t lady. To do her justice, she would have
behaved exactly the same to a statue, or even to nothing at all, as a
peacock dances and postures and vibrates his plumes to a kitten; and had
no more deliberate intention of giving pain to anybody than a nightshade
has of poisoning a silly sheep.

The sublime conceit of a boy of fifteen made him of course think that she
had detected in him a nobility that others overlooked, and so Anthony
began a gorgeous course of day-dreaming, in which he moved as a kind of
king, worshipped and reverenced by this splendid creature, who after a
disillusionment from the empty vanities of a Court life and a Queen's
favour, found at last the lord of her heart in a simple manly young
countryman. These dreams, however, he had the grace and modesty to keep
wholly to himself.

Mary came down one day and found the two in the garden together.

"Come, my child," she said, "and you too, Master Anthony, if you can
spare time to escort us; and take me to the church. I want to see it."

"The church!" said Isabel, "that is locked: we must go to the Rectory."

"Locked!" exclaimed Mary, "and is that part of the blessed Reformation?
Well, come, at any rate."

They all went across to the village and down the green towards the
Rectory, whose garden adjoined the churchyard on the south side of the
church. Anthony walked with something of an air in front of the two
ladies. Isabel told her as they went about the Rector and his views. Mary
nodded and smiled and seemed to understand.

"We will tap at the window," said Anthony, "it is the quickest way."

They came up towards the study window that looked on to the drive; when
Anthony, who was in front, suddenly recoiled and then laughed.

"They are at it again," he said.

The next moment Mary was looking through the window too. The Rector was
sitting in his chair opposite, a small dark, clean-shaven man, but his
face was set with a look of distressed determination, and his lower lip
was sucked in; his eyes were fixed firmly on a tall, slender woman whose
back was turned to the window and who seemed to be declaiming, with
outstretched hand. The Rector suddenly saw the faces at the window.

"We seem to be interrupting," said Mary coolly, as she turned away.

CHAPTER V

A RIDER FROM LONDON

"We will walk on, Master Anthony," said Mistress Corbet. "Will you bring
the keys when the Rector and his l