der the hammer-beam roof, and a loneliness unfelt
before swamped their hearts, as they searched for places in the
unfamiliar Church of England service. The Lord's Prayer "Our Father,
which art"--set the seal on that desolation. Sophie found herself
thinking how in other lands their purchase would long ere this have been
discussed from every point of view in a dozen prints, forgetting that
George for months had not been allowed to glance at those black and
bellowing head-lines. Here was nothing but silence--not even hostility!
The game was up to them; the other players hid their cards and waited.
Suspense, she felt, was in the air, and when her sight cleared, saw,
indeed, a mural tablet of a footless bird brooding upon the carven
motto, "Wayte awhyle--wayte awhyle."

At the Litany George had trouble with an unstable hassock, and drew the
slip of carpet under the pewseat. Sophie pushed her end back also, and
shut her eyes against a burning that felt like tears. When she opened
them she was looking at her mother's maiden name, fairly carved on a
blue flagstone on the pew floor: Ellen Lashmar. ob. 1796. aetat 27.

She nudged George and pointed. Sheltered, as they kneeled, they looked
for more knowledge, but the rest of the slab was blank.

"Ever hear of her?" he whispered.

"Never knew any of us came from here."

"Coincidence?"

"Perhaps. But it makes me feel better," and she smiled and winked away
a tear on her lashes, and took his hand while they prayed for "all women
labouring of child"--not "in the perils of childbirth"; and the sparrows
who had found their way through the guards behind the glass windows
chirped above the faded gilt and alabaster family tree of the Conants.

The baronet's pew was on the right of the aisle. After service its
inhabitants moved forth without haste, but so as to block effectively a
dusky person with a large family who champed in their rear.

"Spices, I think," said Sophie, deeply delighted as the Sangres closed
up after the Conants. "Let 'em get away, George."

But when they came out many folk whose eyes were one still lingered by
the lychgate.

"I want to see if any more Lashmars are buried here," said Sophie.

"Not now. This seems to be show day. Come home quickly," he replied.

A group of families, the Clokes a little apart, opened to let them
through. The men saluted with jerky nods, the women with remnants of a
curtsey. Only Iggulden's son, his mother on his arm, lifted hi