“Nay, all they seem to drift further away from Him,” sighed the father sadly.
“My good friend, it may seem so to you, mainly because yourself are coming nearer.”
Sir Thomas shook his head sorrowfully.
“Nay, for I ne’er saw me to be such a sinner as of late I have. You call not that coming nearer God?”
“Ay, but it is!” said Mr Tremayne. “Think you, friend; you were such a sinner all your life long, though it be only now that, thanks to God, you see it. And I do in very deed hope and trust that you have this true sight of yourself because the Lord hath touched your eyes with the ointment of His grace. Maybe you are somewhat like as yet unto him whose eyen Christ touched, that at first he could not tell betwixt men and trees. The Lord is not like to leave His miracle but half wrought. He will perfect that which He hath begun.”
“God grant it!” said Sir Thomas feelingly. “But tell me, what can I do for Jack? I would I had listed you and Rachel, and had not sent him to London. Sir Piers, and Orige, and the lad himself, o’er-persuaded me. I rue it bitterly; but howbeit, what is done is done. The matter is, what to do now?”
“The better way, methinks, should be that you left him to smart for it himself, an’ you so could.”
“Jack will ne’er smart for aught,” said his father. “Were I to stay his allowance, he should but run into further debt, ne’er doubting to pay the same somewhen and somehow. The way and the time he should leave to chance. I see nought but ruin before the lad. He hath learned over ill lessons in the Court,—of honour which is clean contrary to common honesty, and courtesy which standeth not with plain truth.”
“Ay, the Devil can well glose,” (flatter, deceive) said Mr Tremayne sadly.
“The lad hath no conscience!” added Sir Thomas. “With all this, he laugheth and singeth as though nought were on his mind. Good lack! but if I had done as he, I had been miserable thereafter. I conceive not such conditions.”