"But somehow—"
"You mean the clergymen are not paid as they should be. No, they are not, Miss Mackenzie. And is it not a shame for a Christian country like this that it should be so? But still, as a profession, it has its value. Look at Mrs Stumfold; where would she be if she were not a clergyman's wife? The position has its value. A clergyman's wife is received everywhere, you know."
"A man before he talks of marriage ought to have something of his own, Mr Maguire, besides—"
"Besides what?"
"Well, I'll tell you. As you have done me this honour, I think that I am now bound to tell you what Mrs Stumfold said to me. She had no right to connect my name with yours or with that of any other gentleman, and my quarrel with her is about that. As to what she said about you, that is your affair and not mine."
Then she told him the whole of that conversation which was given in the last chapter, not indeed repeating the hint about the three or four wives, but recapitulating as clearly as she could all that had been said about the suitable young lady.
"I knew it," said he; "I knew it. I knew it as well as though I had heard it. Now what am I to think of that woman, Miss Mackenzie?"
"Of which woman?"
"Of Mrs Stumfold, of course. It's all jealousy: every bit of it jealousy."
"Jealousy! Do you mean that she—that she—"