ople go their own way--always have been. I
go mine."

"Why does Walter choose such a place as that to take Muriel to?" asked
Cicely, who had not remained quite unimpressed by the Squire's diatribe
against the unfortunate suburb.

"Oh, it's convenient for his hospital and gives him the sort of practice
he wants for a year or two. _I_ don't know. They won't live there for
ever. I don't suppose it will kill them to know a few people you
wouldn't ask to dinner. It hasn't killed me. I get on with farmers'
wives better than anybody--ought to have been one."

"Father is going to ask you to put your foot down and say Muriel shan't
go there," said Cicely.

"Well then, I won't," replied Mrs. Graham decisively. "I'm not a snob."
Then she added hurriedly, "I don't say that your father is one either;
but he does make a terrible fuss about all that sort of thing. I should
have thought a Clinton was good enough to be able to know anybody
without doing himself any harm. But you had better go and talk to Muriel
about it, my dear. You will find her upstairs, with her clothes. Oh,
those clothes! I must go and look after the gardeners. They are putting
liquid manure on the roses, and I'm afraid they will mix it too strong."

Mrs. Graham went off to attend to her unsavoury but congenial task, and
Cicely went indoors and up to Muriel's room, where she found her friend
with a maid, busy over some detail of her trousseau. They greeted one
another with coolness but affection, the maid was sent out of the room,
and they settled down in chintz-covered easy-chairs by the window for
the usual good long talk.

Muriel was a pretty girl, less graceful than Cicely, but with her big
brown eyes and masses of dark hair, a foil to her friend's fair beauty.
She had her mother's sensible face, but was better-looking than her
mother had ever been.

"Now you must tell me every word from the beginning," she said. "You
said nothing in your letters. You didn't make me see the room, or any
one in it."

Cicely had a good deal to say about her late experiences, but her
friend's own affairs were of more recent interest. "But I want to hear
about Walter and Melbury Park first," she said. "There is a rare to-do
about it at Kencote, I can tell you, Muriel."

"Is there?" said Muriel, after a short pause, as if she were adjusting
her thoughts. "That was what Walter was afraid of."

"Don't you mind going to live in a place like that?" asked Cicely.
"Father thi