The decree had gone forth, and Dacre was to go to Eton. Ancestral taint and sisterly guile had won the day, though not without a tough struggle. The idea of home culture, vague and ill-defined as it was, died hard, and Mr. and Mrs. Waring still bemoaned their fate daily in the intervals of work.
They were now much disturbed in their minds concerning the plan of religion which they had conceived in the tender youth of their offspring, and which had been worked up to with rather more consistency than usually characterized those plans of theirs that dealt with outside and minor matters.
That it should have occurred to Henry and Grace Waring was the most remarkable part of this plan. They both looked upon religion as they did upon art, as a thing apart and on a somewhat low level, to be considered in leisure hours. In some phases of mind they might indeed almost have been said to glory in it, and to rejoice that the ages should own such a heritage, just as one might rejoice in the work of a great master.
They were, of course, both too appreciative of good literature to have neglected the Bible, they knew every twist and turn in it as they did of the Koran and the Brahminic Vedas.
As for doubts and things of that sort, they never, so to speak, went in for them, their minds were not of that order. In the same way the truths or the untruths of Christianity seemed to them an interesting enough study between working hours. In Mrs. Waring’s case, perhaps, they appealed fitfully to some part of herself she never quite understood, that same sentimental part that often suffered a keen stab,—for instance in the case of the Rectory babies, and sometimes from a strange look in Gwen’s face. But she had almost ceased to speculate upon these odd sensations, and was inclined to put them down to a strain of puritan blood that had somehow trickled into the more vigorous fluid of her fighting forbears, which perhaps might almost account for her preference for Christianity over other creeds.
It will be seen then that the reception or rejection of Christianity by their children, was a matter of no vital importance to these parents. They were, however, intensely interested in the result itself, that was quite another thing; the phases of mind the function must unfold seemed certainly a subject worth research, and filled them with the keenest interest.
“You are quite sure, dearest,” said Mr. Waring, a few days before Dacre’s departure was to take place, “that Mary has not tampered with the minds of our children.”
“I am certain, quite certain. She has certainly seemed to resent my orders in this matter, but she has not disobeyed them.”
Mrs. Waring sat down and tried to take up the thread of her thoughts, but it was broken again in a minute by Mr. Waring pushing back his chair suddenly and looking at her in a disturbed restless way. She went over, laid her hand on his shoulder, and looked anxiously into his face.
“Are you troubled, love, can I not help you?”