come, my dear, – they’ve come?”
“Pylades and Orestes?”
“Well, of course, that’s only my nonsense; but, as I told you, I saw the coach come in, and two gentlemen got down, both young and handsome – one fair, the other dark; and one is evidently our new vicar, and the other must be his friend. I am so glad, my dear, for I have been exceedingly anxious about the kind of person we were to have for our new clergyman.”
“Indeed!” said Rhoda, looking amused. “Why, I thought you went now to the Wesleyan chapel?”
“What a dear satirical girl you are, Rhoda. You know I only went there on account of Mr Chynoweth, and because Mr Owen stared at me so dreadfully, and was so persistent in preaching about dress.”
“But surely that was only at the mining and fishing women, who have been growing dreadfully gay in their attire.”
“Oh dear, no, my dear! oh dear no!” said Miss Pavey, shaking her head. “I have the best of reasons for believing it was all directed at me. You remember his text the last Sunday I was at church?”
“I am sorry to say I do not.”
“Dear me, I wonder at that. It was so very pointed. It was – ‘Who is this that cometh with dyed garments from Bozrah?’ and he looked at me as he spoke. I think it was disgraceful.”
“But, my dear Martha, I think you are too sensitive.”
“Perhaps I am, my dear; perhaps I am. I have had my troubles; but that Mr Owen was dreadful. You know, my dear, he had – perhaps I ought not to say it, but I will – he evidently wanted to make an impression upon me, but I never could like him. He was so coarse, and abrupt, and short-sighted. He used to smoke pipes too. Mrs Mullion has told me, over and over again, that he would sit for hours of a night smoking pipes, and drinking gin and water, with that dreadfully wicked old man, Mr Paul. Really, my dear, I think some one ought to warn our new clergyman not to go and lodge at Mrs Mullion’s. You see there is hardly any choice for a gentleman, and for one who looks so refined to go and stay at Mrs Mullion’s would be dreadful.”
“Mrs Mullion is very good and amiable,” said Rhoda.
“Yes, my dear, she is; but Mr Paul is not a nice person; and then there is that Madge – dreadful girl!”
Rhoda’s heart gave a higher-pressure throb at this last name, and Miss Pavey ran on, as she could if she only obtained a good listener, —
“I do think that girl ought to be sent away from Carnac; I do, indeed. Really, my dear, if I had felt disposed to accept any advances on the part of Mr Tregenna, his conduct with that flighty creature would have set me against him.”
Rhoda’s heart beat faster still, and the colour went and came in her face as she listened. She blamed herself for hearkening to such petty gossip, but her visitor was determined to go on, and added confidence to confidence, for, as it may be gathered, Miss Martha Pavey’s peculiar idiosyncrasy was a belief that was terribly persecuted by the male sex, who eagerly sought her hand in marriage, though at the present time a gossip of Carnac had told another gossip that Miss Pavey was “setting her gashly old cap now at Methody Parson.”
“Don’t you think, my dear,” continued the visitor, “that your papa ought to interfere?”
“Interfere? About what?” exclaimed Rhoda, whose thoughts had run off to her conversation with her father that morning.
“Why, what are you thinking about, Rhoda?” cried Miss Pavey. “Oh, you naughty, naughty girl, you! You were thinking about our handsome young clergyman and his young friend. Oh, for shame, for shame?”
“Indeed, I was not!” exclaimed Rhoda, half amused, half indignant at her visitor’s folly.
“Oh, don’t tell me, dear,” said Miss Pavey, shaking her head. “It’s very shocking of you, but I don’t wonder. See how few marriageable gentlemen there are about here.”
“Miss Pavey, pray don’t be so absurd,” exclaimed Rhoda.
“Oh, no, my dear, I will not,” said the visitor, blushing, and then indulging in a peculiar giggle; “but after all, there is a something in wedlock, my dear Rhoda.”
“A something in wedlock?”
“Yes, dear, there is, you know, speaking to one another as confidantes – there is a something in wedlock after all, as you must own.”
“I never think of such a thing,” said Rhoda, laughing, for Miss Pavey’s evident leanings towards the subject under discussion were very droll.
“Of course not, my dear,” said Miss Pavey, seriously. “We none of us ever do; but still there are times when the matter is forced upon us, as in this case; and who knows, my dear, what may happen? You did not see them, I suppose?”
“See? whom?”
“My dear child, how dense you are this morning! The two new-comers, of course. And don’t you think that something ought to be done to warn them about where they are to take apartments?”
“Certainly not,” said Rhoda. “It would be the height of impertinence.”
“Oh, really, I cannot agree with you there, my dear Rhoda. I think it would be grievous to let this young clergyman go to Mullion’s, and really there is not another place in Carnac where a gentleman could lodge. In fact, I would sooner make the offer that he should board at my little home.”
“Board – take apartments at Dinas Vale?”
“Certainly, my dear. He is a clergyman, and we ought to extend some kind of hospitality to him. I regret that my limited income does not permit me to say to him, ‘Take up your home here for the present as a guest.’ Of course I would not open my doors to any one but a clergyman.”
“Of course not,” said Rhoda, absently; and soon after Miss Pavey took her leave, Rhoda going with her to the door, and on re-crossing the hall noticing a card lying upon the serpentine marble table, against whose dark, ruddy surface it stood out clear and white.
At another time it would not have attracted her attention, but now, as if moved by some impulse beyond her control, she went up close and read upon it the name, —
“Geoffrey Trethick.”
Nothing more – no “Mr” and no address.
Chapter Four
The Wrong Place for the Right Man
“Well, Chynoweth,” said Mr Penwynn, entering his office which was used as a branch of the Felsport bank, “any thing fresh?”
Mr Chynoweth, the banker’s manager, generally known as “The Jack of Clubs,” was a little man, dark, and spare, and dry. He was probably fifty, but well preserved, having apparently been bound by nature in vellum, which gave him quite, a legal look, while it made him thick-skinned enough to bear a good many unpleasantries in his daily life. He was rather bald, but very shiny on the crown. His face was cleanly shaved, and he had a habit of bending down his head, and gazing through his shaggy eyebrows at whosoever spoke, and also when he took up his parable himself.
Mr Chynoweth had been busy inside his desk when he heard
