‘He’s been pretty good,’ he said. ‘Not bad enough to be scolded. But if Helper will get nasty influenza, why parson must do some of her work.’
Alice could not keep up this pretty jesting tone any longer: it was much too serious and wonderful a thing to jest about that she should really be his Helper.
‘Oh, Mr Silverdale,’ she said, ‘have I really been of any use to you?’
He began to be firmly conscious of a wish that Mrs Keeling would appear. Alice’s pale eyes were fixed on him with an almost alarming expression of earnestness. He took refuge in the pretty jesting again.
‘Once upon a time,’ he said, ‘there was a young lady of such a modest disposition that though she had a Sunday School and a boys’ class, and made a beautiful, beautiful, altar-cloth—Oh, Helper,’ he broke off, ‘we had your altar-cloth in use for the first time last Sunday, and you not there to see how smart it looked.’
That was another of the ways in which he made religious matters real to many of his congregation. He used the phraseology, even the slang, of ordinary life about them, speaking of ‘such a ripping prayer’ or ‘such a jolly celebration.’
‘Oh, I hope it fitted well,’ said Alice, diverted for the moment by the mention of this piece of ecclesiastical finery.
‘It was a perfect fit. I wish my coats fitted as well. I looked round to see if I couldn’t catch the eye of my Helper, and there wasn’t a Helper there at all. I wondered if you were ill. I could think of nothing else that would have kept you away, and just said a wee bitty prayer for Helper. And then after church I heard that she had horrid old flue. And now may I make chimney smoke? Smoke not smell nasty to poor Flu-flu?’
This was a joke of well-established standing, and asked permission to light a cigarette. Leave was given him, and he insisted that she should strike the match and hold it to the end of his cigarette.
‘Poor parson has no business to indulge himself,’ he said, and blew the inhaled smoke up the chimney in a gay puff.