her, at least, and she may have died about an hour
before. Filgrave says not more than an hour."

"And how did she die?"

"Heart-complaint. She was standing up, taking hold of the bedstead,
and so they found her." Then there was a pause, during which the
archdeacon sat down to his breakfast. "I wonder how he felt when he
heard it?"

"Of course he was terribly shocked."

"I've no doubt he was shocked. Any man would be shocked. But when you
come to think of it, what a relief!"

"How can you speak of it in that way?" said Mrs. Grantly.

"How am I to speak of it in any other way?" said the archdeacon. "Of
course I shouldn't go and say it out in the street."

"I don't think you ought to say it anywhere," said Mrs. Grantly. "The
poor man no doubt feels about his wife in the same way that anybody
else would."

"And if any other poor man has got such a wife as she was, you may be
quite sure that he would be glad to be rid of her. I don't say that
he wished her to die, or that he would have done anything to contrive
her death--"

"Gracious, archdeacon; do, pray, hold your tongue."

"But it stands to reason that her going will be a great relief to
him. What has she done for him? She has made him contemptible to
everybody in the diocese by her interference, and his life has been a
burden to him through her violence."

"Is that the way you carry out your proverb of De mortuis?" asked Mrs
Grantly.

"The proverb of De mortuis is founded on humbug. Humbug out of doors
is necessary. It would not do for you and me to go into the High
Street just now and say what we think about Mrs. Proudie; but I don't
suppose that kind of thing need to be kept up in here, between you
and me. She was an uncomfortable woman,--so uncomfortable that I
cannot believe that any one will regret her. Dear me! Only to think
that she has gone! You may as well give me my tea."

I do not think that Mrs. Grantly's opinion differed much from that
expressed by her husband, or that she was, in truth, the least
offended by the archdeacon's plain speech. But it must be remembered
that there was probably no house in the diocese in which Mrs. Proudie
had been so thoroughly hated as she had been at the Plumstead
rectory. There had been hatred in the deanery; but the hatred at the
deanery had been mild in comparison with the hatred at Plumstead. The
archdeacon was a sound friend; but he was also a sound enemy. From
the very first arrival of the Proudies at