On a near hill beyond the river reach, the sombre little church of S. Ann changed to a thing of fancy against a yellowing sky. From all sides, seldom in unison, pealed forth bells. In fine religious gaiety struck S. Mary, contrasting clearly with the bumble-dumble of S. Mark. S. Elizabeth and S. Sebastian in Flower Street seemed in high dispute, while across the sunset water S. Ann-on-the-Hill did nothing but complain. Near by S. Nicaise, half-paralysed, and impotent, scarcely shook. Then triumphant, in a hurricane of sound S. Irene hushed the lot. Mrs. Sixsmith fetched a long, calm breath. It was already the hour he had said. “And my experience tells me,” she murmured, as she took her way towards the Deanery, “that with opportunity and time he may hope to succeed to Sir Oliver.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ● Transcriber’s Notes: ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was silently corrected. ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. ○ Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only when a predominant form was found in this book. ○ Text that: was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_); had extra character spacing by “plus” signs (+stretched+).