“Yes, one often likes people at first.”
And as Sylvia looked at her she realized that Miss Hobart was not nearly so old as she had thought her, perhaps not yet fifty. Still, at fifty one had no right to be jealous.
“In fact,” said Sylvia, brutally, “you liked them very much till you thought Mr. Dorward liked them too.”
Miss Hobart’s eyelids almost closed over her eyes and her thin lips disappeared. Miss Horne stopped in her restless parade and, pointing with her fan to the door, bade Sylvia be gone and never come to Sunny Bank again.
“The old witch,” thought Sylvia, when she was toiling up the hill to Medworth in the midsummer heat. “I believe he’s right and that she is the devil.”
She did not tell Philip about her quarrel, because she knew that he would have reminded her one by one of every occasion he had taken to warn Sylvia against being friendly with any inhabitant of Tintown. A week or two later, Philip announced with an air of satisfaction that a van of Treacherites had arrived in Newton Candover and might be expected at Green Lanes next Sunday.
Sylvia asked what on earth Treacherites were, and he explained that they were the followers of a certain Mr. John Treacher, who regarded himself as chosen by God to purify the Church of England of popish abuses.
“A dreadful little cad, I believe,” he added. “But it will be fun to see what they make of Dorward. It’s a pity the old ladies have been kept away by the heat, or we might have a free fight.”
Sylvia warned Mr. Dorward of the Treacherites’ advent, and he seemed rather worried by the news; she had a notion he was afraid of them, which made her impatient, as she frankly told him.
“Not many of us. Not many of us,” said Mr. Dorward. “Hope they won’t try to break up the church.”