“Of course you don’t care for news, my dear,” continued the lady; “I used not when I was your age. But when one comes to be thirty-two one’s ideas change so. One becomes more human, and takes more interest in humanity at large than in one’s self. You are such a happy contented girl, too; nothing seems to trouble you.”
“But your news,” said Rhoda, to change the conversation, as Miss Pavey smoothed down her blue silk dress.
“To be sure, yes, my dear. I saw the coach come over from the station—what a shame it is that we don’t have a branch railway!—and what do you think?”
“Think?” said Rhoda, looking amused, “I really don’t know what to think.”
“Pylades and Orestes!”
“I don’t understand you.”
“They’ve come, my dear,—they’ve come?”
“Pylades and Orestes?”
“Well, of course, that’s only my nonsense; but, as I told you, I saw the coach come in, and two gentlemen got down, both young and handsome—one fair, the other dark; and one is evidently our new vicar, and the other must be his friend. I am so glad, my dear, for I have been exceedingly anxious about the kind of person we were to have for our new clergyman.”
“Indeed!” said Rhoda, looking amused. “Why, I thought you went now to the Wesleyan chapel?”