‘If I go now will it be too early for—the ladies?’ said John, ‘as I see you’ve got business on hand.’
‘Oh, not at all; no business in particular; only I’m taking hold of the work, and Cattley is giving it up. Things are a little different, don’t you know, from what they were when he took it up. I daresay I shall have to make changes,’ Percy said.
‘Every new man does that,’ said mild Mr. Cattley, ‘and undoes them again two or three times probably before he finds the right way.’
‘I hope,’ said Percy, ‘I shan’t be so long about it as that; but if you’re ready, Jack, I’ll step along with you. You mightn’t find Aunt Mary by yourself. She’s busier than ever in the parish, more busy than she has any occasion to be; but ladies seldom attain the juste milieu.’
Mr. Cattley’s eyes flashed a little at this, but he only permitted himself to say,
‘You must give up those pretty speeches about ladies if you mean to do much good in the parish. Shall I see you back to dinner, John?’
‘They’re sure to keep him to lunch,’ said Percy, not sorry to pay back to ‘Old Cattley’ an answering prick: for the curate, in deference perhaps to Mrs. Sibley, had always continued to call his mid-day meal his dinner. ‘Hadn’t you better come too? Aunt Mary will want both of you; and then you can tell her yourself when you are going away. I hope I can give as good as I get,’ said this young ecclesiastic, as he led the way out of the house. ‘Old Cattley is too much of a good thing with his advices and his prophecies, as if we had not learnt a thing or two since his time. And he doesn’t want to go, don’t you know, not a bit. He has hung on here years longer than he ought to have done. My father did not mind waiting till I was ready to step in; but an old fellow like that is quite out of date for a curate. I’ll have a great deal of trouble to work the parish into what’s wanted now.’
‘Perhaps I don’t know what’s wanted now,’ said John, with some suppressed resentment. ‘I always thought Mr. Cattley the model of everything a clergyman should be.’
‘That’s a very nice little speech,’ said the Rev. Percy; ‘but, bless your heart, he’s not a churchman at all—not a bit of him. Even Aunt Mary sees it now. He’s so much her slave, that she has always stuck to him, but I think even she sees it now.’
There was a little pause, and then John said, falteringly,