So far as time had yet gone, the only intercourse with their neighbours held by the Athelings was at church, and their nearest neighbours were those clerical people who occupied the Old Wood House. Mr Rivers was said to have a sister living with him, but she was “a great invalid,” and never visible; and on no occasion, since his new parishioners arrived, had the close Venetian blinds been raised, or the house opened its eyes. There it stood in the sunshine, in that most verdant of trim old gardens, which no one ever walked in, nor, according to appearances, ever saw, with its three rows of closed windows, blankly green, secluded and forbidding, which no one within ever seemed tempted to open to the sweetest of morning breezes, or the fragrant coolness of the night. Agnes, taking the privilege of her craft, was much disposed to suspect some wonderful secret or mystery in this monkish and ascetic habitation; but it was not difficult to guess the secret of the Rector, and there was not a morsel of mystery in the bland countenance of smiling Mr Mead. By this time Mrs Atheling and her children were alone. Papa had exhausted his holiday, and with a mixture of pleasure and unwillingness returned to his office duties; and Mamma, though she had so much enjoyment of the country, which was “so good for the children,” began to sigh a little for her other household, to marvel much how Susan used her supremacy, and to be seized with great compunctions now and then as to the cruelty “of leaving your father and Charlie by themselves so long.” The only thing which really reconciled the good wife to this desertion, was the fact that Charlie himself, without any solicitation, and in fact rather against his will, was to have a week’s holiday at Michaelmas, and of course looked forward in his turn to the Old Wood Lodge. Mrs Atheling had made up her mind to return with her son, and was at present in a state of considerable doubt and perplexity touching Agnes and Marian, Bell and Beau. The roses on the cheeks of the little people had blossomed so sweetly since they came to the country, Mrs Atheling almost thought she could trust her darlings to Hannah, and that “another month would do them no harm.” CHAPTER XVIII. A NEW FRIEND.