aintree's thoughts flew at once to his beloved church.

"Now we shall get the chancel done at last," he said to his wife
gleefully, rubbing his hands. And the very day after Sir John's arrival
Eustace went up to the Hall after dinner to see him upon the subject.

"Had you not better wait a day or two?" counselled his more prudent wife.
"Wait till you meet him, naturally. You don't very well know what kind of
man he is, nor how he will take it."

"What is the use of waiting? I knew him well enough eight years ago; he
was a pleasant fellow enough then. He won't kill me, I suppose, and the
chancel is a disgrace--a positive disgrace to him. It is my duty to point
it out to him; the thing can't afford to wait, it ought to be done at
once."

So he disregarded Marion's advice, and Vera helped him on with his
great-coat in the hall, and wound his woollen comforter round his neck,
and bade him good luck on his expedition to Kynaston.

He came back sorrowful and abashed. Sir John had been civil, very civil;
he had insisted on his sitting down at his table--for he had apparently
not finished his dinner--and had opened a bottle of fine old port in his
honour. He had inquired about many of the old people, and had expressed
a friendly interest in the parish generally; but with regard to the
chancel, he had been as adamant.

He did not see, he had said, why it could not go on well enough as it
was. If it was in bad repair, Davis should see to it; a man with a
barrowful of bricks and a shovelful of mortar should be sent down. That,
of course, it was his duty to do. Sir John did not understand that more
could possibly be expected of him. The chancel had been good enough for
his father, it would probably be good enough for him; it would last his
time, he supposed, in any case.

But the soul of the Rev. Eustace became as water within him. It was
not of a barrowful of bricks and shovelful of mortar that he had been
dreaming, but of lancet windows and stone mouldings; of polished oak
rafters within, and of high gables and red tiles without.

He came down from the Hall disheartened and discomfited, with all the
spirit crushed out of him; and the ladies of his family, for once,
were of one mind about the matter. There arose about him a storm of
indignation and a gush of sympathy, which could not fail to soothe him
somewhat. Eustace went to rest that night sore and heavy-hearted, it is
true, but with all the damnatory verses in the Scr