The Bishop took up the conversation.

“You are thoroughly British, Mr. Griffin, or you would not have said ‘Your Lordship.’  The bishops in England are all addressed in that way, are they not?”

“Of course, and here also.  Did I not hear Father Murray—­”

“Oh, Father Murray is quite different.  He is a convert, and rather inclined to be punctilious.  Then, too, he is from England.  In America the best we get as a rule is just plain ‘Bishop.’  One of your own kind of Bishops—­an Episcopalian—­I knew him well and a charming man he was—­told me that in England he was ‘My Lorded’ and ‘Your Lordshiped’ everywhere, until he had gotten quite used to the dignity of it.  But when he stepped on the dock at New York, one of his lay intimates took all the pomposity out of him by a sound slap on the back and the greeting, ‘Hello, Bish, home again?’”

“It was very American, that,” said Mark.  “We wouldn’t understand it.”

“But we do.  I wouldn’t want anyone to go quite that far, of course.  I have nerves.  But I confess I rather like the possibility of it—­so long as it stays a possibility only.  We Yankees are a friendly lot, but not at all irreverent.  A bishop has to be ‘right’ on the manhood side as well as on the side of his office.  That’s the way we look at it.”

A wicked thought went through Mark’s head.  He let it slide out in words before he weighed the words or the thought.  An instant after, he could have bitten his tongue with chagrin.

“But don’t you take the manhood into account in dealing with your clergy?”

To Mark’s surprise the Bishop was not offended by the plain reference to the unpleasant scene in the rectory at Sihasset.

“Thank you; thank you kindly, Mr. Griffin, for giving me such an excellent opening.  I really wanted you to say something like that.  If you hadn’t, I should certainly have been nonplussed about finding the opening for what I desire to say to you.  You are now referring to my seemingly unchristian treatment of Monsignore Murray?  Eh, what?” It seemed to please the Bishop to lay emphasis on the English “Eh, what?” He said it with a comic intonation that relieved Mark’s chagrin.

“Your Lordship is a diplomat.  I was wrong to ask the question.  The affair is simply none of my business.”

“But it is, Mr. Griffin.  I would not want you, a stranger—­perhaps not even a Catholic—­to keep in your mind the idea that a Catholic bishop is cold and heartless in his dealings with his flock, and particularly with his under-shepherds.”

Mark did not know what to answer, but he wanted to help the Bishop understand his own feelings.

“I like Father Murray very much, my dear Lord—­or rather my dear Bishop.”

It was the Bishop’s turn to smile.  “You are getting our ways fast, Mr. Griffin.  When we part, I suppose you’ll slap me on the back and say ‘Bish.’”