The congregation dispersed slowly with the conviction that there had been created one of those memories to which in later years the reflective mind delights to return. Quite naturally, and as they often did, Mrs. Manson and Mrs. Bowers dropped into the Dibbott house with its mistress. Dibbott was already there. He was about to start on one of his official journeys, and just now was rooting things out of a back cupboard with explosive energy. "Well," said Mrs. Bowers, folding her large, capable hands, "wasn't it lovely?" The rumble of a street car sounded outside. "It revives old times," Mrs. Manson said softly, "but I don't believe we've changed much. We're too bred in the bone." "Do we want the old times back?" asked Mrs. Bowers, to whom the past years had been kind. "For some things, yes, and for others, no. Living's a great deal more expensive, and my husband's income is just the same," put in Mrs. Dibbott after a pause. "Taxes are up, and I'm not any happier though I suppose I'm better informed. John won't sell the place though he has been offered a perfectly splendid price, and it's noisy--but I like it, and there's the garden. Things don't happen to me--they just happen round me." "And you, my dear," continued Mrs. Bowers with an inquisitive glance at the chief constable's wife, "what about you? Your husband's supposed to have done better than any one except Mr. Filmer." The little woman flushed. She was perfectly aware that Manson was credited with making his fortune, and perhaps he had. But she had no knowledge of it. For a while she knew he was dealing in property, and then one morning he told her he had sold out. Her heart leaped at the news, for Manson in the past year or so had changed. Invariably austere, he had been nevertheless kind and considerate--but soon after the real estate venture ended he became only austere, to which there was added something almost like apprehension. And this in her husband was to her of intense concern. "I can't say," she began a little timidly. "Peter has been telling me for months he's going to resign and live at ease, but it's always a matter of waiting just a little longer. I can't help longing for the old days. Perhaps there was less comfort but--" she added pathetically, "there was also less restlessness. I suppose I'm out of date." "Did you see Mr. Clark to-day?" broke in Mrs. Dibbott, changing the subject with swift intuition. "Yes, the first time he has been in church." "He's not interested in us," announced Mrs. Bowers, with the manner of one who delivers an axiom, "not a little bit. St. Marys happens to be the town near the works, and we happen to be the people in it, that's all."