“Gridley wants me to give Exton notice to quit.”
“Oh, dear! Won’t that be very disagreeable?”
“Very. Do you shirk doing your duty, Mr. Goodrich, when it happens to be disagreeable?”
The parson answered quite truthfully:
“Sometimes.”
Lady Selina smiled graciously, and the smile deepened as her two children entered from the lawn. Brian, the son, was a handsome young man of twenty-eight, a dashing hussar, cut to pattern. Cicely deserves more attention. She had been born ten years after her brother, arriving on earth as a surprise packet, so to speak. Intelligence sparkled in her soft brown eyes, a charming alertness, often so distinctively the attribute of children born to parents no longer young. Nobody could call her a beauty. The rather smug comeliness of regular features had been denied her. But her colouring was excellent, the clear red and brown of the out-o’-doors girl. Her laugh warmed the cockles of all hearts; her manners made her welcome everywhere. Fortunately for her, she had been sent to school, much to the surprise of Lady Selina’s kinsmen. At school she had achieved some sort of detachment from the cut-and-dried traditions of Upworthy Manor. None could call her a rebel, but in less robust moments her mother wondered whether the daring experiment had been altogether a success. She could read her son easier than her daughter.
Brian said gaily:
“The goodies are weighing in, Mums.” Then he turned to the parson, holding out his hand. “And how are you coming up this fine day, Mr. Goodrich?”
The parson shook his head. “I don’t know that I’m coming up, Brian.” He smiled paternally at the young man whom he had baptised and confirmed, adding regretfully: “I’m toddling down the shady slopes of sixty. Cicely, my dear, how well you look!”
“Thank you, Mr. Goodrich.”