Louis, without raising his eyes, only answered with a smile.
'Then, what do you mean? As to your notions of a vocation, ninety-nine out of a hundred are in my case. I have been bred up to this—nothing else is open—I mean to do my duty; and surely that is vocation—no one has a right to object—'
'No one; I beg your pardon,' meekly said Louis, taking up his stick to go; but both knew it was only a feint, and James, whose vehemence was exhausting itself, resumed, in an injured tone, 'What disturbs you? what is this scruple of yours!—you, who sometimes fancy you would have been a curate yourself!'
'I have just inclination enough to be able to perceive that you have none.'
'And is every one to follow his bent?'
'This is not a step to be taken against the grain, even for the best earthly motives. Jem! I only beg you to ask advice. For the very reason that you are irreproachable, you will never have it offered.'
'The present time, for instance?' said James, laughing as best he might.
'That is nothing. I have no faith in my own judgment, but, thinking as I do of the profession and of you, I cannot help believing that my distaste for seeing you in it must be an instinct.'
'Give me your true opinion and its grounds candidly, knowing that I would not ask another man living.'
'Nor me, if I did not thrust it on you.'