“—staring right on
With calm eternal eyes.”
Twenty-five years ago a curious break occurred in this apostolic succession of Bodkins. Montagu being the baronet’s third son, and being, into the bargain, “the mildest-mannered man” of whom it is possible to form any adequate conception, had been destined for the Grigsby living, and for the emoluments therefrom accruing, including tithes ordinary and extraordinary.
Montagu had passed just a year at Christ Church, Oxford, when his uncle, who then had the living, died suddenly. And although Montagu was not a man of very brilliant parts, he knew that by no process of selection or patronage understood even by the Church, could his ordination be so hurried as to permit of his stepping into the shoes of his deceased uncle, and he further felt that the inhabitants of Grigsby, being presumably possessed of immortal souls—the said souls standing in weekly need of saving—the living must be temporarily held by someone outside the pale of the family.
During the first weeks following the death of the Rev. Reginald de Stacy Bodkin, M.A., the subject was not broached in the family. But when after a reasonable time grief had become ameliorated, and nothing so demonstrative as a paroxysm permissible, the son approached his father and observed, with his peculiar drawl,—
“The situation is decidedly awkward and complicated—don’t you know.”
“Not at all—not at all,” replied the parent, with decision. “I’ll see that it’s all right. Go back to Oxford. By the time you’re ordained, Grigsby living will be ready for you.”
Montagu was still doubtful, and said hesitatingly,—
“Don’t you think that I’d better study for the Bar?”
Notwithstanding the general gloom, the baronet smiled as he answered,—
“My dear boy, when you are ordained I can present you with a living. If you go to the Bar, I think it quite unlikely that you will be able to pick one up. No. Leave everything to me and go back to Oxford.”