of them to propose that they should walk round the garden, and Fred predicted to himself that he should have to go away without saying a word to her in private. He told her first of Christy’s arrival and then of his own engagement with her father; and he was comforted by seeing that this latter news touched her keenly. She said hurriedly, “I am so glad,” and then bent over her writing to hinder anyone from noticing her face. But here was a subject which Mrs. Farebrother could not let pass.
“You don’t mean, my dear Miss Garth, that you are glad to hear of a young man giving up the Church for which he was educated: you only mean that things being so, you are glad that he should be under an excellent man like your father.”
“No, really, Mrs. Farebrother, I am glad of both, I fear,” said Mary, cleverly getting rid of one rebellious tear. “I have a dreadfully secular mind. I never liked any clergyman except the Vicar of Wakefield and Mr. Farebrother.”
“Now why, my dear?” said Mrs. Farebrother, pausing on her large wooden knitting-needles and looking at Mary. “You have always a good reason for your opinions, but this astonishes me. Of course I put out of the question those who preach new doctrine. But why should you dislike clergymen?”
“Oh dear,” said Mary, her face breaking into merriment as she seemed to consider a moment, “I don’t like their neckcloths.”
“Why, you don’t like Camden’s, then,” said Miss Winifred, in some anxiety.
“Yes, I do,” said Mary. “I don’t like the other clergymen’s neckcloths, because it is they who wear them.”