It was when Cynthia was nine years old that Mrs. Marlowe found a strong-willed ally. Mrs. Tremenheere, the wife of the Dean of Wonston, had girls of her own and very clear ideas of the _via media_ in which health and education go hand in hand. She had the audacity to tilt with the Admiral on the subject. They were equally self-opinionated, but he was not only obliged to defer to her as the lady, but she could produce her own daughters as proofs of her common sense. She also derided the possibility of health of body being compatible with mental ignorance in nineteenth-century England, and commiserated the masters who were to 'finish' unprepared ground. The Admiral, who had long secretly felt himself in a dilemma, listened and yielded. For her own sake Cynthy must not be a dunce. Mrs. Tremenheere undertook to find a governess, and she found Mrs. Hennifer. After this every one had an uneasy time at Lafer Hall until Mrs. Hennifer arrived. The Admiral had yielded, but he was not at all sure that Mrs. Tremenheere knew what sort of a governess he wanted. 'She may have got us something Jesuitical, Juliana,' he said. 'I know Mrs. Tremenheere pretty well, she's a worldly woman and a schemer. She's done well for her girls so far, and she'll marry 'em well; and there's Anthony, you know, her only boy, and depend upon it she'll want a masterpiece for him; and she knows, every one does, that Cynthy's an heiress. Very nice to land Anthony at Lafer Hall, eh? Now what I say is, she may be sending us a creature of her own.' 'Oh Simon, and Cynthy only nine years old!' 'Well, well, I don't say she is, but she's a schemer, depend upon it she is, Juliana. She'd twist you round her little finger, and maybe she's twisted me too, God knows.'