“Never dared,” came rather grimly from Madam.
“Well, maybe,” said Mrs Jane. “But I protest I cannot see why Queen Mary should not have done it, as well as her sister.”
“I own I cannot but very much doubt,” returned Madam, severely, “that any good consequence should follow.”
By which it will be perceived that Madam was an uncompromising Jacobite. Mrs Jane had no particular convictions, but she liked to talk Whig, because all around were Tories. Lady Betty was a Hanoverian Tory—that is, what would be termed an extreme Tory in the present day, but attached to the Protestant Succession. Mrs Clarissa was whatever she found it the fashion to be. As to Mrs Dorothy, she held private opinions, but she never allowed them to appear, well knowing that they would be far from acceptable to Madam. And since Mrs Dorothy was sometimes constrained unwillingly to differ from Madam on points which she deemed essential, she was careful not to vex her on subjects which she considered indifferent.
Rhoda was rather disappointed to find that Phoebe showed no astonished admiration of Tewkesbury Abbey. She forgot that the Abbey Church at Bath, and Saint Mary Redcliffe at Bristol, had been familiar to Phoebe from her infancy. The porch was lined with beggars, who showered blessings upon Madam, in grateful anticipation of shillings to come. But Madam passed grandly on, and paid no attention to them.
The church and the service were about equally chilly. Being a fast-day, the organ was silent; but all the responding was left to the choir, the congregation seemingly supposing it as little their concern as Cupid thought it his—who curled himself up comfortably, and went to sleep. The gentlemen appeared to be amusing themselves by staring at the ladies; the ladies either returned the compliment slily behind their fans, or exchanged courtesies with each other. There was a long, long bidding prayer, and a sermon which might have been fitly prefaced by the announcement, “Let us talk to the praise and glory of Charles the First!” It was over at last. The gentlemen put down their eye-glasses, the ladies yawned and furled their fans; there was a great deal of bowing, and courtesying, and complimenting—Mr William informing Mrs Betty that the sun had come out solely to do her honour, and Mrs Betty retorting with a delicate blow from her fan, and, “What a mad fellow are you!” At last these also were over; and the ladies from Cressingham remounted the family coach, nearly in the same order as they came—the variation being that Phoebe found herself seated opposite Mrs Clarissa Vane.
“Might I pat him?” said Phoebe, diffidently.
“If you want to be bit, do!” snapped Mrs Jane.
“Oh deah, yes!” languishingly responded Mrs Clarissa. “He neveh bites, does ’e, the pwetty deah!”
“Heyday! Doesn’t ’e, the pwetty deah!” observed Mrs Jane, in such exact imitation of her friend’s affected tones as sorely to try Phoebe’s gravity.