ch. None of it
seems beautiful to me as it does to Adela. My aunt used to say that we
were not fortunate in our clergyman, but personally I don't like any
clergymen. I am anti-clerical like a Frenchwoman."

"Have you any French blood?"

"Yes; my mother was French."

"But you do good works; I remember how you nursed the kitchenmaid at
Groombridge."

"I like to stop pain, but not because it is a good work. I can't stand
all the fuss about good works and committees, and nonsense about loving
the poor. It's a way rich people have to make themselves feel
comfortable. Don't you think so?"

"No, I don't. I know people who make themselves exceedingly
uncomfortable because they give away half what they possess."

"Really," said Molly, a little contemptuously. She knew that he was
thinking of Rose Bright. "My opinion is that doing good works means to
bustle about trying to get as much of other people's money to give away
as you can, without giving any yourself."

Edmund did not like to suggest that this opinion might be the result of
special experiences gained while living in the house of Mrs. Delaport
Green.

"If," Molly went on, evidently glad to relieve her mind on the subject,
"you got the money to pay your unfortunate dressmaker, there would be
some justice in that. But," she suddenly sat up and her eyes shot fire
at Edmund, "to fuss at a bazaar to show your kindness of heart while you
know you are not going to pay the woman who made the very gown you have
on, is perfectly sickening."

"It is atrocious," said Grosse, who wanted to change the subject. But
this was effected by the most unexpected apparition of Mr. Delaport
Green, whom they had both supposed to be refreshing himself by the sea
at Brighton.

Mr. Delaport Green was dressed in very light grey, with a white
waistcoat. His figure was curious, as it extended in parts so far in
front of the rest that it gave the impression that you must pass your
eyes over a great deal of substance in the foreground before you could
see the face. Then again, the nose was so predominant that it checked
any attempt to realise the eyes and forehead, while the cheeks were
baggy and the skin unwholesome.

Edmund Grosse had only seen him on two occasions when he dined at his
house, and he had liked him at once. There was something markedly
masculine about him; he knew life, and had made up his mind as to his
own part in it without delusions and without whining. He would have