Margaret Maliphant

								

frank, fresh face. "Well, it does him credit then. It isn't every one
would take so much trouble."
"He likes taking trouble," said I. "Just look at the trouble that he
has taken over our concert."
"He likes playing first-fiddle," laughed Miss Thorne, gayly, her rosy
face--that was too rosy for prettiness, although not too rosy for the
perfection of health--flushing rosier than ever as she said it; "I
always tell him so."
I did not answer. Mr. Thorne and his daughter moved on, and I looked
round the room in search of the captain. The place did look very
beautiful, although I do not think that I should like now to see its
severe proportions and splendid wood wainscoting disfigured by flags
and garlands. We were dancing in what used long ago to be the monks'
refectory. The house had been built on the site of a part of the
monastic buildings belonging to the abbey, and this portion of the old
edifice had been retained, while the remainder of the house was in
Tudor style. I heard the squire explaining it to the new parson, who
had lately come to the next parish. I had heard him explain it before,
or I do not suppose that I should have known anything at all about it.
"I suppose you consider it shocking to be dancing in any part of the
monastery?" I could hear him say, laughing; "but it isn't so bad as a
friend of mine who gives balls in what used to be the chapel."
The parson was a young man, with a sallow, shaven face and very refined
features; the expression of his mouth was gentle, almost tremulous, but
his eyes were dark and penetrating.
"I'm not quite so prejudiced as that," he said, laughing also,
"although I do wear the cloth."
"That's right," said the squire, heartily. "We have the remains of a
thirteenth-century chapel of the purest period in the grounds, and we
don't desecrate that even by a school-feast. You must come and see it
in the day-time."
Father came up at that moment. He was dreadfully like a fish out of
water, poor father, in this assembly, and looked it. The squire, in
a hasty fashion, introduced him to the Rev. Cyril Morgan, and passed
on to shake hands with a portly wine-merchant, who had lately retired
from business in the neighboring town, and had taken one of the solid
red-brick houses that were the remnants of our own town's affluence.
This gentleman introduced his wife, and she had to be introduced to
the company, and the host's hands were full. Father moved away with
the parson. He looked rather disgusted at first, but the young man
looked at him with a smile upon his gentle mouth and in his dark
eyes, and said, diffidently, "I have heard a great deal of you, Mr.
Maliphant--the whole neighborhood rings with your name. I am proud to
meet you."
Of course, I liked that young man at once, and as I went to sit down
again beside the mother and Joyce, I was pleased to see across
the room that father and the Rev. Cyril Morgan had entered upon a