It was a moment requiring some little tact, but Mrs.Woodgate was just equal to it.
"Hugh, how rude of you!" she exclaimed, with only the suspicion of a smile.

"You forget that it's your duty to be friendly with everybody; there's no such obligation on anybody else." "I should be friendly with Mr.Steel," said Hugh, "duty or no duty, after what he has done for the parish." And his pleasant honest face and smile did away with the necessity for a set apology.
"I must say," added his wife to her visitor, "that it's the same with me, you know." There was a pause.
"Then you intend to call upon her ?" said Mrs.Venables, coming with directness to an obviously premeditated point.
"I do--I must--it is so different with us," said the vicar's young wife, with her pretty brown blush.
"Certainly," added the vicar himself, with dogmatic emphasis.
Mrs.Venables did not look at him, but she looked the harder at Morna instead.
"Well," said she, "I suppose you are right.

In your position--yes--your position is quite different!" And the sudden, half accidental turn of her sentence put Mrs.Venables on good terms with herself once more; and so she rose all smiles and velvet.

"No, not even half a cup; but it was really quite delicious; and I hope you'll come and see me soon, and tell me all about her.

At his age!" she whispered as she went.