e perfect alike in
arrangement and execution, that the said housekeeper was a woman of
irreproachable tact and capability, and that she herself had never an
excuse for concrete complaint, formed a growing though intangible
grievance in Rachel's mind. She had not felt it at first. She had
changed in these summer months. She wanted to be more like other wives.
There was Morna Woodgate, with the work cut out for every hour of her
full and happy days; but Morna had not made an anomalous marriage, Morna
had married for love.

And to-day there was not even Morna to come and see her, or for her to
go and see, for Tuesday afternoon was not one of the few upon which the
vicar's wife had no settled duty or occupation in the parish. Rachel so
envied her the way in which she helped her husband in his work; she had
tried to help also, in a desultory way; but it is one thing to do a
thing because it is a duty, and another thing to do it for something to
do, as Rachel soon found out. Besides, Hugh Woodgate was not her
husband. Rachel had the right feeling to abandon those half-hearted
attempts at personal recreation in the guise of good works, and the
courage to give Morna her reasons; but she almost regretted it this
afternoon.

She had explored for the twentieth time that strange treasury known as
the Chinese Room, a state apartment filled with loot brought home from
the Flowery Land by a naval scion of the house of Normanthorpe, and
somewhat cynically included in the sale. The idols only leered in
Rachel's face, and the cabinets of grotesque design were unprovided with
any key to their history of former uses. In sheer desperation Rachel
betook herself to her husband's study; it was the first time she had
crossed that threshold in his absence, but within were the books, and a
book she must have.

These also had been purchased with the house. With few exceptions, they
were ancient books in battered calf, which Steel had stigmatized as
"musty trash" once when Rachel had asked him if she might take one. She
had not made that request again; indeed, it was seldom enough that she
had set foot inside the spacious room which the old books lined, and in
which the master of the house disliked being disturbed. Yet it was
anything but trash which she now discovered upon the dusty shelves.

There was _Tom Jones_ in four volumes and the _Spectator_ in eight, _Gil
Blas_ and the works of Swift, all with the long "s," and backs like
polished oa