They were the best of friends, talking brightly together, when the door burst open and the impetuous priest rushed in. "Well, I'm glad to see you!" he said with a broad grin of welcome. "Had tea?—that's right. I see you've made friends with my clergywoman! I've been in church hearing confessions, or I'd have been in sooner."
His manner was extremely genial. He seemed genuinely glad to see his brother vicar and not in the least surprised or puzzled.
Carr looked attentively at him. So this merry Irishman, with the lined, powerful face, the grey hair, and eyes which sometimes blazed out like lamps—this was the great Ritualist, the Jesuit, the thief of English liberty!
He had a wonderful magnetic power, that was evident at once. His sympathy for everything and everybody poured from him; he was "big," big in every way.
He chatted merrily away on a variety of topics while taking his tea. Asking his sister for another cup, he suddenly turned to Carr. "That reminds me," he said, "of a good story I heard yesterday. Father Cartwright was here to lunch, he is one of the St. Clement Fathers at the Oxford monastery. Not long ago a young nobleman—rather a bon vivant, by the way—went down to spend a few days with the Fathers. He made his arrival, very unfortunately for him, poor fellow! on a Friday, when the fare's very frugal indeed. He had very little to eat, poor chap, and went to bed as hungry as a hunter, quite unable to sleep he was. Now, it's the custom for one of the Fathers to go round in the night with a benediction, 'The Lord be with you.' They always say it in Latin, Dominus tecum. The young man heard some one rapping at the door. 'Who's there?' says he. 'Dominus tecum,' was the answer. 'Thanks, very much,' said the nobleman, 'please put it down outside'!"
While they were laughing at the story, Lucy rose and, shaking hands with Carr, went away.
The two clergymen were left alone. "You'll not mind talking in here?" Father Blantyre said. "I've got a poor chap in me study I don't want to disturb. I found um after lunch making a row in the street with a crowd round him, a poor half-clothed scarecrow, beastly drunk—never saw a man in such a state. I asked one of the crowd who he was and he said he was a stranger, a ship's fireman, who'd been about the place for a day or two, spending all his money in drinks, and he hadn't a friend in the world. A policeman came along and wanted to lock um up, but I managed to get him in here and he's sleeping it off. I shall give um egg in milk when he comes round: his poor stomach's half poisoned with bad liquor and no food. I always find egg and milk the best thing in these cases. I wish he wasn't so dirty! We shall have to give 'm a hot tub before he can go to bed."
"What will you do with him?"
"Oh, keep him here for a day or two to pull round, give um some clothes, and pack 'm off to sea again where he can't get any drink."
"Don't such men ever rob you?"