"But you know, my dear," his mother said gently, "it is not often you do walk about the garden by yourself, so it was natural that Lucy should be surprised."
"Quite natural, mother," Yorke admitted frankly. "Well, I have been thinking over something."
"And what conclusion have you arrived at, Yorke?" his father asked.
The boy hesitated. "I will tell you after breakfast to-morrow," he said, "it is too long to talk about now." Then he asked questions about the afternoon they had spent, and the subject was not alluded to before him until the next morning, although he was the chief topic of conversation between his father and mother that night.
"The boy has something in his head," Mr. Harberton said. "There can be no doubt that this very unfortunate business affects him more seriously than the rest of us. To us it means a quieter life, less gaiety, and a little pinching; to him it means a great deal more—it is a change in his whole prospects, a change in his career. I think that would have come anyhow; Yorke has never said that he disliked the thought of going into the church, but the mere fact that it was a topic he always avoided is quite sufficient to show that his heart was not in it. I should in no case have exercised any strong influence in the matter, for unless a man feels he has a call to the vocation it is better that he should not enter it. Now, I should be still more unwilling to put any pressure whatever upon him. Certainly I shall not be able to afford to send him to college, unless he could gain an open scholarship that would go far towards paying his expenses. But of that I see no prospect whatever.
"Yorke is no fool, but he has no great application, and his school reports show that, although not at the bottom of his form, he is never more than half-way up. If viewed merely as a worldly profession, the church is now the worst that a young man can enter. The value of the livings has long been falling off, owing to the drop in value of tithes and land. The number of curates is immensely larger than that of livings, and the chance of preferment, unless through powerful patronage, is but slight. In other professions a man's value is in proportion to his age. In the church it is otherwise. No incumbent likes having a curate older than himself, and a man of fifty will obtain less pay than one of five-and-twenty; and I see no prospect whatever of any improvement. While some classes have become more wealthy, the landed gentry, who may be considered the best supporters of the church, have become poorer, owing in part to the fall in the value of land, and to the very heavy death and succession duties. It would need much national effort to make any real improvement in our condition, and I see no hope of such a national effort being made. I should not be greatly surprised if, as a result of his cogitations to-day, Yorke tells me to-morrow that he has made up his mind to give up all idea of entering the church."
"I should be sorry," Mrs. Harberton said almost tearfully; "I have so looked forward to it."
"I doubt whether he would have gone in any circumstances," her husband said, "and I certainly should not have urged him to do so had he expressed any reluctance. It is in my opinion the highest and noblest career that man can adopt, but it must be only taken up with the highest motives. Yorke is a good lad, but neither studious nor serious in his disposition. Possibly, had I kept him at home and had a tutor for him, he would willingly have fallen in with our hopes and wishes; but it was on that very account that I sent him to a public school. There is nothing more unfortunate than that a man should too late discover that he has mistaken his avocation. As it is, his decision, if it is his decision, has been quickened by this crash. The path to the church is no longer easy for him, and I fancy that while we were away to-day he has been laying his own plans for the future."
"He is so young to have any plans at all, John."