He had numerous commissions to execute for his vicar, and Gillian had to assist the masculine brains in the department of Church needlework, actually venturing to undertake some herself, trusting to the tuition of Aunt Ada, a proficient in the same; while Mysie reverently begged at least to hem the borders.
Then they revelled in the little paradises of books and pictures in Northumberland Avenue and Westminster Sanctuary, and went to Evensong at the Abbey, Mysie’s first sight thereof, and nearly the like to Gillian, since she only remembered before a longing not to waste time in a dull place instead of being in the delightful streets.
‘It is a thing never to forget,’ she said under her breath, as they lingered in the nave.
‘I never guessed anything could make one feel so,’ added Mysie, with a little sigh of rapture.
‘That strange unexpected sense of delight always seems to me to explain, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive,”’ said Harry.
Mysie whispered—
‘Beneath thy contemplation
Sink heart and voice opprest!’
‘Oh, Harry, can’t we stay and see Henry VII.‘s Chapel, and Poets’ Corner, and Edward I.‘s monument?’ pleaded the sister.
‘I am afraid we must not, Gill. I have to see after some vases, and to get a lot of things at the Stores, and it will soon be dark. If I don’t go to Southampton to-morrow, I will take you then. Now then, feet or cab?’
‘Oh, let us walk! It is ten times the fun.’