Then afterwards they began to develop
little personal traits, and scarcely ever were these pleasing traits.
Always one or two of them would begin haunting the bishop, giving way
to an appetite for special words, special recognitions. He knew the
expression of that craving on their faces. He knew the way-laying
movements in room and passage that presently began.
This time in particular there was a freckled underbred young man who
handed in what was evidently a carefully prepared memorandum upon what
he called "my positions." Apparently he had a muddle of doubts about
the early fathers and the dates of the earlier authentic copies of the
gospels, things of no conceivable significance.
The bishop glanced through this bale of papers--it had of course no
index and no synopsis, and some of the pages were not numbered--handed
it over to Whippham, and when he proved, as usual, a broken reed, the
bishop had the brilliant idea of referring the young man to Canon Bliss
(of Pringle), "who has a special knowledge quite beyond my own in this
field."
But he knew from the young man's eye even as he said this that it was
not going to put him off for more than a day or so.
Pages:
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78