The little old clergyman nodded his head and went on, “I understand all that. But all the same there’s this little crisis which has to be got over. I daresay, my dear, that Miss Hofland had it too, though she tells us that she never had what most people have. I was once a tutor in my young days, and I felt it, though I was a man. There are particular qualities that are wanted for this dependent sort of life. We are all more or less dependents here,” he said, looking round benevolently upon the group about him. The speech was very well meant, but it was not very well received: the young doctor made a hasty step apart, as if to separate himself from the others, while Miss Hofland cried, “Oh, Mr. Rector!” with suppressed indignation, “I do not consider myself a dependent. I have accepted a position for a year, and so long as I do the duties I’ve undertaken, I hope I’m as independent as any one. I don’t mix myself up with the family at all,” Miss Hofland said. “Well, my dear young lady,” said the old clergyman, “I am, if nobody else is: for though I am called the Rector by most people, and though I have been here for a great number of years, I am only here, after all, as _locum tenens_, which is a name you will no doubt have heard, as a clergyman’s daughter; that means, you know, that I am here enjoying all my little comforts at the will and pleasure of somebody else. He might send me away to-morrow, or at least in three months’ time: or he might die. He has been expected to die a great many times. I think sometimes he never will. He’s an old, old fellow, much older that I am, and I, though I am an old man, am quite dependent upon him, so, you see, I know what I am talking about.” “Oh, Mr. Rector, if that is what you mean!” murmured Miss Hofland, abashed. “Papa was the same once,” said Hetty, roused out of her self-occupation. “We had a delightful house and a great, beautiful garden. But then the old gentleman died, and we had to give it up.” “When my old gentleman dies, I shall have to give it up too; but I hope he will outlive me. When an old man like that gets up among the eighties, he may just as well live for ever: and I’m sure I hope he will. So, you see, I have a long experience of being dependent; and I should like to give you the help of my experience, you who are at the other end. But I hope you will not have to live this kind of life.” “You needn’t feel any dependence unless you please,” said Miss Hofland. “I would not set her against it, Mr. Rector, if she should have to follow it, for a girl in most cases cannot choose for herself.” “I don’t mean to set her against it,” said the old clergyman; but they were both interrupted by Hetty, to whom this opening of a new interest was invaluable. “If this old gentleman is so old,” she said, “I wonder what his name is? I wonder if perhaps he is the old Rector, Uncle Hugh, that mamma used to tell us about?”