“Books never embarrass me,” Prudence said, “but occasionally they bore me. I don’t care to read about people who lead the stodgy kind of life we lead.”
“Life is not stodgy,” Agatha reproved her. “And it is the same everywhere.”
“God forbid!” ejaculated Prudence, and thereby brought a storm of horrified reproach upon her head.
On occasions Matilda arrived and spent an afternoon or morning with her, such an altered Matilda that she appeared to Prudence in the guise of a stranger. Matilda had emerged since her marriage, and from being a mild reflection of her eldest sister, reflected now Mr Jones quite brightly and unconsciously. She echoed him in a feminine note, and quoted him with unintentional inaccuracy, but with sufficient likeness to recall the original with unpleasant vividness to Prudence’s mind. Usually Mr Jones was too busy to accompany her.
“The vicar leaves so much to him,” Mrs Jones explained. “Ernest hopes to move from Wortheton shortly.”
“I understood that he was greatly attached to his work here,” Prudence said. “He likes the factory and the people.”
“He has hopes of a living,” Matilda confided, lowering her voice.
“Oh, a living! That’s another matter. You’ll be quite important.”
Matilda looked a little doubtful.
“It’s a very poor living,” she confessed, “even if he succeeds in obtaining it. No clergyman without private means could accept it.”