Between them and Mr.Wright there was only a speaking acquaintance.

The married curate at Redicote would not let his wife call on Mrs.Askerton, and the unmarried curate was a hard-worked, clerical hack,--a parochial minister at all times and seasons, who went to no houses except the houses of the poor, and who would hold communion with no man, and certainly with no woman, who would not put up with clerical admonitions for Sunday backslidings.
Mr.Amedroz himself neither received guests nor went as a guest to other men's houses.

He would occasionally stand for a while at the gate of the Colonel's garden, and repeat the list of his own woes as long as his neighbour would stand there to hear it.

But there was no society at Belton, and Clara, as far as she herself was aware, was the only person with whom Mrs.Askerton held any social intercourse, except what she might have during her short annual holiday in Paris.
"Of course, you are right," she said, when Clara told her of the proposed coming of Mr.Belton.

"If he turn out to be a good fellow, you will have gained a great deal.