“Just the pride of the morning. The glass is going up; there’s an anticyclone on the way. You mark my words, it’ll be fine this afternoon.”

Although the telephone was ringing (with Sir Almeric raging at the other end) the Vicar showed no inclination to leave.

“You’ll sell those Punches” he said, “when the American visitors arrive. Bit of old England: just the sort of thing the Americans love.” (Shades of the New Yorker! thought Stephen.) “But it’s always pleasant to do a deal with you, my boy. No haggling, no hums and hahs; and both of us go away happy. You’ll be particularly pleased, I think, if I tell you something.”

“What?” said Stephen.

The Vicar patted his pocket.

“This is just sufficient, with what I’ve saved up, to pay for that anemometer I told you about; and, bless your heart, I’m going to send off for it this afternoon!”

Beaming, the Vicar went out.

“Dinner’s ready,” called Faith again.

Stephen went up. Faith looked homely in an apron (she must have brought it with her) and the ham smelled very good.

“Faith,” he said. “What the devil’s strangles in horses?”

“Abscesses in the neck,” she replied promptly. “Difficult to distinguish from glanders.”

It seemed there were certain advantages, apart from ham and eggs, in having a farmer’s daughter for your secretary!

“Is it catching?” he said.

“Very.”

“Sir Almeric thinks one of the riding-school horses has got it.”

“Most unlikely,” said Faith. “It attacks young horses generally; all the riding-school hacks look about a hundred and one. But we’d better ring up the riding school and ask them to get the vet.”

It was strange, thought Stephen, that he should have once thought her half-witted, for although her typing and shorthand were as bad as ever, and she had a slap-dash way of doing things which resulted in some terrible muddles, she possessed a kind of rough-and-ready country common sense which made up for everything. More and more he found himself asking, and taking, her advice. It was she who had settled the row about the programme sellers’ uniforms, which had been specially designed by Robin and rejected by the lady in charge of the programme sellers, who had threatened mass resignations on account of them. “What you don’t understand,” Faith had explained patiently to Stephen, “is that Robin designs dresses for pretty girls with good figures. Since half the programme sellers either bulge in the wrong places or are as scraggy as old ewes they know they’d look silly in them.”

“But that wasn’t the reason they gave at all.”

Faith had looked at him with amused pity.

“Do you really imagine they admit it even to themselves?”

He began to rely on her in all sorts of ways. (Relying on Faith! he thought—it wasn’t a bad motto for his Festival.) Unusual properties were always being asked for by the stage manager. He wanted a set of hames and traces, and Faith, who knew all about harness, obtained them next day. He wanted a Very Light pistol and Faith rang up a Group Captain at the nearest aerodrome whom she charmed so completely that he risked court-martial and lent her two. But she wasn’t always charming, by any means; in her abrupt countrified way she could be devastatingly rude, and since Stephen was by nature unqualified to assert himself, Faith’s rough manners sometimes came in very useful. She had been so rude to Councillor Noakes, whose perpetual pawing she resented, that he no longer hung about the office all day; and that, at any rate, was a blessing.

Eating his ham and eggs, Stephen tried to sort out the events of the morning. “Knitting wool and silver paint,” he said, “and we must have a new block made for the printers.”

“Have done,” said Faith with her mouth full.

“And the Cricket Club wants to hire a pro for W. G. Grace. The Captain thinks he ought to have the honour but the team say he’s not good enough.”

“Quite right. Had an average of eight last season.”

“And we want a donkey. Mr. Gurney says the Holy Hermit’s got to be led on to the field by Odo and Dodo, riding on a donkey.”

“What, Odo and Dodo?”

“No, the Hermit.”

“Well, that’s lucky,” said Faith. “If they were as drunk as they were at the rehearsal last night they’d fall off.” “But can you get a donkey?”

“Of course. Old Mother Perks at the bottom of our lane has one in her orchard. It’s older than I am so it ought to be quiet.”

“Good girl.