“‘Wilt thou, then,’” pursued the bishop benignly, “‘obediently keep God’s holy will and commandments and walk in the same all the days of thy life?’”
“‘I will,’” said Hobart Eddy, “‘by God’s help.’”
There was no slightest hesitation, no thought, or so it seemed to me; only the old urbane readiness to say what was required of him. What had he said, what had he done, this young lion of the social moment, beau, gallant, dilettante, and was it possible that he did not understand what he had promised? Or was I a stupid and exacting old woman taking with convulsive literalness that which all the world perhaps recognizes as a form of promise for the mere civilized upbringing of a child? I tried to remember other godfathers and I could remember only those who, like Pelleas, had indeed served, as Enid had said in jest, by office of their virtue. And yet Hobart Eddy—after all I told myself he was a fine, upright young fellow who paid his debts, kept his engagements, whose name was untouched by a breath of scandal, who lived clear of gossip; so I went through the world’s dreary catalogue of the primal virtues. But what had these to do with that solemn “I renounce them all”?
By the time that the service was well over I could have found it in my heart to proclaim to our guests that, as the world construed it, a christening seemed to me hardly more vital than the breakfast which would follow.
This however I forbore; and at the end every one pressed forward in quite the conventional way and besieged the baby and Hobart and showered congratulations upon them both and kissed Enid and was as merry as possible. And as for Hobart, he stood in their midst, bowing a little this way and that, giving his graceful flatteries as another man gives the commonplaces, complaisant, urbane, heavy-lidded....
I omitted the baby and looked straight at the godfather.
“How do you like the office?” I asked somewhat dryly.
He met my eyes with his level look.
“Dear friend,” he said softly, “you see how inefficient I am. Even to describe your charming christening toilet is my despair.”
“Hobart Eddy,” said I sharply, “take Enid in to breakfast.”