“My dear old chap!”

“It has been very difficult to speak of this.”

“Of course, of course!” And there was a silence, while Robert’s eyes travelled round the walls for inspiration.  They encountered only the effigies of past Piersons very oily works, and fell back on the dining-table.  Edward went on speaking to the fire: 

“It still seems to me incredible.  Day and night I think of what it’s my duty to do.”

“Nothing!” ejaculated Robert.  “Leave the baby with Thirza; we’ll take care of it, and when Nollie’s fit, let her go back to work in a hospital again.  She’ll soon get over it.”  He saw his brother shake his head, and thought:  ’Ah! yes; now there’s going to be some d—­d conscientious complication.’

Edward turned round on him:  “That is very sweet of you both, but it would be wrong and cowardly for me to allow it.”

The resentment which springs up in fathers when other fathers dispose of young lives, rose in Robert.

“Dash it all, my dear Ted, that’s for Nollie to say.  She’s a woman now, remember.”

A smile went straying about in the shadows of his brother’s face.  “A woman?  Little Nollie!  Bob, I’ve made a terrible mess of it with my girls.”  He hid his lips with his hand, and turned again to the flames.  Robert felt a lump in his throat.  “Oh!  Hang it, old boy, I don’t think that.  What else could you have done?  You take too much on yourself.  After all, they’re fine girls.  I’m sure Nollie’s a darling.  It’s these modern notions, and this war.  Cheer up!  It’ll all dry straight.”  He went up to his brother and put a hand on his shoulder.  Edward seemed to stiffen under that touch.

“Nothing comes straight,” he said, “unless it’s faced; you know that, Bob.”

Robert’s face was a study at that moment.  His cheeks filled and collapsed again like a dog’s when it has been rebuked.  His colour deepened, and he rattled some money in a trouser pocket.

“Something in that, of course,” he said gruffly.  “All the same, the decision’s with Nollie.  We’ll see what Thirza says.  Anyway, there’s no hurry.  It’s a thousand pities you’re a parson; the trouble’s enough without that:” 

Edward shook his head.  “My position is nothing; it’s the thought of my child, my wife’s child.  It’s sheer pride; and I can’t subdue it.  I can’t fight it down.  God forgive me, I rebel.”

And Robert thought:  ’By George, he does take it to heart!  Well, so should I!  I do, as it is!’ He took out his pipe, and filled it, pushing the tobacco down and down.

“I’m not a man of the world,” he heard his brother say; “I’m out of touch with many things.  It’s almost unbearable to me to feel that I’m joining with the world to condemn my own daughter; not for their reasons, perhaps—­I don’t know; I hope not, but still, I’m against her.”

Robert lit his pipe.