"Look here," said Paul, laughing, "this is no place for me. I'm off. I'll tell your mother to expect you in half an hour, Madeline. Good-bye. Good-bye, Miss Cator. Your tea's topping. I'll send in everyone I see." And he walked off. Madeline glanced quickly across the room; Mrs. Thornton and Edith were making their way to the door; Paul caught them up as she watched. She flushed slightly. Ethel Cator slipped into the empty place by her side, and dropped her voice a little. "He's not keen on that girl, surely," she said. Madeline shrugged her shoulders. "How should I know?" she asked, with an assumption of indifference. Ethel laughed. "Well, my dear, of course it's not my business, but I thought you saw a good deal of him." "Well, naturally, seeing what our fathers are." "Has Cambridge changed him? I should have thought he'd have dropped the Mission Hall now." Ethel's tone was a little contemptuous, and it roused Madeline to the defensive. "My dear, you don't know Paul," she said coolly. "He doesn't play at religion. He probably wants to speak to Miss Thornton about the Christian Endeavour. It would take more than a term at Cambridge to make Paul throw that over. And I like him for it." Her friend got up. "I must go," she said. "I didn't mean to be a cat, Madeline. Everybody knows Paul's a born parson, and of course he'll make a good one." "He wants to go to India," said Madeline, mollified and inconsequent, and not realising that she lied. "He'll be a bishop one day, I expect." Ethel looked envious, and rewarded her. "India!" she exclaimed, and sat down again for a minute or two. The girls fell to discussing Simla with a suburban imagination. Mrs. Thornton had asked him "'Ow he liked Cambridge?" and Paul had replied at length. But she had gone off at last, and left him with the tall girl whose brown eyes had been alight with a flicker of amusement the while he had talked to her mother. They were standing near the platform at the top of the room, and a not yet opened "fishpond" with its appurtenances screened them slightly. He was able to look her full in the face now and realise how good she looked, though the little fur hat was slightly out of place there, and her coat a little shabby. "Mother's a dear," she said. He nodded. "I know. Edith, I've longed to see you again. Why weren't you at the Mission Hall on Sunday?" "I couldn't go. I was ever so sorry." "Really?" She nodded. "I knew you were preaching. Mr. Derrick told us. But I had to stay and help mother with the kiddies." Paul saw a mental vision of the little rooms over the shop and the three small Thornton children sprawling everywhere. Once or twice he had been in on business for the Society, and he knew it well. Edith in that setting had always puzzled him a little. She did not seem quite to belong to it, and yet she moved about household jobs with a quiet dignity that did not in the least suggest resentment or incongruity.