Dorothea did not like being told of her duty in so pastoral a manner, and resolved to be more than ever particular in the protection of her own pecuniary rights before she submitted herself to Mr. Prong's marital authority once and for ever. By Miss Pucker she was at any rate treated with great respect, and was allowed perhaps some display of pastoral manner on her own part. It began to be with her a matter of doubt whether she might not be of more use in that free vineyard which she was about to leave, than in that vineyard with closed doors and a pastoral overseer, which she was preparing herself to enter. At any rate she would be careful about the money. But, in the mean time, she did agree with Mr. Prong that Rowan's proper character should be made known to her mother, and with this view she went out to the cottage and whispered into Mrs. Ray's astonished ears the fact that Luke was terribly in debt. "You don't say so!" "But I do say so, mother. Everybody in Baslehurst is talking about it. And they all say that he has treated Mr. Tappitt shamefully. Has anything come from him since he went?" Then Mrs. Ray told her elder daughter of the letter, and told her also that she intended to consult Mr. Comfort. "Oh, Mr. Comfort!" said Mrs. Prime, signifying her opinion that her mother was going to a very poor counsellor. "And what sort of a letter was it?" said Mrs. Prime, with a not unnatural desire to see it. "It was an honest letter enough,--very honest to my thinking; and speaking as though everything between them was quite settled." "That's nonsense, mother." "Perhaps it may be nonsense, Dorothea; but I am only telling you what the letter said. He called his mother a goose; that was the worst thing in it." "You cannot expect that such a one as he should honour his parents." "But his mother thinks him the finest young man in the world. And I must say this for him, that he has always spoken of her as though he loved her very dearly; and I believe he has been a most excellent son. He shouldn't have said goose;--at any rate in a letter;--not to my way of thinking. But perhaps they don't mind those things up in London." "I never knew a young man so badly spoken of at a place he'd left as he is in Baslehurst. I think it right to tell you; but if you have made up your mind to ask Mr. Comfort--" "Yes; I have made up my mind to ask Mr. Comfort. He has sent to say he will call the day after to-morrow." Then Mrs. Prime went back home, having seen neither the letter nor her sister.