'A good deal has gone to the bad since his time,' said Clement, 'and well it may! I could think of nothing but the traffic in Babylon the Great of "the souls of men," and wonder whether I was sharing in it! Not a word as to my fitness or unfitness, not an attempt at inquiry! I might be the veriest disgrace to my Orders for what they cared, so long as my name is Underwood!'
'And, Edward!' said Felix, 'I can't but be touched to see how the poor old man feels it an act of restitution. It is the best he knows, Clem, his first step, and I am glad you have not baulked him of it.'
'It is a vicious and rotten system altogether,' said Clement, 'and I am not sure how far one is justified in submitting to it.'
'And now, without going into the question of lay-patronage, what brought you to submit to it?'
'I'll tell you, Felix. I set out to walk with Smiles, to see the place, and set Shaw so far on his way home. We went on beyond the village street, where all looks smooth and fair—all roses and gable-ends—like the model place you fancy it, and maybe it was in Father's time. On by the little river—'
'The Leston. Isn't it beautiful?'
'It is like places I saw in Wales. Well, there is another little ravine running down to meet that—very wild—a show place.'
'Blackstone Gulley. Isn't there a quarry?'
'Indeed there is; and such a set of hovels round it, run up in a hollow without a notion of health or comfort! It seems the demand for the stone is uncertain; so these wretched quarrymen are half their time poaching and pilfering, a villainous ferocious lot, that do all the harm in the neighbourhood—in fact, the Squire flew into a rage at the very name. He had forbidden anything from his house to be given to them; and even the Miss Hepburns were afraid to go among them. What are you laughing at, Felix?'
'Because I see why Mr. Smiles took you that way. Go on.'