ut impediment to the runners often end in something
of the kind.

I am bound to say that when we returned home to Fulcombe, where of
course we met with a great reception, including the ringing (out of
tune) of the new peal of bells that I had given to the church, Bastin
made haste to point this out.

"Your wife seems a very nice and beautiful lady, Arbuthnot," he
reflected aloud after dinner, when Mrs. Bastin, glowering as usual,
though what at I do not know, had been escorted from the room by
Natalie, "and really, when I come to think of it, you are an unusually
fortunate person. You possess a great deal of money, much more than you
have any right to; which you seem to have done very little to earn and
do not spend quite as I should like you to do, and this nice property,
that ought to be owned by a great number of people, as, according to
the views you express, I should have thought you would acknowledge, and
everything else that a man can want. It is very strange that you should
be so favoured and not because of any particular merits of your own
which one can see. However, I have no doubt it will all come even in the
end and you will get your share of troubles, like others. Perhaps Mrs.
Arbuthnot will have no children as there is so much for them to take. Or
perhaps you will lose all your money and have to work for your living,
which might be good for you. Or," he added, still thinking aloud after
his fashion, "perhaps she will die young--she has that kind of face,
although, of course, I hope she won't," he added, waking up.

I do not know why, but his wandering words struck me cold; the
proverbial funeral bell at the marriage feast was nothing to them. I
suppose it was because in a flash of intuition I knew that they would
come true and that he was an appointed Cassandra. Perhaps this uncanny
knowledge overcame my natural indignation at such super-gaucherie of
which no one but Bastin could have been capable, and even prevented me
from replying at all, so that I merely sat still and looked at him.

But Bickley did reply with some vigour.

"Forgive me for saying so, Bastin," he said, bristling all over as it
were, "but your remarks, which may or may not be in accordance with the
principles of your religion, seem to me to be in singularly bad taste.
They would have turned the stomachs of a gathering of early Christians,
who appear to have been the worst mannered people in the world, and at
any decent heathen feast