He knew perfectly well what Juliana wanted the key for.

She meant to go into his church and pray in it.
The rector of St.Asaph's was, he trusted, as broad-minded a man as an Anglican clergyman ought to be.

He had no objection to any reasonable use of his church--for a thanksgiving festival or for musical recitals for example--but when it came to opening up the church and using it to pray in, the thing was going a little too far.

What was more, he had an idea from the look on Juliana's face that she meant to pray for _him_.
This, for a clergy man, was hard to bear.

Philippa, like the good girl that she was, had prayed only for herself, and then only at the proper times and places, and in a proper praying costume.