On the Thursday in Passion week, which fell on the 6th of April, Mr. and Mrs. Quickenham came to Bullhampton Vicarage. The lawyer intended to take a long holiday,—four entire days,—and to return to London on the following Tuesday; and Mrs. Quickenham meant to be very happy with her sister.

“It is such a comfort to get him out of town, if it’s only for two days,” said Mrs. Quickenham; “and I do believe he has run away this time without any papers in his portmanteau.”

Mrs. Fenwick, with something of apology in her tone, explained to her sister that she was especially desirous of getting a legal opinion on this occasion from her brother-in-law.

“That’s mere holiday work,” said the barrister’s anxious wife. “There’s nothing he likes so much as that; but it is the reading of those horrible long papers by gaslight. I wouldn’t mind how much he had to talk, nor yet how much he had to write, if it wasn’t for all that weary reading. Of course he does have juniors with him now, but I don’t find that it makes much difference. He’s at it every night, sheet after sheet; and though he always says he’s coming up immediately, it’s two or three before he’s in bed.”

Mrs. Quickenham was three or four years older than her sister, and Mr. Quickenham was twelve years older than his wife. The lawyer therefore was considerably senior to the clergyman. He was at the Chancery bar, and after the usual years of hard and almost profitless struggling, had worked himself up into a position in which his income was very large, and his labours never ending. Since the days in which he had begun to have before his eyes some idea of a future career for himself, he had always been struggling hard for a certain goal, struggling successfully, and yet never getting nearer to the thing he desired. A scholarship had been all in all to him when he left school; and, as he got it, a distant fellowship already loomed before his eyes. That attained was only a step towards his life in London. His first brief, anxiously as it had been desired, had given no real satisfaction. As soon as it came to him it was a rung of the ladder already out of sight. And so it had been all through his life, as he advanced upwards, making a business, taking a wife to himself, and becoming the father of many children. There was always something before him which was to make him happy when he reached it. His gown was of silk, and his income almost greater than his desires; but he would fain sit upon the Bench, and have at any rate his evenings for his own enjoyment. He firmly believed now, that that had been the object of his constant ambition; though could he retrace his thoughts as a young man, he would find that in the early days of his forensic toils, the silent, heavy, unillumined solemnity of the judge had appeared to him to be nothing in comparison with the glittering audacity of the successful advocate. He had tried the one, and might probably soon try the other. And when that time shall have come, and Mr. Quickenham shall sit upon his seat of honour in the new Law Courts, passing long, long hours in the tedious labours of conscientious painful listening; then he will look forward again to the happy ease of dignified retirement, to the coming time in which all his hours will be his own. And then, again, when those unfurnished hours are there, and with them shall have come the infirmities which years and toil shall have brought, his mind will run on once more to that eternal rest in which fees and salary, honours and dignity, wife and children, with all the joys of satisfied success, shall be brought together for him in one perfect amalgam which he will call by the name of Heaven. In the meantime, he has now come down to Bullhampton to enjoy himself for four days,—if he can find enjoyment without his law papers.

Mr. Quickenham was a tall, thin man, with eager gray eyes, and a long projecting nose, on which, his enemies in the courts of law were wont to say, his wife would hang a kettle, in order that the unnecessary heat coming from his mouth might not be wasted. His hair was already grizzled, and, in the matter of whiskers, his heavy impatient hand had nearly altogether cut away the only intended ornament to his face. He was a man who allowed himself time for nothing but his law work, eating all his meals as though the saving of a few minutes in that operation were matter of vital importance, dressing and undressing at railroad speed, moving ever with a quick, impetuous step, as though the whole world around him went too slowly. He was short-sighted, too, and would tumble about in his unnecessary hurry, barking his shins, bruising his knuckles, and breaking most things that were breakable,—but caring nothing for his sufferings either in body or in purse so that he was not reminded of his awkwardness by his wife. An untidy man he was, who spilt his soup on his waistcoat and slobbered with his tea, whose fingers were apt to be ink-stained, and who had a grievous habit of mislaying papers that were most material to him. He would bellow to the servants to have his things found for him, and would then scold them for looking. But when alone he would be ever scolding himself because of the faults which he thus committed. A conscientious, hard-working, friendly man he was, but one difficult to deal with; hot in his temper, impatient of all stupidities, impatient often of that which he wrongly thought to be stupidity, never owning himself to be wrong, anxious always for the truth, but often missing to see it, a man who would fret grievously for the merest trifle, and think nothing of the greatest success when it had once been gained. Such a one was Mr. Quickenham; and he was a man of whom all his enemies and most of his friends were a little afraid. Mrs. Fenwick would declare herself to be much in awe of him; and our Vicar, though he would not admit as much, was always a little on his guard when the great barrister was with him.

How it had come to pass that Mr. Chamberlaine had not been called upon to take a part in the Cathedral services during Passion week cannot here be explained; but it was the fact, that when Mr. Quickenham arrived at Bullhampton, the Canon was staying at The Privets. He had come over there early in the week,—as it was supposed by Mr. Fenwick with some hope of talking his nephew into a more reasonable state of mind respecting Miss Lowther; but, according to Mrs. Fenwick’s uncharitable views, with the distinct object of escaping the long church services of the Holy week,—and was to return to Salisbury on the Saturday. He was, therefore, invited to meet Mr. Quickenham at dinner on the Thursday. In his own city and among his own neighbours he would have thought it indiscreet to dine out in Passion week; but, as he explained to Mr. Fenwick, these things were very different in a rural parish.

