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_By the Same Author:_

     WYMPS: Fairy Tales. With eight  illustrations by Mrs.
     Percy Dearmer.

     AT THE RELTON ARMS: A Novel.

     THE MAKING OF A SCHOOL-GIRL.




     THE
     MAKING OF A PRIG

     BY
     EVELYN SHARP

     JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD
     NEW YORK AND LONDON
     1897




     _Copyright, 1897_,
     BY JOHN LANE.

     _All rights reserved._

     University Press:
     JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.




The Making of a Prig




CHAPTER I


It was supper time at the Rectory, and the Rector had not come in.
There were two conflicting elements at the Rectory, the Rector's
disregard of details and his sister's sense of their importance. There
was only one will, however, and that was his sister's. So the meals
were always punctual, and the Rector was always late; a fact that by
its very recurrence would have long ceased to be important, had not
Miss Esther loved to accentuate it by a certain formula of complaint
that varied as little as the offence itself. This evening, however, he
was later than usual; and Miss Esther did not attempt to conceal her
impatience as she glanced from the old clock in the corner down to the
fire-place, where another familiar grievance awaited her.

"Katharine, how often have I told you not to lie on the rug like a
great boy?" she said querulously, in the tone of one who has not the
courage or the character to be really angry. She added immediately, "I
want you to ring the bell for the soup."

The girl on the floor rolled over lazily, and shut her book with a
bang.

"Daddy hasn't come in yet," she said, sitting up on her heels and
shaking the hair out of her eyes. A latent spirit of revolt was in her
tone, although she spoke half absently, as if her thoughts were still
with her book. Miss Esther tapped her foot on the ground impatiently.

"It is exactly two minutes to eight," she said sharply. "I asked you
to ring the bell, Katharine."

The girl walked across the room in a leisurely manner, and did as she
was told with a great assumption of doing as she wished. Then she sat
on the arm of the nearest chair, and the rebellious look returned to
her face.

"How do you know it is daddy's fault, Aunt Esther? The Stoke road is
awfully bad, and it's blowing hard from the north-west. He may have
been kept, and cold soup's beastly. I think it's a shame."

"I really wish," complained Miss Esther, "that you would try and
control your expressions, Katharine. It all comes of your romping so
much with young Morton. Of course I am a mere cipher in my own house;
but some day your father will be sorry that he did not listen to me in
time. Can you never remember that you are not a boy?"

"I am not likely to forget," muttered Katharine. "I should not be
sticking in this stupid old place if I were. I should be working hard
for daddy, so that he could live with his books and be happy, instead
of grinding his life away for people who only want to get all they can
out of him. What's the use of being a girl? Things are so stupidly
arranged, it seems to me!"

"My dear," said Miss Esther, who had only caught the end of her
speech, "it is difficult to believe that your father is one of God's
chosen ministers."

"But he isn't," objected Katharine. "That's just it. They made him go
into the church because there was a family living; so how on earth
could he have been chosen? Why, you told me so yourself, Aunt Esther!
It's all rubbish about being chosen, isn't it?"

"Don't chatter so much," said Miss Esther, who was counting her
stitches; and Katharine sighed petulantly.

"I can't think," she went on to herself, "how he was ever weak enough
to give in. He must have been absent-minded when they ordained him,
and never discovered it until afterwards! Don't you think so, Dorcas?"

But Dorcas, who had only just brought in the soup