But the tale of Elizabeth Dean was interrupted by a lady of a speculative habit of mind.

“Now I want to ask you all, should one put up a tombstone to the departed?  I’ve been having quite a kick-up with my sisters about it lately.  Hadn’t one better spend the money on the living?  What do you think, Miss Matthews?”

Miss Matthews said she liked to see a handsome headstone.

“After all, one honours them that way.  It’s all one can do for them, isn’t it.”

“Oh, Miss Matthews, all?” Several ladies were shocked.  “What about one’s prayers for the dead?”

“I don’t pray for the dead,” said Miss Matthews, who was a protestant, and did not attend the large church in the next street.  “I do not belong to the Romish religion.  I’m not saying anything against those who do, but I consider that those who do not should confine their prayers to those who may require them in this troubled world, and not waste them upon those whose fate we have every reason to believe is settled once and for all.”

The lady who always quarrelled with her on this subject rose to the occasion.  Peggy, soothing them down, said mechanically, “There now....  Three lumps, Peter?...  Micky, one doesn’t suck napkin rings; naughty.”

Peter was appealed to by his neighbour, who knew that he occasionally attended St. Austin’s church.  People were always drawing him into theological discussions, which he knew nothing at all about.

“Mr. Peter, isn’t that against all reason, to stop praying for our friends merely because they’ve passed through the veil?”

“Yes,” Peter agreed.  “I should have thought so.”  But all he really thought was that beyond the veil was such darkness that he never looked into it, and that it was a pity people should argue on a holiday.

“Now,” said someone else, wishing to be a peace-maker, “I’m afraid you’ll all say I’m very naughty, but I attend the early Mass at St. Austin’s, high Mass at the Roman church”—­she nodded at Peggy—­“and the City Temple in the evening”—­she smiled at the commercial traveller, who was believed to be a New Theologian.  “Aren’t I naughty, now?”

Mademoiselle, the French governess, came down at this point, saying she had had a dream about a hat with pink roses.  The peace-making lady said, “Bad little thing, she’s quite frisky this morning.”  Hilary, to whom Mademoiselle was the last straw, left the room.

Rhoda followed his example.  She had sat very silent, as usual, over breakfast, eating little.  Peter came out with her, and followed her into the sitting-room, where she stood listlessly playing with the tassel of the blind.  Rhoda was thinner than ever, and floppier, and took even less pains to be neat.  She had left off her beads, but had not replaced them by a collar.

Peter said, “Are you coming out with me this morning?”

She replied, listless and uncaring, “If you like.”