r desire to cultivate a Christian friendship with you,
and that you will therefore excuse me if I ask you a question which
might otherwise have the appearance of interference. Miss Mackenzie,
is there anything between you and my husband's curate, Mr Maguire?"

Miss Mackenzie's face became suddenly as red as fire, but for a
moment or two she made no answer. I do not know whether I may as
yet have succeeded in making the reader understand the strength as
well as the weakness of my heroine's character; but Mrs Stumfold
had certainly not succeeded in perceiving it. She was accustomed,
probably, to weak, obedient women,--to women who had taught
themselves to believe that submission to Stumfoldian authority
was a sign of advanced Christianity; and in the mild-looking,
quiet-mannered lady who had lately come among them, she certainly did
not expect to encounter a rebel. But on such matters as that to which
the female hierarch of Littlebath was now alluding, Miss Mackenzie
was not by nature adapted to be submissive.

"Is there anything between you and Mr Maguire?" said Mrs Stumfold
again. "I particularly wish to have a plain answer to that question."

Miss Mackenzie, as I have said, became very red in the face. When it
was repeated, she found herself obliged to speak. "Mrs Stumfold, I do
not know that you have any right to ask me such a question as that."

"No right! No right to ask a lady who sits under Mr Stumfold whether
or not she is engaged to Mr Stumfold's own curate! Think again of
what you are saying, Miss Mackenzie!" And there was in Mrs Stumfold's
voice as she spoke an expression of offended majesty, and in her
countenance a look of awful authority, sufficient no doubt to bring
most Stumfoldian ladies to their bearings.

"You said nothing about being engaged to him."

"Oh, Miss Mackenzie!"

"You said nothing about being engaged to him, but if you had I should
have made the same answer. You asked me if there was anything between
me and him; and I think it was a very offensive question."

"Offensive! I am afraid, Miss Mackenzie, you have not your spirit
subject to a proper control. I have come here in all kindness to warn
you against danger, and you tell me that I am offensive! What am I to
think of you?"

"You have no right to connect my name with any gentleman's. You can't
have any right merely because I go to Mr Stumfold's church. It's
quite preposterous. If I went to Mr Paul's church"--Mr Paul was a
very