Rose had abrupt ways of changing the conversation when she thought it was becoming indelicate.
§ 18
George went up to Conster after all. Rose finally persuaded him, and pushed him into his overcoat. She was anxious that he should not give fresh offence at the Manor; also she was in her own way jealous for his priestly honour and eager that he should vindicate it by exercising its functions when they were wanted instead of when they were not.
There was no family council assembled over Gervase as there had been over Mary. Only his father and mother were in the drawing-room when George arrived. Gervase was a minor in the Alard household, and religion a minor matter in the Alard world—no questions of money or marriage, those two arch-concerns of human life, were involved. It was merely a case of stopping a silly boy making a fool of himself and his family by going ways which were not the ways of squires. Not that Sir John did not think himself quite capable of stopping Gervase without any help from George, but neither had he doubted his capacity to deal with Mary without summoning a family council. It was merely the Alard tradition that the head should act through the members, that his despotism should be as it were mediated, showing thus his double power both over the rebel and the forces he employed for his subjection.
“Here you are, George—I was beginning to wonder if Rose had forgotten to give you my message. I want you to talk to that ass Gervase. It appears that he’s gone and taken to religion, on the top of a dirty trade and my eldest son’s ex-fiancée.”
“And you want me to talk him out of it?” George was occasionally sarcastic when tired.
“Not out of religion, of course. Could hardly mean that. But there’s religion and religion. There’s yours and there’s that fellow Luce’s.”
“Yes,” said George, “there’s mine and there’s Luce’s.”
“Well, yours is all right—go to church on Sundays—very right and proper in your own parish—set a good example and all that. But when it comes to letting religion interfere with your private life, then I say it’s time it was stopped. I’ve nothing against Luce personally——”
“Oh, I think he’s a perfectly dreadful man,” broke in Lady Alard—“he came to tea once, and talked about God—in the drawing-room!”