicar smiled openly now.
"People do marry for love occasionally," he remarked.
"Do they?... Do they indeed?"
John Musgrave was gazing into the fire again, his expression doubtful,faintly discomfited--almost, it seemed to the man watching him inpuzzled amusement, shocked.
"Dear me!" he ejaculated softly, and seemed disquieted at thepresentment of this extraordinary idea. "Dear me!" he repeated slowly.
The vicar broke into a hearty laugh.
"Oh, Coelebs, my dear old Coelebs," he said; "it was not without asufficient reason you gained that nickname at Oxford. What have youbeen doing, to live in the world so long and never to have learned thebiggest and simplest of life's lessons? From the bottom of my heart Iwish it may yet fall to your lot to get some practical experience. Findsome one to fill Belle's place in your home, dear old fellow, and thenyou will miss her no longer."
/> "I wish, Walter," John Musgrave said, frowning heavily, "that you weregiven to a greater seriousness in your conversation."
"I wish, John," the other retorted amiably, "that you were inclinedtowards a lesser seriousness. As for me, I was never more in earnest inmy life. Fill Belle's place, and then you will be relieved of thenecessity for engaging such a sour-faced person as opened your frontdoor to me yesterday."
"You mean Eliza?" said John Musgrave, surprised. "She is a mostrespectable woman."
"Guaranteed