back just in time for the
dinner.

'It's just about five years since they had such a turn-out at the
vicarage,' said Higgs in a crisp little voice. 'Miss Violetta was
nineteen then; she'll be twenty-four now.'

'Yes,' said the curate absently; 'what was up then?'

''Twas a dinner much of a muchness to this. Mrs. Higgs, she was just
reminding me of it. But that was in honour of Mr. Herbert, of the 'All.
You'll 'ave heard of him?'

'Oh, yes,' said the curate, 'all that was very sad.'

'The more so,' said Higgs briskly, 'that when it was broke hoff, Mr.
Herbert died of love. He went to some foreign countries and took up with
low company, and there he died. Squire hasn't held his head up straight
since that day.'

'All that was before I came,' said the curate very gravely, for he did
not know exactly what to say.

'Lor' bless you, sir,' said Higgs, 'I was in no way blaming you. There's
no blame attaching to any, that I know; squire's wife was as mad as a
hare. Miss Violetta, she cried her pretty eyes nigh out for Mr. Herbert;
it's time she'd another.'

The curate went to the dinner, and it was a very fine affair indeed.
Violetta wore a silk gown and looked charming. She does not look a day
older than she did when I saw her five years ago,' said the dean to the
curate, meaning to be very polite, but the curate did not smile at the
compliment.

'How fine your flowers are!' said the maiden aunt to Violetta. 'Where
did you get them, my dear?'

'The squire sent them to me,' said Violetta, with a droop of her eyelids
which made her look more charming than ever. Then they had dinner, and
after dinner Violetta gave them some music. It was sacred music, for
Mrs. Moore did not care for anything else.

When the song was over Mrs. Moore said to the curate, 'It has been my
wish to give dear Violetta a little gift as a slight remembrance of this
happy occasion, and I thought that something of my own would be more
valuable than----' Here the mother's voice broke with very natural
emotion, and she pressed her handkerchief to her eyes. 'You must excuse
me,' she murmured, 'she is such a dear--such a very dear girl, and she
is our only child.'

'Indeed, I can well understand,' said he, with earnest sympathy.

'Such a dear--such a very dear girl,' murmured Mrs. Moore again. Then
she rose and embraced Violetta and wept, and the aunts all shed tears,
and the vicar coughed. Violetta's own blue eyes over-flowed with very
pretty