he Cathedral and the
Close in the middle of them. Inside Pontings there was a hush as of the
study and the church combined. It was a rather dark shop with rows
and rows of books disappearing into the ceiling, and one grave and
unnaturally old young man behind the counter. Jeremy did not know what
he should do about Hamlet, so he brought him inside, only to discover
to his horror that the fiercest of all the Canons, Canon Waterbury, held
the floor of the shop. Canon Waterbury had a black beard and a biting
tongue. He had once warned Jeremy off the Cathedral grass in a voice of
thunder, and Jeremy had never forgotten it. He glared now and pulled
his beard, but Hamlet fortunately behaved well, and the old young man
discovered Jeremy's notepaper within a very short period.

Then suddenly the Canon spoke.

"Dogs should not be inside shops," He said, as though he were condemning
someone to death.

"I know," said Jeremy frankly. "I wanted to tie him up to something and
there was nothing to tie him up to."

"What did you bring him out for at all?" said the Canon.

"Because he's got to have exercise," said Jeremy, discovering, to his
own delighted surprise, that he was not frightened in the least.

"Oh, has he? I don't know what people keep dogs for."

And then he stamped out of the shop.

Jeremy regarded this in the light of a victory and marched away, his
head more in the air than ever. He should now have hurried home. The
midday chimes had rung out and Jeremy's duties were performed. But he
lingered, listening to the last notes of the chimes, hearing the cries
of the Cathedral choir-boys as they moved across the green to the
choir-school, watching all the people hurry up and down the street. Ah,
there was the Castle carriage! Perhaps the old Countess was inside it.
He had only seen her once, at some service in the Cathedral to which his
mother had taken him, but she had made a great impression on him with
her snow-white hair. He had heard people speak of her as "a wicked
old woman." Perhaps she was inside the carriage... but he only saw
the Castle coachman and footman and the coronet on the door. It rolled
slowly up the hill with its fine air of commanding the whole world--then
it disappeared around the corner of the Close.

Jeremy decided then that he would go home across the green and down
Orchard Lane. He had a wish to enter the Cathedral for a moment; such
a visit would, after all, complete the round of his expe