“And finding, sir, year after year, year after year, as one year gives place to another, that they are never heard, we have got to call ’em amid ourselves, the Silent Chimes,” spoke the clerk, as they turned to leave the church. “The Silent Chimes, sir.”
Clinking his keys, the clerk walked away to his home, an ivy-covered cottage not a stone’s-throw off; the clergyman lingered in the churchyard, reading the memorials on the tombstones. He was smiling at the quaintness of some of them, when the sound of hasty footsteps caused him to turn. A little girl was climbing over the churchyard-railings (as being nearer to her than the entrance-gate), and came dashing towards him across the gravestones.
“Are you grandpapa’s new parson?” asked the young lady; a pretty child of ten, with a dark skin, and dusky-violet eyes staring at him freely out of a saucy face.
“Yes, I am,” said he. “What is your name?”
“What is yours?” boldly questioned she. “They’ve talked about you at home, but I forgot it.”
“Mine is Robert Grame. Won’t you tell me yours?”
“Oh, it’s Kate.—Here’s that wicked Lucy coming! She’s going to groan at me for jumping here. She says it’s not reverent.”
A charming young lady of some twenty years was coming up the path, wearing a scarlet cloak, its hood lined with white silk; a straw hat shaded her fair face, blushing very much just now; in her dark-grey eyes might be read vexation, as she addressed Mr. Grame.
“I hope Kate has not been rude? I hope you will excuse her heedlessness in this place. She is only a little girl.”
“It’s only the new parson, Lucy,” broke in Kate without ceremony. “He says his name’s Robert Grame.”