“I never heard you admit that much!” she marvelled.
“You’re approaching years of discretion,” laughed her old rector. “All these things are of small moment compared with the great fact that the Church does stand as a constant effort to inculcate the grace of God. The young are prone to require roses without a blemish, but even God has never made one.”
“I don’t understand,” she puzzled. “You’re not combatting me on any of these things as you used to,” and it actually worried her.
“Let me whisper something to you,” and the Reverend Doctor Mooreman, whose face had the purity which is only visible in old age, leaned forward, with his eyes snapping. “I don’t believe a lot of them myself; but Gail, I believe much in the grace of God, and I believe much in its refining and bettering influence on humanity, so to the people who would discard everything for the reason of one little flaw, I teach things I don’t believe; and my conscience is as clean as a whistle.”
“You’re a darling old fraud!” Gail’s mind was singularly relieved. She had worried how a man of Doctor Mooreman’s intelligence could swallow so many of the things which were fed him in his profession. The conversation had done her good. It tempered her attitude toward certain things, but it did not change her steadfast principle that the Church would be better off if it did not require the teachings of tenets and articles of faith which were an insult to modern intelligence.
Had she been unfair with the Reverend Smith Boyd? She could not shake off that thought. She must tell him the attitude of Doctor Mooreman. That is, if she ever saw him again. Of course she would, however.
CHAPTER XVII
SOMETHING HAPPENS TO GERALD FOSLAND
There was something radically wrong with the Fosland household. Gerald’s man had for years invariably said: “Good morning, sir; I hope you slept well, sir.” This time he merely said: “Good morning, sir”; and he forgot the salt. What was the matter with the house? With the exception of William’s slip, the every morning programme was quite as usual. Gerald arose, had his plunge, his breakfast, read his mail and his paper, went for a canter in the Park, had luncheon at the Papyrus Club, and unless his morning engagement slip had shown him some social duty for the afternoon, he did not see Mrs. Fosland until he came down, from the hands of William, dressed for dinner.
One can readily see that no deviation from this routine confronted Gerald Fosland this morning. He had had his plunge and his breakfast, his mail and his paper laid before him, and yet there was something ghastly about the feel of the house. It was as if some one were dead! Gerald Fosland made as radical a deviation from his daily life as William had done. He left his mail unopened, after a glance at the postmark; he left his paper unread, and he started for his canter in the Park a full half hour early!
He arrived at the Papyrus Club a full half hour early, and sat in the dimmest corner of the library, taking himself seriously in hand. Somehow, he was not quite fit, not quite up to himself. It seemed desperately lonely in the Club. There were plenty of fellows there, but they were merely nodders. They were not the ones who came at his hour. He brightened a shade as Tompkinson came in five minutes early. He was about to wonder if all the world had started a trifle early this morning, when he remembered that, ordinarily on his arrival, he found Tompkinson there. He could not analyse why this should be such a relief to him, unless it was that he found mere normality comforting to-day.