The moment I resumed my devotions another lozenge came
rattling in, and then another. I took no notice for awhile, and
then turned round suddenly just as the dreadful man was about to
flip another one at me. He hastily pretended to be turning over
the leaves of his book, but I was not to be taken in that time.
He saw that he had been discovered and no more lozenges came. Of
course I have changed my pew."
"No gentleman would have acted in such a disgraceful manner," said
one of her listeners; "and yet Mr. Lington used to be so respected
by everybody. He seems to have behaved like a little ill-bred
schoolboy."
"He behaved like a monkey," said Miss Wepley.
Her unfavourable verdict was echoed in other quarters about the
same time. Groby Lington had never been a hero in the eyes of his
personal retainers, but he had shared the approval accorded to his
defunct parrot as a cheerful, well-dispositioned body, who gave no
particular trouble. Of late months, however, this character would
hardly have been endorsed by the members of his domestic
establishment. The stolid stable-boy, who had first announced to
him the tragic end of his feathered pet, was one of the first to
give voice to the murmurs of disapproval which became rampant and
general in the servants' quarters, and he had fairly substantial
grounds for his disaffection.
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