The Montmorrises were quiet, steady-going, rather old-fashioned people, who lived in Brighton as evenly and monotonously as they would have lived in a country village. They were not by any means in Mrs Eyrecourt's "set," but they were very old friends of the Chancellor family--old Mr Montmorris, indeed, had been their lawyer for generations, and his firm, in which his eldest son now represented him, still managed the Halswood affairs. Once upon a time there had been a large family of young Montmorrises, but, after the manner of large families, they were now scattered far and wide--"some were married, some were dead," two maiden sisters only, no longer youthful, still representing at home the boys and girls, the "children" of long ago. But their brother--Mr Christian Montmorris, the hope of the family and the head of the firm--had by this time a wife and large family of his own, none of whom had any objection to spending a few weeks now and then at "grandpapa's," on which occasions their father used to "run down" from town as many times a week as he could spare the time, "running up again" by the first train the next morning; for he was a shrewd, clever, energetic man, with some fingers to spare for other pies besides those it was his legitimate office to cook; with a clear head and a sharp eye for a wary venture or a profitable investment. Among other by-concerns of this kind, in which his name did not appear, he was interested in the affairs of the great Wareborough engineering company, in whose employ Gerald Thurston, the curate's elder brother, had spent the last three years in India. The sisters-in-law were received by their friends with open arms. "So kind of you to come to us in this unceremonious way. So pleased to see Miss Eyrecourt again. We quite feared Mrs Eyrecourt would have left Brighton this year before you joined her," said Miss Cecilia Montmorris. And then old Mrs Montmorris broke in with self-congratulations that "Christy" had just arrived unexpectedly, and, what was more, had brought a friend with him, a gentleman just arrived from India. "We were quite pleased to see him, I assure you," she continued, addressing Roma in particular, "for a new-comer always brings a little variety; and now that my boys are all away from us we seem to be falling out of fresh acquaintances sadly. Mr Montmorris and I are getting too old for any sort of gaiety," she went on. "It is dull for Cecilia and Bessie sometimes, but they are good girls, very, and they know it won't be always that they will have their father and me to care for. Besides, they have a little change now and then when Mrs Christian takes one of them up to town for a week or two. Bessie is going back with them next week. And you have been away up in the north, I hear, my dear? How did you like that? I used to know Cumberland in my young days."