She permitted all of these admissions to be wormed out of her, as it were unwillingly, with Auntie Puss as chief inquisitor, and gained immense moral prestige by fouling her own nest, which was a situation especially congenial to her temperament. She might have been some noble-minded Russian who had, at immense personal risk, escaped to give aid to the democracies.

As Mrs Warboys was basking in her glory, the doorbell rang, and the elderly maid admitted Mrs Swithin Shillito, who was accompanied by Mr Bevill Higgin.

“Dear Louisa,” said the old lady, “I hoped that I might introduce Mr Higgin to you, for I know you have so much in common, and as he is still a stranger in Salterton—”

“But of course,” said Mrs Bridgetower. “It is rarely nowadays that I see gentlemen at my Thursdays, and so Mr Higgins is doubly welcome.”

“I am honoured,” said Mr Higgin, bowing, “to meet a lady of whom I have heard so much. The name is Higgin, without the ‘s’. Yes.” And Mr Higgin was introduced to everyone and was very much at ease, rather like an indifferent but experienced actor in a comedy by Pinero. At last he seated himself on a low pouffe next to his hostess, and looked rather like a pixie on a toadstool.

“And where are you living in Salterton, Mr Higgin?” said Mrs Bridgetower, after some general conversation.

“For the time being I have taken rooms, rather in the north of town,” said he.

“With some people called Morphew,” said Mrs Shillito.

“I don’t know anyone called Morphew,” said Mrs Bridgetower.

“I’m sure you don’t,” said Mr Higgin. “They are a very good sort of people in their way, and I am very comfortable there, but it is not the sort of place in which one would wish to stay indefinitely. But until I have acquired some pupils, and have had an opportunity to look round for a bachelor flat, with a studio, it will do very nicely.”

And then, without much prompting, he told the company that he taught singing and elocution, and Mrs Shillito said all the complimentary things about his abilities which he wanted said, but which he could not suitably say himself.

“Connection is every thing, of course, for an artist like Mr Higgin,” said that lady, “but it takes time to meet the right people.”

“Less so, perhaps, in a university town than elsewhere,” said Mr Higgin, with a bow which included all the ladies. “And in a young country, so avid for culture as Canada, I hope that it will not take me too long to make my way.”

“I have been urging Mr Higgin to seek some connection with the Cathedral,” said Mrs Shillito. “Perhaps, Mrs Knapp, you can tell us if there is any part of the musical service in which Mr Higgin’s talents could be of use?”

Mrs Knapp said that Mr Cobbler looked after everything of that kind.

“Oh, my dear, you are too modest,” said Mrs Shillito, who was a rosy, round little old lady, got up in grey and purple and, like her husband, English with the peculiar intensity of English people abroad. “We all know how musical Mr Dean is, and I am sure that Mr Cobbler does nothing except on his advice.”

“I have been trying to see Mr Cobbler,” said Higgin, “but he is a very elusive man.”

“He may soon be downright missing, if I am any judge,” said Miss Pottinger, who had been seething for some time. Mrs Bridgetower’s opposition to her conviction that Cobbler was at the root of the great scandal had served only to intensify her certainty of his guilt.

This pregnant remark brought the conversation back to the great theme again, and as Mr Higgin was acquainted with it, having heard much about it from the Shillitos, he was able to enter into it with some spirit, though modestly, as befitted a newcomer. He listened with wide-open blue eyes, and said “Oh!” and “Ah!” with the right amount of horror at the right places.

“If I may venture to say so,” said he, smiling at all the ladies in turn, “I think that it will not be at all easy to get satisfaction from Mr Ridley. I have only met him once, of course, but he seemed to me to be a very saturnine kind of man.” And he told the tale of his visit to Ridley, under the wing of Mr Shillito; and, as he told it, it appeared that Ridley had shown a strongly Philistine attitude toward the cultural advancement of Canada, and the improvement of The Bellman. He told his story so well, and imitated Ridley so drolry, that it made the ladies laugh very much, and gave particular satisfaction to Mrs Warboys.

“When I think of him sitting there, without a word to say for himself, and snapping at the air with those scissors,” said Higgin, “I really can’t help smiling, though I assure you it was rather embarrassing at the time.”

This led to further discussion of Ridley, whose eccentricities, habits of cooking, and single state were all thoroughly rehearsed.

“Perhaps it is as well that he never married, if he is so disagreeable,” said gentle little Mrs Knapp.

“Is it widely believed that he is unmarried?” said Higgin, with a very knowing look.

“Why, whatever do you mean by that, Mr Higgin?” said Mrs Knapp.

“Perhaps I’d better say no more—at present,” said Higgin, leaving Mrs Knapp most unsatisfied, and the other ladies even more incensed against Ridley for daring to have a secret, though they admired Mr Higgin for his discretion in not explaining it, to the only one of their number who did not know it.

“And that is the man,” said Auntie Puss, “to whom Waverley thinks of giving an honorary degree! Strange days we live in.”

“Because of Swithin’s association with him—his strictly professional association, I should say—it would ill become me to comment on that matter,” said Mrs Shillito. “But I would have thought that the University would have wanted its new course in journalism to be formed by those with a—shall I say?—more literary approach to the matter? Writing—the light touch—the formation of a style—you know the sort of thing I mean.”

They all knew. It meant Mr Shillito, and whimsical little essays about birdseed and toothpicks.

“The degree has not been conferred yet, or even formally approved,” said Mrs Warboys, in a marked manner. And as everyone present knew, or thought they knew, that she had several members of the University Board of Governors in her pocket, this was a great stroke, and brought forth a good deal of murmuring and head nodding.

The tea, and the thin bread and butter, and the little cakes, and the big cake, having been pretty well disposed of by this time, it was a pleasant diversion when Mrs Shillito begged Mrs Bridgetower, as a personal favour to herself, to permit Mr Higgin to try her piano. This instrument, which was an aged Chickering, was a great ornament of the drawing-room, for its case was beautifully polished, and its top was covered with photographs in silver frames, and the late Professor Bridgetower’s military medals, exhibited on a piece of blue velvet. Mrs Bridgetower graciously gave her consent.

“I hope that an artist like yourself will not be too critical, Mr Higgin,” said she. “I do not play so much now as once I did, and it may not be completely in tune.”

With appropriate demurral, Mr Higgin sat down at the piano and struck a chord. It was not so much out of tune as out of voice. The sound board had split under the rigours of winter heating, and the old wires gave forth that nasal, twangling sound peculiar to senile pianos and Siamese cats. Some of the photographs jingled as well. But Mr Higgin dashed off a few brilliant arpeggio passages, and smiled delight at his hostess.

“May I give myself the pleasure?” said he. “Oh, do say that I may.” And without waiting for further permission he began to play and sing.

It might be said of Mr Higgin that he brought a great deal to the music he performed—so much, indeed, that some composers would have had trouble in recognizing their works as he performed them. He had a surprisingly large voice for a small man, and he phrased with immense grandeur and feeling, beginning each musical statement loudly, and tailing off at the end of it as though ecstasy had robbed him of consciousness. He enriched the English language with vowels of an Italian fruitiness, so that “hand” became “hond”, and “God” “Goad”. It was plain that he had had a lot of training, for nobody ever sang so by the light of Nature.