Church Leet, watching its neighbours' doings sharply, began to whisper
that the new clergyman, Mr. Grame, was likely to cause unpleasantness to
the Monk family, just as some of his predecessors had caused it. For no
man having eyes in his head (still less any woman) could fail to see
that the Captain's imperious daughter had fallen desperately in love
with him. Would there be a second elopement, as in the days of Tom
Dancox? Would Eliza Monk set her father at defiance, as Katherine did?

One of the last to see signs and tokens, though they took place under
her open eyes, was Mrs. Carradyne. But she saw at last. The clergyman
could not walk across a new-mown field, or down a shady lane, or be
hastening along the dusty turnpike road, but by some inexplicable
coincidence he would be met by Miss Monk; and when he came to the Hall
to pass an hour with Hubert, she generally made a third at the
interview. It had pleased her latterly to take to practising on the old
church organ; and if Mr. Grame was not wiled into the church with her
and her attendant, the ancient clerk, who blew the bellows, she was sure
to alight upon him in going or returning.

One fine evening, dinner over, when the last beams of the sun were
slanting into the drawing-room, Eliza Monk was sitting back on a sofa,
reading; Kate romped about the room, and Mrs. Carradyne had just rung
the bell for tea. Lucy had been spending the afternoon with Mrs. Speck,
and Hubert had now gone to fetch her home.

"Good gracious, Kate, can't you be quiet!" exclaimed Miss Monk, as the
child in her gambols sprung upon the sofa, upsetting the book and its
reader's temper. "Go away: you are treading on my flounces. Aunt Emma,
why do you persist in having this tiresome little reptile with us after