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148 too, because the note which his housemaid found on the table before she saw the challenge from the Major, which was on the chimney-piece, said that he had been called away very suddenly. No: they both went to catch the early train in order to go away before they could be stopped, and kill each other. But why didn’t they go? What happened? Don’t suppose the outside porter showed them how wicked they were, confirmation-class or no confirmation-class. Stumps me. Almost wish Elizabeth was here. She’s good at guessing.”

The Padre’s eye brightened. Reaction after the perils of the morning, crab and port combined to make a man of him.

“Eh, ’tis a bonny wee drappie of port whatever, Mistress Plaistow,” he said. “And I dinna ken that ye’re far wrang in jaloosing that Mistress Mapp might have a wee bitty word to say aboot it a’, ’gin she had the mind.”

“She was wrong about the portmanteau,” said Diva. “Confessed she was wrong.”

“Hoots! I’m not mindin’ the bit pochmantie,” said the Padre.

“What else does she know?” asked Diva feverishly.

There was no doubt that the Padre had the fullest attention of the two ladies again, and there was no need to talk Scotch any more.

“Begin at the beginning,” he said. “What do we suppose was the cause of the quarrel?”

“Anything,” said Diva. “Golf, tiger-skins, coal-strike, summer-time.”

He shook his head.

“I grant you words may pass on such subjects,” he said. “We feel keenly, I know, about summer-time in Tilling, though we shall all be reconciled over that next