It would probably be unjust to Miss Laura Pottinger to describe her as a busybody; she preferred to think of herself as one who possessed a strong sense of her responsibility toward others. She was a soldier’s daughter, as she had told the Dean; her father had for many years been a colonel of militia, and if he had not been somewhat too busy for service when the first Boer War broke out, and somewhat too old for it when the second Boer War came along, he would undoubtedly have distinguished himself in the field. He was a very successful wholesale grocer, and his business yielded the means to support his military dignity on the highest level; indeed, in his household it was possible to maintain the most idealistic concepts of military honour, of good breeding and of Victorian Anglicanism, without ever being troubled about such base considerations as money. Miss Pottinger, in her advanced years, had yielded nothing to the spirit of the times; two world wars had beaten vainly against her sense of propriety, and the reduction of her means (though she was very comfortably off) had only served to increase her devotion to what she believed to be the public good.

She was aggrieved, but not surprised, that Dean Knapp had behaved so oddly in the matter of the midnight disturbance in the Cathedral. She had long ago decided that the Dean lacked those qualities of decison, censoriousness and command which she included under the general heading of “gimp”. But she was devoted to the Cathedral, and was ready to put all her own boundless stock of gimp at its service. Therefore she made her way to early Communion on All Saints’ Day in a martial spirit, and as soon as the service was over she buttonholed Mr Matthew Snelgrove, the lawyer, as he made his way toward the door.

“You are not locking up the Communion plate, Mr Snelgrove?”

“Surely that is not necessary, Miss Pottinger? There will be another service at eleven.” Mr Snelgrove was chancellor of the diocese, and although it was not strictly his duty to do so, he usually locked the church valuables in the vault, and made himself responsible for their safe keeping.

“I hope that there was nothing missing this morning?”

“Not that I know of. Why would there be?”

“There was something very odd going on in the Cathedral last night, at midnight and after. A dreadful clamour, as though the place were full of rowdy people. I called the Dean, and I believe he took some action, though of course I don’t know. Naturally I was anxious. After all, there were many fine pieces on the altar all night, including the chalice which father gave to St Nicholas’ on the successful conclusion of the South African War. I was concerned. And of course I concluded that you, as chancellor, would have news which would be some time in getting down to those of us who are merely parishioners.”

Simple though this speech appears, it contained many of those qualities of hidden meaning and implication which made Miss Pottinger a remarkable, if unrecognized, rhetorician. It aroused suspicion in the mind of Mr Snelgrove, and warmed up his well-developed animosity against the Dean; it suggested sacrilege, which to his lawyer-like mind was deeply repugnant; it brought into the open the old quarrel about whether the altar should be decked with Communion plate at night (which was convenient) or in the morning (which was safe); it reminded Mr Snelgrove that the Pottingers had been an influential and generous family in Cathedral life for almost a century, and that when Miss Pottinger died her small fortune might come to the Cathedral if she got her way in some Cathedral affairs; its mock humility flattered the chancellor, while goading him, and gave him an excuse to harry the Dean. Mr Snelgrove’s keen legal mind grasped all these points at once, and after a few more words with Miss Pottinger he hurried off to the vestry, like a ruffled old stork, to tackle the Dean about it.

It must not be supposed, because Dean Knapp was not in every respect satisfactory to Miss Pottinger, Mr Snelgrove and some others among his parishioners, that he was less than capable as a clergyman. He was, on the contrary, a man of more than ordinary ability in his profession. But in every church there are people who, for reasons which seem sufficient to them, do not approve of their pastor and who seek to harry him and bully him into some condition more pleasing to themselves. The democracy which the Reformation brought into the Christian Church rages in their bosoms like a fire; they would deny that they regard their clergyman as their spiritual hired hand, whom they boss and oversee for his own good, but that is certainly the impression they give to observers. Dean Knapp attracted this sort of bullying, for he had his share of personal vanity, and it was his desire to be considered urbane. Although he lived in Canada, in the middle of the twentieth century, his clerical ideals were those nineteenth-century clergymen in England who were witty men of the world, as well as men of God. His aptitude for this sort of masquerading was not great, but he tried hard, and often committed innocent follies in pursuit of his urbane goal. He made little literary jokes which people did not understand; he sometimes suggested that certain minor sins were unimportant and rather funny, instead of ignoring them completely as a really tactful Canadian clergyman should; he lacked zeal for the more uproarious sorts of boys’ work, and when it was necessary to raise money for good causes he did not show that wholehearted reverence for money which is so reassuring to a flock composed predominantly of business people. And, worst of all, he sometimes refused to be serious when dealing with people who were angry. It was this characteristic of the Dean’s which especially annoyed Mr Matthew Snelgrove, who was often angry and who liked people to share his anger or tremble at it. A surprising amount of Mr Snelgrove’s time was spent in trying to make the Dean be serious when the Dean wanted to be urbane.

Mr Snelgrove entered the vestry, with the most cursory of knocks, just as the Dean had removed his cassock and was about to put on his waistcoat and coat. It is not as easy to be urbane in shirtsleeves as when fully dressed.

“What’s this I hear about trouble in the church last night?” asked Mr Snelgrove.

But Dean Knapp was not to be caught that way, and he replied: “Well, what do you hear about it, Mr Snelgrove?” He then smiled, as though to say that Mr Snelgrove was making a fuss about nothing.

“Miss Pottinger thought that there might be some danger to the plate which was on the altar. It is of considerable value, you know.”

“It is certainly more valuable than one might think, without being as valuable as the donors suppose,” said the Dean, and laughed urbanely. Not bad, thought he, for a man who has not yet had his breakfast. But Mr Snelgrove was not pleased.

“We should have our work cut out to replace it, if any of it were stolen,” said he.

“Then perhaps we should increase the insurance,” said the Dean.

“The insurance is all right as it is,” said Mr Snelgrove. “But associations, and sentiment, and the devotion to the Cathedral which those pieces represent can’t be replaced with insurance.”

“No, of course not,” said the Dean, pulling in his horns. He rarely had the temerity to be urbane straight through even the shortest conversation.

“What was happening here last night?”

“What was not happening last night? Hallowe’en, you know. The first thing to happen was that someone made an impudent use of the Cathedral’s name in connection with a practical joke.” And then the Dean told Mr Snelgrove about the false engagement notice, and the unreasonable treatment to which he had been subjected by Professor Vambrace. But that was not enough to assuage the curiosity of the lawyer.