There was no question now but that the room [Pg 285]was certainly revolving. Presently it steadied itself, and General Carden knew that he was sitting by the fire, the two men opposite to him, and that the old priest was talking. Gradually his mind adjusted itself to facts: he heard and understood the words that were being spoken. When they stopped there was a silence. There is so astonishingly little to be said at such times, though the tittle-tattle of small events will supply us with endless talk.
“Thank you for coming to tell me,” said General Carden gravely, and he pushed a box of cigars towards the two men. Again silence.
Presently Tommy began to talk, quietly, easily, now. He put forward Muriel’s suggestions, her advice, her plans. He explained minutely the scheme she had proposed.
General Carden listened intent.
“It is like her kind-heartedness to suggest it,” he said, as Tommy paused, “and yours to follow it up. I have no notion where he is, nor—nor have his publishers. I happened to ask them the other day.” He made the statement with an airy carelessness of manner.
“Then,” said Tommy with a firmness which [Pg 286]Muriel would distinctly have approved, “I start to-morrow.”
Thus definitely was the decision given.
The two stayed a while longer, Tommy supplying most of the remarks made—conversation it can not be termed.
General Carden kept falling into abstracted silences, in which his eyes sought the fire and his hand pulled gently at his white moustache. Father O’Sullivan watched him from under his shaggy eyebrows. He was not a priest for nothing. He knew well enough how to read the vast unsaid between the little said, and the workings of the reserved old mind were as clear as daylight to him.
Presently they rose to depart. In the hall General Carden spoke.