Then we strolled together to a tent set beneath the cedar, whither the maid had already taken the tea and strawberries, and there we sat around gossiping.
Afterwards, when Shuttleworth rose, he said—
“Come across to my study and have a smoke. You’re not in a great hurry to get back to town. Perhaps you’ll play a game of tennis presently?”
I followed him through the pretty pergola of roses, back into the house, and when I had seated myself in the big old arm-chair, he gave me an excellent cigar.
“Do you know, Mr. Biddulph,” he said after we had been smoking some minutes, “I’m extremely glad to have this opportunity of a chat with you. I called at Wilton Street, because I wished to see you.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Well, for several reasons,” was his slow, earnest reply. His face looked thinner, more serious. Somehow I had taken a great fancy to him, for though a clergyman, he struck me as a broad-minded man of the world. He was keen-eyed, thoughtful and earnest, yet at the same time full of that genuine, hearty bonhomie so seldom, alas! found in religious men. The good fellowship of a leader appeals to men more than anything else, and yet somehow it seems always more apparent in the Roman Catholic priest than in the Protestant clergyman.
“The reason I called to-day was because I thought you might wish to speak to me,” I said.
He rose and closed the French windows. Then, re-seating himself, he removed his old briar pipe from his lips, and, bending towards me in his chair, said very earnestly—