ed, in a self-conscious voice, when
they were in the parlour again.

Louis had almost surreptitiously taken an envelope from his pocket,
and was extracting a paper from it.

On finding themselves alone they had not followed their usual
custom of bursting into comment, favourable or unfavourable, on the
departed--a practice due more to a desire to rouse and enjoy each
other's individualities than to a genuine interest in the third
person. Nor had they impulsively or deliberately kissed, as they
were liable to do after release from a spell of worldliness. On the
contrary, both were still constrained, as if the third person was
still with them. The fact was that there were two other persons in
the room, darkly discerned by Louis and Rachel--namely, a different,
inimical Rachel and a different, inimical Louis. All four, the seen
and the half-seen, walked stealthily, like rival beasts in the edge of
the jungle.

"Oh!" said Louis with an air of nonchalance. "It came by the last post
while old Batch was here, and I just shoved it into my pocket."

The arrivals of the post were always interesting to them, for during
the weeks after marriage letters are apt to be more numerous than
usual, and to contain delicate and enchanting surprises. Both of
them were always strictly ceremonious in the handling of each other's
letters, and yet both deprecated this ceremoniousness in the beloved.
Louis urged Rachel to open his letters without scruple, and Rachel
did the same to Louis. But both--Louis by chivalry and Rachel by
pride--were prevented from acting on the invitation. The envelope in
Louis' hand did not contain a letter, but only a circular. The fact
that the flap of the envelope was unsealed and the stamp a
mere halfpenny ought rightly to have deprived the packet of all
significance as a subject of curiosity. Nevertheless, the different,
inimical Rachel, probably out of sheer perversity, went up to Louis
and looked over his shoulder as he read the communication, which was a
printed circular, somewhat yellowed, with blanks neatly filled in, and
the whole neatly signed by a churchwarden, informing Louis that his
application for sittings at St. Luke's Church (commonly called the Old
Church) had been granted. It is to be noted that, though applications
for sittings in the Old Church were not overwhelmingly frequent, and
might indeed very easily have been coped with by means of autograph
replies, the authorities had a sufficient se