‘Certainly, I do wish them to come back--if it is possible,’ said Heathcote, but his countenance, too, grew somewhat long. He would have liked for himself a warmer reception, perhaps. And when he went to see Mr. Ashley, though his welcome was very warm, and though the Rector was absolutely gleeful over his arrival, and confided to him instantly half a dozen matters in which it would be well that he should interest himself at once, still it was not very long before ‘they’ recurred also to the old man’s mind as the chief object of interest. ‘Why are they going abroad? it would be far better if they would come home,’ said the Rector, who afterwards apologised, however, with anxious humility. ‘I beg your pardon--I beg your pardon with all my heart. I forgot actually that Mount had changed hands. Of course, of course, it is quite natural that they should go abroad. They have no home, so to speak, till they have made up their mind to choose one, and I always think that is one of the hardest things in the world to do. It is a blessing we do not appreciate, Mr. Mountford, to have our home chosen for us and settled beyond our power to change----’ ‘I don’t think Mrs. Mountford dislikes the power of choice,’ said Heathcote; ‘but so far as I am concerned, you know I should be very thankful if they would continue to occupy their old home.’ ‘I know, I know. You have spoken most kindly, most generously, exactly as I could have wished you to speak,’ said the Rector, patting Heathcote on the shoulder, as if he had been a good boy. Then he took hold of his arm and drew him towards the window, and looked into his eyes. ‘It is a delicate question,’ he said, ‘I know it is a delicate question: but you’ve been in town, and no doubt you have heard all about it. What is going to happen about Anne?’ ‘Nothing that I know of,’ Heathcote replied briefly. ‘Nothing has been said to me.’ ‘Tchk, tchk, tchk!’ said the Rector, with that particular action of the tongue upon the palate, which is so usual an expression of bother, or annoyance, or regret, and so little reducible into words. He shook his head. ‘I don’t understand these sort of shilly-shally doings,’ he said: ‘they would have been incomprehensible when I was a young man.’ The same question was repeated by Mr. Loseby, whom next day Heathcote went to see, driving over to Hunston in the Rector’s little carriage, with the sober old horse, which was in itself almost a member of the clerical profession. Mr. Loseby received him with open arms, and much commended the interest which he was showing in his property. ‘But Mount will be a dreary place to live in all by yourself,’ he said. ‘If I were you I would take up my abode at the Rectory, at least till you can have your establishment set on a proper footing. And now that is settled,’ said the lawyer (though nothing was settled), ‘tell me all about Anne.’ ‘I know nothing to tell you,’ said Heathcote. ‘Mr. Douglas is always there----’