ig, and get's _all_ the sun. You remember, Jacky"--she looked
at her husband with widened eyes--"Mr Maplestone called it a `Sun
Trap'."

It seemed an innocent enough remark, but the Vicar's grave assent
implied a deeper meaning. Mrs Merrivale sighed, and elaborately
lengthened her chin.

"Uplands is so _bleak_. General Underwood feels the cold so much. All
the windows of the entertaining rooms seem to look the wrong way."

"He should have some more put in, facing the sun," Charmion suggested in
her regal way, and Mrs Merrivale looked as much aghast as if she had
suggested pulling down the whole house and building it afresh. I burst
hastily into the conversation.

"I think I met General Underwood the other day. In a bath-chair. I was
glad that he was well enough to get out. I hope he will soon be quite
well."

The Vicar said gravely:--

"He will never be well. The most that can be hoped is that he will not
grow worse rapidly. He is a fine man, and has done good service. We
are proud to have him back amongst us, but I am afraid, for his own
sake, it has been a bad move. He ought to have settled in a kindlier
climate."

"Yes, but--" Mrs Merrivale began impulsively, and pulled herself up,
and bit her red lip. "Jacky," she said hurriedly, "I'm afraid we must
go."

They went, and I felt a worm. It was plain to me now that the parish in
general, from the Vicar downward, had absorbed the idea that the strange
ladies at Pastimes had played a mean trick on their local hero, and were
not inclined to smile upon the ladies in consequence. The Vicar had
probably heard the Squire's prejudiced story direct, and from the Manor
House and the Vicarage reports had percolated, as such reports _will_
percolate, to the draper's assistants, and the man in the street, down
and down to the truant cook herself.

Now the feudal feeling still lingers in English villages, and no
self-respecting tenant chooses to range herself against the Squire. The
cook's mother, no doubt, lived in a cottage owned by the Squire, and
enjoyed perquisites of various sorts which she had no disposition to
throw away. Beside the kitchen fire there had, no doubt, been a lengthy
conference over that rumour, and the mother had said, "Don't you do it,
Mary Jane. If the ladies are across with the Squire, how'll he take it
if he hears my daughter's in their service? And half a dozen people
with their eyes on this cottage as it is. A nice thing i