Looking in, the evening before, in order to deliver her message, she had been so full of the impending change in Miss Marigold’s life that she had quite forgotten the impending change in Mrs. Clapham’s. Seated in the armchair that had been made by the long-departed Jonty Clapham, she had talked excitedly of her daughter in the Government office, who would be snatched out of it, pen in hand, so to speak, to be married to a bridegroom who, metaphorically, would still have one foot on his ship. She had also wept a little in the way that women and mothers have, and Mrs. Clapham, whose own tears over a daughter’s bridal had been shed so many superior years before, had consoled her with words of sympathy and wisdom, and her well-known kindly laugh. Presently Mrs. Wrench had dried her tears and begun to tell her about her daughter’s frocks, and Mrs. Clapham, whose Tibbie happened to be a dressmaker by profession, was able to shine a second time as a qualified judge. But never once during the conversation had she as much as hinted at her own bright hope which was so near its wonderful fulfilment. She had just allowed Mrs. Wrench to babble happily on, and kept her own thoughts hugged to herself where they lay so snug and warm. Not even when Mrs. Wrench had risen at last to go had she referred to any possible alteration in her own affairs. She had merely sent her love and respects to the bride, and the bride’s mother had promised to come and tell her about the wedding. “And of course next week as usual, please!” she had said as she hurried away, and the charwoman had said neither yea nor nay, but had merely dropped her old-fashioned curtsey. It was no use reminding the Vicar’s wife that, by the time next week came round, things might have become anything but “usual.” There was always the possibility, too, that it might be unlucky, with the whole entrancing affair still hanging breathlessly in the balance. So she had let her go away without even dropping a hint of her personal prospects, and it was only after the door was shut that she had allowed herself to smile. Then she had begun to chuckle and chuckle, and sat down and chuckled, and stood up and chuckled, and sat down again and chuckled and chuckled and chuckled _and_ chuckled.... She chuckled afresh now as she lay thinking, and then reflected that it might possibly be as unlucky as singing too early, and therefore desisted. It occurred to her also that she might be tempting Providence by lying in bed, behaving, as it were, as if the decree which would set her free to lie in bed had actually been spoken; and, sitting up in a flurry, she threw off the bed-clothes and began to dress. It was more than probable that she would have as much bed as anybody could want, in the near future. She who had always been a phenomenally early riser need not grudge an exhibition of the accomplishment on this possibly last day.