“That’s it, sir, to be repaired, and where they were past repair, to be copied in sound wood.  But, bless you, the money fell short, and there they are, waiting for new subscriptions, and nobody to subscribe.  It was all done a year ago, sir.  Six gentlemen dined together about it, at the hotel in the new town.  They made speeches, and passed resolutions, and put their names down, and printed off thousands of prospectuses.  Beautiful prospectuses, sir, all flourished over with Gothic devices in red ink, saying it was a disgrace not to restore the church and repair the famous carvings, and so on.  There are the prospectuses that couldn’t be distributed, and the architect’s plans and estimates, and the whole correspondence which set everybody at loggerheads and ended in a dispute, all down together in that corner, behind the packing-cases.  The money dribbled in a little at first—­but what can you expect out of London?  There was just enough, you know, to pack the broken carvings, and get the estimates, and pay the printer’s bill, and after that there wasn’t a halfpenny left.  There the things are, as I said before.  We have nowhere else to put them—­nobody in the new town cares about accommodating us—­ we’re in a lost corner—­and this is an untidy vestry—­and who’s to help it?—­that’s what I want to know.”

My anxiety to examine the register did not dispose me to offer much encouragement to the old man’s talkativeness.  I agreed with him that nobody could help the untidiness of the vestry, and then suggested that we should proceed to our business without more delay.

“Ay, ay, the marriage-register, to be sure,” said the clerk, taking a little bunch of keys from his pocket.  “How far do you want to look back, sir?”

Marian had informed me of Sir Percival’s age at the time when we had spoken together of his marriage engagement with Laura.  She had then described him as being forty-five years old.  Calculating back from this, and making due allowance for the year that had passed since I had gained my information, I found that he must have been born in eighteen hundred and four, and that I might safely start on my search through the register from that date.

“I want to begin with the year eighteen hundred and four,” I said.

“Which way after that, sir?” asked the clerk.  “Forwards to our time or backwards away from us?”

“Backwards from eighteen hundred and four.”

He opened the door of one of the presses—­the press from the side of which the surplices were hanging—­and produced a large volume bound in greasy brown leather.  I was struck by the insecurity of the place in which the register was kept.  The door of the press was warped and cracked with age, and the lock was of the smallest and commonest kind.  I could have forced it easily with the walking-stick I carried in my hand.

“Is that considered a sufficiently secure place for the register?” I inquired.  “Surely a book of such importance as this ought to be protected by a better lock, and kept carefully in an iron safe?”