Papa! The shock was too
much... `Mrs and the Misses Mallison return warm thanks for kind
sympathy in their sad and sudden bereavement,' something like that...
They have a book at the stationer's, with a selection drawn out. I've
seen them at the end of the Christmas mottoes. We'll telephone... The
Vicar will be in again presently. Most attentive. He enquired for you,
Mary. I said we had wired. He felt quite sure you would come. Mrs
Evans sent a cross. Mrs Beverley's were coloured. Pale pink roses,
and a note with them. Very feeling, I must say. Being an orphan
herself, she can understand. Only cards from the Court. We've seen
nothing of them this last year. The Squire's mother died, so they don't
entertain, and Lady Cassandra and Mrs Beverley are always together. Of
course, as I tell Teresa, she's so much younger. Teresa is looking
thinner, Mary, isn't she? Quite slim. You haven't altered, my dear. I
see no difference. I thought perhaps you'd have changed your hair.--No!
Papa didn't speak of you specially; he hadn't time, but he spoke of his
children,--something about ruining me and the children--he thought of
us, not himself. I said to him, whatever he had done, he had done it
for the best. Mr Hunter said the same thing this morning. He came in
to offer to help. He is looking after the--er,... arranging for
Thursday. Quite simple, I told him, but _good_. I could not bear to
skimp for Papa. The dressmaker's coming at six..." Her face quivered
and a stray tear rolled slowly down her cheek. "He looks so
peaceful!... Afterwards--you must come up..."

Mary shrank. She did not want to see the still, changed effigy of what
had been; she wanted to remember her father as the quiet man who had
kissed her on the doorstep, and said: "My dear, I hope you may have a
pleasant time," but she had not the courage to refuse. She looked
appealingly at Teresa, and saw a sudden wave of feeling sweep over the
pale face. From without came the sound of wheels, a heavy, lumbering
sound which to Chumley ears announced the advent of one of the venerable
station flies. The next moment the bell rang, and a man's footstep was
heard in the hall. "The Vicar!" murmured Mrs Mallison, but Mary knew
it was not the Vicar; the look on her sister's face announced too surely
the name of the new-comer.

There came a pause, while the new maid was escorting the visitor into
the drawing-room, and came back to announce his n