But Alice couldn't leave it alone.
"How about Sunday? Just after dinner? He'll be clean then."
"All right. Sunday."
But it was not till they had passed the schoolhouse outside Garth village that Alice's great idea came to her.
"Gwenda! The Concert! Wouldn't he be ripping for the Concert!"
XX
But the concert was not till the first week in December; and it was in November that Rowcliffe began to form the habit that made him remarkable in Garth, of looking in at the Vicarage toward teatime every Wednesday afternoon.
Mrs. Gale, informed by Essy, was the first to condole with Mrs.
Blenkiron, the blacksmith's wife, who had arranged to provide tea for
Rowcliffe every Wednesday in the Surgery.
"Wall, Mrs. Blenkiron," she said, "yo' 'aven't got to mak' tae for yore doctor now?"
"Naw. I 'aven't," said Mrs. Blenkiron. "And it's sexpence clane gone out o' me packet av'ry week."