The bell of Trinity church rang out for service, arousing Lucy from her reverie. She said she should like to attend it.
"What! this afternoon?" exclaimed Karl. "You are not accustomed to go in the afternoon."
That was true. The heat of the summer weather had been almost unbearable, and Lucy had not ventured to church in it more than once a day.
"It is cooler now," she answered. "And I always like to go if I can when I have stayed for the communion."
But Karl held back from it: rather, Lucy thought, in an unaccountable manner, for he was ever ready to second any wish of hers. He did not seem inclined to go forth again, and said, as a plea of excuse, that he preferred to retain the impression of the morning's sermon on his mind, rather than let it give place to an inferior one. His head was aching badly.
"I do not ask you to come," said Lucy, gently. "I should like to go myself, but I can go quite well alone."
When she came down with her things on, however, she found him ready also; and they set off together.
It may be questioned, though, whether Lucy would have gone had she foreseen what was to happen. In the middle of the service, while the "Magnificat" was being sung, a respectable, staid woman entered the church with an infant in her arms. A beautifully dressed infant. Its long white robe elaborately embroidered, its delicate blue cloak of surpassing richness, its veil of lace dainty as a gossamer thread. The attire, not often seen at Foxwood, caught Lucy's eye, and she wondered who the infant was. It seemed to her that she had seen the nurse's face before, and began to ransack her memory. In an instant it flashed on her with a shock--it was the servant at the Maze.
She turned her eyes on her husband: not intentionally, but in an uncontrollable impulse. Karl was looking furtively at the woman and child--a red flush dyeing his face. Poor Lucy's benefit in the afternoon service was over.
The baby had come to be baptised. Ann Hopley sat down on a bench to which she was shown, just underneath the Andinnian pew. Towards the close of the second lesson, the clerk advanced to her, and entered on a whispered colloquy. Every word of which was distinct to Karl and Lucy.