He sat down to tea and glanced at his dining-room furniture, almost ecclesiastical in its chaste simplicity, and heaved a sigh of annoyance. Then, taking a large piece of cake in one hand and a newspaper in the other, he endeavoured to immerse himself in the news of the day.
Did Mr. and Mrs. Simpson feel anything like as jolly as he did when he bought his new furniture? If so——
He turned to the foreign telegrams, and in the midst of China and Peru he saw Mrs. and an imaginary Mr. Simpson buying a sideboard for their new home.
Pshaw! He flung down his paper and rang for the little maid.
“Please tell Mrs. Jebb I shall want lunch at twelve to-morrow. I am going out.”
Then, feeling that it was a deed which accorded more with a freckled nose and an abbreviated Christian name than with the dignified attitude of a Vicar of position, he began to search the sale catalogue for a mahogany sideboard. He knew that the senior curate would never have done such a thing. He would have given the money to the deserving poor.
Andy felt profoundly thankful that the senior curate would never know as he wrote to countermand his order for a new bicycle.
After that he went across the field and looked over the hedge into the churchyard, where that Mrs. Werrit who was his rival for the sideboard chanced to be tending the graves of such Werrits as were already taking their rest. People in Gaythorpe said that it was the only time a true Werrit did rest; and Mrs. Will was one to the backbone though she had been born a Thorpe of Millsby.
It was strange to Andy, who had always lived in towns, to find that nearly all the people were more or less related to one another: the Thorpes and Werrits permeated the social relationships of the countryside in the very same way as one or two great families have done the aristocracy of England. It is a thing that is going, but it survives still in many country places, and it produces a social atmosphere which is rather different from any other.
“Good afternoon,” said Andy.