Our snapshots of Mr. Alfred Challis's mind have taken long to record, but they serve their turn in this place better, perhaps, than the few trifling incidents of the visit at the Rectory. Consider that the lady and gentleman are on their way back to the Hall, in a golden sunset-light which makes the former resplendent, and does no harm to the appearance of the latter. Judith weighs him more carefully than she has done yet, and the result may be more favourable in such a glow. Quite passable!—is her verdict. And she knows how she looks, bless you, reasoning by analogy! For all her previous verdicts about her companion's looks—so far as they were favourable—have run on lines of intellectual rather than physical beauty.
The reason she looked at him carefully at that moment of starting from the Parsonage may have been because of an impression she had that he had cut a poor figure as against that of the Parson. It had so chanced that Saladin, who had behaved well in the house—accepting small sweet biscuits with reserves as to first approval of them—had, on coming away through the garden, just as they reached the gate, become aware of cats, as an abstraction. Mr. Challis's hold on his collar he hardly took any notice of; and it was fortunate that the Rev. Athelstan Taylor (that was his name) got hold on the other side just in time to prevent Saladin starting for a concrete cat over the flower-beds. "You had, perhaps, best let me have both sides, Mr. Challis," said he. Then had followed a magnificent contest between the Rev. Athelstan and the boarhound. If the former could have been unfrocked, it would have been a Greek bas-relief. It ended in a draw, as the concrete cat vanished. "I couldn't have held you much longer, old chap," said the Rector unassumingly to Saladin, during apologies and explanations, dogwise. These continued for some time after they had left the Rectory, and Judith was really glad Saladin's chain was on, with no one to help stronger than her literary friend, if a cat occurred. Rabbits had palled on Saladin, owing to their absurd and unfair practice of running underground.
"He's a fine fellow, your Parson, Miss Arkroyd," said Challis. He acknowledged it readily; athletics were not his line.
"The Reverend Athelstan? (Yes, my darling precious pet, you did quite right, and it was an odious cat!) Oh yes—he was a great athlete in his old Oxford days; was in the 'Varsity eight. (Yes, dear love!—you shall lick when we get home. Now walk quiet, and let people talk.) Yes—he's painfully strong." There was something in this of implied justification for people who were not.
"I'm afraid I'm painfully weak—by comparison. My sedentary employments don't develop the muscles." But, after all, reading prayers and singing of anthems does not, either. This was in foro conscientiæ—not spoken aloud.
"Oh, everybody can't Sandow. I think that sort of thing rather tiresome, carried too far. However, we are very good friends, the Reverend and I. I like a man that has the courage of his opinions. He's quite in a minority here about the Woman question—or I suppose I should say questions. But I meant the Franchise business particularly. He and the Bishop are at daggers drawn about it. I haven't heard him say much about the other. I fancy, though, he's at heart in favour of it—more than myself, perhaps. I mean the Deceased Wife's Sister Bill."
"Are not you...?" Mr. Challis had a hesitation on him, not like his usual way of speech. That was an amused way usually, a confident one almost always. This was neither.
"I must confess ..." said Judith hesitatingly—"I must confess to having very little sympathy with men who want to marry their deceased wives' sisters. It's a question of taste, according to me—nothing to do with the high moralities." The implied sneer against all moral law was no discomfort to her hearer. On the contrary, spoken as it was by a good-looking young lady in a sunset light, it seemed to him alike picturesque and liberal. But he changed the conversation suddenly, as though something in it had disagreed with him.
"What a capital photographer the great Athelstan seems to be!" He said it with a definite air of "Let us talk of something else." She glanced round at him, decided with some surprise that she had shocked him, but answered without showing it. She was quite a woman of the world, was Judith.
"He's a splendid photographer. You know he took all those photos for 'Ten Years of Slum Growth'—my cousin's book?" Mr. Challis pretended he knew this book; but he didn't. "I made him come and photograph my own special slum population in Tallack Street. But Lady Elizabeth wouldn't have them in the book. She said Tallack Street could hardly rank as a slum, in her sense of the word."