“By the Lord Harry, you’ve done for yourself now, my hearty!” cried the earl.  “What the blazes do you mean by attacking the Word of God in that fashion?”

“Tommy,” said the Rev. George Holland, smiling a patronizing smile at his patron, “Tommy, my friend, if you take my advice you’ll not meddle with what doesn’t concern you.  You’re a peer; better leave the Word of God to me.  I’m not a peer, but a parson.”

“I’ll not leave it with you; it isn’t safe,” said the peer.  “Anything more damnably atheistical than that book of yours I never read.”

“And you didn’t read it, Thomas; you know you only read a screeching review of it, and you didn’t even read that through,” said the parson.

“Who told you that?” asked the patron.  “Well, at any rate I read what you said about Ruth.  It was quite scandalous!  Ruth!  Good Lord! what character is safe nowadays?  One of the loveliest of the women of the Bible—­my wife says so.  She knows all about them.  And the best painters in the world have shown her standing among the field of oats.  By the Lord, sir, it’s sheer blasphemy! and worse than that, it’s making people—­good, religious people, mind, not the ruck—­it’s making them ask why the blazes I gave you the living.  It’s a fact.”

“I’m sorry for you, Tommy—­very sorry.  I’m also sorry for your good religious people, and particularly sorry for the phraseology of their earnest inquiries on what I am sure is a matter of life and death to them—­spiritually.  That’s my last word, Thomas.”

“And you were doing so well at the Joss-house, too.”  Lord Earlscourt was shaking his head sorrowfully, as he spoke.  “We were all getting on so comfortably.  That was what people said to me—­they said——­”

“Pardon me, I’m a parson, therefore I’m not particular; but I can’t stand the way your good religious people express themselves.”

“They said, ’It’s so d——­ pleasant to get hold of a parson who can be trusted in the pulpit—­sermons with a good healthy moral tone, and so forth.  You might bring your youngest daughter to St. Chad’s in the certainty that she would hear nothing that would make her ask uncomfortable questions when she got home.’  It’s a fact, they said that; and now you go and spoil all.  The bishop will have a word to say to you some of these days, my lad.  He ran away to the Continent, they tell me, when your book was published, and it’s perfectly well known that he never runs away unless things look serious.  When the bishop is serious, those that can’t swim had best take to the boats.”

“I’ll ask you for a seat in your yacht, Tommy.  Meantime kindest regards to her ladyship.”

“Oh! by the way, it’s not true, is it, that the girl has thrown you over on account of the book?”

For an instant there came a little flush to the face of the Rev. George Holland; then he shifted his umbrella from one hand to the other, saying: 

“If you mean Phyllis, all I can say in reply is that she is the best and the truest girl alive at present.  I’ve an engagement at a quarter-past six.”