nurse and his housekeeper) "and one girl cannot even keep it clean. It
was most foolish of my predecessor in the living to restore that old
refectory and all the southern dormitories upon which I am told he
spent no less than L1,500 of his own money, never reflecting on the
expense which his successors must incur merely to keep them in order,
since being once there they are liable for charges for dilapidations.
It would have been better, after permission obtained, to let them go to
ruin."

"No doubt, but they are very beautiful, are they not?" remarked Lady
Jane feebly.

"Beauty is a luxury and, I may add, a snare. It is a mistaken love of
beauty and pomp, baits that the Evil One well knows how to use, which
have led so large a section of our Church astray," he replied sipping
at his tumbler of water.

A silence followed, for Lady Jane, who from early and tender
associations loved high-church practices, did not know what to answer.
It was broken by Isobel who had been listening to the conversation in
her acute way, and now said in her clear, strong voice:

"Why don't you keep a school, Mr. Knight? There's lots of room for it
in the Abbey."

"A school!" he said. "A school! I never thought of that. No, it is
ridiculous. Still, pupils perhaps. Out of the mouth of babes and
sucklings, &c. Well, it is time for me to be going. I will think the
matter over after church."

Mr. Knight did think the matter over and after consultation with his
housekeeper, Mrs. Parsons, an advertisement appeared in _The Times_ and
_The Spectator_ inviting parents and guardians to entrust two or three
lads to the advertiser's care to receive preliminary education,
together with his own son. It proved fruitful, and after an exchange of
the "highest references," two little boys appeared at Monk's Acre, both
of them rather delicate in health. This was shortly before the crisis
arose as to the future teaching of Isobel, when the last governess,
wishing her "a better spirit," had bidden her a frigid farewell and
shaken the dust of Hawk's Hall off her feet.

One day Isobel was sent with a note to the Abbey House. She rang the
bell but no one came, for Mr. Knight was out walking with his pupils
and Mrs. Parsons and the parlour-maid were elsewhere. Tired of waiting,
she wandered round the grey old building in the hope of finding someone
to whom she could deliver the letter, and came to the refectory which
had a separate entrance. The door was open