'And is this on account of the proselytizing?'
'Oh! no, not entirely; he has refused to give his tenants Griffith's valuation; but it makes one very unpopular to be denounced by the priest. I assure you, papa is very angry. He told Sarah and Jane this morning at breakfast that he'd have no more of it; that they had no right to go into the poor people's houses and pull the children from under the beds, and ask why they were not at school; that he didn't care of what religion they were as long as they paid the rent; and that he wasn't going to have his life endangered for such nonsense. There was an awful row at home this morning. For my own part, I must say I sympathize with papa. Besides the school, Sarah has, you know, a shop, where she sells bacon, sugar, and tea at cost price, and it is well-known that those who send their children to the school will never be asked to pay their bills. She wanted me to come and help to weigh out the meal, Jane being confined to her room with a sick headache, but I got out of it. I would not, if I could, convert those poor people. You know, I often fancy—I mean fear—I often sympathize too much with your creed. It was only at service last Sunday I was thinking of it; our religion seems so cold, so cheerless compared to yours. You remember the convent-church at St. Leonard's—the incense, the vestments, the white-veiled congregation—oh, how beautiful it was; we shall never be so happy again!'
'Yes, indeed; and how cross we used to think those dear nuns. You remember Sister Mary, how she used to lecture Violet for getting up to look out of the windows. What used she to say? 'Do you want, miss, to be taken for a housemaid or scullery-maid, staring at people in that way as they pass?''
'Yes, yes; that's exactly how she used to speak,' exclaimed Cecilia, laughing. And, as the girls advanced through the oakwood, they helped each other through the briers and over the trunks of fallen trees, talking, the while, of their past life, which now seemed to them but one long, sweet joy. A reference to how May Gould used to gallop the pony round and round the field at the back of the convent was interrupted by the terrifying sound of a cock-pheasant getting up from some bracken under their very feet; and, amid the scurrying of rabbits in couples and half-dozens, modest allusion was made to the girls who had been expelled in '75. Absorbed in the sweetness of the past, the girls mused, until they emerged from the shade of the woods into the glare and dust of the highroad. Then came a view of rocky country, with harvesters working in tiny fields, and then the great blue background of the Clare Mountains was suddenly unfolded. A line and a bunch of trees indicated the Brennan domain. The gate-lodge was in ruins, and the weed-grown avenue was covered with cow-dung.
'Which of the girls do you like best?' said Alice, who wished to cease thinking of the poverty in which the spinsters lived.
'Emily, I think; she doesn't say much, but she is more sensible than the other two. Gladys wearies me with her absurd affectations; Zoe is well enough, but what names!'
'Yes, Emily has certainly the best of the names,' Alice replied, laughing.
'Are the Miss Brennans at home?' said Cecilia, when the maid opened the hall-door.
'Yes, miss—I mean your ladyship—will you walk in?'
'You'll see, they'll keep us waiting a good half-hour while they put on their best frocks,' said Cecilia, as she sat down in a faded arm-chair in the middle of the room. A piano was rolled close against the wall, the two rosewood cabinets were symmetrically placed on either side of the farther window; from brass rods the thick, green curtains hung in stiff folds, and, since the hanging of some water-colours, done by Zoe before leaving school, no alterations, except the removal of the linen covers from the furniture when visitors were expected, had been made in the arrangement of the room.