Father Frontford was absent, and there was nothing to
throw a shadow of restraint over the feast, the other priests being
almost as boyish as the deacons.
"Here's Wynne," the Southerner said laughing, "is as glum as if he were
Lent incarnate, come six hours too soon. You must have a good deal on
your conscience to be so solemn."
Maurice smiled, trying to shake off his depression.
"It isn't always what is on one's conscience," he retorted, "so much as
how tender the conscience is."
"Good! He has you there, Ballentyne," one of the deacons cried.
"Oh, not at all. If a conscience is tender, it must be because it is
harrowed up. Now Wynne has probably vexed his so that it is habitually
sore."
Maurice was out of the mood of the company, but he tried to answer with
a light word. The jesting seemed to him trifling; and his companions,
compared to the men he had seen during his stay with Mrs. Staggchase,
appeared like boys chattering at boarding-school. He wondered where
they had been for their absence; then he remembered that they had all
told him, and that he had forgotten. He had had no real interest in
them after all, he reflected; and at the thought he reproached himself
with egotism and a lack of brotherliness.
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