"Can't we talk over things reasonably, Mercer? If I thought I had that sort of power, I should make some attempt to exercise it, shouldn't I? I shouldn't be asking you if we can't come to some understanding."
"And what understanding on such a subject is possible, I should like to know. You want me to go; that's the plain truth of the matter. Do you think I'm not a fit person to exercise my duties here, may I ask?"
Grafton was silent, with a silence that was significant.
There was a drop in the temperature. "For my own satisfaction this must be cleared up," said the Vicar, speaking with dignified restraint. "If you have any charges to bring against me I must know what they are, so that I can meet them in the open."
"There are no charges, Mercer, to be met in that way. I've told you already why I should like a change made, if you can bring yourself to consider it. It isn't only the people of our own sort, as you say, that you don't get on with. You're at loggerheads with half your parishioners at one time or another. My girls are always coming across it, wherever they go. They're keen—Caroline is especially—to make friends with the people in the place, and for us who live here in a certain relation with them to do what we can for them. It's one of the pleasures of landholding to be given that sort of opportunity. We've all of us come to see that. I believe we should be as happy and contented a community as you'd find anywhere, if—well, if it weren't for you, Mercer. I don't want to be offensive, but that's what it comes to."
The Vicar was trembling with anger. "But this is outrageous," he exclaimed.
"Oh, I don't think so," said Grafton easily. "I've no wish to offend you, but it seems to me that the state of things I want here is worth taking that risk for. I tell you plainly that you seem to me such a difficulty in the way of it that if you go on here I can't continue to offer you the friendship of myself and my family. In ordinary life, if a man you know is continually acting in a way you don't like, you drop his acquaintance, or if it's necessary you fight him. I don't want to fight you, and I don't suppose you want to fight me. I've said enough to show you that I've reasons which seem to me important for wanting to come to the understanding with you that I've indicated. I don't want to argue about them, or to push them in. They're there. I'll ask you to think over what I've said. Anything I can do to make it advantageous and agreeable to you to find some other place to work in, I will do; and if you decide to go, well, as far as people outside will be able to see, you and we will part as friends, and you'll be going, of course, of your own free will."
He rose from his chair, and the Vicar rose at the same time. He had an enormous amount to say, but found it difficult to say it as Grafton walked down the long room, opened the door for him, and accompanied him through the dining-room into the hall.
"It wants thinking over, I know," said Grafton, taking no notice of his beginnings of sentences. "You can't decide this sort of thing in a hurry. If you and Mrs. Mercer will come and dine with us to-morrow night, you and I could have a friendly talk about it afterwards and see if there's anything to be done. Caroline will write Mrs. Mercer a note."