y
winds, various infirmities began to plague him.

"He's done himself rather too well since his marriage," said Mahony in
private. "After being a worker for the greater part of his life, it
would have been better for him to work on to the end."

Yes, that, Mary could understand and agree with. But Richard continued:
"All it means, of course, is that the poor fellow is beginning to
prepare for his last long journey. These aches and pains of his
represent the packing and the strapping without which not even a short
earthly journey can be undertaken. And his is into eternity."

Mary, making lace over a pillow, looked up at this, a trifle
apprehensively. "What things you do say! If any one heard you, they'd
think you weren't very... very religious." Her fear lest Richard's
outspokenness should be mistaken for impiety never left her.

Tilly was plain and to the point. "Like a bear with a sore back that's
what 'e is, since 'e can't get down among his blessed birds. He leads
Tom the life of the condemned, over the feeding of those bantams. As if
the boy could help 'em not laying when they ought!"

At thirty-six Tilly was the image of her mother. Entirely gone was the
slight crust of acerbity that had threatened her in her maiden days,
when, thanks to her misplaced affections, it had seemed for a time as
if the purple prizes of life--love, offers of marriage, a home of her
own--were going to pass her by. She was now a stout, high-coloured
woman with a roar of a laugh, full, yet firm lips, and the whitest of
teeth. Mary thought her decidedly toned down and improved since her
marriage; but Mahony put it that the means Tilly now had at her
disposal were such as to make people shut an eye to her want of
refinement. However that might be, "old Mrs. Ocock" was welcomed
everywhere--even by those on whom her bouncing manners grated. She was
invariably clad in a thick and handsome black silk gown, over which she
wore all the jewellery she could crowd on her person--huge cameo
brooches, ear-drops, rings and bracelets, lockets and chains. Her name
topped subscription-lists, and, having early weaned her old husband of
his dissenting habits, she was a real prop to Archdeacon Long and his
church, taking the chief and most expensive table at tea-meetings, the
most thankless stall at bazaars. She kept open house, too, and gave
delightful parties, where, while some sat at loo, others were free to
turn the rooms upside-down for a dance, or