so she had determined on trying a neighbourhood where people were extremely well acquainted with each other’s affairs, and where the women were mostly ill-dressed and ugly.  Mr. Bridmain’s slow brain had adopted his sister’s views, and it seemed to him that a woman so handsome and distinguished as the Countess must certainly make a match that might lift himself into the region of county celebrities, and give him at least a sort of cousinship to the quarter-sessions.

All this, which was the simple truth, would have seemed extremely flat to the gossips of Milby, who had made up their minds to something much more exciting.  There was nothing here so very detestable.  It is true, the Countess was a little vain, a little ambitious, a little selfish, a little shallow and frivolous, a little given to white lies.—­But who considers such slight blemishes, such moral pimples as these, disqualifications for entering into the most respectable society!  Indeed, the severest ladies in Milby would have been perfectly aware that these characteristics would have created no wide distinction between the Countess Czerlaski and themselves; and since it was clear there was a wide distinction—­why, it must lie in the possession of some vices from which they were undeniably free.

Hence it came to pass that Milby respectability refused to recognize the Countess Czerlaski, in spite of her assiduous church-going, and the deep disgust she was known to have expressed at the extreme paucity of the congregations on Ash-Wednesdays.  So she began to feel that she had miscalculated the advantages of a neighbourhood where people are well acquainted with each other’s private affairs.  Under these circumstances, you will imagine how welcome was the perfect credence and admiration she met with from Mr. and Mrs. Barton.  She had been especially irritated by Mr. Ely’s behaviour to her; she felt sure that he was not in the least struck with her beauty, that he quizzed her conversation, and that he spoke of her with a sneer.  A woman always knows where she is utterly powerless, and shuns a coldly satirical eye as she would shun a Gorgon.  And she was especially eager for clerical notice and friendship, not merely because that is quite the most respectable countenance to be obtained in society, but because she really cared about religious matters, and had an uneasy sense that she was not altogether safe in that quarter.  She had serious intentions of becoming quite pious—­without any reserves—­when she had once got her carriage and settlement.  Let us do this one sly trick, says Ulysses to Neoptolemus, and we will be perfectly honest ever after—­

[Greek:  all edu gar toi ktema tes uikes labien
tolma dikaioi d’ authis ekphanoumetha.]

The Countess did not quote Sophocles, but she said to herself, ’Only this little bit of pretence and vanity, and then I will be quite good, and make myself quite safe for another world.’