"I don't mean to grumble. But I do so detest handling dirty old library books, and running the Shoe-Club, and going in and out of stuffy cottages, and hearing all about the old women's complaints. I suppose, if I were really good, I should dote on that sort of life. But I'm not!—and I don't! I do love things to be nice and clean and dainty. And—perhaps it is conceited of me—I sometimes think I could really do something with my music, if only—but there is never any time. Mother likes me to practise every day; but as soon as I begin to get into it, and forget the whole world, I'm morally certain to be called off, and sent to take some wretched note somewhere." "That must be a little trying." "It's just horribly trying, and it makes me so cross. Ought I to say all this? Of course mother doesn't mean—but you see, she's not musical. And when interruptions come again and again, I get out of heart, and it doesn't seem worth while to go on. Sometimes I feel as if I must chuck it all, and get right away!—as if I couldn't go on!" Her face flushed. He questioned—had the elder lady acted as suggester to the girl, or the girl to the elder lady? Some collusion of ideas evidently existed. "But you like to be useful." The corners of her mouth curled upward in a protesting smile. "Ye—es—I suppose so. Not always. And I'd rather be useful in my own fashion. Not in other people's fashion." No more could be said, for on their way to the stable they skirted the glass door which opened from the Rector's study upon a side-lawn. There stood the Rector himself, in an attitude of bored endurance. There also was the rectorinn,—so named, and not inappropriately, by Mrs. Brutt,—large and comfortable in figure, calm and positive in manner. Though she never spoke loudly, her voice had a penetrative quality. "Really, Sylvester, with that woman always about you must be more careful. Only last week you promised me never to be seen in this coat. I shall have to give it away." "Drastic measure!" muttered the Rector. "I don't see what else can be done. You never remember to change it; and positively I cannot have you going about in rags. She will gossip about you all over the place. If the husband goes shabby, it is always the wife who is blamed." "Well, well, my dear, I'll be careful." "You won't. You never are. When once you get to your tools, everything else goes out of your head—promises included. Nothing will cure you but getting rid of the coat altogether." "The consent of the owner is generally supposed—" "Not in the case of husband and wife, I hope." The Rector wondered what his wife would say, if he proceeded to dispose, without her consent, of her best black silk. But he was not a lover of what the Scots call "argle-bargle." "Hallo!—here's Stirling!" The Squire made believe to have heard nothing; and the grateful Rector carried him off. Doris was not allowed to follow. Mrs. Winton beckoned her indoors.