he motherly tone that was natural to her when
she was not receiving visitors. "Come and see the garden and you can play
with Carlo."

"Can't I see Laws Catterbay, too?" asked the little girl rather
wistfully.

"Carlo is a great, big, brown dog," said Mrs. Ambrose, leading the child
out into the garden, while Mrs. Goddard followed close behind. Before
they had gone far they came upon the vicar, arrayed in an old coat, his
hands thrust into a pair of gigantic gardening gloves and a battered old
felt hat upon his head. Mrs. Goddard had felt rather uncomfortable in the
impressive society of Mrs. Ambrose and the sight of the vicar's genial
face was reassuring in the extreme. She was not disappointed, for he
immediately relieved the situation by asking all manner of kindly
questions, interspersed with remarks upon his garden, while Mrs. Ambrose
introduced little Nellie to the acquaintance of Carlo who had not seen so
pretty a little girl for many a day, and capered and wagged his feathery
tail in a manner most unseemly for so clerical a dog.

So it came about that Mrs. Goddard established herself at Billingsfield
and made her first visit to the vicarage. After that the ice was broken
and things went on smoothly enough. Mrs. Ambrose's hints concerning
foreign blood, and her husband's invariable remonstrance to the effect
that she ought to be more charitable, grew more and more rare as time
went on, and finally ceased altogether. Mrs. Goddard became a regular
institution, and ceased to astonish the inhabitants. Mr. Thomas Reid, the
sexton, was heard to remark from time to time that he "didn't hold with
th'm newfangle fashins in dress;" but he was a regular old conservative,
and most people agreed with Mr. Abraham Boosey of the Duke's Head, who
had often been to London, and who said she did "look just A one, slap up,
she did!"

Mrs. Goddard became an institution, and in the course of the first year
of her residence in the cottage it came to be expected that she should
dine at the vicarage at least once a week; and once a week, also, Mr. and
Mrs. Ambrose went up and had tea with her and little Eleanor at the
cottage. It came to pass also that Mrs. Goddard heard a vast deal of talk
about John Short and his successes at Trinity, and she actually developed
a lively interest in his career, and asked for news of him almost as
eagerly as though he had been already a friend of her own. In very quiet
places people easily get into the