Alfred was puffing clouds from his briar pipe, but Mutimer had ceased smoking. Near the latter was a vacant seat; Adela took it, as there was no other. ‘What a good thing the day of rest is!’ exclaimed Mrs. Waltham. ‘I always feel thankful when I think of the poor men who toil so all through the week in Belwick, and how they must enjoy their Sunday. You surely wouldn’t make any change in _that_, Mr. Mutimer?’ ‘The change I should like to see would be in the other direction,’ Richard replied. ‘I would have holidays far more frequent. In the towns you can scarcely call Sunday a holiday. There’s nothing to do but to walk about the streets. On the whole it does far more harm than good.’ ‘Do they never go to church?’ asked Adela. She was experiencing a sort of irritation against their guest, a feeling traceable to more than one source; Mutimer’s frequent glances did not tend to soothe it. She asked the question rather in a spirit of adverse criticism. ‘The working people don’t,’ was the reply, ‘except a Dissenting family here and there.’ ‘Perhaps that is one explanation of the Sundays being useless to them.’ Adela would scarcely have ventured upon such a tone in reference to any secular matter; the subject being religion, she was of course justified in expressing herself freely. Mutimer smiled and held back his rejoinder for a moment. By that time Alfred had taken his pipe from his lips and was giving utterance to unmeasured scorn. ‘But, Mr. Mutimer,’ said Mrs. Waltham, waving aside her son’s vehemence, ‘you don’t seriously tell us that the working people have no religion? Surely that would be too shocking!’ ‘Yes, I say it seriously, Mrs. Waltham. In the ordinary sense of the word, they have no religion. The truth is, they have no time to think of it.’ ‘Oh, but surely it needs no thought--’ Alfred exploded. ‘I mean,’ pursued his mother, ‘that, however busy we are, there must always be intervals to be spared from the world.’ Mutimer again delayed his reply. A look which he cast at Adela appeared to move her to speech. ‘Have they not their evenings free, as well as every Sunday?’