They found a chair for her; she refused to have lights brought, saying that she preferred this soft gloom that enveloped them.
Her question about the meeting was not immediately responded to. The men seemed collecting their thoughts. By this time, she was really upon something that resembled a true sisterly footing with these two. Both were well-bred men, incapable of any slackening of the cords of courtesy, but there was a mutual understanding between them and her which allowed deliberation in talk, which, in fact, dispensed with the necessity of conventional chatter.
King spoke at length. "Go on, young 'un," he said to Stephens, waving his pipe at him, as Lucy could see by the red glow in the bowl. "You tell her."
"No, you tell her, old chap."
Lucy wanted to laugh at the odd pair with whom she was in such sympathy. They were just like two boys.
King sighed. Conversation of any sort, unless it was actually in the course of his priestly ministrations, was always painful to him. He was a man who thought. But he could be eloquent and incisive enough when he chose.
"Well, look here, Miss Blantyre," he said, "to begin with, the whole thing has been an unqualified success for the other side! That is to say that the people in the hall—and it was crammed—have gone away in the firm conviction and belief that the Luther Lecturers have got the best of the priests, that, in short, the Protestants have won all along the line."
"Good gracious! Mr. King, do you really mean to say that one of these vulgar, half-educated men was able to beat Bernard in argument, to enlist the sympathies of the audience against Bernard?"
"That's exactly what has happened," King answered. "The vicar is up-stairs now, utterly dejected and worn out, trying to get some sleep."
"But I don't understand how it could be so."