Mr. Quickenham arrived an hour or two before dinner, and was immediately taken out to see the obnoxious building; while Mrs. Fenwick, who never would go to see it, described all its horrors to her sister within the guarded precincts of her own drawing-room.

“It used to be a bit of common land, didn’t it?” said Mr. Quickenham.

“I hardly know what is common land,” replied the Vicar. “The children used to play here, and when there was a bit of grass on it some of the neighbours’ cows would get it.”

“It was never advertised—to be let on building lease?”

“Oh dear no! Lord Trowbridge never did anything of that sort.”

“I dare say not,” said the lawyer. “I dare say not.” Then he walked round the plot of ground, pacing it, as though something might be learned in that way. Then he looked up at the building with his hands in his pockets, and his head on one side. “Has there been a deed of gift,—perhaps a peppercorn rent, or something of that kind?” The Vicar declared that he was altogether ignorant of what had been done between the agent for the Marquis and the trustees to whom had been committed the building of the chapel. “I dare say nothing,” said Mr. Quickenham. “They’ve been in such a hurry to punish you, that they’ve gone on a mere verbal permission. What’s the extent of the glebe?”

“They call it forty-two acres.”

“Did you ever have it measured?”

“Never. It would make no difference to me whether it is forty-one or forty-three.”

“That’s as may be,” said the lawyer. “It’s as nasty a thing as I’ve looked at for many a day, but it wouldn’t do to call it a nuisance.”

“Of course not. Janet is very hot about it; but, as for me, I’ve made up my mind to swallow it. After all, what harm will it do me?”

“It’s an insult,—that’s all.”

“But if I can show that I don’t take it as an insult, the insult will be nothing. Of course the people know that their landlord is trying to spite me.”

“That’s just it.”

“And for awhile they’ll spite me too, because he does. Of course it’s a bore. It cripples one’s influence, and to a certain degree spreads dissent at the cost of the Church. Men and women will go to that place merely because Lord Trowbridge favours the building. I know all that, and it irks me; but still it will be better to swallow it.”

“Who’s the oldest man in the parish?” asked Mr. Quickenham; “the oldest with his senses still about him.” The parson reflected for awhile, and then said that he thought Brattle, the miller, was as old a man as there was there, with the capability left to him of remembering and of stating what he remembered. “And what’s his age,—about?” Fenwick said that the miller was between sixty and seventy, and had lived in Bullhampton all his life. “A church-going man?” asked the lawyer. To this the Vicar was obliged to reply that, to his very great regret, old Brattle never entered a church. “Then I’ll step over and see him during morning service to-morrow,” said the lawyer. The Vicar raised his eyebrows, but said nothing as to the propriety of Mr. Quickenham’s personal attendance at a place of worship on Good Friday.

“Can anything be done, Richard?” said Mrs. Fenwick, appealing to her brother-in-law.

“Yes;—undoubtedly something can be done.”

“Can there, indeed? I am so glad. What can be done?”

“You can make the best of it.”

“That’s just what I’m determined I won’t do. It’s mean-spirited, and so I tell Frank. I never would have hurt them as long as they treated us well; but now they are enemies, and as enemies I will regard them. I should think myself disgraced if I were to sit down in the presence of the Marquis of Trowbridge; I should, indeed.”

“You can easily manage that by standing up when you meet him,” said Mr. Quickenham. Mr. Quickenham could be very funny at times, but those who knew him would remark that whenever he was funny he had something to hide. His wife as she heard his wit was quite sure that he had some plan in his head about the chapel.

At half-past six there came Mr. Chamberlaine and his nephew. The conversation about the chapel was still continued, and the canon from Salisbury was very eloquent, and learned also, upon the subject. His eloquence was brightest while the ladies were still in the room, but his learning was brought forth most manifestly after they had retired. He was very clear in his opinion that the Marquis had the law on his side in giving the land for the purpose in question, even if it could be shown that he was simply the lord of the manor, and not so possessed of the spot as to do what he liked in it for his own purposes. Mr. Chamberlaine expressed his opinion that, although he himself might think otherwise, it would be held to be for the benefit of the community that the chapel should be built, and in no court could an injunction against the building be obtained.

“But he couldn’t give leave to have it put on another man’s ground,” said the Queen’s Counsel.

“There is no question of another man’s ground here,” said the member of the Chapter.

“I’m not so sure of that,” continued Mr. Quickenham. “It may not be the ground of any one man, but if it’s the ground of any ten or twenty it’s the same thing.”

“But then there would be a lawsuit,” said the Vicar.

“It might come to that,” said the Queen’s Counsel.

“I’m sure you wouldn’t have a leg to stand upon,” said the member of the Chapter.

“I don’t see that at all,” said Gilmore. “If the land is common to the parish, the Marquis of Trowbridge cannot give it to a part of the parishioners because he is Lord of the Manor.”

“For such a purpose I should think he can,” said Mr. Chamberlaine.

“And I’m quite sure he can’t,” said Mr. Quickenham. “All the same, it may be very difficult to prove that he hasn’t the right; and in the meantime there stands the chapel, a fact accomplished. If the ground had been bought and the purchasers had wanted a title, I think it probable the Marquis would never have got his money.”

“There can be no doubt that it is very ungentlemanlike,” said Mr. Chamberlaine.

“There I’m afraid I can’t help you,” said Mr. Quickenham. “Good law is not defined very clearly here in England; but good manners have never been defined at all.”

“I don’t want anyone to help me on such a matter as that,” said Mr. Chamberlaine, who did not altogether like Mr. Quickenham.

“I dare say not,” said Mr. Quickenham; “and yet the question may be open to argument. A man may do what he likes with his own, and can hardly be called ungentlemanlike beca............