CHAPTER X.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XX, Issue 16, 5 February 1892, Page 23

CHAPTER X.

Miss Cluttbbbeck had gone round, animated with a desire for gossip and news set about with the dne decorum of Abbey shadows, to Mrs Cadwallader's. Now Mrs Cadwallader's house was approached' by five steps, and the brass knocker on the door had an expression all its own : " Loud, hut not too loud," it seemed to say. Mrs Cad. wallader'g friends must be of that kind who, having served the world for a period and learnt it, now prepared to throw it up cheerfully ai a thing which promised twenty per cent and gave barley three, and on that account had subsided into a society which demanded far lesi strain, and yet was really most agreeable and amiable— that set known as the Abbey eet. Mrs Cadwallader was reposing on her sofa by the bay-window overlooking the Abbey gardens. A yellow canary, in a cage of exceptional neatness, was singing as only a yellow canary can ; and a big Persian cat was on the hearthrug, looking at it as only a cat can look at a dainty which, by order of its physician, it is forbidden to eat. A email wicker table was placed by the side of the sofa, with two dainty cups and a teapot which promised rather a cold cup of tea. Mrs Cadwallader was getting old, and her comforts were at the mercies of her natural enemies (as she called them), the servants. She was glad to see Miss Clutterbeck for many reasons. To begin with, you might untie your shoe-strings just a little bit with Miss Clutterbeck, and the most distinguished of people are very glad now and then to have this privilege, but Mrs Cadwallader had not gone so far as to be distinguished. Mrs Cadwallader caw that Miss Clutterbeck was disturbed, and disturbance in that qnarter meant a tidal wave later on. Misa Clutterbeck's hair looked as if it wouldn't set ; it looked out of sorts. There was a frizzle (for even Miss Clutterbeck had reconciled her conscience as to the desirability of making the best of herself), aDd the frizzle was upside down. It wai at the frizzle Mrs Cadwallader's pale blue eyes, with the sudden and unextinguiehable gleam of captious humour which now and then visited them, was directing her gaze. " You are not well," she said to Miss Clutterbeck. " Never felt better in my life ; but the fact is a disturbing and new element has got into our midat, and I don't see our way out of it."

Not for worlds would Mrß Cadwallader have professed ignorance as to tbe " disturbing element " singled out by Miss Clutterbeck ; she merely bowed her Lead slightly, and murmured some indistinct acquiescence. " I have never approved of Mr B, B. Brown's appointment,""cor7tinued Miss Cluttetbeck. " I have watched them narrowly, and I pronounce the men Beleced by him as the rash conclusions of Nature's eccentricities." Miss Clutterbeck was so proud of this epigram that she gave it the additional weight of repetition. " I consider them the rash conclusions of Nature's eccentricities or, to put it in plain words, the square man in the round box." Apain Mis Cadwallader bowed acquiescence, but Miss Clutterbeck smhed. " What a horrible nuisance servants are 1" she said suddenly " the plagues and torments and enforced demons of our households I Yet— yet— yet till we are prepared for the wash-tub and the fryingpan we mnst endure them." Now Mrs Cadwallader waa sevpral steps beyond Miss Clutterbeck from the point of good breeding, and for one moment she felt the jar of something lowering ; but the next instant curiosity, which is like a laundress, and ready to wash all the dirty linen of medium-bred people, rushed upon the column marked "Society Gossip" in Mrs Cadwallader's mental arrangements, and she said : " What, have you been on your G.F.S. rounds again ?" Here was the untie of poor Mrs Cadwallader's shoes with a vengeance, the false marking which betrayed her breed.

"It ia my duty to look up Sarah," said Misi Olatterbeck with a sign. " Nobody has a higher sense of duty in St Swithun's than you," said Mrs Cadwallader. " Sarah is a girl in whom, like yon, I hare always felt a profound interest. Brought up under the shadow of the dear old Abbey walls, reared in the very bosom of the Church, I have always felt a deep interest in her." " I know it," said Miss Clutterbeck. " It distresses me that she must make another more ; but it is inevitable." Mrs Cadwallader shook the cushion which supported her round and well-padded back. 11 These constant changes are regrettable, I should have thought nothing could have been nicer for her than her situation at Canon Hope's." "It will unhinge her mind," said Miss Clutterbeck. " Our new Canon it, lam convinced, mad ! Sarah has told me—" " H — m 1 " said Mrs Cadwallader, " do you mind just closing that door, my dear f I'm an old lady, and so you will forgive my lack of agility. I couldn't rise to save my life, or, rather, I can't rise to save my poor old bones I Youth is a blessed thing."

But Miss Olutterbeck was not to be put off. Her nose was on the actnt, and she waa determined to run her fox to ground. " Sarah says be paces tbe floor of his bedroom from 10 p.m. till 3 a.m. sometimes. At others he creeps to the oratory (yon know he has set up an oratory), and plays music so divinely sad that Sarah lays it gives her the creeps ; at other times he sleeps in the coal-cellar or on the bard boards anywhere ! He eats no meat ; be scarcely touches even vegetables. But this is not all. Lately he has had a friend to stay with him — a round-faced man with a queer-cut coat — neither priest nor elder, but who calls himself the ' new apostle : ' and Sarah says she is frightened to death of the man. He is the founder of some new order, and wants Canon Hope to throw up everything and join him. He says very impolite things about all of us here ; and tbe worßtof it is ( anon Hope listens. You know how intelligent Sarah always was. My best G.F.S. girl— qoite my best." " Why, Canon Hope has only just come ! " said Mrs Cadw»Uader. " What possesses the man ? But from tbe moment he raved up and down like a Jack-in-the-box that Sunday morning, and disturbed my ÜBQal nap, I felt mischief would come of it, and when am I wrong 1 And, again, directly Mrs Cudlip-Gaye, charming impulsive creature, takes a fancy to anybody, that person is sure to be one of these highflyers. She has the same taste in everything ; she never notices what I call ordinary, proper-minded, every-day people."

" Emma is Emma," said Miss Olutterbeck. "Of course I shouldn't dare tell her what I Lave now told you ; she would ' stare me oat of her drawing-room,' and as likely as not she would get the Bishop to entirely remodel the G.F.S,, and somehow or other put a stop to our pleasant little avenues for hearing anything we may care to. No, I know very well how to arrange my conversation with our Archdeacon 'B wife." " She has great power over the bishop," said Mrs Cadwallader — " anybody can see that. She is a powerful woman, and has admirable and subtle tact ; somebody said the bishop proposed to her. " I can positively deny that," said Miss Clutterbeck. " Emma never had but one downright proposal, and that was the Archdeacon's. Emma and lin that are alike. I had one and refused him, and she had one and accepted him." " Dear me ! " said Mrs Cadwallader as she took up the cat and tenderly smoothed its fur ; " then Emma Cudlip-Gaye and you are on the aame scale as regards attractiveness." " Good gracious 1 Look at the married frights and the scores of proposals registered by them," said Miss Clutterbeck, rising, " and for any sake, my dear lady, don't think proposals are the measure of attractiveness." " They are tbe measure of sweetness only, perhaps," said Mrs Cadwallader ; " they make folks uncommonly good-tempered. Bat I'm an old frump."