Reding had got somewhat excited; the paragraph in the newspaper had annoyed him. But, without taking that into account, there was enough in the circumstances in which he found himself to throw him out of his ordinary state of mind. He was in a crisis of peculiar trial, which a person must have felt to understand. Few men go to battle in cold blood, or prepare without agitation for a surgical operation. Carlton, on the other hand, was a quiet, gentle person, who was not heard to use an excited word once a year.
The conversation came to a stand. At length Carlton said, "I hope, dear Reding, you are not joining the Church of Rome merely because there are unreasonable, unfeeling persons in the Church of England."
Charles felt that he was not showing to advantage, and that he was giving rise to the very surmises about the motives of his conversion which he was deprecating.
"It is a sad thing," he said, with something of self-reproach, "to spend our last minutes in wrangling. Forgive me, Carlton, if I have said anything too strongly or earnestly." Carlton thought he had; he thought him in an excited state; but it was no use telling him so; so he merely pressed his offered hand affectionately, and said nothing.
Presently he said, dryly and abruptly, "Reding, do you know any Roman Catholics?"
"No," answered Reding; "Willis indeed, but I hav'n't seen even him these two years. It has been entirely the working of my own mind."
Carlton did not answer at once; then he said, as dryly and abruptly as before, "I suspect, then, you will have much to bear with when you know them."
"What do you mean?" asked Reding.
"You will find them under-educated men, I suspect."
"What do you know of them?" said Reding.