He sat down as he spoke on the couch where Edgell had lain on that day, and tried to look cheerful.
'Nonsense, old man! it isn't so bad as that. You are through, for certain.'
'No; I don't think I am through.'
'Well, suppose the worst, if it gives you much pleasure to anticipate it; you can come up again in October.'
'No; I shall not come up again. I shall go down and try something else. Remember, I have already tried two professions. I shall take it, if I fail, that—that the Church is closed to me. I have an offer of something in the City, and I should have to go abroad for a time, and then settle down to work. Perhaps it's the right thing for me, after all.'
'Nonsense, Wattles! What would you do stuck on a high stool in the City? You'd be getting off it half a dozen times a day to go on your knees. It's no use your choosing a profession that isn't very near the ground, where you could be on your knees all day long. That's the only profession you've got any chance in, Wattles.'
Eric smiled, and if Edgell hadn't been looking straight before him in that way he had of not seeing anything within a hundred miles he might have seen that his eyes were red, and that there was something very suspiciously like a tear in the corner of one of them.
'You are working in earnest,' he said presently, nodding towards the table where Edgell was seated, which was covered with books and papers.