It was tea-time before courage was mustered for telling the facts to Mrs. Prime. Mrs. Prime, after dinner, had gone into Baslehurst; but the meeting at Miss Pucker's had not been a regular full gathering, and Mrs. Prime had come back to tea. There was no hot toast, and no clotted cream. It may appear selfish on the part of Mrs. Ray and Rachel that they should have kept such good things for their only little private banquets, but, in truth, such delicacies did not suit Mrs. Prime. Nice things aggravated her spirits and made her fretful. She liked the tea to be stringy and bitter, and she liked the bread to be stale;—as she preferred also that her weeds should be battered and old. She was approaching that stage of discipline at which ashes become pleasant eating, and sackcloth is grateful to the skin. The self-indulgences of the saints in this respect often exceed anything that is done by the sinners.
"Dorothea," said Mrs. Ray, and she looked down upon the dark dingy fluid in her cup as she spoke, "I have been up to Mr. Comfort's to-day."
"Yes; I heard you say you were going there."
"I went to ask him for advice."
"Oh."
"As I was in much doubt, I thought it right to go to the clergyman of my parish."
"I don't think much about parishes myself. Mr. Comfort is an old man now, and I fear he does not give himself up to the Gospel as he used to do. If people were called upon to bind themselves down to parishes, what would those poor creatures do who have over them such a pastor as Dr. Harford?"
"Dr. Harford is a very good man, I believe," said Rachel, "and he keeps two curates."
"I'm afraid, Rachel, you know but little about it. He does keep two curates,—but what are they? They go to cricket-matches, and among young women with bows and arrows! If you had really wanted advice, mamma, I would sooner have heard that you had gone to Mr. Prong."
"But I didn't go to Mr. Prong, my dear;—and I don't mean. Mr. Prong is all very well, I dare say, but I've known Mr. Comfort for nearly thirty years, and I don't like sudden changes." Then Mrs. Ray stirred her tea with rather a quick motion of her hand. Rachel said not a word, but her mother's sharp speech and spirited manner was very pleasant to her. She was quite contented now that Mr. Comfort should be regarded as the family counsellor. She remembered how well she had loved Mr. Comfort always, and thought of days when Patty Comfort had been very good-natured to her as a child.