[CHAPTER XLIV]
THE RECTOR'S OPINION, AND WHY IT CARRIED NO WEIGHT. OF THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER, AND WHY CHALLIS DOUBTED IT. YET THE RECTOR TOLERATED HIS IMPIETY
The Rector sat in his usual chair in the library smoking his usual after-dinner pipe, his only concession to tobacco. It served a turn now—harmonized his life with that of his friend, who, of course, sat on the other side of the rug, that both might be conscious of an empty grate. One pays this tribute in the summer, to the comfort the warmth would have been had it been winter. Or is it a survival of some ancestral fire-worship?
It was Challis's second pipe in the day that he was lighting, but his fourth smoke. He looked as though something narcotic were wanting, if he were to sleep in the night ahead of him. His forehead throbbed, the Rector felt convinced. Else why did that restless, nervous hand skim it over, from side to side, then press the closed eyelids below as though to squeeze a pain out?
He had told the whole of his story, ending it up during dinner, and doing poor justice to the efforts of the Rectory cook. Athelstan Taylor had listened nearly in silence, not saying how much he had already heard, or had guessed, of the way things had gone since his attempted intercession with Mrs. Challis. Challis's absences from England, and the chance that their London visits never coincided, had kept them apart until his visit to London three months since. On that occasion they did little more than arrange that Challis should visit the Rectory "as soon as he could get away." And he couldn't—or at least didn't—"get away" till August. But nothing that he had told his friend had occasioned the latter the least surprise.
"Well!—that's all," said he, as he lighted his pipe.
The Rector's face was all strength and pity as he sat looking at his storm-tossed friend. He remained silent awhile over it. Challis could not hurry him to speech. However, there was the whole evening ahead.
At last he spoke. "That's quite all, is it? Very good. Now, I can't and won't recommend any course to you, because, my dear man, you are under an hallucination, and you wouldn't pay the slightest attention to anything I suggested. But I'll tell you, if you like, what I shall say to Judith Arkroyd if she comes to me for advice."
"What?"