“No,” said Miss Toner eyeing him, “I don’t class them with the evening mists; I class them with the sick, whom we must be kind to and take care of.”
Mrs. Chadwick was now emerging in her new spring hat, which was not very successful and gave emphasis to her general air of strain. Meg’s hat was very successful, as Meg’s hats always were; and if Nancy’s did not shine beside it, it was, at all events, exceedingly becoming to her. Nancy’s eyes went to Barney. Barney, in the past, had been very appreciative of becoming hats. But he had no eyes for Nancy now. He had drawn Miss Toner aside and Oldmeadow heard their colloquy:
“Would you rather I didn’t go?”
“I’d rather, always, you followed your light, dear friend.”
“I do like going here, you know. It seems to belong with it all—and Mummy can’t bear our not going.”
“It makes your dear mother happy. It all means love to you.”
“Not only that”—Oldmeadow imagined that Barney blushed, and he heard his stammer: “I don’t know what I believe about everything; but the service goes much deeper than anything I could think for myself.” Their voices dropped. All that came further to Oldmeadow was from Miss Toner: “It makes you nearer than if you stayed.”
“Confound her ineffability!” he thought. “It rests with her, then, whether he should go or stay.”
It certainly did. Barney moved away with them all, leaving Palgrave to the more evident form of proximity.
“You know,” Mrs. Chadwick murmured to Oldmeadow as they went, between the primroses, down the little path and through a wicket-gate that led to the village—“you know, Roger, it’s quite possible that they may say their prayers together. It’s like Quakers, isn’t it—or Moravians; or whoever those curious people are who are buried standing up—so dismal and uncomfortable, I always think. But it’s better that Palgrave should say his prayers with some one, and somewhere, isn’t it, than that he shouldn’t say them at all?”