Zachariah was somewhat surprised. He did not know what sort of a supper it could be; but he was silent. She asked Pauline to take off her bonnet, and then proceeded to lay the cloth. For five minutes, or perhaps ten minutes, she disappeared, and then there came, not only bread and cheese, but cold ham, a plentiful supply of beer, and, more wonderful still, a small cold beefsteak pie. Everything was produced as easily as if it had been the ordinary fare, and Zachariah was astonished at his wife’s equality to the emergency. Whence she obtained the ham and beefsteak pie he could not conjecture. She apologised for having nothing hot; would have had something better if she had known, etc., etc., and then sat down at the head of the table. The Major sat on her right, Pauline next to him, and opposite to Pauline, Caillaud and Zachariah. Their hostess immediately began to ask questions about the events of that fatal night when they all left London. The Major, however, interposed, and said that it would perhaps be better if nothing was said upon that subject. “A dismal topic,” he observed; “talking about it can do no good, and I for one don’t want to be upset by thinking about it just before I go to bed.” “At least,” said Zachariah, “you can tell us why you are in Manchester?” “Certainly,” replied the Major. “In the first place, Paris is not quite so pleasant as it used to be; London, too, is not attractive; and we thought that, on the whole, Manchester was to be preferred. Moreover, a good deal will have to be done during the next twelvemonth, and Manchester will do it. You will hear all about it when your club meets next time.” “You’ve been in Paris?” said Mrs. Zachariah. “Isn’t it very wicked?” “Well, that depends on what you call wicked.” “Surely there cannot be two opinions on that point.” “It does seem so; and yet when you live abroad you find that things which are made a great deal of here are not thought so much of there; and, what is very curious, they think other things very wrong there of which we take no account here.” “Is that because they are not Christians?” “Oh dear no; I am speaking of good Christian people; at least so I take them to be. And really, when you come to consider it, we all of us make a great fuss about our own little bit of virtue, and undervalue the rest—I cannot tell upon whose authority.” “But are they not, Major, dreadfully immoral in France?” Pauline leaned over her plate and looked Mrs. Coleman straight in the face. “Mrs. Coleman, you are English; you—” Her father put up his hand; he foresaw what was coming, and that upon this subject Pauline would have defied all the rules of hospitality. So he replied calmly, but with the calm of suppressed force: “Mrs. Coleman, as my daughter says, you are English; you are excusable. I will not dispute with you, but I will tell you a little story.” “Will you not take some more beer, Mr. Caillaud, before you begin?”