Mr. Ferrars thought, and then said,
‘If you wish it, Gilbert, I will gladly do what I can for you. I believe that I may rightly do so.’
His face gleamed for a moment with the light of grateful gladness, as if at the first ray of comfort, and then he said, ‘I am sure none was ever more grieved and wearied with the burden of sin—if that be all.’
‘I think,’ said Mr. Ferrars, ‘that it might be better to give time to collect yourself, examine the past, separate the sorrow for the sin from the disgrace of the consequences, and then look earnestly at the sole ground of hope. How would it be to come for a couple of nights to Fairmead, at the end of next week?’
Gilbert gratefully caught at the invitation; and Mr. Ferrars gave him some advice as to his reading and self-discipline, speaking to him as gently and tenderly as Albinia herself. Both lingered in case the other should have more to say, but at last Gilbert stood up, saying,
‘I would thankfully go to Calcutta now, but the situation is filled up, and my father said John Kendal had been enough trifled with. If I saw any fresh opening, where I should be safe from hurting Maurice!’
‘There is no reason you and your brother should not be a blessing to each other.’
‘Yes, there is. Till I lived at home, I did not know how impossible it is to keep clear of old acquaintance. They are good-natured fellows—that Tritton and the like—and after all that has come and gone, one would be a brute to cut them entirely, and Maurice is always after me, and has been more about with them than his mother knows. Even if I were very different, I should be a link, and though it might be no great harm if Maurice were a tame mamma’s boy—you see, being the fellow he is, up to anything for a lark, and frantic about horses—I could never keep him from them. There’s no such great harm in themselves—hearty, good-natured fellows they are—but there’s a worse lot that they meet, and Maurice will go all lengths whenever he begins. Now, so little as he is now, if I were once gone, he would never run into their way, and they would never get a hold of him.’
Mr. Ferrars had unconsciously screwed up his face with dismay, but he relaxed it, and spoke kindly.
‘You are right. It was a mistake to stay at home. Perhaps your regiment may be stationed elsewhere.’