“Glad to see you, Aspel; thought you were going to fail me. Sit down. Now, come, I hope you have considered my proposal favourably.—The piece of business I asked you to come about is nothing more than to offer you again that situation, and to press it on you. It would just suit a man of your powers.—What! No?”
The Baronet frowned, for George Aspel had smiled slightly and shaken his head as he sat down.
“Forgive me, Sir James, if I seem to regard your kind proposals with indifference. Indeed, I am sincerely grateful, especially for the motive that actuates you—I mean regard for my dear father’s memory—”
“How do you know, sir,” interrupted Sir James testily, “that this is my only motive?”
“I did not say it was your only motive, Sir James. I cannot doubt, from your many expressions of kindness, that personal regard for myself influences you; but I may not accept the situation you offer me—bright with future prospects though it be—because I feel strongly that God has called me to another sphere of action. I have now been for a considerable time, and hope to be as long as I live, a missionary to the poor.”
“What! A city missionary? One of those fellows who go about in seedy black garments with long lugubrious faces?” exclaimed Sir James in amazement.
“Some of them do indeed wear seedy black garments,” replied Aspel, “under some strange hallucination, I suppose, that it is their duty to appear like clergymen, and I admit that they would look infinitely more respectable in sober and economical grey tweeds; but you must have seen bad specimens of the class of men if you think their faces long and lugubrious. I know many of them whose faces are round and jovial, and whose spirits correspond to their faces. No doubt they are sometimes sad. Your own face would lengthen a little, Sir James, if you went where they go, and saw what they sometimes see.”
“I dare say you are right. Well, but have you seriously joined this body of men?”
“Not officially. I—I—hesitate to offer myself, because—that is to say, I am a sort of free-lance just now.”
“But, my young friend,” returned Sir James slowly, “I understand that city missionaries preach, and usually have a considerable training in theology; now, it is not very long ago since you were a—excuse me—I—I shrink from hurting your feelings, but—”