"I don't know if you remember me," he cried, with a ripple of fat laughter, going up to James, "I had the pleasure of addressing a few words to you yesterday in my official capacity. Miss Clibborn told me you were waiting, and I thought I would introduce myself. My name is Dryland."
"I remember quite well."
"I'm the Vicar's bottle-washer, you know," added the curate, with a guffaw. "Change for you—going round to the sick and needy of the parish—after fighting the good fight. I hear you were wounded."
"I was, rather badly."
"I wish I could have gone out and had a smack at the Boers. Nothing I should have liked better. But, of course, I'm only a parson, you know. It wouldn't have been thought the correct thing." Mr. Dryland, from his superior height, beamed down on James. "I don't know whether you remember the few words which I was privileged to address to you yesterday—"
"Perfectly," put in James.
"Impromptu, you know; but they expressed my feelings. That is one of the best things the war has done for us. It has permitted us to express our emotions more openly. I thought it a beautiful sight to see the noble tears coursing down your father's furrowed cheeks. Those few words of yours have won all our hearts. I may say that our little endeavours were nothing beside that short, unstudied speech. I hope there will be a full report in the Tunbridge Wells papers."
"I hope not!" cried James.
"You're too modest, Captain Parsons. That is what I said to Miss Clibborn yesterday; true courage is always modest. But it is our duty to see that it does not hide its light under a bushel. I hope you won't think it a liberty, but I myself gave the reporter a few notes."
"Will Miss Clibborn be long?" asked James, looking at the cottage.
"Ah, what a good woman she is, Captain Parsons. My dear sir, I assure you she's an angel of mercy."
"It's very kind of you to say so."
"Not at all! It's a pleasure. The good she does is beyond praise. She's a wonderful help in the parish. She has at heart the spiritual welfare of the people, and I may say that she is a moral force of the first magnitude."
"I'm sure that's a very delightful thing to be."
"You know I can't help thinking," laughed Mr. Dryland fatly, "that she ought to be the wife of a clergyman, rather than of a military man."
Mary came out.
"I've been telling Mrs. Gray that I don't approve of the things her daughter wears in church," she said. "I don't think it's nice for people of that class to wear such bright colours."
"I don't know what we should do in the parish without you," replied the curate, unctuously. "It's so rare to find someone who knows what is right, and isn't afraid of speaking out."
Mary said that she and James were walking home, and asked Mr. Dryland whether he would not accompany them.
"I shall be delighted, if I'm not de trop."
He looked with laughing significance from one to the other.
"I wanted to talk to you about my girls," said Mary.
She had a class of village maidens, to whom she taught sewing, respect for their betters, and other useful things.
"I was just telling Captain Parsons that you were an angel of mercy, Miss Clibborn."
"I'm afraid I'm not that," replied Mary, gravely. "But I try to do my duty."
"Ah!" cried Mr. Dryland, raising his eyes so that he looked exactly like a codfish, "how few of us can say that!"
"I'm seriously distressed about my girls. They live in nasty little cottages, and eat filthy things; they pass their whole lives under the most disgusting conditions, and yet they're happy. I can't get them to see that they ought to be utterly miserable."
"Oh, I know," sighed the curate; "it makes me sad to think of it."
"Surely, if they're happy, you can want nothing better," said James, rather impatiently.
"But I do. They have no right to be happy under such circumstances. I want to make them feel their wretchedness."
"What a brutal thing to do!" cried James.
"It's the only way to improve them. I want them to see things as I see them."
"And how d'you know that you see them any more correctly than they do?"
"My dear Jamie!" cried Mary; and then as the humour of such a suggestion dawned upon her, she burst into a little shout of laughter.
"What d'you think is the good of making them dissatisfied?" asked James, grimly.
"I want to make them better, nobler, worthier; I want to make their lives more beautiful and holy."
"If you saw a man happily wearing a tinsel crown, would you go to him and say, 'My good friend, you're making a fool of yourself. Your crown isn't of real gold, and you must throw it away. I haven't a golden crown to give you instead, but you're wicked to take pleasure in that sham thing.' They're just as comfortable, after their fashion, in a hovel as you in your fine house; they enjoy the snack of fat pork they have on Sunday just as much as you enjoy your boiled chickens and blanc-manges. They're happy, and that's the chief thing."
"Happiness is not the chief thing in this world, James," said Mary, gravely.
"Isn't it? I thought it was."
"Captain Parsons is a cynic," said Mr. Dryland, with a slightly supercilious smile.
"Because I say it's idiotic to apply your standards to people who have nothing in common with you? I hate all this interfering. For God's sake let us go our way; and if we can get a little pleasure out of dross and tinsel, let us keep it."
"I want to give the poor high ideals," said Mary.
"I should have thought bread and cheese would be more useful."
"My dear Jamie," said Mary, good-naturedly, "I think you're talking of things you know nothing about."
"You must remember that Miss Clibborn has worked nobly among the poor for many years."
"My own conscience tells me I'm right," pursued Mary, "and you see Mr. Dryland agrees with me. I know you mean well, Jamie; but I don't think you quite understand the matter, and I fancy we had better change the conversation."
VII
Next day Mary went into Primpton House. Colonel Parsons nodded to her as she walked up the drive, and took off his spectacles. The front door was neither locked nor bolted in that confiding neighbourhood, and Mary walked straight in.
"Well, my dear?" said the Colonel, smiling with pleasure, for he was as fond of her as of his own son.
"I thought I'd come and see you alone. Jamie's still out, isn't he? I saw him pass our house. I was standing at the window, but he didn't look up."
"I daresay he was thinking. He's grown very thoughtful now."
Mrs. Parsons came in, and her quiet face lit up, too, as she greeted Mary. She kissed her tenderly.
"Jamie's out, you know."
"Mary has come to see us," said the Colonel. "She doesn't want us to feel neglected now that she has the boy."
"We shall never dream that you can do anything unkind, dear Mary," replied Mrs. Parsons, stroking the girl's hair. "It's natural that you should think more of him than of us."
Mary hesitated a moment.
"Don't you think Jamie has changed?"
Mrs. Parsons