Page:Minnie's Bishop and Other Stories (1915).djvu/138

 more. He succeeded in making me see the Cambridgeshire landscape.

"There it all is," he said. "Flat land, flat. There's nothing to break the frightful flatness of it except church spires, sticking up stiff into the air, spires and great foolish windmills. Look at the flat fields, the flat roads, the flat sky and those rigid pointed spires."

While he was speaking, a motor car rushed along the village street, a handsome car, one of the squire's, I suppose. In the tonneau sat a woman I recognised, Lady Crumlin. Her reputation, in several respects, had got beyond the stage of being doubtful; but she is a remarkably handsome woman, and is always dressed as if she owned, instead of owing, a large fortune. Mr. Metcalf appeared to be getting somewhat hysterical over the scenery. I attempted to divert his attention from it.

"That," I said with a smile, "is one of the people whom my uncle particularly dislikes. It's a great pity they don't keep up the old fashion of going to church once a week in the country."

Once more the curate entirely ignored my remark. He had seen Lady Crumlin, but he was not thinking of her as a possible member of his congregation.

"Now and then," he said, "people come flashing along these roads. I get a glimpse at them. I don't know them. I don't speak to them. I don't see them at their races or their cards. But I fancy sometimes I can hear the men laugh or smell the