"I'm sorry to 'ave to say it, sir. But when a party goes turning vegetarian suddenly and putting out all the cooking, and hasn't no proper luggage of his own, and borry's shirts and socks from his 'ost, and don't know no better than to try his knife at peas (as I seed my very self), and goes talking in odd corners to the housemaids, and folds up his napkin after meals, and eats with his fingers at minced veal, and plays the fiddle in the middle of the night keeping everybody awake, and stares and grins at his elders a-getting upstairs, and generally misconducts himself with things that I can scarcely tell you all, one can't help thinking, sir. Thought is free, sir, and one can't help coming to one's own conclusions. Besides which, there is talk all over the village about him--what with one thing and another. I know a gentleman when I sees a gentleman, and I know a gentleman when I don't see a gentleman, and me, and Susan, and George, we've talked it over, being the upper servants, so to speak, and experienced, and leaving out that girl Delia, who I only hope won't come to any harm through him, and depend upon it, sir, that Mr Angel ain't what you think he is, sir, and the sooner he leaves this house the better." Mrs Hinijer ceased abruptly and stood panting but stern, and with her eyes grimly fixed on the Vicar's face. "_Really_, Mrs Hinijer!" said the Vicar, and then, "Oh _Lord_!" "What _have_ I done?" said the Vicar, suddenly starting up and appealing to the inexorable fates. "What HAVE I done?" "There's no knowing," said Mrs Hinijer. "Though a deal of talk in the village." "_Bother!_" said the Vicar, going and staring out of the window. Then he turned. "Look here, Mrs Hinijer! Mr Angel will be leaving this house in the course of a week. Is that enough?" "Quite," said Mrs Hinijer. "And I feel sure, sir...." The Vicar's eyes fell with unwonted eloquence upon the door. THE ANGEL IN TROUBLE. XLV. "The fact is," said the Vicar, "this is no world for Angels." The blinds had not been drawn, and the twilight outer world under an overcast sky seemed unspeakably grey and cold. The Angel sat at table in dejected silence. His inevitable departure had been proclaimed. Since his presence hurt people and made the Vicar wretched he acquiesced in the justice of the decision, but what would happen to him after his plunge he could not imagine. Something very disagreeable certainly. "There is the violin," said the Vicar. "Only after our experience----" "I must get you clothes--a general outfit.---- Dear me! you don't understand railway travelling! And coinage! Taking lodgings! Eating-houses!---- I must come up at least and see you settled. Get work for you. But an Angel in London! Working for his living! That grey cold wilderness of people! What _will_ become of you?---- If I had one friend in the world I could trust to believe me!" "I ought not to be sending you away----"