Mr Wentworth came to a hesitating pause at the head of the turning
which would have led him to Wharfside. He looked at his watch and saw
there was half an hour to spare. He gave a wistful lingering look down
the long line of garden-walls, pausing upon one point where the
blossomed boughs of an apple-tree overlooked that enclosure. There
was quite time to call and ask if the Miss Wodehouses were going down
to the service this afternoon; but was it duty? or, indeed, putting
that question aside, was it quite right to compound matters with his
own heart's desire and the work he was engaged in, in this undeniable
fashion? The young priest crossed the street very slowly, swinging his
cane and knitting his brows as he debated the question. If it had been
one of the bargemen bringing his sweetheart, walking with her along
the side of the canal to which Spring and sweet Easter coming on, and
Love, perhaps, always helpful of illusions, might convey a certain
greenness and sentiment of nature--and echoing her soft responses to
the afternoon prayers--perhaps the Curate might have felt that such
devotion was not entirely pure and simple. But somehow, before he was
aware of it, his slow footstep had crossed the line, and he found
himself in Grange Lane, bending his steps towards Mr Wodehouse's door.
For one thing, to be sure, the Canticles in the evening service could
always be sung when Lucy's sweet clear voice was there to lead the
uncertain melody; and it was good to see her singing the 'Magnificat'
with that serious sweet face, "full of grace," like Mary's own.
Thinking of that, Mr Wentworth made his way without any further
hesitation to the green door over which hung the apple-blossoms,
totally untroubled in his mind as to what the reverend pair were
thinking whom he had left behind him in the ugly church; and
unconscious that his impromptu chapel at Wharfside, with its little
carved reading-desk, and the table behind, contrived so as to look
suspiciously like an altar, was a thorn in anybody's side. Had his
mind been in a fit condition at that moment to cogitate trouble, his
thoughts would have travelled in a totally different direction, but in
the mean time Mr Wentworth was very well able to put aside his
perplexities. The green door opened just as he reached it, and Lucy
and her elder sister came out in those grey cloaks which the Rector
had slandered. They were just going to Wharfside to the service, and
of course they were s