CHAPTER V
WEALTHY MISS PRITCHETT AND POOR GUSSIE DAVIES ENTER THE VICARAGE GARDEN
"Todgers," Mr. Stephens remarked to Lucy, as they went down into the garden after lunch on Saturday, "could do it when it chose."
The last preparations for the garden party were being made. The big marquee was erected, the tennis lawns were newly marked, there was a small stand for the string band.
Waiters, looking oddly out of their element in the brilliant sunshine, which showed dress-coats, serviceable enough at night, tinged with a metallic green like a magpie's wing, were moving about with baskets of strawberries and zinc boxes of ice.
The old-fashioned garden, an oasis in the wilderness of brick all around, was brilliant with sunflowers, stocks, and geraniums; the lawns were fresh and green. The curate was in tennis flannels and an Oxford blazer, and Lucy meditated upon the influence of clothes, as her betters had done before her. Stephens seemed to have put off his priesthood with his tippet and cassock, and the jaunty cap covered a head which seemed as if it had never worn a berretta. Lucy found, to her own surprise, that she liked the man less so. It was a total inversion of her ordinary ideas. She began to think that a priest should be robed always.
Miss Cass, the housekeeper, in a new cap, came up to them. Lucy had talked to the woman for more than an hour on Friday afternoon, and the prejudice caused by her appearance was removed.
"I hope everything is satisfactory, Miss," she said. "It all seems to be going on well. The men from Whiteley's know their business."
"It all seems splendid, Miss Cass," Lucy said. "I'm sure it couldn't be better. Have the band people come?"
"Yes, Miss, and the piano-entertainer too. They're having some refreshment in the library. His Reverence is telling them funny stories, Miss."