A week later the Graftons were invited to dine at the Bishop's Palace. The invitation was sent to Caroline by the Bishop's wife, who indicated in a few terse sentences that a clergyman would be there on inspection, but didn't know it, and was not to know it. If he didn't suit he could go back where he came from, and nobody would be any the worse. Probably her way of putting it had not been authorised by the Bishop, who, however, took Grafton into his library on their arrival, and told him that he thought he had found him the right man. "He is quite young," he said, "and has not long been married. He has been working hard in a very poor part of London, and I fancy that his health won't stand it much longer. His father was an old friend of mine, and if you like him I think I can persuade him to come to you. He hasn't any money of his own, but what you mentioned the other day will be enough for him. His name is Gerald Prescott." They went up to the drawing-room, where a little group was standing by one of the windows, admiring the view of the garden, with the piled masonry of the Cathedral rising above the trees which enclosed it. There were four of them. Ella Carruthers and her aunt were talking together apart. The first impression of the group was one of happy youth. They were all talking and laughing together, as if none of them had a care in the world. They were Caroline, the Bishop's chaplain whom she knew already, and Prescott and his wife, with both of whom she had established relations almost upon the first words of introduction. Grafton's first impression of the man to whom he had been invited to extend his patronage was of one hardly more than a boy. He was very fair, with untidy hair crowning a smooth fresh face, and though his smile was frequent and pleased there was rather a pathetic look as of a tired child about his eyes. His wife looked older than he, though she was actually a few years younger, and not marked by the physical weariness that showed in him. She had rosy cheeks and dark alert eyes, in which there was a motherly look very noticeable when she turned them upon her husband.