Miss Coyle was a maiden lady of intense gentility, who possessed a small annuity--bestowed on her by the head of the house of Coyle, which was supposed to be a family of distinction--and who inhabited one of the prettiest cottages in Little Yafford--a rustic bower with a porch of green trellis-work, curtained with clematis and woodbine. The cottage was so small that a single friend dropping in to tea filled it to overflowing, insomuch that the small servant could hardly turn the corner of the parlour door with the tea-tray. This smallness Miss Coyle found economical. She visited a great deal in Little Yafford, and was not called upon to exercise any hospitality in return. ‘With my poor little place it would be ridiculous to talk about giving parties,’ she used to say, ‘but if my friends will drop in upon me any afternoon they will always find a good cup of tea.’ Thus Miss Coyle contrived to cry quits with the best people in Little Yafford at the cost of a cup of tea. Even Mrs. Dulcimer--who prided herself upon the superiority of her tea--confessed that Miss Coyle excelled as a tea maker, and would condescend to drop in at the cottage once in a way on a hot summer afternoon, when the roads were ankle-deep in dust, and seemed longer than usual. Miss Coyle had not only tea to offer for the refreshment of the body, but she generally had some scrap of news for the entertainment of her visitor’s mind. She was a wonderful woman in this way, and seemed always to be the first to know everything that occurred in Little Yafford, as if she had been the centre of an invisible telegraphic system. ‘Oh, Miss Coyle was there, was she?’ said Beatrix. ‘Yes, she has been at the Park a good deal since the beginning of Mrs. Piper’s illness. She goes to sit with poor Mrs. Piper almost every afternoon, and they talk of the wickedness of servants. Miss Coyle’s father kept seven servants--four indoor and three outdoor. I have heard her describe them all, again and again. They seem to have been models; but Miss Coyle said they belonged to a race that has disappeared off the face of the earth--like the Drift people, or the poor Swiss creatures who lived in the lakes. You may imagine how lively it is to hear Miss Coyle and Mrs. Piper bewailing the iniquities of the present race.’ ‘Did Miss Coyle speak about my father--or me?’ asked Beatrix, with an anxious look. She remembered meeting Miss Coyle at the Vicarage two or three times, and she had a vague notion that if this lady had assisted at a memorable scene, when the sinless among the crowd were bidden to cast the first stone, she would assuredly have been ready with her pebble. Bella looked embarrassed at the question. ‘They did talk a little,’ she faltered. ‘Mr. Piper and Miss Coyle. Yon know how vulgar and coarse he is--and I’m afraid she is not so good-natured as she pretends to be. But you must not be unhappy about anything such people can say.’