“Confess, Joan, that’s what brought you over.”

“Perhaps so.  Edith heard some nonsense at Backsworth, and mamma could not rest till she had sent me over to see about it; but would there be any great harm in it if it were true?  Is not Lady Susan a super-excellent woman?”

“You’ve hit it again, Jenny.  Couple the two descriptions.”

“I gather that you don’t think the danger great.”

“Not at present.  The fascination is dual, and is at least a counteraction to the great enchantress.”

“That is well!  It was not wholesome!”

“Whereas, these two are hearty, honest, well-principled girls, quite genuine.”

“Yet you don’t say it with all your heart.”

“I own I should like to find something they had left undone.”

“What, to reduce them to human nature’s daily food?”

“Daily indeed!  There’s just no escaping them.  There they are at matins and evensong.”

“How shocking!  What, gossip afterwards?”

“Ask Rollo whether Mungo and Tartar don’t stand at the lych-gate, and if he finds it easy to put an end to the game at play.”

“Oh! and he said they never missed a Sunday service, or the school.  Do they distract him?”

“Whom would it not distract to see two figures walking in with hunches on their backs like camels, and high-heeled shoes, and hats on the back of their heads, and chains and things clattering all over them?”

“Aren’t they lady-like?”

“Oh! they are quite that.  Rose says it is all the pink of fashion—­ only coming it strong—­I declare they are infectious!”

“I believe so.  I never heard so many nibbles at slang from any of you five, as from the Rector of Compton in the last five minutes.  I gather that he is slightly bothered.”

“There’s so much of it.  We are forced to have them to all the meals on Sunday, and their lectures on functions have nearly scared poor Anne to the Pilgrim level again.  They have set upon me to get up a choir-concert and a harvest-feast; but happily no one has time for the first at this season, and as to the other, I doubted whether to make this first start after such a rainy summer, and they decide me against it.  To have them decorating the church!”

“Awfully jolly,” suggested Jenny.

“Even so.  They are, if you understand me, technically reverent; they have startled the whole place with their curtsies and crossings in church; but they gabble up to the very porch; and the familiarity with which they discuss High Mass, as they are pleased to call it!  I was obliged to silence them, and I must say they took it nicely.”

“How do they suit Lena?”

“She likes them.  Lady Susan was a great help to her in London, and she feels the comfort of their honesty.  They brought her to church with them one or two mornings, but it knocked her up to walk so early.  Insensibly, I think they do Lady Tyrrell’s work in shutting her up from any of us.”