The Semi-Attached Couple

Book Excerpt: ...d observation by coming early to church, for they arrived before the end of the first lesson-a most unusual degree of punctuality; but this sign of timidity did not prevent the whole congregation from fixing their eyes intently on the tall young man who followed Lord Eskdale into church, and who took a seat opposite to Lady Helen in the pew. Never was the congregation so alert in standing up at the proper opportunities. Old Mr. Marlow, a martyr to rheumatic gout, and Mrs. Greenland, who had, for two years, made her stiff knee an excuse for sitting down during the whole of the service, were both on their legs before the psalm was given out. The clerk, who had a passion for his own singing, saw his advantages, and gave out five verses of a hymn, with repetition of the two last lines of each verse. Seven verses and a half! but nobody thought it a note too long. Moreover, Lady Helen dropped her prayer-book, and the tall young man picked it up for her. Such an incident! Mrs. Thompson, as usual, missed it, because...