This may sound queer, but is as naught to the queerness about to
be unfolded.
II
It cannot be considered unnatural that Mrs and Miss Ebag, with the
assistance of the vicar, should have managed the affairs of the church.
People nicknamed them "the churchwardens," which was not quite nice,
having regard to the fact that their sole aim was the truest welfare of
the church. They and the vicar, in a friendly and effusive way, hated
each other. Sometimes they got the better of the vicar, and, less often,
he got the better of them. In the choice of a new organist they won.
Their candidate was Mr Carl Ullman, the artistic orphan.
Mr Carl Ullman is the hero of the tale. The son of one of those German
designers of earthenware who at intervals come and settle in the Five
Towns for the purpose of explaining fully to the inhabitants how
inferior England is to Germany, he had an English mother, and he himself
was violently English. He spoke English like an Englishman and German
like an Englishman. He could paint, model in clay, and play three
musical instruments, including the organ. His one failing was that he
could never earn enough to live on.
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