“What is that?” asked Reginald.
He was not easily roused by Carlingford gossip, but there was clearly more in this than met the eye.
“An Anti-State Church Meeting,” said Mr. May, “with special compliments in it to you and me. It is not worth our while to think of it. Your agitators, my dear Mrs. Hurst, are not worth powder and shot. Now, pardon me, but I must go to work. Will you go and see the sick people in Back Grove Street, Reginald? I don't think I can go to-day.”
“I should like to know what was in the paper,” said the young man, with an obstinacy that filled the girls with alarm. They had been in hopes that everything between father and son was to be happy and friendly, now that Reginald was about to do what his father wished.
“Oh, you shall see it,” said Mrs. Hurst, half alarmed too; “but it is not anything, as your father says; only we women are sensitive. We are always thinking of things which, perhaps, were never intended to harm us. Ursula, you take my advice, and don't go and mix yourself up with Dissenters and that kind of people. The Tozer girl may be very nice, but she is still Tozer's granddaughter, after all.”
Reginald followed the visitor out of the room, leaving his sisters very ill at ease within, and his father not without anxieties which were so powerful, indeed, that he relieved his mind by talking of them to his daughters—a most unusual proceeding.
“That woman will set Reginald off at the nail again,” he cried; “after he had begun to see things in a common-sense light. There was an attack made upon him last night on account of that blessed chaplaincy, which has been more trouble to me than it is worth. I suppose he'll throw it up now. But I wash my hands of the matter. I wonder how you girls can encourage that chattering woman to come here.”
“Papa!” cried Janey, ever on the defensive, “we hate her! It is you who encourage her to come here.”
“Oh, hush!” cried Ursula, with a warning glance; it was balm to her soul to hear her father call Mrs. Hurst that woman. “We have been to see the house,” she said; “it was very nice. I think Reginald liked it, papa.”
“Ah, well,” said Mr. May, “girls and boys are queer articles. I dare say the house, if he likes it, will weigh more with him than justice or common sense. So Copperhead was the people's name? What would be wanted, do you think, Ursula, to make Reginald's room into a comfortable room for a pupil? Comfortable, recollect; not merely what would do; and one that has been used, I suppose, to luxury. You can look over it and let me know.”