John hesitated.
"No doubt opinions differ,"---he began.
"Oh, of course!--you can get out of it that way, if you like!" she retorted, gaily--"You won't say uncharitable things of the rest of your brethren if you can help it, but you know--yes, you must know that parsons are as jealous of each other and as nasty to each other as actors, singers, writers, or any other 'professional' persons in the world. In fact, I believe if you were to set two spiteful clergymen nagging at each other, they'd beat any two 'leading ladies' on the operatic stage, for right-down malice and meanness!"
"The conversation is growing quite personal!" said Walden, a broad smile lighting up his fine soft eyes--"Shall we finish it at the Manor when I come up to tea?"
"But are you really coming?" queried Cicely--"And when?"
"Suppose I say this afternoon---" he began. Cicely clapped her hands.
"Good! I'll scamper home and tell Maryllia! I'll say I have met you, and that I've been as impudent as I possibly could be to you---"
"No, don't say that!" laughed Walden--"Say that I have found you to be a very delightful and original young lady---"
"I'm not a young lady,"--said Cicely, decisively--"I was born a peasant on the sea-coast of Cornwall--and I'm glad of it. A 'young lady' nowadays means a milliner's apprentice or a draper's model. I am neither. I am just a girl--and hope, if I live, to be a woman. I'll take my own ideas of a suitable message from you to Maryllia-- don't YOU bother!" And she nodded sagaciously. "I won't make ructions, I promise! Come about five!"
She waved her hand and ran off, leaving Walden in a mood between perplexity and amusement. She was certainly an 'original,' and he hardly knew what to make of her. There was something 'uncanny' and goblin-like in her appearance, and yet her sallow face had a certain charm when the smile illumined it, and the light of aspiration burned up in the large wild eyes. In any case, she had persuaded him in a moment, as it were, and almost involuntarily, to take tea at the Manor that afternoon. Why he had consented to do what he had hitherto refused, he could not imagine. Cicely's remark that Miss Vancourt thought him 'rather rude,' worried him a little.
"Perhaps I have been rude"--he reflected, uneasily--"But I am not a society man;--I'm altogether out of my element in the company of ladies--and it seemed so much better that I should avoid being drawn into any intimacy with persons who are not likely to have anything in common with me--but of course I ought to be civil--in fact, I suppose I ought to be neighbourly---"