Oh, why was a use to be made of these out-of-date weapons? Why could not one or two of his prejudices be surrendered, so that there were a chance of meeting him half-way?
"But sometimes," said Guy desperately, "inclination and duty coincide."
"Very rarely, I'm afraid, in this world."
"Do they in the next then?" asked Guy a little harshly, hating the conventionality of the answer that seemed to crystallize the intellectual dishonesty of a dominie's existence. He knew that the next world was merely an arid postulate which served for a few theorems and problems of education, and that duty and desire must only be kept apart on account of the hierarchical formulae of his craft. He must eternally appear as half-inhuman as all the rest of the Pharisees: priests, lawyers and schoolmasters, they were all alike in relying for their livelihood upon a capacity for depreciating human nature.
"I was merely using a figure of speech," said his father.
Exactly, thought Guy, and how was he ever to justify his love for Pauline to a man whose opinions could never be expressed except in figures of speech? He made up his mind to postpone the visit to the Rectory until to-morrow. Evidently it was not going to be made even moderately easy to broach the subject of Pauline.
"I expect you'd like to have a look at some of my work," he suggested.
"Very much," said Mr. Hazlewood; and in a moment with his dry assent he had reduced all his son's achievement to the level of a fifth-form composition. Guy took the manuscripts out of his desk, and disengaging from the heap any poems that might be ascribed to the influence of Pauline, he presented the rest to his father. Mr. Hazlewood settled himself as comfortably as he could ever seem to be comfortable and solemnly began to read without comment. Guy would have liked to get up and leave him alone, for though he assured himself that the opinion whether favourable or unfavourable did not matter, his suspense was sharp and the inexpression of his father's demeanour, that assumption of tutorial impartiality, kept him puzzling and unable to do anything but watch the critic's face and toy mechanically with the hair of Bob's sentimental head upon his knee.
At last the manuscripts were finished, and Guy sat back for the verdict.
"Oh, yes, I like some very much," said Mr. Hazlewood. "But I can't help thinking that all of them could have been written as well in recreation after the arduousness of a decent profession. However, you've burned your boats as far as Fox Hall is concerned, and I shall certainly be the first to congratulate you, if you bring your ambition to a successful issue."