“It’s a busy day with me, thank you,” answered the Reverend Henderson a little coldly, for this Mr. Jonas was a man of no church. His faith, he had frequently assured the young clergyman, would long ago have died for breathing space in any creed he yet had met with.
“When you’re older you’ll understand better what I mean, my dear boy,” the little man had in good part and cheerfulness assured the other. “Come around and use my books any time you like.”
For the soul of Mr. Jonas enthused—or convinced its owner that it did—over Confucius, and further revelled in the belief that it delved in occult knowledge; it also led him to place the volumes of the early Fathers on his book-shelves and the literature of the Saints and of Kant and Comte and Swedenborg; it conducted its owner to the feet of Emerson and Thoreau; it made him talk Darwinism. Jesus Christ and Plato, Mr. Jonas loved to say, made up his ideal philosophy.
Mr. Henderson, on the other hand, spoke of church buildings in Aden other than his own as assembling places. It was inevitable he did not give his approval to Mr. Jonas. His feeling against the little man even made him enumerate the occupations ahead for the day, as if it was a sort of avowal of the faith to thus declare them.
“It’s a busy day with me, thank you. I have a feast day service and a guild meeting, besides my parochial duties and a vestry meeting for the evening.”
“Dear me,” said Molly, looking at him. “To be sure—I’d forgotten you’re a minister.” The young man looked up, instant self-arraignment in his face, for permitting it to be forgotten.
“When do you have service?” Molly was saying. “We must come over, Malise and I.”
He told her gravely.
Mr. Jonas was standing against the gallery railing, rising and falling on his neat little toes, the setter’s eyes following his every movement. He was facing Mrs. Garnier and her daughter, looking from the mother, with her red-brown hair and shadowy lashes, to the girl, quite lovely, also, when she smiled in this sweet, sudden way up at him. She had nice hair, too, something the colour of wild honey.
“Charming women, charming women,” he was summing them up.